'Moon Knight' recap: Key moments and Easter eggs ahead of Season 1 finale

It’s time to summon the suit, as the debut season of Jeremy Slater’s Moon Knight comes to a close on Disney+.

Oscar Isaac has been welcomed to the Marvel Cinematic Universe with open arms, pulling double duty as Marc Spector and Steven Grant for the six-part series which ends on Wednesday, 4 May.

The MCU’s rebranded Phase Zero has branched out in a number of ways, but much like how the critically-acclaimed WandaVision tackled some heavy issues, Moon Knight and its message on mental health has been praised for its handling of the source material.

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There’s just one episode left, but rest assured, there’s a long 'knight' ahead. So, what did you miss?

Moon Knight: The story so far

Moon Knight follows mild-mannered Steven Grant, who is a museum gift shop worker. Grant is actually Marc Spector (and vice versa), with him suffering from Dissociative Identity Disorder. Marc is a brutal mercenary trying to stop the villainous Arthur Harrow (Ethan Hawke) from resurrecting the Egyptian god Ammit and purging humanity of evil.

Cue an Indiana Jones-inspired jaunt to Egypt, Marc’s wife coming along for the ride, and outcast god Khonshu using Steven/Marc as his avatar — no, not the blue guys from Pandora.

A modern twist on the source material

First introduced in 1975’s Werewolf By Night #32, Moon Knight is often considered Marvel's answer to Batman because his Steven alter is a billionaire and he has no real superpowers. Presumably wanting to move away from these comparisons in the MCU, Isaac’s version of Grant is quite the opposite.

Aside from his three main comic book alters, there’s the suited Mr. Knight, while Marc has also introduced personalities of a werewolf-fighting astronaut, Spider-Man, and even Wolverine. Could we see Isaac practising his best Tom Holland impression?

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Moon Knight plays fast and loose with the source material, as Slater warned fan-favourite comic book characters like Marlene Alraune, Jean-Paul “Frenchie” DuChamp, and Bertrand Crawley wouldn’t appear. Still, each has found their way into Moon Knight in some way.

May Calamawy’s Layla is a reimagined Marlene, down to the same backstory of her father being killed and Marc 'dying' to become Khosnshu’s avatar. The first episode included a burner phone with the name Frenchie in it, suggesting that even if Marc’s long-suffering BFF and pilot doesn’t appear, he’s out there somewhere. Finally, Slater confirmed that Shaun Scott’s living statue is actually Crawley, who is one of Moon Knight’s closest informants.

Like how WandaVision modernised Kathryn Hahn’s Agatha Harkness, Moon Knight’s Harrow bears little resemblance to his comic book counterpart who appeared in a single issue. This means viewers have jumped on the usual Mephisto bandwagon and suggested it’s a cover for a much bigger player.

In Moon Knight’s first episode, some speculated that the European castle Steven woke up at was our first look at Doctor Doom’s homeland of Latveria. It might be a fanciful notion that Hawke is playing the Fantastic Four’s biggest rival, but stranger things have happened.

Breaking down THAT big scene

Alongside Wanda Maximoff breaking bad in episode 4 of WandaVision and Loki’s fourth outing throwing the God of Mischief into the Void with his variants, the fourth episode of Marvel’s Disney+ shows seems to be the big one.

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Enter Moon Knight’s big asylum reveal and its Easter egg-packed second half. After Steven was shot by Harrow, he woke up in a brightly-lit psychiatric facility. As well as Steven’s museum boss Donna, other 'patients' included Crawley and Layla, while Harrow’s shady cop friends were a pair of orderlies.

There’s the Tomb Buster parody playing on the TV, drawings of Khosnu, a goldfish in a bowl, and even Mark holding a Moon Knight action figure. You might’ve noticed a sarcophagus as a nod toward a third alter… but there’s more on him later.

The big twist is that Harrow is Marc’s psychiatrist — claiming he’s been a patient of his for years. Comic book fans will know it’s a direct parallel to Jeff Lemire’s 2016’s Moon Knight run, where Khonshu had Marc committed to an asylum.

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Episode 5 continued to jump between sense and nonsense, as Marc and Steven worked with hippo god Tarawet to navigate the Egyptian afterlife. While we recapped the trauma of Marc’s childhood and learned how Steven came to be, the episode ended with another gut punch when the heroic Steven was left behind and Marc returned to the land of the living.

It’s hard to believe Steven really could be gone, but for now, Marc is flying solo.

The future of Mr Night

Despite criticisms that Moon Knight hasn’t connected to the larger MCU, there have been some loose ties. Namely, episode 3 opened up a wider mythos with the introduction of the Egyptian gods and their avatars.

There’s also been a link to the realms of Blank Panther when Taweret mentioned the Ancestral Plane. If that wasn’t enough, Khonshu is said to be the half-brother of Bast — the Panther God. Remembering that Christian Bale is Gorr the God Butcher in Thor: Love and Thunder, there are theories that he’ll start killing off the Egyptian gods, tackle Russell Crowe’s Zeus and co. at Olympus, and then turn his attention to the Norse deities.

Elsewhere, there are continued whispers about a formation of the Midnight Sons. One of the Moon Knight’s hidden QR codes took you to Tomb of Dracula #10, which just so happens to be the debut of Blade.

Eternals debuted the voice of Mahershala Ali as the day-walking vamp, but some are holding out hope he could appear physically for Moon Knight’s post-credit scene. Either way, a roster of Kit Harington’s Black Knight, Ali’s Blade, Isaac’s Moon Knight, and maybe a new Ghost Rider makes a lot of sense for Phase Zero’s ever-darkening slate of projects.

Even though there’s no news about Moon Knight season 2, Slater has sown the seeds for two big villains when the penultimate episode name-dropped Randall Spector and Raoul Bushman. Marc’s tragic backstory claims his brother drowned as a child, but with that ol’ “we didn’t see a body” trope, it’s the perfect opportunity to reintroduce Randall as the supervillain known as Shadow Knight.

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Many questioned why Bushman wasn’t the big bad of Moon Knight, however, Slater had said it would’ve been too similar to the dynamic between Black Panther’s T’Challa and Killmonger. Now that the series has found its feet, Bushman is a prime candidate for the mythical season 2.

Three’s A Crowd

Circling back to the sarcophagus, it was the confirmation we needed that Marc’s Jake Lockley alter is just around the corner. The comics portray Jake as a streetwise taxi driver that is similar to Batman’s Matches Malone alter ego used to infiltrate Gotham’s underworld.

Earlier in the season, neither Marc nor Steven took ownership of attacking a group of grunts in Egypt, teasing that Jake will be the most violent of Marc’s alters.

Isaac himself pretty much confirmed the third alter when he told ComicBook.com, “I’d say that you’re right. That it’s definitely things are pointing towards the idea that it’s not just Steven and Marc in that system, that there are possibly others. Yeah, that’s something that we discussed.”

Some think they spotted Jake in episode 5, with Marc sporting a bandaged nose how Jake is typically remembered from the comics. Others picked up on an apparent change of accent and the fact Marc attacked Harrow, hinting that Jake is breaking free. Although we hope the finale finds a way to bring back Steven, Jake could just as easily stop by to save the day.

Jake will surely play into Moon Knight’s MCU future, and given that three’s a crowd, it will be interesting to see how the dynamic shifts if this tormented trio tries to occupy the same space.

Harrow himself has questioned how many personalities are lurking inside Marc’s mind, and you can bet it’s going to be a fun ride finding out. As the First of Khonshu heads toward a final showdown with Harrow and the gods, Moon Knight rounds off yet another stellar MCU debut series.

Here’s hoping it won’t be long before Mr. Knight is doing his little Deadpool dance back into our lives and Isaac continues to cement himself as one of the franchise’s most marketable additions.

The final episode of Moon Knight will stream on Disney+ from Wednesday, 4 May.

Watch the cast of Moon Knight talk to Yahoo.