TL;DR – This first episode is a bit of a mood introduction for the series, preparing you for where things will go.  

Disclosure – I paid for the Disney+ service that viewed this film.

Secret Invasion Review –

When people wondered where the MCU could go after Endgame, one of the most mentioned storylines had to be Secret Wars. So you can understand there was quite a reaction when it was finally announced. Even more so, you realise that they have been seeding this story since Captain Marvel and Spider-Man: Far From Home. Now it is here, and we get to see how well this franchise can jump back into the spy/espionage genre.

So to set the scene, we open in Moscow as Agent Ross (Martin Freeman) walks through a night as society starts to fray when he meets an agent Prescott (Richard Dormer), who thinks that Skrulls are trying to take over the Earth with targeted terrorist attacks. With a warning that an attack is coming that “will set the world on fire”, and then Prescott attacks Ross. Flying through the streets of Moscow, Agent Hill (Cobie Smulders) tries to get Ross an evacuation, only to discover all is not what it seems. Now from here, we will be looking at the episode as a whole, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead. 

I came into this series without knowing the source material besides what has already been seeded through the MCU. So this series of reviews will be less focused on how well of an adaptation it is because that is just out of my wheelhouse. However, from the perspective of someone who has watched everything in the MCU, I was interested in this story because it was moving back towards the vibe of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which might still be my favourite thing the MCU has done. Secondly, because Ben Mendelsohn is a national treasure and is fantastic in everything he has done.

From a narrative perspective, most of this episode sets up the key players and lets you know the series’ vibe going forward. It has been 30-odd years since the Skrull were promised a new homeland, and it didn’t happen. So now, after being promised by humans and then reneged on in the fallout of The Blip, there are a group of rebels managed by Gravik (Kingsley Ben-Adir) that is using terrorist attacks to destabilise the Earth so they can take over and possibly exterminate all humans. This is playing on many concepts around refuges, failure of government, and radicalisation that are not simple terms. They are deeply complex. I hope that this series has the narrative strength to do them justice.    

The vibe is part espionage, part grimy last stand against a more superior foe. We get a classic spy escape in a hostile city, tracking an operative through a crowded space who knows they are being followed, even a gadget or two. I honestly quite liked these parts of the show, and they worked just as well as story beets as they did, getting you comfortable with the story. Also, there was a bit of inference about the sins of the parents with Talos (Ben Mendelsohn) and G’iah (Emilia Clarke) and also if I was a betting man Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and Gravik. I was a bit annoyed that they continued a trope that everywhere outside of America is dirty and grimy. Still, honestly, I don’t really care if Moscow gets a raw deal in the current circumstance with its depiction that is almost right out of Man from UNCLE East Berlin, almost.  

There were two things that bothered me as the credits rolled. The first was how they foreshadowed deaths in the opening credits. The fact that Ross and Hill would not make it to the end of the episode became clear when Rhodey (Don Cheadle) got the opening credits listing, and they did not. This fundamentally undercut much of the tension of the final attack in Red Square. Also, on the notion of the credits, those opening credits were rough.

In the end, do we recommend Secret Invasion: Resurrection? Yes, we do. While there were a couple of frustrating elements, overall, I was captured from start to finish. Samuel L. Jackson takes the commanding presence of someone who has to fix the misstates of the past. Emilia Clarke and Olivia Colman make great additions to the MCU and look, I am always here for Ben Mendelsohn.

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

Have you seen Secret Invasion yet ?, let us know what you thought in the comments below, feel free to share this review on any of the social medias and you can follow us Here. Check out all our past reviews and articles Here, and have a happy day.    

Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Secret Invasion
Directed by – Ali Selim
Written by – Kyle Bradstreet & Brian Tucker
Created by – Kyle Bradstreet
Based On – Secret Invasion by Brian Michael Bendis & Leinil Francis Yu
Production/Distribution Companies –
Starring – Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Killian Scott, Samuel Adewunmi, Dermot Mulroney, Richard Dormer, Emilia Clarke, Olivia Colman & Don Cheadle with Cobie Smulders, Martin Freeman, Uriel Emil, Tony Curran, Irmena Chichikova, Ben Pell & Mark Lewis