According to Nick Fury star Samuel L. Jackson, his MCU hero is still reeling from Iron Man's death in this year's Secret Invasion.
Fury is set to be the focus of the upcoming "spy/espionage" thriller on Disney+, as the former SHIELD director deals with a potential Skrull invasion at home on Earth.
While the streaming show is being dubbed as the first "crossover event series," going bigger and "darker" than any MCU Disney+ project to date, it will also take a deeper look at some characters fans have come to know and love over the past fifteen years.
Despite its reported universe-altering narrative, a character study of the likes of Nick Fury will be at the center of this Marvel Studios tale, diving into never-before-seen aspects of the character's life.
Nick Fury Hit Hard by Iron Man's Death
While promoting the upcoming Secret Invasion Disney+ series, Samual L. Jackson revealed how Iron Man/Tony Stark's MCU death changed his Nick Fury.
Speaking with Vanity Fair, the MCU star noted that when Secret Invasion starts, his character is still reeling from the death of his friends. He noted that "even Nick Fury can be shaken," and the biggest reason Nick has been off-world ignoring the happenings of Earth since Avengers: Endgame is because he is just trying to "process what the f*** happened:"
“Even Nick Fury can be shaken, you know? He’s up there trying to process what the fuck happened, you know? And what his place in the world is.The death of Iron Man, the death of Black Widow, with that stuff going on he just kind of checked out.”
In the same interview, Jackson addressed why his Marvel hero seems to no longer be sporting his signature eyepatch in Secret Invasion. He noted that the patch was a "part of who the strong Nick Fury was" and the lack thereof is "part of his vulnerability now:"
“He just doesn’t wear the patch. The patch is part of who the strong Nick Fury was. It’s part of his vulnerability now. You can look at it and see he’s not this perfectly indestructible person. He doesn’t feel like that guy.”
Jackson's Secret Invasion co-star Cobie Smulders chimed in on the subject as well, remarking that the upcoming streaming series is a little more grounded and that "there’s nobody here who’s glossy and ready for action in a spandex one-piece:"
“There’s nobody here who’s glossy and ready for action in a spandex one-piece. I mean, my wardrobe alone has changed so much since the original film. I was in platform knee-high boots, and a skintight leotard in the 'Avengers' movie. And I’m in a straight-up jeans and tee in this one.”
A Different MCU in Secret Invasion
From the sounds of it, Secret Invasion is going to shine a bit of a different light on the MCU. Not to say the franchise has never tackled deeper, darker content (i.e. see much of the Captain America franchise), but the upcoming streaming series looks like it is going to be much more introspective than anything from Marvel Studios to this point.
This 'changed' Nick Fury is a perfect example of that. Gone are the saturated colors and Avengers Initiative invites of Samuel L. Jackson's early MCU performances, and in their place is a more nuanced story focused on a hero who has lost "his place in the world" after the loss of some close friends.
It will be interesting to see how Marvel balances this mourning hero motif for Jackson's Fury with the intergalactic Skrull invasion at the center of the story.
Despite how crazy it may sound, these two story elements actually could complement one another fairly well. This "checked out" Nick Fury is going to be paranoid, not knowing who he can trust anymore.
That theme of paranoia is something that will only be amplified when it is revealed that shape-shifting Skrulls have been hiding on Earth, possibly embodying some of the few remaining people Fury thought he could trust.
Secret Invasion is set to hit Disney+ on June 21.
