Emilia Clarke could play two roles in ‘Secret Invasion’ if Marvel plays its cards right

Warning: Minor spoilers for Secret Invasion episode one to be found hereon in.

One of the most exciting things about Secret Invasion isn’t actually its content but its cast list. On top of familiar faces like Samuel L. Jackson and Ben Mendelsohn returning, a few A-list franchise newcomers are making their MCU debuts in the show, like Olivia Colman as Sonya Falsworth and Emilia Clarke as G’iah.

Clarke’s roles in proceedings, in particular, has been the subject of intense scrutiny for the longest time, and before we found out she was playing the turncoat daughter of Talos, many fans were convinced she might be a character who is key to the Secret Invasion comic book event such as Jessica Drew (aka Spider-Woman) or Skrull Queen Veranke. Alternatively, some thought she might be Abigail Brand, the head of S.W.O.R.D. in the comics.

While you might think we can forever strike those theories from the record at this point, Secret Invasion‘s opening episode actually teased that we should maybe hold onto them for a while longer. It’s implied that the Skrull insurgents need to keep those original humans their “shells” are based on alive — they certainly need them to be so initially in order to use “fracking pods” to mine their memories.

If this is the case then that means the human whose face G’iah is wearing could be introduced later down the line, perhaps rescued by Fury’s team from Gravik’s base in some later episode. It’s still possible, then, that Clarke could be playing, say, Jessica Drew or Abigail Brand, only in addition to her role as G’iah.

Clarke is a wonderful talent, we all know that from Game of Thrones, but she’s previously been wildly underused by such franchises as Terminator and Star Wars. If Marvel doesn’t want to make the same mistake, hopefully Kevin Feige and co. have got an ace up their sleeve and Secret Invasion will ultimately reveal she’s been cast as not one, but two characters.