WHAT IF...? Season 3

Marvel’s What If…? Season 3 Review

The MCU's multiverse shenanigans continue with mixed—but mostly fun—results.

What If…?, the long-running Marvel comic book series, is one of the most fun titles in the company’s entire repertoire. Each issue places one of their characters in some new context, either by examining a different pivotal choice they could have made or by shifting them into another universe entirely. The streaming adaptation from Marvel Animation, now in its third season, continues this storytelling style with your favourite characters from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, delivering multiverse shenanigans with mixed—but mostly fun—results.

As with the comics, each episode takes heroes we already know and places them in a new situation and, as in previous seasons, the characters are (mostly) voiced by the actors that play them in the live action movies and series, too. That means when Captain America shows up, it’s actually Anthony Mackie voicing him, and same with The Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan), Red Guardian (David Harbour), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Binary (Teyonah Parris), Shang-Chi (Simu Liu), Moon Knight (Oscar Isaac), Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson), and even Agent Coulson (Clark Gregg). Each story is narrated and presided over by The Watcher (Jeffrey Wright), an all-seeing cosmic being.

WHAT IF...? Season 3
A scene from Marvel Animation’s WHAT IF…? Season 3. Photo courtesy of Marvel Animation. © 2024 MARVEL. All Rights Reserved.

In the episodes Disney+ provided for review, we see a future team of Avengers fighting a kaiju version of The Hulk in giant robots that form together like Voltron or the Power Rangers’ Zords. In another, we join Agatha Harkness (Kathryn Hahn) as she stars in a 1940s musical opposite the Eternal Kingo (Kumail Nanjiani), all as a ruse to cast a spell. In another still, Red Guardian and The Winter Soldier go on a buddy adventure and, in the third, newlyweds Howard the Duck and Darcy (Kat Dennings) go on an intergalactic cruise and end up pursued by various bad guy groups from the first three marvel phases.

As with previous seasons of the show–and with any anthology series–your milage with each episode may vary. In these particular episodes a connecting plot has yet to emerge, but this critic holds that as a good thing. These stories are at their most fun when they are a one-off, both self-contained and weird. In fact, if there is a complaint to be made about the show, it’s that it often doesn’t get weird enough, although episode four makes up for this a little bit by going completely overboard (in a good way).

WHAT IF...? Season 3
Agatha Harkness (voiced by Kathryn Hahn) in Marvel Animation Television’s WHAT IF…? Season 3. Photo courtesy of Marvel Animation. © 2024 MARVEL. All Rights Reserved.

Another small quibble is that some of this season’s episodes may be a bit unapproachable to the more casual fans of the franchise. One, in particular, has a prologue that is several minutes of Jeffrey Wright expositing a whole new universe before anyone else even has a chance to speak, which is a lot when each episode is less than half an hour long. Still, for those in the audience who are deep in the MCU lore, this series may well end up feeling like it was made specifically for them, showing them versions of characters they’ve wanted to see, in styles and tones they’ve wanted to see Marvel try.

WHAT IF...? Season 3
(L-R): Kate Bishop (voiced by Hailee Steinfeld) and Shang-Chi (voiced by Simu Liu) in Marvel Animation Television’s WHAT IF…? Season 3. Photo courtesy of Marvel Animation. © 2024 MARVEL. All Rights Reserved.

It’s hard to ignore that there is a real sense among audiences of both Marvel Fatigue and multiverse fatigue. While this series is not likely to fix the former for anyone, the series is exactly the kind of thing that makes multiversal storytelling so potentially fun.

The bottom line here is that if you have liked What If…? to this point, you will definitely continue to do so. If you are a fan of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, nothing here will turn you away and you might even hope to see some of the versions of these characters again. If you’re not already a fan, this series may not be the best entry point, but luckily there’s something to love for all of us who are. 

The new season of What If…? drops an episode per day on Disney+ from December 22 to 29.



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