Looking back, the warning signs about Secret Invasion were there right from the off. Though Marvel fans — somehow still largely optimistic despite suffering both Quantumania and Love and Thunder within the past 12 months — were hopeful the Samuel L. Jackson show would somehow manage to pull it all together in its final episode, Secret Invasion ultimately proved itself to be the worst entry in the entire MCU, if you believe the Rotten Tomatoes ratings.
And yet we should’ve known something was rotten in the MCU when we saw those terrifying — both visually and conceptually — AI-generated opening credits. Marvel’s decision to go this route instead of hiring actual human artists to create the sequence was immediately criticized, of course, although the studio insists no loss of jobs occurred due to the decision. Nevertheless, folks have been complaining about the credits long before we even got a glimpse of Emilia Clarke’s oddly-sized Drax arm.
Despite that, and the public enemy status Secret Invasion has accrued in the weeks since its sixth episode aired, one brave — wrong, but brave — soul has now come forward to admit that they love the show’s opening credits, actually. In a Reddit post on the r/MarvelStudios sub, the OP declared, “Hot take: I think the opening credits for Secret Invasion were great!”
While the viewer made sure to stress that they “do not support AI where it causes animators to lose work,” they added that they liked “the weirdness of it, the use of Soviet-era art styles, the way the human faces just don’t look right — I have to admit it fit the theme of the show just right.”
That was indeed director Ali Selim’s own reasoning for why the decision to utilize an AI-created credits sequence was made, as it seemed to fit a series about Skrulls impersonating humans. Still, seeing the most overtly disturbing aspect of the show, one that’s angered fans more than the many nonsensical plot holes in the finale, receiving praise does engender a vague feeling that we might’ve just taken the first steps towards an AI apocalypse. Or at least giving Marvel an excuse to abuse our eyes with more of these things.