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SYFY WIRE Secret Invasion

Emilia Clarke trades Westeros for the MCU as Marvel's 'Secret Invasion' series fills cast

By Josh Weiss

No need to worry about winter coming anymore — because the Skrulls are on the way, and they're bringing a Game of Thrones fan favorite to the MCU. Put simply, Nick Fury and Talos won't be wanting for talented company in Marvel Studios' Secret Invasion series on Disney+.

Based on two separate reports published by Variety, the upcoming project has cast a pair of major British stars: Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones) and Olivia Colman (The Crown). In true MCU fashion, their roles are being kept tightly under wraps, especially since Colman is reportedly still in talks. The growing collection of actors already includes Samuel L. Jackson and Ben Mendelsohn, who will reprise their Captain Marvel roles as Fury and Talos, respectively. One Night in Miami's Kingsley Ben-Adir was added to the ensemble last month, and is expected to take on the lead villain role (the character's specific name and motivations are still a mystery). 

No word on who Clarke or Colman might play, but one wild guess is that Clarke could be bringing S.W.O.R.D. commander Abigail Brand to life, tapping into her action experience from Game of Thrones and Terminator: Genisys. There's even a bit of speculation from Nerdist's Hector Navarro that Clarke could be playing Jessica Drew, aka Spider-Woman, who has an English accent in the comics. But again, this is all pure speculation at this point.

Emilia Clarke & Olivia Colman Secret Invasion

Two Marvel projects — Spider-Man: Far From Home and WandaVision — have already started to lay the groundwork for Secret Invasion, which, drawing from the 2008 limited series by Brian Michael Bendis and Leinil Francis Yu, deals with alien Skrulls using their shapeshifting abilities in an attempt to take over the planet.

Right now, we know that: 1) Fury is actually off-world (meaning the version we saw in Far From Home was Talos pretending to be Fury) and 2) Monica Rambeau (played by Teyonah Parris) is set to play a role after making contact with a Skrull, who said an old friend of her mother's (presumably Fury or Talos), would like to meet up in space.

"We're interested in the political paranoia aspect of Secret Invasion and really showcasing the stars with Samuel L. Jackson and Ben Mendelsohn, two amazing actors that you want to have in any series, and we're very lucky to have them for that," Kevin Feige explained in January. "That's the sort of primary focus of that and, of course, it will tie into other things and the Skrulls in ways you haven't seen before, but yes, anything could be anything. Wise words… But we wanted to do that as a series because it would allow us to do something different than we've done before."

Disney has yet to announce a production start for the show, let alone a premiere date.