Summary
The weakest episode of the season thus far puts its focus in the wrong place and has its most interesting character moments occur off-screen. However, it does still boast some solidly animated action and some decent gags.
One supposes it’s typical of Marvel to release an anthology series that can’t tell a complete story in a single episode. Episode 4 of What If…? Season 2, “What If… Iron Man Crashed Into the Grandmaster?”, is explicitly connected to the first season finale, “What If… The Watcher Broke His Oath?”, in which The Watcher assembled a superstar tag-team of heroes known as the Guardians of the Multiverse.
We know this is the case since the episode starts with a “Previously On…” section in proper serialized storytelling fashion, and the basis of the episode is how Gamora (Cynthia McWilliams), one of the members of the Guardians of the Multiverse, got there from being the mad assassin daughter of the Mad Titan. But curiously the episode deigns to tell this story through the lens of Tony Stark (Mick Wingert) entering a destruction derby on Sakaar at the behest of the Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum).
What If…? Season 2 Episode 4 Recap
The conceit here is that during the Battle of New York, instead of launching the nuclear warhead through the portal and plummeting back down to Earth, Tony fell through a portal and was transported to a near-future Sakaar (remember, time works differently there.) The outcome of the battle hasn’t changed, but Tony has been temporarily displaced, and the only way to get back on track is to indulge in the Grandmaster’s ridiculous whims.
This is a cross between the pod race from The Phantom Menace and Thor: Ragnarok. Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) and Korg (Taika Waititi) are around just like Ragnarok, and the battle arena racecourse is a hodgepodge of weird-looking vehicles piloted by a menagerie of aliens and suchlike, just like The Phantom Menace. It’s nicely animated superfluous fun, or at least it is until Gamora arrives.
Gamora Meets Tony
Gamora is determined to kill Tony, and her being the daughter of Thanos is the only explanation she offers for why. At this point, Tony doesn’t even know who Thanos is and has never met Gamora, so the episode lends their interactions a weird kind of confused couple dynamic with Korg clumsily playing third wheel.
Maybe it’s just me, but there’s something about this vaguely flirtatious back-and-forth relationship that doesn’t ring true to either character, perhaps because these versions aren’t voiced by Robert Downey Jr. or Zoe Saldana. It’s not entirely clear what vibe we’re supposed to be getting here. Still, pretty quickly – a certainty of a 30-minute episode, even the second one in the same canon – Tony and Gamora are forced to put their differences aside to take down the bloodthirsty Grandmaster.
The climactic chase, which also features Valkyrie and Korg, is visually fun but burdened by the same largely uninteresting dynamic – Tony spends the entire time lecturing Gamora about how she can choose a better life for herself than simply Thanos’s plaything – and a sense of familiarity. Valkyrie’s presence feels like a direct retread of her Ragnarok role, and as fun as Korg is, he already had a big-ish part in Episode 1 of this season, and there are only so many rock-based jokes that anyone can conceivably write.
How does What If…? Season 2 Episode 4 end?
Tony manages to play to the Grandmaster’s ego and challenge him to a one-on-one race for control of the planet like this is The Fast and the Furious or something, which is dumb when you think about it but works well enough to justify the big action beats.
Of course, Tony wins, albeit narrowly, and a brush with Topaz’s melting stick leaves the Grandmaster in a pool of goo with his likeness (stick around for the mid-credits scene if you want to see it.) Ultimately, though, it’s Valkyrie who becomes king, and Tony returns home to reunite with Pepper – though not before stopping off to meet Thanos with Gamora, where she leaps at him with Topaz’s melting stick, having presumably decided to claim her own identity after all.
What did you think of What If…? Season 2 Episode 4? Let us know in the comments.
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