In the latest episode of Secret Invasion, there is a subtle nod to the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s first outing, Iron Man, that you may have missed. What’s more, the reference may provide a clue for a hotly debated retroactive plot element that the show introduced.
Warning: the article contains spoilers for Secret Invasion episode 4.
With Secret Invasion episode 4, the cat is finally out of the bag that Don Cheadle’s Rhodey is actually a Skrull and that Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury is aware of this fact. However, given that the alien Skrulls were first introduced to Earth as early as the 1990s — as depicted in Captain Marvel — the question remains: how long has Rhodey been a Skrull? Even Marvel boss Kevin Feige teased that the Rhodey revelation would retroactively change our perception of the character’s previous appearances in movies and TV shows.
Since the Skrull’s presence on Earth stretches back at least 30 years or so, that makes it theoretically possible that Rhodey has been an imposter for the entire duration of the MCU. However, I think a subtle scene in the latest episode serves as a nod to 2008’s Iron Man in an intentional way that could provide some breadcrumbs for us to fuss over.
You see, after getting fired by Rhodey, Fury meets up with him during lunchtime to offer him some bourbon in order to squash the beef. In reality, Fury knows Rhodey is a Skrull at this point so we think it’s probably some kind of 4D chess move he is trying to pull off. Nonetheless, Rhodey accepts the drink with hardly any hesitation, other than an offhand remark about hoping it’s not poisoned. However, this scene plays out entirely differently from a similar scenario in Iron Man.
In the original Iron Man, Robert Downey Jr’s Tony Stark is on an airplane ride with Rhodey, then played by Terrence Howard. Stark orders warm sakes for the two of them but Rhodey is extremely hesitant at first, explaining that he doesn’t drink while he’s on the job: “We’re not drinking we’re working right now.” After a little coaxing, a humorous smash-cut reveals Rhodey and Stark completely blitzed on the private jet. What’s more, a deleted extended version of the scene from Iron Man reveals the two also began imbibing around lunchtime, 11 am to be exact.
Even though Rhodey eventually succumbs to Stark’s offer in that film, the fact that the Skrull Rhodey in Secret Invasion practically doesn’t hesitate at all means we at least know that Rhodey was likely not a Skrull in the first Iron Man film. I also get the feeling Fury feeding Rhodey liquor in Secret Invasion may be some kind of ploy to out him as an imposter since we later see another government agent taking note of his out-of-character intoxication.
We’d guess that it was only due to Stark’s unique charms and the novel situation of being on a private jet that Rhodey agreed to get drunk with his buddy on the plane in Iron Man, to begin with. Otherwise, it seems to us Colonel James Rhodes would operate with the utmost professionalism on any mission, given his high ranking in the government.
Who knows, maybe Rhodey’s recasting from Howard to Cheadle, in the course of Iron Man 2, will become part of the Skrull imposter plot somehow, as if he is some kind of imperfect duplicate of the original and Stark was just too drunk to notice.
I guess we’ll find out more about Rhodey’s dubious history and the legitimate colonel’s real location when more episodes of Secret Invasion land on Disney Plus every Wednesday.