More and more (and more) it's looking like the first season of Disney Plus' What If.? animated series was something of an extended trailer or even a full-on prequel to May 2022's Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
The nature of the MCU Multiverse, the ground rules of how different Multiverses interact, and the presence of the Watcher established in What If.? all seem like they could pay off in multiple future MCU films and streaming series.
And with the now-infamous Venom: Let There be Carnage mid-credits scene, a new Morbius trailer for that January release, and the continued heightened anticipation for a second trailer for Spider-Man: Now Way Home and the film itself in December, MCU fans are hungry for information about the Multiverse.
But even if those elements of What If.? don't pay off that soon, evidence continues to mount that a Multiverse of Madness villain was introduced in the series.
Newsarama has been making this case for a few months already, and the latest news doesn't exactly dissuade our theory.
Let's get into the nitty-gritty...
Marvel Studios can sometimes be playful with its fans, and What If.? seemed like it was designed to be an inconsequential detour. The series is based on a Marvel comic book concept that for most of its history was designed to not be part of ongoing Marvel Universe continuity.
The whole point of the original premise was to tell brief one-off stories that played with continuity rather than in it by turning it on its ear. But as the Uatu the Watcher, the series' omniscient narrator always reminded readers, the stories were just glimpses at possible alternative realities. However, back then, the idea that these Earths or universes existed side-by-side with the main reality wasn't a thing - when the comic book series debuted in 1977, the concept of a Marvel Multiverse wasn't fully formed.
But unlike the source material, the Disney Plus series now looks like it was required MCU viewing.
The conclusion of Loki was the catalyst to a rapidly expanding Multiverse that might lead directly to the "Madness" in the Doctor Strange sequel's title, a term named-checked by Miss Minutes in the opening minutes of the Tom Hiddleston-starrer.
Add to that the last scene of WandaVision, which implies Wanda Maximoff's children Billy and Tommy continue to exist somewhere after the newly-crowned Scarlet Witch ended her elaborate illusionary takeover of the town of Westview, NJ. Then there was the introduction of the villain Kang (Marvel's preeminent time-traveling/multiversal villain) to the MCU in Loki, and the now established fact that December's Spider-Man: No Way Home will also deal with the Multiverse.
It seems like What If.? landing smack dab between them all was too much to be a coincidence - or in other words, too great an opportunity for Kevin Feige and crew to pass up.
Given Marvel Studios' perfection of the connective tissue model of movies and now streaming TV shows, we probably should have concluded all along there was more to What If.? than met the eye, something fans may have been clued into right in the first episode.
In episode one, Captain Carter fights off a tentacled monster trying to invade Earth, which appeared to be long-time Doctor Strange villain Shuma-Gorath, although the creature's name was not revealed and its signature one eye wasn't seen.
The result of the battle was Captain Carter being transported from the World War II 1940s to 2012 in the same timeline, suggesting the monster could travel through time.
The same tentacled monster appeared again in episode 4, again unnamed, and again its main body unrevealed, but the episode did reveal a few new wrinkles.
For one it establishes the same creature exists in multiple timelines/universes and that it is super-powerful (Doctor Strange Supreme amasses enough power to destroy his universe just by absorbing a few of its tentacles).
Marvel Studios does little without a purpose. Everything you see on-screen in an MCU production is calculated the peek-abo way they revealed Shuma-Gorath has a purpose.
Now that could be a reappearance and expanded role in What If...? season 2, but an unusual "leak" may have just revealed Shuma-Gorath is indeed slated to appear, perhaps even as the film's main big bad, in Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, now scheduled for release on May 6, 2022.
Bearing in mind What If...?, despite being animated, is in MCU continuity, and while the two-part finale featuring an Infinity Stones powered omnipotent Ultron, a proactive Watcher, and a team of alternate reality heroes dubbed the Guardians of the Multiverse got wrapped up in a pretty tidy fashion at the end, it seems unlikely the existence of the Watcher and the Multiversal stakes the series raised will be contained to just the first season and any subsequent seasons to come.
Marvel Studios also has something of a challenge - it faces an increasingly uphill battle figuring out ways to surprise its most ardent and aware followers.
Actor Jonathan Majors (Kang and He Who Remains) had to flat out deny (falsely, it turns out) he was appearing in Loki to preserve the surprise of the introduction of Kang and his variant in episode 6 - and which actors from previous incarnations of the Spider-Man franchise are or are not appearing in No Way Home remains a guessing game and something of a Twitter obsession as we head into November and Spider-Man: No Way Home in December.
All of this may ultimately force MCU fans who overlooked What If...? to pay closer attention to it before No Way Home arrives we learn more and more about Madness in the Multiverse...
... which may have been Marvel's clever plan all along.
The MCU Multiverse and Marvel Comics Multiverse seem to be aligning with Multiversal Avengers.