The Marvels Post-Credits Scenes Explained

Contains spoilers for "The Marvels"

"The Marvels" ends with one of the biggest Marvel Cinematic Universe mid-credits scenes in years: a tease of the long-awaited return of the X-Men. After venturing through the rift in space-time created by Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton), Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) uses the combined powers of herself, Captain Marvel (Brie Larson), and Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani) to close it. Carol tries to pull her out before the rift is shut, but there's nothing she can do.

Fortunately, the mid-credits scene reveals that Monica is alive and well in a new universe — or, more specifically, an old one. She awakens in what looks like a hospital bed where she's being watched over by a younger, alternate version of her mother Maria (Lashana Lynch). It's then revealed that she's actually recovering in an X-Men facility, as the blue and fuzzy Hank McCoy, aka Beast, enters the room.

If you're a fan of the Fox X-Men movies, you'll quickly identify this version of Beast as the same one who appears in "X-Men: The Last Stand," played by Kelsey Grammer. His voice and mannerisms are essentially the same as they are in that film, and the big X doors outside the medical facility also harken back to the Fox films. However, Beast looks a little different this time around. Rather than a man in makeup, he's fully CGI, and his design evokes "X-Men: The Animated Series" in some ways. That might not be a coincidence.

We know that Monica is in a universe where the X-Men exist, but pinning down where exactly she goes is tricky. The last time an X-Men universe appeared in the MCU was "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness." But we know this isn't that reality — Earth-838 — because Charles Xavier is still alive here. Hank mentions Charles by name and says that he's expecting an update on Monica. In "Multiverse of Madness," Earth-838's version Professor X (Patrick Stewart) is killed by the Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen).

The aesthetic of the building around Monica and the return of Kelsey Grammer indicate this could just be the Fox X-Men universe, but there are hints that that's not the case either. For one, Maria Rambeau wears the costume of the comic book character Binary in the scene — someone who never pops up in the old "X-Men" movies. Beast's new look has similarities to his "X-Men: The Animated Series" design as well, which some might read as significant due to the upcoming "X-Men '97" show. That animated series, slated for a 2024 release on Disney+, will be a continuation of "X-Men: The Animated Series," and it's believed to have no direct connection to the MCU.

The most likely theory is that this is a new universe, but one that takes heavy inspiration from the Fox movies. The MCU has had no issues in the past bringing back actors from other continuities as slightly different incarnations of their old characters, and that's probably what's happening here with Kelsey Grammer's Hank McCoy.

Although Kelsey Grammer's reprisal of the Hank McCoy character is a clear nod to the older X-Men movies, his CGI look changes things up. This new appearance could strictly be a production thing, though. Grammer is much older now than he was when he first played the character, so Marvel Studios might have wanted a CGI look to keep Beast consistent age-wise with his former version. Or it might just be that Grammer would only sign back on if he didn't have to sit in a hair and makeup chair for hours on end (a fair request).

What's perhaps more interesting is the fact that Marvel brought Grammer back, rather than Nicholas Hoult, who played Hank McCoy in the second X-Men movie timeline that began with "X-Men: First Class." Hoult's is the more recent iteration of the character, and choosing Grammer over him creates a bit more distance from the latter-day X-Men films. Or, again, this might just be a production issue. Hoult could have been asked and just wanted nothing to do with the project.

Though the mid-credits scene of "The Marvels" is exciting for X-Men fans, it doesn't necessarily tell us anything we didn't already know. The mutant heroes are definitely coming (at some point) to the MCU, but we still don't really know what form that return will take.