The latest MCU TV show has returned for its second episode this week, and I was left feeling deflated by the end of  “Summon the Suit’s” 52 minute run time. This episode was bogged down by repetitive dialogue, a tedious main character, and the introduction with a new (and as of right now) plain jane in Marc Spector‘s wife Layla.

The first half of this week’s outing was sluggish, as much of it focused too much on Steven‘s constant confusion and utter reluctance to try and understand what is going on in his own life. Many scenes are spent arguing with his alter ego Marc, a mercenary who was saved by the Egyptian moon god Khonsu and is now forced to serve as the god’s avatar to dish out justice to the cruel and unjust.

Steven’s attitude was a hindrance in the episode as what came off as charming and awkward in “The Goldfish Problem” outstayed its welcome. The repetitive back and forth of Marc begging for control of Steven‘s body so he could save himself and those around him became quite irritating. Each internal fight boils down to the same dialogue beating the audience over the head with lines like “let me take control” and “summon the suit” over and over again to the point of pure exhaustion.

Marc‘s wife Layla was officially introduced in this episode and was left with not much to do. As such, it is unclear what her skillset offers as of right now. Layla seems to be set up to be Khonsu’s next avatar and the showrunners have alluded to her being a mercenary partner with Marc. We are told she has skill, but we never see it. Instead, we see her pushing people to escape with Steven when he is kidnapped in the second half of the episode.

A clumsy fistfight plays out in the background and afterward, she isn’t seen again in the last few minutes of the episode. Layla provides some background on Marc, but her explanations are still vague and mildly frustrating as she says so much without really saying anything.

Thankfully not all is a snooze fest with “Summon the Suit” as we get an interesting sit-down and an info dump with the series villain Arthur. It so happens that Arthur used to be Khonsu’s previous avatar and is now the avatar of Ammit. The god Ammit looks to pull a Thanos and judge the actions of people’s past, present, and future to create a “Heaven on earth”.

On paper, this sounds like an interesting villain. However, this is more worrisome to me for a few reasons; first of all, the MCU has always had a villain problem. Many of the series villains tend to be rehashes of the main protagonist’s powers and abilities, I.E. Killmonger (Black Panther) Iron Monger (Iron Man), and Yellowjacket (Ant-Man) just to name a few.

Secondly, since Endgame it feels like the writers are out of steam and are putting some of the best traits from the series’ best villains into second or third-rate villains to try and garner that premium feeling that they gave the audience years ago.

The episode ends with Marc in full control of Steven’s body, miles away in Egypt. This setup should be promising as we may get more time with a better character with Marc and learn more about the alter egos living within each other.

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Moon Knight

6

Score

6.0/10

Pros

• Arthur Harrow's Scenes
• Promising Ending

Cons

• Repetitive Dialog
• Sluggish First Half
• Steven's Confusion