‘Moon Knight’ Director Sees a Long Life for the Character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe
The Disney+ release of Marvel’s Moon Knight is quickly approaching, and with it comes some hopes for the character. For director Mohamed Diab, who directed four of the six episodes of the series, he’s hopeful just as much for the future of Marc Spector and Steven Grant as he is for the current series.
In a conversation for SFX Magazine, via Games Radar, Diab talked about the future of the character and what he hopes it holds for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “I dream and wish for a film,” he said, “but with Marvel, the way they play it, it’s not like you graduate into a film. You can go into a film and come to a TV show and go back. It’s like a crazy world. Even with the successful shows, like WandaVision, they’re not doing season two. She jumped into a film, maybe she’s going to come back or not. I don’t know. And that’s exciting.”
He’s right. You never really know what Marvel has planned for these characters. It took over ten years for Natasha Romanoff to get her own movie, and Wanda Maximoff (who joined the MCU in 2012 with Age of Ultron) finally got her own time to shine in WandaVision but is now back in the movies with the upcoming Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. You never really know what’s going to happen next, but Diab does see a big future for Marc Spector, Steven Grant, and Moon Knight.
“But I can tell you for a fact, I can see him in the next 10 years, not just the next film. He’s a very interesting character. He’s probably the most interesting character for any actor to play. Oscar is doing a great job. People already like him even from the trailer. I think the show’s going to resonate with people, so I see him staying for a long time.”
Representing Egypt
One of the things that Mohamed Diab has been very vocal about is bringing the Egyptian aspect of Moon Knight to life in a way that represents his heritage and doesn’t make it into some caricature. He went on to speak about Orientalism in Wonder Woman 1984 and the disappointment there, and how it wasn’t representative of the Egypt he knows.
“You never see Cairo. You always see Jordan shot for Cairo, Morocco shot for Cairo, sometimes Spain shot for Cairo. This really angers us,” Diab said. “I remember seeing ‘Wonder Woman 1984’ and there was a big sequence in Egypt and it was a disgrace for us. You had a sheik — that doesn’t make any sense to us. Egypt looked like a country from the Middle Ages. It looked like the desert.”
His point is that Egypt is often presented to audiences as something it is not, and it has consistently happened throughout movies and as recently as the 2020 release of Wonder Woman 1984. Moon Knight hits Disney+ on March 30th and is one of the most inventive and fun new Marvel entries in a while. You won’t want to miss it!
(featured image: Marvel Entertainment)
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