The MCU has just doubled down on Spider-Man: Homecoming‘s F, marry, kill scene. This came in the most recent Marvel Disney+ TV show, Ironheart. The ending of Ironheart episode 3 teased some big changes for the show’s magic vs. technology plot, but the reference to Homecoming came in episode 1’s opening moments.
This was just one of many wider MCU Easter eggs in Ironheart, which focuses intently on the legacy of Iron Man. Naturally, Tony Stark mentions are the most common references, but Ironheart even links to Obadiah Stane, one of the MCU’s first supervillains. Regarding the small connection to Spider-Man: Homecoming, though, the MCU’s God of Thunder is involved.
Ironheart Includes One Of Marvel’s Most Explicit Jokes Yet
In The Opening Moments
In the opening moments of Ironheart episode 1, a flashback featuring Riri Williams and her best friend is shown. The flashback sets the tone for the entire series, showing Riri stating what she wants more than anything. This links to her desire to create something iconic before she asks Natalie, her best friend, what she wants more than anything.
Before saying she simply wants to be happy, Natalie jokes that she wants “a night with Thor and his hammer.” Riri says they need to cut the camera now, and the two laugh together, leading to the Marvel Television logo. Although this scene is vital to Iprnheart‘s broader themes, the Thor joke is fairly explicit, linking to a similar scene from almost a decade ago.
Spider-Man: Homecoming Had A Similar Scene, 8 Years Ago
Featuring Peter’s First MCU Crush, Liz Allan
The scene that Ironheart‘s joke links to came in Spider-Man: Homecoming. During gym class, Peter and Ned are shown listening in on a conversation between Liz Allan, Betty Brant, and a few of their friends. The topic of the conversation is an F, marry, kill, specifically between MCU heroes like Thor, Iron Man, and the Hulk.
Betty insists she would F Thor, marry Iron Man, and kill Hulk, before asking Liz’s opinion. Liz goes on to talk about Spider-Man, tying back to Peter Parker’s love story in Spider-Man: Homecoming. Interestingly, though, this was the first time the MCU featured an explicit joke about some of its heroes.
Ironheart doubles down on that in its opening moments. Neither of these jokes is exactly R-rated, and they both work within the context of their respective stories, but it is still an interesting connection. After all, both Spider-Man: Homecoming and Ironheart focus on younger members of the MCU, meaning both scenes make sense tonally.
Why Ironheart Repeats Spider-Man: Homecoming’s MCU Scene
They Ground The MCU In Reality
Image via Disney+
Concerning why both of these scenes are worth mentioning, they add a sense of reality to the MCU. As many will know, regular celebrities in our own world are spoken about in the same vein as both of these scenes, be it the F, marry, kill dynamic from Spider-Man: Homecoming or the joke from Natalie in Ironheart.
Given that superheroes are essentially the celebrities of the MCU’s world, this makes a lot of sense. Another element of Ironheart‘s opening scene supports this, with Riri stating she wants to be bigger than several innovators. She lists the likes of Jobs and Gates, obviously referencing real-life businessmen, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates.
This allows the MCU to have a sense of human realism that is rarely shown…
Riri then goes on to mention Stark and Pym, claiming she will one day be bigger than these four combined. In the same way that the likes of Iron Man and Ant-Man are mentioned alongside Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, people like Thor are brought up in the same vein as Chris Hemsworth would be in our world.
This allows the MCU to have a sense of human realism that is rarely shown. Especially when so many installments focus on older characters or have world-altering, multiverse-changing stakes, Ironheart‘s smaller references that feel more relatable make a lot of sense. Spider-Man: Homecoming understood that, too.
