So, remember that scene in Iron Man when some poor, bald science lackey said that it was “impossible” to make a smaller Arc reactor, only to get yelled at by Obadiah Stane because Tony Stark was able to build this? In a CAVE?!?! With a BOX OF SCRAPS?!?!?
No?
Okay, how about now?
Iconic!
Well, guess what, said bald science lackey was actually a producer on Iron Man, and he’s resurrected his character for another film he’s producing this year, a little-known experimental piece called Spider-Man: Far From Home. As it turns out, it’s all part of a long-running (11 years since Iron Man came out! 11!) MCU gag.
And it only gets darker from here.
(Spoilers, spoilers, spoilers up ahead for Spider-Man: Far From Home, so don’t keep going if you want to avoid.)
Keep scrolling past the spoiler space.
We obsessively equalized the white space between these sentences so that no one would go crazy.
You’re welcome.
So in, Spider-Man: Far From Home, the (first) big twist is that Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal) is actually a disgruntled former Stark employee, utilizing drones and “Binarily Augmented Retro-Framing” technology (from Civil War) to pose as a superhero in order to usurp Tony’s legacy as Iron Man and get even. He’s also been teaming up with some other disgruntled former Stark employees for tech (and possibly…emotional?) support; one of whom is–you guessed it–box of scraps guy.
(His actual character’s name is William Riva.)
During the final showdown between Mysterio and Spider-Man, it’s this guy who’s tasked with downloading drone footage of the fight. And again, when Mysterio is shot down, it’s this guy who copies the footage, screws with it to make it look like Spidey killed Mysterio, and leaks it the MCU’s very own J. Jonah Jameson.
So basically the guy who, 11 years ago, was browbeaten into making Obadiah Stane into Iron Monger, is also directly responsible for outing Spider-Man.
And that guy?
It’s Ralphie, from A Christmas Story.
Here. Witness the moment humanity betrayed him.
Ralphie = the Phase 4 MCU villain confirmed.
