Oscar Isaac reveals why he was hesitant to do Moon Knight

Moon Knight is the next Marvel show coming to Disney+, and if the trailer is anything to go by it looks like it’s going to be a bit of a departure for the MCU. Moon Knight is set to debut, and will have a darker tone than many of the company’s other shows or movies.

Oscar Isaac plays the lead role of Moon Knight, a masked vigilante who suffers from dissociative identity disorder. In the comics, Moon Knight’s alter ego Marc Spector was a mercenary who came into contact with the Egyptian moon god Konshu, who charged him with going out and protecting those who seek safe passage by night. Spector also has a quieter personality, Steven Grant, who appears to be working in a museum in England. It looks like a mind-bending show that will have lots of twists, as Marc has to navigate not only his life as a superhero but the confines of his own mind.

At first, though, Isaac was hesitant to sign on to the series. He previously starred in the non-MCU superhero film X-Men: Apocalypse as well as the Star Wars sequel trilogy. Apocalypse wasn’t received very well by fans, and the Star Wars sequels were divisive at best. So Isaac wasn’t exactly looking to return to those sorts of mega-franchises.

Moon Knight is “the first legitimate Marvel character study since Iron Man

“My initial thing was, ‘No, I don’t want to go back into that kind of machinery,'” the actor told Empire in the magazine’s April 2022 issue. “I did that already. The last thing I want is to be on a massive set, [thinking], ‘What am I doing here?’… Often on these big movies, it can feel like you’re building the plane on the runway. The idea of getting back to ‘handmade’ films, character studies… I was desperate for that feeling.”

With Moon Knight, however, Isaac saw an opportunity do exactly the sort of deep dive character work that he’d been looking for. “[Moon Knight] felt ‘handmade,'” Isaac said. “And it’s the first legitimate Marvel character study since Iron Man. Plus…I thought, ‘Maybe I can hijack this thing. Maybe this is the chance to do something really f***ing nutty on a major stage.”

"What I love about this thing is that it’s an exploration of a mind that doesn’t know itself. A human being that doesn’t know his own brain. I found that really moving: what the mind is capable of as far as survival. But the workload was massive: the technical challenge of embodying these different characters, physically, the way I manifest my body… It required a lot of energy."

Marvel Studios CEO Kevin Feige was eager to bring Isaac into the MCU; they just had to find the right angle. “[Oscar Isaac] clearly likes this world — Star Wars and X-Men — but we hadn’t found the right thing, necessarily,” he said. “We started talking about Moon Knight and he had a couple of outside-the-box ideas that were like, ‘Maybe this could work…’ And spoiler alert: they do.”

Moon Knight’s British accent was Oscar Isaac’s idea

One of those out-of-the-box ideas was Steven Grant’s British accent. According to head writer and executive producer Jeremy Slater (The Umbrella Academy), this was an idea Isaac had to help differentiate his multiple personalities for viewers. “[I]n the initial script, the difference between [the personalities] was in attitude,” Slater said. “It was Oscar who said, ‘What about an accent?'”

"He’s playing radically different people. That’s scary, and a lot of actors could have phoned it in. But Oscar’s thing was, ‘This may be a superhero show, but I’m going to approach it like it’s Shakespeare. Ultimately, the key to letting the audience know which persona is in charge of Spector’s body at any given point came from an Isaac-originated brainwave."

Whether you love the accent, hate it, or just plain think it’s weird, Isaac’s lilting British affectations have gotten people talking. It make us wonder what his voice will sound like as Marc Spector or Moon Knight.

Moon Knight will likely return after season 1

While we haven’t seen the show yet, one question a lot of people are asking is if Moon Knight will get multiple seasons. As of now, it’s been announced that this will be a six-episode limited series…but given that this is Marvel, more is certainly not out of the question. If the company can afford to give Agatha Harkness her own spinoff, surely they’ll bring Moon Knight back for season 2, right?

Head writer Jeremy Slater is optimistic. “I can’t imagine this is the last time you’ll see Moon Knight in the MCU. He’s too much fun,” he said.

“It depends on whether people see the freakin’ show first,” added Isaac. “If they see it, then maybe we’ll see more Moon Knight. But I love playing him. Particularly Steven [Grant]. I hope I get to revisit him again. I love him so much. I feel he’s someone real, who lives in the world. It’s been a long time since I felt that kind of connection.”

Not to jump the gun, but the chances that Marvel is introducing Moon Knight with no plans to use him again later are about the same as Disney letting everyone stay in its Galactic Starcruiser hotel for free. And considering that Moon Knight’s first comic appearance involved fighting the Werewolf by Night, who we know is being played by Gael Garcia Bernal in a Halloween special on Disney+ later this year, Isaac’s reprisal of the character may come sooner rather than later.

Moon Knight premieres on Disney+ on March 30.

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h/t Syfy Wire