This season of "What If…" is better than the last one. The animation is about the same quality, and the attempts at ongoing storylines are iffy, but several individual episodes are standouts. The funny episodes this year are actually funny, and the writers clearly got to cut loose and take more chances. I'm always surprised by the number and caliber of actors who decided to voice their animated counterparts, and the voice actors filling in for the absent ones are stellar. High marks to Mick Wingert and Lake Bell in particular as Tony Stark and Natasha Romanov.
Now here they are, from best to least, and many spoilers lie ahead. So, What if…?
1. "Iron Man Crashed Into the Grandmaster" - This is the leftover episode from last season, where Tony Stark ends up on Sakaar for a galactic adventure. He buddies up with Korg and Valkyrie, antagonizes the Grandmaster and Gamora, and never seems to stop quipping. This episode is a ton of fun, featuring several big personalities and big action scenes. Best of all, it's a great spotlight for Tony Stark, and a reminder of how important he is to the MCU.
2. "Happy Hogan Saved Christmas" - It's "Die Hard" in a festive Avengers tower, but instead of Bruce Willis we have Happy Hogan with a side of Darcy. Happy has access to some Hulk blood to help him Freak out, but most of the episode sees him seriously outmatched against Justin Hammer. I wish the animation here were better - Sam Rockwell's dance moves are not done justice - but the writers are having a blast. The Werner Herzog A.I. and Darcy's Chrstmas carol are highlights.
3. "Peter Quill Attacked Earth's Mightiest Heroes" - It's a 1988 Avengers team, who are up against a powered-up kid version of Peter Quill, sent to conquer Earth by his Bad Dad, Ego. I love the mix of characters, and what is legitimately the best use of Hope van Dyne in any MCU story I've seen yet. I love that Michael Douglas, Kurt Russell, and Laurence Fishburne all decided to show up for this. The ending is a little syrupy, but it's also one that feels earned.
4. "The Avengers Assembled in 1602" - I couldn't follow the logic for why the mash-up universe happened, but the jokes and the character reinterpretations kept me entertained throughout. Here's Cap playing Robin Hood. Here's Happy Hogan as the hapless Captain of the Guard. Here's Loki being a thespian again. Captain Carter being the lead in so many episodes was too much, but I legitimately liked her connection with a different version of Steve here.
5. "Kahhori Reshaped the World" - The biggest swing this year was introducing the Native American heroine Kahhori, voiced by Devery Jacobs, who gets a chance to head off European colonialism when the Tesseract lands in her neck of the woods. The narrative is speculative fiction in its purest form, and a rare example of a "What If…" episode that you don't need to know anything about the MCU to watch. While not a totally successful experiment, this was a welcome one.
6. "Strange Supreme Intervened" - As is tradition, the season finale pulls in cameos from all the previous episodes for a climactic battle. The premise and the big bad are interesting, but the execution is not, sadly. Kahhori in particular feels awfully shoehorned into this story as a supporting player, but I like the way Strange Supreme got some more development - his origin remains the show's best episode. If "What If…" had decided to wrap up here, I wouldn't have had any complaints.
7. "Nebula Joined Nova Corp" - So, "Blade Runner" with Nebula on Xandar sounds great on paper, and the guest stars are certainly a fun bunch - can we get more of Seth Green's Howard the Duck please? - but otherwise this was a pretty humdrum outing. The double crosses and the film noir tropes were telegraphed far in advance, and even killing off some familiar faces didn't have much impact. Too bad this was Nebula's only appearance in "What If…" this time around.
8. "Hela Found the Ten Rings" - I feel like the only reason this episode happened was because Cate Blanchett said yes to appearing as Hela. Giving her a redemption story via the "Shang Chi" mythology feels very random, and Hela never really works as a protagonist. It all looks great, and Odin being a real villain for once is nice, but it never stops feeling like the Chinese elements are only there because the creators were mandated to get some "Shang Chi" into the show.
9. "Captain Carter Fought the Hydra Stomper" - I like Captain Carter, but her story is such a one-for-one substitution that her story isn't as compelling as most of the other episodes. Here she gets to gal-pal with Black Widow, Steve ends up in the Winter Soldier role, and Bucky founds SHIELD. So we replay the second "Captain America" movie, and the rest of episode is mostly used to set up other storylines. Consider some of the other universes for sequels next time, please.
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