Secret Invasion: Nick Fury Joins The Ranks Of Marvel Heroes Who Have Created Their Own Villains
Contains spoilers for "Secret Invasion" Episode 2
Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) returns to tackle a major Skrull problem in "Secret Invasion," and in true Marvel Cinematic Universe fashion, the situation is one of his own making. Since the Skrulls arrived on Earth in the 1990s and the initial misunderstandings depicted in "Captain Marvel" were straightened out, Fury has acted as their main ally on Earth, using their unique talents for espionage while working to find them a new home world in return. Or that was the plan, anyway.
"Secret Invasion" Episode 2 reveals that Fury didn't hold his end of the bargain. After Thanos' (Josh Brolin) Blip incident, Fury — who was among the people who disappeared for five years — has become increasingly withdrawn and detached, neglecting Earthly affairs in favor of a cozy existence on a space station. This has caused one of his trained Skrull superspies, Gravik (Kingsley Ben-Adir), to become radicalized and take matters into his own hands.
Fury inadvertently creating his own antagonist like this isn't what you'd call a flattering look, but at least he's in good company. After all, both the MCU and Marvel superhero movies at large are full of protagonists who are responsible for making their own villains.
Gravik is just the latest in a long line of hero-created antagonists
Within the confines of the MCU, few heroes have created more villains than Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.). Apart from providing the motivation and the technology for the duplicitous Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges) to become the Iron Monger, he also fatefully cold-shoulders "Iron Man 3" villain Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce). Together with Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), he builds the AI that becomes Ultron (James Spader) — and when the Avengers deal with this situation, the destruction in Sokovia causes Helmut Zemo (Daniel Bruhl) to go after them.
Various Spider-heroes also have a habit of creating their antagonists (see: Topher Grace's Venom; Jason Schwartzman's The Spot). While the MCU version of Spider-Man (Tom Holland) hasn't technically done this (yet), his own actions do cause a number of multiversal supervillains to arrive in his world in "Spider-Man: No Way Home." Though the MCU Spidey has been slacking on this front, Iron Man has expanded to creating villains for his mentee: A team of disgruntled Stark employees is behind Spider-Man antagonist Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal), and Tony cornering the clean-up market after the Battle of New York causes Michael Keaton's Vulture to delve into villainy.
Perhaps no other MCU villain has it worse than Darren Cross (Corey Stoll), who gets two separate villain origin stories, which involve no less than two different Ant-Men and a Wasp. First, he breaks bad as Hank Pym's (Michael Douglas) former protégé, using his technology and Hope van Dyne's (Evangeline Lilly) corporate talents to create the Yellowjacket armor. Then, Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) defeats him, which throws Cross into the Quantum Realm, where Kang (Jonathan Majors) turns him into M.O.D.O.K.
The story between Gravik and Fury is still unfolding, so we're yet to see whether the former S.H.I.E.L.D. director's chilling antagonist can top any of these origin stories. For now, Fury can console himself with the fact that every hero worth their salt seems to have a self-created supervillain lurking in the shadows.