If every movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe can more or less be appreciated as it is, it is nevertheless preferable to follow all the feature films and series that are linked to it in order to grasp all the subtleties. Latest example: if you haven’t watched Moon Knightso one of the mysteries ofavengers infinity war and Endgame will not be explained to you.
A connection between Moon Knight and Avengers
Broadcast for a few weeks on the SVOD Disney+ platform, the mini-series Moon Knight is a real cardboard, which is arguably one of the MCU’s most beloved works outside of movies. And while its direct ties to the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe remain light overall, these are nonetheless very interesting.
One of them concerns for example the world of souls (“soul world”), glimpsed in the last two parts of Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Endgame (2019). It is indeed on the occasion of the introduction of the Duat, the beyond of the soul of the deceased after their death according to Egyptian mythology, that Moon Knight enlightened us on this specific element.
In the fifth episode, the hippopotamus goddess Tawaret explains that the Duat is “A life after the death”, not “Life after death”. He is only one of “many intersectional planes of consciousness” that exist.
A multitude of universes, a multitude of beyond
What must be understood with the MCU is that it does not only have an infinity of universes (which we will find in Doctor Strange 2), but also of several beyonds in which life after death is possible. We were able to discover the ancestral plan in Black Panther, wheras’avengers infinity war and Endgame allowed us to glimpse the world of souls (in which Thanos and Iron Man found themselves separately, perhaps thanks to the stones of infinity) which seems closer to the concept found in Egyptian mythology and therefore in Moon Knightalthough the two worlds seem quite similar.
If you don’t know how many different afterlife there are, on the other hand, we know that they are all distinct from each otherthat they each have their own visual identity, but also their own rules. The Ancestral Plan of Wakanda allows Wakandans, for example, to get in touch with their ancestors (T’challa with his father), while the Duat rather acts as a court in which Tawaret acts as judge (the scale scene). On his side, the world of souls seems to offer the deceased to find inner peace by rediscovering the milestones of their lives.
We hope to learn more in the MCU sequel, although outside of Moonknight, exploring this afterlife concept doesn’t seem to be on Marvel Studios’ agenda right now.
