Marvel’s Ironheart finale cracked open a whole new dimension of the MCU. What began as a grounded story about teen genius Riri Williams building armor to protect her world took a sharp left turn into the supernatural.
SPOILERS Ahead!
After duking it out with a supercharged Ezekiel Stane (Alden Ehrenreich) and finally taking down The Hood, Riri comes face to face with a mysterious cloaked figure in the rubble of a neighborhood pizzeria and it’s Mephisto, played by none other than Sacha Baron Cohen.
“I learned in the midst of our shooting,” Dominique Thorne told Variety. “So, by the time they gave me the correct name in the script, it was like ‘Whoa, the Reddit guy! The guy from all the rumors. He’s in this show? OK, y’all are serious!’”
Thorne sees the reveal as a sign that Marvel is going all-in on Riri. “The true Marvel fans know that Marvel always has a plan,” she said. “So, to know that they’ve chosen to introduce him here with Riri Williams, with Parker Robbins, it’s strategic… It is just a joy to get a seat on that ride.”
Ryan Coogler agrees, saying: “I just absolutely love that we’re not meeting him in WandaVision or Agatha [All Along]. You’re meeting him through this stressed-out, young Black genius… That’s where he’s gonna be: in a pizza shop in Chicago, like, where you would absolutely never expect him.”
For Coogler, the show’s blend of street-level grime and mystical high-stakes is what makes Ironheart so good. When reflecting on how quickly Riri’s story escalates from garage tinkering to demonic negotiations, he said:
“I love the compression that we have in this show. Watching Riri get so in over her head, not just at street level, but Armor War level…”
Chinaka Hodge, the show’s head writer, said the choice to bring Mephisto in came through “a collaborative effort,” though one person in the room championed the idea. “And I’m eternally grateful for him leading us that direction.”
Originally, Dormammu was the front-runner for the demon role as Parker’s powers trace back to him in the comics, but Marvel’s Zoie Nagelhout said Mephisto ultimately made more thematic sense.
“He offered a sort of interesting and heightened way to tie together the characters’ journeys — and in particular, Riri’s — so it became almost like a no-brainer to have him.”
Director Angela Barnes was the one who first pitched Cohen for the role. Nagelhout recalled, “She pitched it, and we couldn’t unsee it.” Once he signed on, Marvel went to great lengths to keep his cameo under wraps. “If he was outside, we wrapped him up in tarps… We would cast extras who were family members and beg everyone to keep it a secret.”
As for Baron Cohen’s take on the infamous Marvel villain, Hodge explained: “He does two or three different versions of the Mephisto in the episode. Because Mephisto is a shape-shifter… It’s a key to open many doors.”
So where does Riri go next? Ryan Coogler, said: “I don’t know jack shit,” he laughed. “I think the audience is going to take to that ending and I can’t wait to see those characters again.”
What did you think about the finale of Ironheart and the introduction of Mephisto.
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