Lots of people were saying Season Two of What If? was amazing. I thought it was average at best. Watched most of these episodes on background while house cleaning and exercising so... maybe I really missed some powerful nuance or storytelling... but I doubt it.
Best of Marvel?
Nahhh... Middest of Marvel maybe. This season they really decided to go with some super positive stories and outcomes and really seemed to want to make Mohawk Teenage Girl Kohhari with nondescript energy powers the next Ms. Marvel or something. She was so cringe and her character so forced. She was so good and smart and witty and best at everything.
Captain Britain/Peggy Carter was pushed pretty hard as well but she was more bearable and not nearly as munchy.
The whole season was infested with MCU Banter and Humor it was eyerolling. Even The Watcher wasn't immune to observational meta humor. None of the emotional beats hit. There was very little impact. Promising ideas and settings were wasted. And for some reason they keep trying with these narrative arcs where you have to watch multiple episodes in a story arc instead of just making good stand alone stories.
Episode Three was the only clearly GOOD episode of the nine. And it was a lighthearted Christmas special. It worked though.
Episode One:
"What If... Nebula Joined the Nova Corps?": Nebula is a Space Cop. Xandar is cut off from the rest of the galaxy due to the threat of Ronan the Accuser and his Power Gem. The planet is supposed to be like slowly coming apart at the seams society wise but you don't really get that impression. It tries to play a hard boiled police procedural in space but thirty minutes isn't enough for the mystery to cook. It tries to be serious but also quirky since space Marvel is rightly quirky. Nebula was cool. Episode is average. Forgettable.
Episode Two:
"What If... Peter Quill Attacked Earth's Mightiest Heroes?": Ten year old Peter Quill is turned over to his Father, the feral celestial and living planet and as a kid he comes back to Earth under his Fathers control and wrecks stuff in preparation for Ego's "Expansion Project" where he'd spread himself across the galaxy like in the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 film. The most neat thing about this episode was seeing an Avengers team form up in 1988. I'll admit seeing that was pretty cool. The final Battle with the 1988 Avengers, US Army and SHIELD versus Ego was kinda neat in parts, and kinda not in parts as well. Black Panther was exceptionally boring. Again... fast paced storytelling. Another mid episode.
Episode Three:
"What If... Happy Hogan Saved Christmas?": Best episode of the Season. Like with the live action Hawkeye TV series the lighter tone in this episode was an asset. Sam Rockwell voices Justin Hammer as the criminally underused Iron Man 2 villain who during Christmas, takes over Stark/Avengers Tower on Christmas while the Avengers are away and it's up to Happy Hogan, voiced by John Favreau, to save the day. It was fun. I loved Happy Hogan and Justin Hammer in this show. The MCU humor was actually in service to the story here as well, as opposed to literally every other damn episode this season which was also loaded with "MCU Humor." Would recommend watching. Especially if you want a Marvel Christmas tradition.
Episode Four:
"What If... Iron Man Crashed into the Grandmaster?": Uhhhh I remember watching this... It was filled with... action. Gladiator fights and an improbable vehicle race and involved Tony Stark being captured by the Grandmaster and he meets up with Gamora and Korg and Valkyrie and things happen. I'm sorry I can't remember much of the plot. For some reason they try to kill Thanos at the end. Whatever. Forgettable... Clearly.
Episode Five:
"What If... Captain Carter Fought the Hydra Stomper?": What if Marvel Animation tried to make Captain Britain/Peggy Carter a thing? So the premise of this is based off a Season One episode where Peggy got the Super Soldier treatment and Steve remained scrawny but piloted that WW2 era Hydra Stomper powered armor. In the modern day they find Hydra Stomper is back and doing evil things and Steve Rogers was given the Winter Soldier treatment and is working for Hydra now. The idea that a somewhat modernized WW2 Era Armor Suit is such a threat to the modern day was pretty underwhelming and I didn't really care about the forlorn romance as Peggy tried to save Steve. Just didn't care. Pfffffbbbttt Next!
Episode Six:
"What If... Kahhori Reshaped the World?": This might've been the worst episode... and it was the most "woke" episode as well. When the characters started speaking Mohawk and I had to read subtitles, I actually paid attention. I was like Oh... this could be a treat. It was not a treat. I was back to busy work in no time as this Mohawk teenaged girl named Kahhori saw Spanish conquistadors sack her village so she fled into this sacred cave that was actually the Fountain of Youth which the Conquistadors were looking for. Apparently after Surtur destroyed Asgard, the Tesseract or Space Infinity Stone fell in 16th Century Mohawk land and fell in a lake that turned into the Fountain of Youth which isn't just a Fountain of Youth but also leads to this other magical dimension where all of these Native American people who everyone thought had gone missing was actually some fantasy Utopia know as the Sky World where they all have superpowers and immortality but can't return home because the portal is in the sky.
Conquistadors show up, Kahhori defeats them and then showing she is best girl, uses her powers to bring the portal from the sky to the ground, makes a speech to shame everyone else and then goes back by herself to fight the Spanish. She uses her magic Sky World powers to defeat a few hundred Conquistadors since she has nondescript energy telekinesis powers and super speed and super everything else (except flight) but is suddenly overwhelmed by the full broadsides of multiple Spanish warships. Oh spoilers btw. Anyways she blocks most of them but one knocks her out but before the sneering Spanish Conquistador leader can dramatically kill her, all of the other superpower Indians emerge from the forest and defeat the Spanish and run across the water and literally run through their ships sinking them etc.
Then it cuts to the court of Queen Isabella (keeping in mind she was only in power until like 1504, I remember I just read a book about Colombus) who is angrily receiving reports how the New World is lost to them and they've lost multiple expeditions. Then a portal opens up and Kohhari and a bunch of her superpowered Indian pals show up and beat up all of Isabella's guards and as Isabella growls that the New World is hers by God Given Right or something, Kohhari replies that we all depend on each other and no one should own anyone else or someshit and but Isabella gives no fucks so Kohhari lifts her up effortlessly and then destroys her throne and as Isabella is embarrassed by being upskirted, is dumped back onto the ground. Kohhari says she can sign a Peace Treaty or her Kingdom destroyed.
Then super Dr. Strange from the previous season shows up through a magic portal and congratulates Kohhari for achieving World Peace.
*coughs*
Episode Seven:
"What If... Hela Found the Ten Rings?": Hela for being too bloodthirsty is banished to Midgard/Earth and stripped of all of her powers including her Crown which can only be lifted by someone who exemplifies mercy or some shit (similar to Mjolnir worthiness I guess). Hela tries to impress the Chinese locals but fails to lift the Crown. She's still a badass combatant though so Wenwu (the leader of the Ten Rings in the Shang Chi)really likes her but she wants more power so she ends up in the fantasy Kung Fu land and learns fantasy Kung Fu and becomes more wise and worldly before hearing that Odin is leading his armies to conquer Midgard (and thinks that the locals killed her daughter Hela since she diseappered from Heimdalls sight). Anyways Hela and Wenwu team up, defeat Asgard and Hela refuses to kill Odin and so by showing mercy, she regains her Death Crown but is glowing silver and Odin is so impressed she makes Hela the Queen of Asgard and Hela then vows to free all of the realms from Asgard's tyranny because she belies in Freedumb now. What a beautiful story. Nice episode for the most part. Ending was cringe as fuck.
Two more episodes? Fuck...
Episode Eight:
"What If... the Avengers Assembled in 1602?": So I actually read Marvel 1602 thus when I saw this, I could be even more disappointed in this episode. The concept here is that the 1602 world Scarlet Witch summons Peggy Carter/Captain Britain there as a champion who can save them from some dimensional tear that'll eventually destroy their universe. There were some cool bits, but Thor as King of England... Asgard.... I'm not sure what he was King ofd actually but regardless it was cringe asf. The Watcher says she can save Peggy Carter and take her out of there, but Peggy says she can't just WATCH and let this world die, even though Watcher says she doesn't belong there. Anyways Peggy is so awesome and does the impossible and finds a way to save this Universe from destruction. But it costs her... personally. Very sad. Wasted setting for the most part. Mid episode.
Episode Nine:
"What If... Strange Supreme Intervened?": So in the climax of Season Two, we find out that someone is gathering the most powerful beings across the Multiverse to their magical dimensional pocket prison so they can feed them to this thing called 'THE FORGE" where they will fuel the creation of a new universe. The antagonist was originally only hunting villains but soon became greedy and started scooping up all sorts of powerful individuals and uses an unwitting Captain Britain/Peggy Carter to collect the last heroine they need. This heroine... is KOHHARI. Needless to say, they break free and then free all of the other super powerful Marvel beings before having to fight through them all to confront the main antagonist.
In this episode Kohhari (and Captain Britain) take on Marvel Zombie Scarlet Witch whose a universal threat that last season almost defeated multiversal Ultron. They also defeat a version of Hela. They also defeat a version of Killmonger whose super intelligent and in an armor armed with all five Infinity Stones. And they defeat them all EASILY along with a bunch of other random scrubs who are supposedly universe enders. Then they have this epic fight with the main villain... and it's so blah and Kahhori is so smart and witty and powerful and Captain Britain is really good too and masters the Infinity Stones and the two of them save the Multiverse and kill the villain and save the Multiverse. Another stinker of an episode.. but I mean there's some cool amalgamated multiversal characters so... yay? Something for the fans. Subpar climax to a subpar season.
"What If... Nebula Joined the Nova Corps?": Nebula is a Space Cop. Xandar is cut off from the rest of the galaxy due to the threat of Ronan the Accuser and his Power Gem. The planet is supposed to be like slowly coming apart at the seams society wise but you don't really get that impression. It tries to play a hard boiled police procedural in space but thirty minutes isn't enough for the mystery to cook. It tries to be serious but also quirky since space Marvel is rightly quirky. Nebula was cool. Episode is average. Forgettable.
Episode Two:
"What If... Peter Quill Attacked Earth's Mightiest Heroes?": Ten year old Peter Quill is turned over to his Father, the feral celestial and living planet and as a kid he comes back to Earth under his Fathers control and wrecks stuff in preparation for Ego's "Expansion Project" where he'd spread himself across the galaxy like in the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 film. The most neat thing about this episode was seeing an Avengers team form up in 1988. I'll admit seeing that was pretty cool. The final Battle with the 1988 Avengers, US Army and SHIELD versus Ego was kinda neat in parts, and kinda not in parts as well. Black Panther was exceptionally boring. Again... fast paced storytelling. Another mid episode.
Episode Three:
"What If... Happy Hogan Saved Christmas?": Best episode of the Season. Like with the live action Hawkeye TV series the lighter tone in this episode was an asset. Sam Rockwell voices Justin Hammer as the criminally underused Iron Man 2 villain who during Christmas, takes over Stark/Avengers Tower on Christmas while the Avengers are away and it's up to Happy Hogan, voiced by John Favreau, to save the day. It was fun. I loved Happy Hogan and Justin Hammer in this show. The MCU humor was actually in service to the story here as well, as opposed to literally every other damn episode this season which was also loaded with "MCU Humor." Would recommend watching. Especially if you want a Marvel Christmas tradition.
Episode Four:
"What If... Iron Man Crashed into the Grandmaster?": Uhhhh I remember watching this... It was filled with... action. Gladiator fights and an improbable vehicle race and involved Tony Stark being captured by the Grandmaster and he meets up with Gamora and Korg and Valkyrie and things happen. I'm sorry I can't remember much of the plot. For some reason they try to kill Thanos at the end. Whatever. Forgettable... Clearly.
Episode Five:
"What If... Captain Carter Fought the Hydra Stomper?": What if Marvel Animation tried to make Captain Britain/Peggy Carter a thing? So the premise of this is based off a Season One episode where Peggy got the Super Soldier treatment and Steve remained scrawny but piloted that WW2 era Hydra Stomper powered armor. In the modern day they find Hydra Stomper is back and doing evil things and Steve Rogers was given the Winter Soldier treatment and is working for Hydra now. The idea that a somewhat modernized WW2 Era Armor Suit is such a threat to the modern day was pretty underwhelming and I didn't really care about the forlorn romance as Peggy tried to save Steve. Just didn't care. Pfffffbbbttt Next!
Episode Six:
"What If... Kahhori Reshaped the World?": This might've been the worst episode... and it was the most "woke" episode as well. When the characters started speaking Mohawk and I had to read subtitles, I actually paid attention. I was like Oh... this could be a treat. It was not a treat. I was back to busy work in no time as this Mohawk teenaged girl named Kahhori saw Spanish conquistadors sack her village so she fled into this sacred cave that was actually the Fountain of Youth which the Conquistadors were looking for. Apparently after Surtur destroyed Asgard, the Tesseract or Space Infinity Stone fell in 16th Century Mohawk land and fell in a lake that turned into the Fountain of Youth which isn't just a Fountain of Youth but also leads to this other magical dimension where all of these Native American people who everyone thought had gone missing was actually some fantasy Utopia know as the Sky World where they all have superpowers and immortality but can't return home because the portal is in the sky.
Conquistadors show up, Kahhori defeats them and then showing she is best girl, uses her powers to bring the portal from the sky to the ground, makes a speech to shame everyone else and then goes back by herself to fight the Spanish. She uses her magic Sky World powers to defeat a few hundred Conquistadors since she has nondescript energy telekinesis powers and super speed and super everything else (except flight) but is suddenly overwhelmed by the full broadsides of multiple Spanish warships. Oh spoilers btw. Anyways she blocks most of them but one knocks her out but before the sneering Spanish Conquistador leader can dramatically kill her, all of the other superpower Indians emerge from the forest and defeat the Spanish and run across the water and literally run through their ships sinking them etc.
Then it cuts to the court of Queen Isabella (keeping in mind she was only in power until like 1504, I remember I just read a book about Colombus) who is angrily receiving reports how the New World is lost to them and they've lost multiple expeditions. Then a portal opens up and Kohhari and a bunch of her superpowered Indian pals show up and beat up all of Isabella's guards and as Isabella growls that the New World is hers by God Given Right or something, Kohhari replies that we all depend on each other and no one should own anyone else or someshit and but Isabella gives no fucks so Kohhari lifts her up effortlessly and then destroys her throne and as Isabella is embarrassed by being upskirted, is dumped back onto the ground. Kohhari says she can sign a Peace Treaty or her Kingdom destroyed.
Then super Dr. Strange from the previous season shows up through a magic portal and congratulates Kohhari for achieving World Peace.
*coughs*
Episode Seven:
"What If... Hela Found the Ten Rings?": Hela for being too bloodthirsty is banished to Midgard/Earth and stripped of all of her powers including her Crown which can only be lifted by someone who exemplifies mercy or some shit (similar to Mjolnir worthiness I guess). Hela tries to impress the Chinese locals but fails to lift the Crown. She's still a badass combatant though so Wenwu (the leader of the Ten Rings in the Shang Chi)really likes her but she wants more power so she ends up in the fantasy Kung Fu land and learns fantasy Kung Fu and becomes more wise and worldly before hearing that Odin is leading his armies to conquer Midgard (and thinks that the locals killed her daughter Hela since she diseappered from Heimdalls sight). Anyways Hela and Wenwu team up, defeat Asgard and Hela refuses to kill Odin and so by showing mercy, she regains her Death Crown but is glowing silver and Odin is so impressed she makes Hela the Queen of Asgard and Hela then vows to free all of the realms from Asgard's tyranny because she belies in Freedumb now. What a beautiful story. Nice episode for the most part. Ending was cringe as fuck.
Two more episodes? Fuck...
Episode Eight:
"What If... the Avengers Assembled in 1602?": So I actually read Marvel 1602 thus when I saw this, I could be even more disappointed in this episode. The concept here is that the 1602 world Scarlet Witch summons Peggy Carter/Captain Britain there as a champion who can save them from some dimensional tear that'll eventually destroy their universe. There were some cool bits, but Thor as King of England... Asgard.... I'm not sure what he was King ofd actually but regardless it was cringe asf. The Watcher says she can save Peggy Carter and take her out of there, but Peggy says she can't just WATCH and let this world die, even though Watcher says she doesn't belong there. Anyways Peggy is so awesome and does the impossible and finds a way to save this Universe from destruction. But it costs her... personally. Very sad. Wasted setting for the most part. Mid episode.
Episode Nine:
"What If... Strange Supreme Intervened?": So in the climax of Season Two, we find out that someone is gathering the most powerful beings across the Multiverse to their magical dimensional pocket prison so they can feed them to this thing called 'THE FORGE" where they will fuel the creation of a new universe. The antagonist was originally only hunting villains but soon became greedy and started scooping up all sorts of powerful individuals and uses an unwitting Captain Britain/Peggy Carter to collect the last heroine they need. This heroine... is KOHHARI. Needless to say, they break free and then free all of the other super powerful Marvel beings before having to fight through them all to confront the main antagonist.
In this episode Kohhari (and Captain Britain) take on Marvel Zombie Scarlet Witch whose a universal threat that last season almost defeated multiversal Ultron. They also defeat a version of Hela. They also defeat a version of Killmonger whose super intelligent and in an armor armed with all five Infinity Stones. And they defeat them all EASILY along with a bunch of other random scrubs who are supposedly universe enders. Then they have this epic fight with the main villain... and it's so blah and Kahhori is so smart and witty and powerful and Captain Britain is really good too and masters the Infinity Stones and the two of them save the Multiverse and kill the villain and save the Multiverse. Another stinker of an episode.. but I mean there's some cool amalgamated multiversal characters so... yay? Something for the fans. Subpar climax to a subpar season.
Best of Marvel?
Nahhh... Middest of Marvel maybe. This season they really decided to go with some super positive stories and outcomes and really seemed to want to make Mohawk Teenage Girl Kohhari with nondescript energy powers the next Ms. Marvel or something. She was so cringe and her character so forced. She was so good and smart and witty and best at everything.
Captain Britain/Peggy Carter was pushed pretty hard as well but she was more bearable and not nearly as munchy.
The whole season was infested with MCU Banter and Humor it was eyerolling. Even The Watcher wasn't immune to observational meta humor. None of the emotional beats hit. There was very little impact. Promising ideas and settings were wasted. And for some reason they keep trying with these narrative arcs where you have to watch multiple episodes in a story arc instead of just making good stand alone stories.
Episode Three was the only clearly GOOD episode of the nine. And it was a lighthearted Christmas special. It worked though.
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