MOON KNIGHT Writer Talks About That Surprise Big Swing in Episode 4 and Permission To Get Weird
The fourth episode of Marvel’s Moon Knight recently dropped and if you watched it, you know that things ended up going in a super weird direction. This episode is the “big swing” that was previously teased, and in a recent interview with Marvel, Moon Knight head writer Jeremy Slater opens up about that big swing and the permission Marvel Studios gave them to get weird.
If you haven’t watched the latest episode of Moon Knight, you might want to steer clear.
In the episode, after being shot by Ethan Hawke's villainous Arthur Harrow, Oscar Isaac's Marc Spector finds himself waking up in a psychiatric hospital and we discover that the persona of Steven Grant is actually the name of a fictional adventurer in VHS bargain bin mainstay Tomb Busters. At first, it seems like all of this stuff was just happening in Marc’s head. Then he finds Steven Grant trapped in a sarcophagus, and the two different personalities find themselves face to face.
At the very end of the episode, the two meet a mysterious talking hippo! Yeah, things definitely get really strange. This hippo is actually an Egyptian God named Taweret, and she is the god of fertility and childbirth. The character is played by Antonia Salib in the series. This is a new Marvel charcter that’s never appeared in any of the comics.
When talking about introducing this character, Slater said: "I knew a show like this needs big swings and it needs to take the audience by surprise." That certainly did the trick.
Slater went on to talk about the moment he had in the writer’s room where he pushed the inclusion of the hippo Egyptian God and it’s the moment everyone realized they had permission to get weird. He said: "I interrupted whatever we were talking about and I was like, ‘Guys, we have something much more important, which is, how do I get this hippo into the show?"
He added, "I think that was the first moment everyone realized, oh, we have permission to get weird, here. We have permission to do some things you wouldn't necessarily get to do if you weren't working at a place like Marvel Studios… This gave me my weird swing."
Now, we just have to wait and see what the plan is for this weird swing now that it’s been introduced. This was such a wild episode and I’m excited to see what happens next!
