Thanos Could've Caused MCU's Secret Invasion (& Endgame Made It Worse)

Marvel's Secret Invasion Disney+ TV series remains something of a mystery, but it's possible Thanos is the one responsible for the Skrull invasion. When Marvel Studios introduced the shapeshifting Skrulls in 2019's Captain Marvel, most viewers expected a story inspired by the 2007-2008 Secret Invasion epic. Instead, a surprise villain twist reinvented the Skrulls as victims of persecution by the Kree Empire. Far from being antagonists, they were allies.

Marvel's upcoming Secret Invasion Disney+ TV series is therefore best seen as a course-correction. There's evidence the villainous Skrulls of Secret Invasion will be a sect of religious zealots, because a cap distributed among the cast and crew bore the words "He Loves You" in the Skrull language. In the comics, this line was associated with worshipers of the Skrull god Kly’bn, in whose name the Skrulls eventually invaded Earth in force. Nick Fury will lead the charge against Skrull infiltrators in what promises to be a superhero espionage drama stylistically reminiscent of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

There were initial reports Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige had claimed Secret Invasion would be set "during the Blip, when half of the Universe was decimated by Thanos, and will explore the events that happened in that period." Secret Invasion's supposed place in the MCU timeline seems rather odd, given Nick Fury numbered among the people who were blipped away, but fortunately later comments have suggested this was an incorrect paraphrasing of Feige's comments. Still, this may well form an important clue to just how the Skrulls invaded the Earth.

Thanos' Snap Would Have Created The Perfect Opportunity For A Secret Invasion

The story of the event now referred to on Earth as "the Blip" begins in Avengers: Infinity War, when Thanos snapped his fingers and erased half the living creatures in the universe. It took the Avengers five years to figure out a way to bring everyone back in Avengers: Endgame, with Earth's Mightiest Heroes performing a time heist to recover the Infinity Stones from the past and reverse Thanos' snap. The Blip is the period between these two events, and events from the five-year time jump have only gradually been revealed.

According to The Falcon & the Winter Soldier, global government collapsed. There seems to have been unprecedented mass migration, as sorrowful survivors gathered together to try to rebuild their lives from the losses they had suffered. All the old differences that had divided human beings faded due to the sheer scale of the crisis. Every government would have been destabilized as key leaders, politicians, and civil servants disappeared. Global trade would have been disrupted, with farming, food production, and shipping in chaos. Thanos had erased people at random, which means there will inevitably have been some industries where the disappearances were out of all proportion due to the sheer randomness of it all.

This would be the perfect opportunity for the shapeshifting Skrulls to launch an invasion. They'd have been able to take advantage of the chaos by stealing the identities of some of Thanos' victims. Some of the missing would have been high-profile politicians; if the Skrulls reacted quickly to these events, they'd have been able to replace world leaders and billionaires before their disappearances were noted. Other temporary absences could have been explained away due to the chaos of the snap, with infiltrators claiming they'd been caught up in car accidents and the like. The Skrulls would have been able to position themselves to create a new world order that they dominated. This theory would explain why Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige apparently linked the Blip with Secret Invasion; it isn't that the upcoming Disney+ MCU TV show is set during the Blip, but rather that it was initiated during it.

Avengers: Endgame Would Have Revealed The Secret Invasion

It's important to remember nobody knew the Blip would be over in just five years. Even the Avengers came to believe they were now living in a new status quo - right up until Ant-Man emerged from the Quantum Realm and hit upon the idea of using it for time travel. What's more, the Avengers didn't tell anybody they were making another attempt at reversing Thanos' snap; all over the universe, beings would have been taken aback as people suddenly started reappearing. If the Skrulls had indeed taken advantage of Thanos' actions to launch their invasion, then the events of Avengers: Endgame would have plunged their plans into chaos.

The Hulk's snap in Avengers: Endgame would have left the Skrulls at risk of being uncovered. All over the world, the missing people they'd impersonated would have suddenly returned. It's easy to imagine a scenario where a Skrull had pretended to be a president, only for the real president to be unexpectedly restored. Meanwhile, Skrulls who had worked their way into everyday society would have risked exposure when the people they'd impersonated returned. In the latter case, the imposters would at least have had a chance to react, either by slipping away into the night or by tracking down the restored humans.

This could well explain Nick Fury's post-Avengers: Endgame mission. The discovery of a few high-profile Skrull imposters would have naturally meant the world's intelligence services figured out they'd been invaded; as someone experienced with the Skrulls, Nick Fury would have been the first choice for dealing with the threat. It's interesting to note that, in Spider-Man: No Way Home, government departments such as Damage Control knew Fury had been taken off-world. What's more, although Fury has been shown to be recruiting assets, the first one to be identified is Monica Rambeau - a person who was missing during the Blip, and whose identity doesn't seem to have been taken. It's quite possible Fury is prioritizing recruiting agents and operatives who he can be confident weren't impersonated during that five-year time jump.

Each Phase of the MCU tends to deal with the repercussions from the latest event movie. Phase 4's Disney+ TV shows in particular have wrestled with the consequences of the Blip, with some focusing on the personal stories of Thanos' victims while others explored the geopolitical implications of the Blip - complete with a disturbing "Thanos Was Right" movement. It would be fitting, therefore, for Secret Invasion too to explore previously-unseen repercussions from the Blip.