After months of hype and a customary lack of leaks to satiate fans, Secret Invasion is set to drop on Disney Plus tomorrow (Wednesday, June 21). The new show follows Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) as he attempts to stop a group of rogue Skrulls from entering Earth. At the same time, many of the shapeshifting race who are supposed to be his allies are unhappy with him for his failure to keep his promises to Skrull refugees.
During a recent global press conference for the show’s release, show producer Jonathan Schwartz and Marvel president Kevin Feige confirmed when in the MCU timeline the new, gritty spy show takes place. So, if you’ve been wondering what happened before the events of the new series, then read on!
When does Secret Invasion take place in the MCU timeline?
Show producer and VP of production and development at Marvel Studios Jonathan Schwartz was able to confirm that Secret Invasion takes place in the “present-day MCU,” which means that the Blip has happened, as have the events of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. Fittingly, this means it is the most recent project in the MCU, as well as the most recent in the real world. Speaking at the global conference, Schwartz said:
“It’s present day MCU, is what we’re calling it. So it exists basically along the timeline that the shows come out in. So post-She-Hulk, post-blip right at this exact, present day in the MCU. I think that’s all I can say.”
Seeing as we know She-Hulk: Attorney at Law takes place a “relatively short time” after the events of Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, which supposedly mostly takes place in 2023, we can guess that it would be around 2025 in the MCU when Secret Invasion is taking place. This is also before the events of The Marvels will take place, the next film to come out from the comic studio. So, it does seem to all be tying in quite nicely, in terms of timeline clarity — something we can’t always say about Marvel projects, especially in Phase 4.
How will Secret Invasion advance the MCU timeline?
Given that this show is going to be heavily focused on Nick Fury and is linked to the 2019 Captain Marvel film, we can be sure that we’ll get some important developments in Secret Invasion that will become vital to the MCU canon at a later date. This is despite the fact the story will be mostly taking place in our little old world (even if it does have universe-wide consequences).
However, as Marvel has been expectedly tight with the storyline (to the point that newly joining star Emilia Clarke is afraid of what she can say at the premiere), we don’t know exactly what widespread effects the events of the show will have, because we don’t know which direction Secret Invasion will go in. It’s all very exciting and is only driving the hype further.
Who have we seen before in the MCU in Secret Invasion, and who is a new character?
We have plenty of returning characters and actors in Secret Invasion, as well as some fresh new faces in the MCU. The biggest stars rejoining the universe are Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, Ben Mendelsohn as Talos, Cobie Smulders as Maria Hill, Martin Freeman as Everett K. Ross, and Don Cheadle as James Rhodes. All were excited about returning to the franchise, but like Clarke, remained tight-lipped about plot points. Jackson, however, did let slip that Fury wasn’t too happy about coming back to Earth:
“This is my second appearance post-snap, and Nick Fury’s been gone for a while. He’s a little tired, a little vulnerable, but coming back to Earth because he’s been summoned. And we’ll see what happens. He’s got a bad knee now, and is not so happy.”
Jackson himself was happy to be working again with Cobie Smulders, though, which he was pretty clear about (even if there is some tension between their characters):
“We were actually talking last night about the fact that I remember meeting Cobie for the first time at the screen test. Because I screen tested with all the people that were trying to be Maria Hill. She killed it. You know, and I told her, I was like, ‘I knew she had this.'”
Smulders gave us a little more information about Hill’s state of mind, but nothing avid fans wouldn’t have been able to surmise:
“I think the relationship between Maria and Nick is quite strained because she’s been calling, and he hasn’t been answering. I think Maria Hill came back and someone else was sitting in her desk, and immediately kicked them out and got to work. I think there was just a mountain of cases to get to, which is part of her resentment towards Fury, because he was not around.”
While it’s nice to see stars come back, it’s always exciting for fans of the franchise to have new faces in the universe, and in Secret Invasion, there are three major additions to the cast: Emilia Clarke as G’iah (a character we have seen in the MCU previously, but only as a child, played by the actors Auden L. Ophuls and Harriet L. Ophuls), The Favourite star Olivia Colman as Sonya Falsworth (an MI6 agent and close friend of Nick Fury), and Kingsley Ben-Adir as Gravik, the leader of the rebel Skrull faction and main antagonist in the new series. And, thankfully, all three seem to have absolutely adored their time on the project, and working on something as massive as the MCU. Clarke was particularly effusive about her experiences:
“Who on Earth would ever not want to be sitting here with all of these incredible people? It’s like, even just a single one of these people on their own is enough. Altogether, it’s completely undeniable. So yeah, that’s why. I think what I can definitely say is that it was the warmest, most gorgeous, safe, lovely, happy, playful set I’ve ever been on. You know you’re coming into. You’ve just gone to the top of the tree, you’re there, and then you find everyone who’s there is just having a really good time. That’s kind of how it felt.”
Even Oscar winner Olivia Colman couldn’t contain her excitement (if you’re translating understated Brit into American English, anyway):
“After every Marvel film that’s landed in cinemas, I found my agent and said, ‘Please can I be in a Marvel?’ And finally, either she got fed up with me calling her or it happened. So it wasn’t why Secret Invasion. Secret Invasion called. Any mention of the word Marvel and I went, ‘Yes, please.’ So that’s why, and I had an absolute ball, and it lived up to everything that I was hoping for. Sonya works for MI6. And she likes wearing red. And she’s quite funny. And she’s potentially a little bit not that nice sometimes.”
Ben-Adir, however, was more drawn in by the complexities of his character, and the prospect of working with legends like Jackson and Mendelsohn:
“Well, I think to begin with, we had many conversations for hours at the beginning. Gravik just felt like a part that I hadn’t been approached for before. There was an opportunity to do something a little bit different with this one. When we spoke, it was just Sam and Ben who were attached to the project, and Brian sent me a couple of taster scenes, which was the showdown with me and Sam in episode three. In a series called ZeroZeroZero, there was a character called Manuel, and I kept seeing weird parallels, because I knew the show was trying to be more grounded and darker. I guess I took a lot of inspiration from that and how to make him as unsentimental as possible in his hatred.”
Secret Invasion is out tomorrow, June 21, on Disney Plus.