Nick Fury has many secrets, but Secret Invasion’s latest reveal is a whopper

“The driver for [Secret Invasion] is that this is a deep dive into Nick Fury,” said series director Ali Selim, speaking to Polygon before the show’s premiere. “Not only into Nick Fury’s personal life, but into Nick Fury’s inner life. His demons and his questions and his fears, and his secrets.”

As the unflappable spymaster of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Nick Fury has had precious little screen time devoted to who he is when he’s not pulling superhero strings from the shadows. And with all that shadowy space to work with, you can’t just reveal that Nick Fury loves Bon Jovi. You have to go bigger.

And in the second episode of Secret Invasion, the show went bigger.

[Ed. note: This piece contains spoilers for episode 2 of Secret Invasion.]

Photo: Gareth Gatrell/Marvel Studios

The final note of episode 2 is a surprising one to say the least. After receiving a true dressing down from Rhodey Rhodes (Don Cheadle), Fury wanders around Moscow until he arrives at a charming modern home where a Skrull woman (Charlayne Woodard) is chopping vegetables. Nick escorts himself inside, where the woman asks him if he’s forgetting something, and that something turns out to be a wedding ring.

The tabloid headline writes itself: NICK FURY’S SECRET ALIEN WIFE!!

To Selim, the reveal was all about getting at Fury’s inner life in a way that justified itself. “His home life has been a secret for 15 years in the MCU. We revealed his home life, and I think revealing a wife is more interesting than revealing a leather sofa.”

But how does this all fit in with the story of Nick as Secret Invasion is telling us? Characters like Talos and Maria Hill have criticized him for withdrawing from Earth after Thanos’ snap, but his wife doesn’t seem very surprised to see him walk in the front door. Has Nick actually been much closer than the rest of the MCU thought this whole time?

Selim demurred from providing those details — which we’re sure will come out in upcoming episodes. To him it’s all about showing the audience that Nick Fury is truly on his back foot, but he might just be starting to come around.

“He’s been in hiding. And if you’re hiding [but have] no attachments, it’s not as interesting as if you’re hiding from somebody as significant and influential as a wife or a child in your life. To bring him back and say he’s been ignoring part of his personal life is really part of what Nick’s character is. He’s disappeared, he’s pulled back, and now he’s coming back, not only to fight one more battle for Earth, but to fight one more battle for himself.”