MCU Phase 4: 8 Major Comics That Could Inspire Its Story
3. Secret War
Marvel Comics
No, not that Secret Wars. Secret War - a story penned by Brian Bendis 10 or so years ago - looks to already have an influence in Phase 4, at least if we go off what we know of Spider-Man: Far From Home.
We already know that Nick Fury and Maria Hill will have a role in the story, which will see Tom Holland's Peter Parker come up against Jake Gyllenhaal's Mysterio. There looks to be some element of espionage at play, and though Peter and Fury are yet to be formally introduced in the MCU, Marvel fans won't need reminding of how frequently the super-spy called upon 'favours' from the superhero community in the comics, which brings us to Secret War.
The storyline revolved around Fury bringing together Spider-Man, Captain America, Black Widow, Wolverine and Daredevil to infiltrate Latveria to expose an apparent terrorist plot against the United States. The context obviously differs massively with what we know of Far From Home's plot, but the idea of Fury manipulating the wall-crawler in order to attain his objectives comes straight from the comics, and no comic does that particular thing better than Secret War.
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
