Welcome back, nerd squad.
As you may have heard recently Disney plus is slated to have a slew of new Marvel shows
joining the MCU soon, including a show for the character Moon Knight.
For those unfamiliar with this character, allow us to give you an introduction.
Moon Knight also known as Marc Spector was introduced to the comics in 1975 in Werewolf
By Night issue 32.
The character himself has often been likened to Batman in the sense that both are have
cover identities for their vigilante justice, going by millionaire playboys during the day
and fighting crime in costume at night.
His costume even somewhat resembles Batman.
But today we are going to be looking less at this comparison and instead looking more
into what makes Moon Knight such a dark character in the MCU, get to know him a bit more by
uncovering some of the scary facts surrounding him.
Join me in counting down the top 10 scary Moon Knight facts you need to know.
And feel free to let us know how scary of a character you think Moon Knight is.
Let’s get counting.
10 He Died
Sort of.
He got his powers while working as a mercenary for hire for a man named Raul Bushman who
was looking for an egyptian tomb.
Raul was a ruthless sort, enjoying the violence he brought to others, and killing people to
try and find what he wanted.
Marc did not enjoy this side of Bushman and punched Bushman after he killed the archaeologist
on the expedition, Peter Alraune, in an attempt to protect Peter’s daughter, Marlene.
During this fight, Bushman ended up getting the upper hand and left him for dead.
Fortunately he was able to make him was back to the tomb before he went unconscious.
Marlene and the rest of exploration team carried his body into the tomb and laid him out below
an idol belonging to egyptain god, Konshu.
Marc had a vision involving Konshu who promised him life in exchange for his loyalty to the
god and commitment to do Khonshu’s bidding.
Marc accepted.
Later Spector would ponder that he had simply been having near-death hallucinations.
Oooo, spooky!
9 Military Service
Before he was Moon Knight, Marc Spector served in the military as a marine and even went
to Iraq.
While you might not think this is scary, war is actually terrifying.
To add to this intensity of his service, he also began having episodes.
Marc actually suffers from dissociative personality disorder but we’ll touch more on this later.
He at one point in shown in the comics coming to after seeming to have wandered outside
of the military camp, following a voice that called to him in the dark, under the full
moon.
Not only is this in and of itself terrifying as it could have compromised his fellow soldiers
safety but concern is expressed by those who leave to camp to find him when they tell him
he has actually walked into a minefield.
8 Ol Uncle Nazi
Yitz Perlman was a close family friend and Rabbi who had fled Germany with Spector’s
family.
Oh yeah, Marc is also Jewish.
But it is later revealed in a flashback in the comics that Yitz Perlman who has been
a family friend of the Spector’s since Elias, Marc’s father was just a kid, is actually
not who he appears to be.
Marc ends up in an area of the synagogue he is not meant to be in and falls down through
a trap door leading into the basement.
He was meant to meet, Yitz who he even fondly refers to as Uncle Yitz later in the evening.
Yitz is also down in the basement, in the dark and upon Marc stumbling in, decides to
reveal his true identity.
He lights a match to reveal a bloody corpse hanging from the ceiling and offers Marc the
prompt, “A rabbit, a and a serial killer walk into a bar.”
Yitz Perlman was actually the adopted identity that allowed Ernst, the man’s real name,
to escape to Germany as reign was coming to an end and avoid prosecution as a . And as
he suggests, he is also a serial killer.
This revelation would scar Marc for the rest of his life and leads into our next scary
fact.
7 Multiple Personalities
The traumatic revelation of finding out that his Uncle Yitz was actually a and ended up
traumatizing Marc to the point that he developed a dissassociative personality disorder.
Which, I mean fair.
If I found out that my uncle was a and serial killer, I probably want to take a break from
being myself too.
For those who don’t know, dissociative personality disorder, also sometimes referred to as dissociative
identity disorder or multiple personality disorder is a condition where the afflicted
alternates between at least two different personality states.
The condition also is usually accompanied by black outs and gaps in one's memory.
Meaning you can adopt another personality and go about your life in that separate identity
or state and then potentially forget what you were doing or have done.
Pretty spooky stuff.
And Marc doesn’t just have two alternate personalities, he has a revolving door of
10, including Jake Lockley, cab driver and Steven Grant, millionaire.
The fact that he also is capable of transitioning between them so quickly also makes it hard
from him to settle down in life.
6 He Has a Kid
While admittedly having children isn’t very scary, having a child while also suffering
severely from dissociative identity disorder can be.
I also think the premise of having a child and being fully responsible for a life is
objectively terrifying.
But that’s just me.
Remember Marlene from the egyptian expedition gone wrong that strengthened his bond to Konshu?
Her and Marc have an on again off again romance in the comics.
Kind of to be expected considering their shared trauma.
While the two have never quite been able to make it stick due to that fact that Marc’s
crime fighting persona Moon Knight means putting Marlene constantly and danger and the fact
that he is constantly jumping from one of his personalities to the next, there was a
time that they managed to settle down for awhile.
During this time the two conceived a child and Marlene gave birth to a daughter who is
named Diatrice in the comics.
Diatrice Alraune, she took her mother’s last name.
The really odd and scary thing is that she's not really fully Marc’s daughter.
At the time that they settled down Marc was living as his personality, Jake Lockley and
it was because he settled into this personality for such a lengthy period that he and Marlene
were even able to make their relationship work.
So is Diatrice really even Marc’s daughter?
I don’t know.
5 Khonshu
You might not think the Egpytian god of the moon, Khonshu is a particularly frightening
figure.
Especially since Khonshu is the one granting Marc his powers.
But is he?
Later in the comics, it is revealed that Khonshu seeks to drive Marc insane so that he can
use his body as a vessel to enter the realm of the living.
While this ends up being untrue, what is implied instead is even more terrifying.
It is implied that Khonshu is simply an illusion that was created to help cure Marc.
Ultimately he recognizes that in order to gain control of himself and his personalities
he must accept them.
In doing so, he gains control again and regains his sanity.
One of those ooo it was all a dream type scenarios.
4 Morpheus
No, not that Morpheus.
Not the vampire sometimes hero.
We are instead talking about, one of Moon Knight’s villain’s Robert Markham.
To really understand the darker side of this character, it’s good to get into the mind
of those he fights and also the way Marc grapples with his demons.
Not just his internal demons either.
Robert Markam has a rare viral disease and sought help.
From there he became a patient of Peter Alruane Junior, brother of Marlene Alruane and son
of the original Peter Alruane.
The experimental drug that Peter Junior prescribes leads to Robert being unable to sleep and
developing psionic abilities.
Oh and he also becomes a boogie-man monster-looking type.
With claw-like hands.
It’s creepy.
He ends up being thwarted the first time but returns to his villainous ways after mutating
even further, allowing to link his mind Peter Jrs and use it project nightmare into other
minds.
Hence his name Morpheous which he adopts from Greek mythology where Morpheus is known as
the God of Dreams.
Not from the Matrix unfortunately in case you thought that was where I was going.
But oddly enough the same source that the writers for the Matrix probably were inspired
by for their character of the same name.
3 Addiction
Like most heroes, he has also suffered with his addiction.
His is one that is actually also a huge global issue in the real world currently, an addiction
to painkillers.
This happened as a result of battle between him and Bushman that left him crippled with
two broken knees.
Obviously needing the medication while healing, he ended up developing an addiction to them.
Like Marc doesn’t have enough issues to worry about.
He sees things, has illusions, was friends with a and wrestles with multiple personalities.
And fights crime on top of that.
And then he also had to wrestle with addiction?
Talk about a rough go.
2 His Brother is a Serial Killer
Everywhere you look with Moon Knight, there are serial killers.
And you definitely don’t have to look far for this one.
Randall Spector is Marc Spector’s brother.
Who after betraying him by killing his girlfriend, and getting blown up by Marc with a grenade
became a serial killer of nurses.
He currently goes by the name Shadow Knight and his costume and look is also quite terrifying
as well.
Definitely not someone you’d wanna meet in a dark alley.
He is part of the Cult of Khonshu and was granted superhuman strength and durability
by Princess Nepthys, who was also once his lover.
1 Brutality
Bushman has obviously been one of Marc’s greatest foes throughout the comics and as
a result of such their fights have been legendary.
These fights have also gone to show just how different Marc Spector really is from DC’s
Batman.
Batman can be violent when it comes to how he doles out justice.
Batman can be brutal too, sure.
But there’s Batman level brutal and then there’s Moon Knight’s level of brutal.
For an example of just how violent Moon Knight can be and as an example of how he really
sees himself as the one doling out justice, I point you to Moon Knight, vol 5, issue 2.
This is also the fight where Moon Knight shatters both his knees but even while down he keeps
on fighting.
And gruesomely too.
He manages to cut off Bushman’s face using the blade on his crescent moon dart.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen Batman quite do that.
Thanks so much for watching, nerd squad.
Hopefully you found some these Moon Knight facts scary.
To be honest, Moon Knight’s entire story could be spun as a horror story of sorts.
So macabre.
I really hope they manage to keep all the grim, almost Spawn-like darkness of his narrative
entact in the Disney plus series.
But who knows?
What are you most looking forward to when it comes to his series?
Are there things you would like the MCU to change about him, keep?
Let us know in the comments below.
And if you enjoyed this list and want to see more lists exploring Moon Knight make sure
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so you don’t miss it when it drops.
Till next time, this is top 10 nerd and I’m your host Amanda McKnight, reminding you to
get spooky and stay nerdy, You Tube.