Marvel Animation’s Marvel Zombies is new on streaming this week, and I think it might be the bloodiest project from the MCU that’s been produced yet! The four-episode limited series is a spinoff of a fan-favorite What If…? episode from 2021, and wow, does it really deliver on the promise of turning the universe into a full-on apocalyptic affair. There’s a ton of big death scenes to talk about, but only one really crossed the line into filling my tear ducts during my binge.
OK, I Wasn't Expecting So Many Big Deaths In Marvel Zombies
Now I’m not totally sure what I was expecting from Marvel Zombies, but I certainly didn’t see the animated series reveling in killing just about every Marvel character off in front of our eyes coming at all. When the first episode began, for example, I thought Kamala Khan, Kate Bishop and Riri Williams was going to be the trio we were going to follow the entire run of the series. But when Kate died after her trick arrow was a disappointment, I quickly realized that this series wasn’t going to hold on so tightly to its beloved characters like the MCU usually does.
By the time we get to the Marvel Zombies ending, we’ve watched pretty much every character die, including the particularly sacrificial deaths of Melina, Yelena and Red Guardian from Black Widow. There were a lot of sad deaths of fan favorites, but I realized it was all in good fun and wouldn’t have actual implications on the MCU, so why not go ham, Marvel!
But, Rocket Raccoon's Sudden Death Made Me Want To Sit In A Corner And Bawl
However, one death was a completely different story for me. At the beginning of Episode 3, in a flashback scene that Spider-Man is narrating about Zombie Thanos, Rocket, Groot and Thor appear to charge at the famed Avengers villain. However, they are obliterated immediately! Watching Rocket be turned into nothing but bones before his little raccoon skull jumped to the front of the screen completely took me aback, and I started crying in shock and sadness over seeing the adorable, traumatized fan-favorite dying in the blink of an eye.
I think my reaction to the death has something to do with how seeing animals die can actually hit one harder than seeing humans oftentimes, but also because the story of Rocket that was delved into in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 makes him one of the heroes in the MCU I want to root for the most. I mean, his backstory was so heartbreaking that Bradley Cooper “cried a lot” in the vocal booth while making it.
By the end of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Rocket Raccoon got a happy ending as the new leader of the Guardians. I will not expect anything less when it comes to upcoming Marvel movies. Clearly my heart cannot take any other type of fate for the character, and I will scream it from the rooftops.
