Things Fans Want To See In Moon Knight

One of the things that sets Moon Knight apart from Marvel's heroes is that the hero suffers from a pronounced mental illness. Once known as Multiple Personality Disorder, Moon Knight has Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) due to the personas he utilizes after becoming the servant of Khonshu. 

After being gifted with his moon-based abilities, Marc Spector creates two new identities to help shield his activities as Moon Knight — millionaire Steven Grant and taxi driver Jake Lockley. While initially these serve simply as multiple secret identities, over time they become something more. Not only does he speak and act differently while using the different names, but even in some of his earliest stories Moon Knight's closest allies view his identities as separate people. For example, while Marc Spector is almost always portrayed as the dominant persona, his love interest Marlene feels differently. Whether he's got his mask on or not, Marlene sees Steven Grant — not Spector or Lockley — as her lover, and calls him by that name.

Assuming "Moon Knight" deals with Marc Spector's DID, the series could be tasked with a challenging but important job — portraying mental illness in a more genuine and responsible way than Hollywood is used to. 

Comic book inspired media doesn't have the best track record when it comes to realistically depicting mental illness, but it doesn't have the worst either. While plenty of experts gave 2019's "Joker" low scores — particularly in terms of linking mental illness with violence — Netflix's "Jessica Jones" was praised for its portrait of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  

A 2019 column in The Hollywood Reporter expressed the hope "Moon Knight" will offer "a thoughtful look at the mental health issues the titular hero struggles with." It further praised FX's "Legion" and HBO Max's "Doom Patrol" for their handling not only of mental illness, but DID specifically. For now, we can only hope the creators take a cue from those earlier series to deliver a Moon Knight who isn't defined by his DID, but nevertheless has to confront it in order to move forward.

Moon Knight was portrayed a bit differently in his first appearance. When he first shows up in 1975's "Werewolf by Night" #32, it's as an antagonist to the titular shapeshifter. He works as a mercenary hired by a shadowy organization calling itself the Committee to capture the wolfman. Moon Knight succeeds, though he eventually frees the werewolf while pocketing the dough he earns from his mysterious employers.

As Moon Knight's story was fleshed out, the earlier tale was retconned: Spector was now working undercover the entire time. Since then, while they've clashed with other heroes like Spider-Man, Moon Knight has been the group's most constant target. A collection of powerful businessmen, the Committee usually uses mercenaries like the Taskmaster to act on their behalf.

While Moon Knight certainly needs some more physical bad guys to contend with, the Committee would be the perfect behind-the-scenes organization to be gunning for the hero — kind of like Spector's own version of Hydra or The Hand.

Marc Spector is one of the most notable Jewish superheroes in Marvel Comics. While Fantastic Four's Thing and Doc Samson showed up in the comics long before Marc Spector, they weren't written as Jewish until much later. Marc's Jewish heritage becomes clear in 1984's "Moon Knight" #37, when Spector thinks back on his childhood — particularly his peace-loving Rabbi father — after a synagogue is set on fire and Moon Knight hunts the perpetrators.  

Fans and critics have made it clear they want Marvel to mention Moon Knight's Jewish background in the upcoming series. Marvel has already weathered criticism for a lack of overt Jewish representation, particularly in terms of what some have called the whitewashing of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver. When it was announced Oscar Isaac was cast as Moon Knight, quite a few fans took to social media to express their disappointment in Marvel's choice to not go with a Jewish actor. 

Even before Isaac's casting, Josh Weiss of Forbes warned that it was important to not forget Spector's background in the show. Using the example of Daredevil — who we see regularly visiting a Catholic priest for confession in Netflix's "Daredevil" — Weiss wrote, "Marc Spector's Jewish background is just as important to Moon Knight's growth as Matt Murdock's Catholicism" is to Daredevil's. 

If we've learned one thing from the "Thor" films, we know that sometimes brothers can be the deadliest of enemies. This is perhaps even more true for Marc Spector and his brother Randall than it is for Thor and his adoptive brother.

Before he had his own series, Moon Knight's adventures were told as a back-up in the "Hulk!" magazine. In 1979's "Hulk!" #17, we learn that a serial killer known as "Hatchet Man" is Marc's brother Randall — and he's looking to murder both Moon Knight and his lover Marlene. Years later, in 1992's "Marc Spector: Moon Knight" #35, Randall returns and in the following issue becomes Shadowknight — a super-powered member of the Cult of Khonshu. His last appearance was in 2010's "Shadowland: Moon Knight #3," when his outfit was a ragged, dark reflection of his brother's.

With familial ties and a look clearly meant to make him the anti-Moon-Knight, Shadowknight could be the perfect Big Bad for the upcoming Disney+ series. In fact, upon news that Ethan Hawke would be joining the series, the possibility that he was cast as Randall Spector was one of a few theories thrown around the online rumor mill.

In late '80s, Marvel Comics created a surprising connection between Moon Knight and Hawkeye, and fans would get a kick of seeing this given some kind of acknowledgement or nod in the series. 

In 1987's "West Coast Avengers" #23, the team finds itself bouncing around time, including the team being split up. In ancient Egypt, part of the team — minus Moon Knight — fight the servants of the villain Rama-Tut alongside priests of the moon god Khonshu, the god Moon Knight serves. In order to help the priests defend themselves, Hawkeye designs projectile weapons for them such as boomerangs and darts. When the Avengers are reunited, we learn Moon Knight's weapons in the present are the ones designed by Hawkeye in the distant past.

It would seem unlikely for that specific story to be adapted even if Jeremy Renner were to make an appearance on "Moon Knight," but we're sure the writers could come up with some clever way to hint at the connection between Spector and Clint Barton.

Depending on who you ask, Moon Knight is either the servant of an ancient god, a mercenary, a mystical protector of travelers, or just an obvious Batman copycat. His history and even his identity have grown muddier over the years, and in part this is because up until now he's been a Marvel Comics C-lister. It's not at all rare for writers who drastically change the foundation of a marquee hero like Spider-Man or Captain America to endure death threats for their new takes, but doing the same for, say, Howard the Duck isn't going to attract the same kind of fan rage. 

For example, when Warren Ellis helped redesign the character in a new volume that was released in 2014, he consciously chose to shift away from talking about Spector's DID, in spit of many readers seeing it as a defining aspect of his character. When speaking to the L.A. Times in 2013 (via CBR), Ellis explained his reasoning with, "you can't catch DID just from pretending to be other people. If that was true, every actor in L.A. would be hospitalized."

We're guessing that in light of this, fans are hoping the release of "Moon Knight" and its presumed success will put an end to the character getting such drastic makeovers every few years, and finally set one version in stone.