How Moon Knight Set Up Shocking Credits Scene, According To Writer

WARNING! Spoilers for Moon Knight below.

Moon Knight head writer Jeremy Slater has opened up about the post-credit scene for the season 1 finale and explained how the creative team went about executing the big Jake Lockley reveal. In the show, Oscar Isaac steps into the shoes of Marc Spector a.k.a Steven Grant a.k.a Moon Knight in order to do battle against a fanatical extremist named Arthur Harrow (Ethan Hawke). The series is now available to stream in its entirety on Disney+.

One of the defining characteristics of the Moon Knight character is his living with dissociative identity disorder. In the comics, he often has several alters that swap in and out of control. However, in the first season of the show, the dynamic primarily centered around his more mild-mannered persona Steven Grant and the tougher and more experienced Marc Spector. The six-episode arc of the first season centers on their quest to free themselves from their role as the avatar of Khonshu (F. Murray Abraham), and while it seems that they are successful in their endeavor, the post-credit scene of the Moon Knight finale sets up a third personality who is still willingly working for Khonshu: Jake Lockley. A fan-favorite character from the comics, Jake is one of Moon Knight’s more brutal and violent personalities and seemingly one Marc and Steven will have to contend with in future stories.

With Moon Knight now fully released in its entirety, fans have many questions about the inclusion of Jake Lockley at the tail end of the finale. In a recent interview with Marvel.com, Slater addressed the decision to tease Jake and noted that they wanted to drop hints early and make his tease accessible to fans of Moon Knight as well as newcomers. Noting that balancing act, Slater explained:

We knew right from the beginning that fans were going to be on the lookout for references and clues that Jake Lockley is going to appear in the show… we have to make sure that the mystery works as satisfying for the newcomers to the Moon Knight story. It was really just a balancing act that definitely involved my team of writers, but also involved the directors, the executives, and ultimately, all the way up to Kevin Feige, in of how many breadcrumbs are we dropping? Is this a satisfying reveal? Are we telegraphing it too much? Or are we not telegraphing enough?

Of course, the inclusion of Jake Lockley on-screen was the culmination of a series of teases that played out throughout the entire season of Moon Knight. Prior to showing him in the post-credit scene, Jake also briefly appeared in a mirror in Steven’s apartment in the show’s second episode. He also was confirmed to be the one responsible for the violent murders that neither Marc nor Steven took responsibility for in the third episode. Lastly, and perhaps most notably, it has been confirmed that the sarcophagus seen in Moon Knight episode 4 was intended to represent Jake.

All of this seems to indicate a future for Jake Lockley going forward as Moon Knight stories play out in the MCU. He is the one personality that seems to actually want to work with Khonshu, and he is willing to commit acts of extreme violence in order to achieve Khonshu’s mission. This will likely put him at odds with Marc and Steven when he finally reveals himself, but audiences will just have to wait and see how Jake Lockley’s story unfolds.

Next: Everything We Know About Moon Knight Season 2

Source: Marvel.com