What Do Captain Marvel's Skrulls Mean For The MCU?

2. Secret Invasion

With the Kree-Skrull War, one of the latter's goals is infiltrating Earth and gaining influence, which they do by adopting the identities of other people. There's already a sign of this happening in Captain Marvel, with Ben Mendelsohn - who plays the Skrull leader Talos - appearing in human form too, as he goes undercover in S.H.I.E.L.D.

That won't just be a part of this movie, however, but it also opens the door for storytelling on a much bigger scale with Secret Invasion. This story revealed that Skrulls had secretly replaced a number of Marvel superheroes over the years, biding their time and paving the way for a full-blown invasion by the alien race.

It's another tricky story to do fully, because they can't just suddenly reveal that all of the heroes we've been watching over the past decade are green, shape-shifting aliens, but there's definitely the potential for at least one (Maybe two) characters to be unveiled as Skrulls at the end of Avengers 4, leading to this being a major arc for Phase Four.

The MCU has already included a couple of Skrull Easter eggs - their language appeared in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 - so Marvel have planted the seeds, and now the time is coming to watch them grow.