Barbie Meets Secret Invasion: Did Seeing Murderous ‘Gravik’ Become Meek ‘Ken’ Give You Whiplash?
There are a lot of familiar faces in the blockbuster Barbie movie; heck, it and “#Barbenheimer” companion Oppenheimer combined seemed to employ two-thirds of Hollywood.
To name just a few of the TV-famous folk who populate Barbieland, you had SNL vet Kate McKinnon being, well, Kate McKinnon (as “Weird Barbie”), Insecure‘s Issa Rae presiding as President Barbie, The Idol‘s Hari Nef as a Barbie and Sex Education co-star turned Doctor Who lead Ncuti Gatwa playing a Ken, plus Ugly Betty vet America Ferrera and erstwhile Cheers waitress Rhea Perlman in pivotal roles.
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But the biggest whiplash — at least for those of us who’ve been watching Disney+’s Secret Invasion — had to come from seeing Kingsley Ben-Adir in the span of a few days go from being the murderous Marvel sociopath Gravik to one of Barbie‘s many inert Kens.
Just last Wednesday, in Secret Invasion‘s penultimate (“That means ‘next-to-last,'” explains Ken) episode, Gravik when confronted about his frankly sus grand plan abruptly speared rebel Skrull lieutenant Pagon with his Groot-ified arm. And that came on the heels of Gravik murdering Talos in cold blood the week prior (and almost G’iah the week before that, and Maria Hill in the season premiere).
But then, just days later, you saw Ben-Adir as one of Barbie‘s devil-may-care Kens, who in the blockbuster comedy’s early goings is content to just “beach” around with the other Kens, played by the aforementioned Gatwa, Ryan Gosling, Shang-Chi‘s Simu Liu, Scott Evans (Grace and Frankie) and Peacemaker himself, John Cena, as a finned Kenmaid. (Later in the film, though — vague spoiler ahead! — Ben-Adir’s Ken got to engage in a very different kind of “war” than the one Gravik is mulling….)
If you are one of the Secret Invasion faithful, did it take you a minute to adjust from viewing Ben-Adir as ruthless Gravik to accepting him as a headband-wearing, Barbie-adoring Ken?
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