The second half of Ironheart leads viewers to believe that Dormammu is pulling The Hood's strings, something that seems obvious when you look at Parker Robbins' history on the page.
When Riri Williams puts it to Sacha Baron Cohen's mysterious villain that he's the Doctor Strange villain, he scoffs at the idea and reveals his true name: Mephisto. It's a huge moment, and Ironheart executive producer Ryan Coogler broke it down in an interview with Variety.
"It’s funny, when I first met Jon Watts in 2016 and he was doing 'Spider-Man: Homecoming,' Spider-Man was like basement level, like fighting underneath the street-level villains," he said of bringing the devil into Riri's story. "Then, by the time 'No Way Home' comes around, he’s dealing with Doctor Strange and going through different realities and shit."
"I just absolutely love that we’re not meeting him in 'WandaVision' or 'Agatha [All Along]," Coogler continued. "You’re meeting him through this stressed-out, young Black genius. When you watch the show, it’s like, 'Oh, that was how you always were gonna meet him.' It wasn’t gonna be in 'Loki.' That’s the trickster; that’s how he works. That’s where he’s gonna be: in a pizza shop in Chicago, like, where you would absolutely never expect him."
Ironheart director Angela Barnes is credited with suggesting Cohen play Mephisto, and executive producer Zoie Nagelhout revealed that Marvel Studios went to great lengths to keep the actor's casting under wraps (which, as we're sure you'll recall, didn't work).
"If he was outside, we wrapped him up in tarps and the poor guy had to walk like two steps at a time," she recalled. "Nobody but crew or friends of crew were allowed, so we would cast extras who were family members and beg everyone to keep it a secret. You do your best."
Nagelhout later confirmed that the "initial idea" called for Dormammu to be Ironheart's secret big bad. "If you look to publishing, Parker’s power is drawn back to Dormammu, who is also a very epic character in the MCU and who would have been very exciting to play with. But as we developed it, we realized Mephisto was a better thematic fit for what the show is about.”
"Diving into these scenes of ambition and cost and what you’re willing to give up for the things you want, he offered a sort of interesting and heightened way to tie together the characters’ journeys — and in particular, Riri’s — so it became almost like a no-brainer to have him," she added.
Back to Coogler, and he was asked whether the next stage of Ironheart and Mephisto's respective stories might play out in Black Panther 3 or a potential second season.
"I don’t know jack shit," he said with a laugh. "I’m here for whatever Chinaka’s got coming at us next; whatever Kevin’s got coming at us next, you know what I’m saying. I think the audience is going to take to that ending and I can’t wait to see those characters again."
It's always a shame to get a cliffhanger ending without any clear idea of when or where it will be resolved. That's been a recurring theme throughout the Multiverse Saga, with many characters and subplots introduced in post-credits scenes that have yet to pan out.
Jake Lockley, Hercules, Blade, and more have all shown up, only to be left on the shelf, and the hope now is that Mephisto won't eventually be added to the list.
All episodes of Ironheart are now streaming on Disney+.