Avengers Earth's Mightiest Heroes S02E10 Review: What Measure Is A Skrull

Avengers, Earth's Mightiest Heroes, Season 2, Episode 10: Prisoner of War

Ah, ten episodes with Skrull-Cap (although not really, with how many episodes are more guest-star-centric) and we finally address where the real Captain America is! This episode sort of ends up playing as one of those guest-star-centric episodes, ditching most of the Avengers cast to focus fully on Captain America as he breaks out of the Skrull prison. We get a pretty neat cold open, too, with how AIM Scientist Supreme, Dr. Lyle Getz, is replaced by a Skrull -- neatly demonstrating to us just how these alien shapeshifters apparently are able to copy nearly every memory. We then cut away to Captain America in a cell, and the Skrulls note that Steve Rogers is the one man they cannot break, with a neat montage of how he had refused to give the Skrulls anything, being defiant and even mocking the aliens at times.

And, interestingly, instead of just killing Steve outright, the Skrulls decided to keep Steve around in order to learn how to break humanity, because if they can break Steve Rogers, they can break the rest of the humans. You... you aliens know what "killing" is, yeah? That seems needlessly complex. But we do get a badass moment as Skrull shapeshifters masquerading as the Avengers show up to try and rescue the Captain, only for Steve to just whack all of these bogus Avengers on their ass.

Steve, of course, ends up escaping when the Interrogator (no name given, unless I'm missing something) drops his guard, taking the Interrogator hostage and ends up freeing the real Madame Viper, who apparently is still alive. And Viper recognizes that only the real Captain America would be honourable and foolish enough to put down his weapon in front of someone who wants to kill him. They form an uneasy alliance as they're both humans,  and it's kinda neat. Cap and Viper quickly free the rest of the prisoners -- Invisible Woman, Mockingbird, Lyle Getz, and also a bunch of other characters like King Cobra of the Serpent Society, Henry Gyrich of the government and Agent Quartermain of SHIELD. And... and I really kind of wish that these characters were ones we know more about. Mockingbird is pretty well-developed and Lyle is a generic villain. Invisible Woman is out cold for nearly the entirety of the episode, Quartermain is interchangeable with most other SHIELD agents, and Gyrich's sole appearance in this season has been pretty forgettable.


The tensions quickly mount, though, with King Cobra and Lyle being generic evil villains to contrast Viper's more reasonable mentality, Gyrich is a pompous "thou must protect me" douchebag and Quartermain is... helpful? We get some pretty fun scenes from the unlikely group, though, with Gyrich trying to throw his weight around and only getting derisive snarks from the people who are completely unimpressed with his job of protecting Earth from aliens. Cobra also ends up surprisingly fun, with a lot of mileage out of his cowardice and his snakey powers.

We also finally get a sneaky little cameo from Galactus, and what amounts to a mission statement from the Skrulls about just what happened. Apparently Galactus ate their planet, and now they have to invade Earth due to some prophecy that states that they'll obtain victory on Earth.

Throw in the Super-Skrull Kl'rt, a modified Skrull that has the superpowers of the Fantastic Four, and our heroes (who are mostly just normal people with the exception of Cap and Cobra) end up in a fun cat-and-mouse game with Super Skrull as they try their best to survive. We get a fun bit where Lyle tries to abandon the rest of the group by flying out on a Skrull ship, or Invisible Woman waking off and unleashing some superpowers, or the dramatic moment of Viper deigning to save Cap from being blown up with the Super-Skrull. It's a basic story, of course -- Captain America's so heroic that he'll save the villain all the time, and this impresses even a member of Hydra. And the humans escape into deep space, meaning that it'll take some time for them to finally reach Earth...

While the Skrull Queen realizes just what she needs to truly "inspire" the people of Earth to surrender. After all, the Captain America on Earth is a Skrull. Overall, while it's an episode that could've benefited more from having a lot of these characters be actual people we care about other than Cap, it still does a remarkable job of introducing and juggling the half-dozen humans while keeping the focus on Viper and Captain America. Not a bad episode at all!