Secret Invasion's Sonya Falsworth Is New To The MCU – And Olivia Colman Is Having A Blast
"Secret Invasion" feels like a breath of fresh air for Marvel Studios. While "Captain America: Winter Soldier" already gave us a relatively grounded spy thriller, this show actually makes heroes out of regular people, rather than those with super serums or super suits. This is a grounded, tense thriller about regular humans in a world of gods and aliens.
After 15 years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and a cavalcade of world-ending threats, it makes sense that "Secret Invasion" would follow not an Avenger, but Nick Fury, who looks so incredibly tired of people wanting to mess up Earth and forcing him to keep working. The show loosely adapts the comic book storyline of the same name and follows Fury as he tries to stop an infiltration of rebel Skrulls who want to take over the planet.
Because a big appeal of the show is discovering that characters we've known for years are secretly Skrulls in disguise, we're meeting a whole host of new characters in "Secret Invasion." Despite the caliber of the cast, there is one character who immediately stands out and makes every scene better: Olivia Colman's Sonya Falsworth.
We know very little of Falsworth, given she isn't from the comics (though her last name hints she might be related to James Montgomery Falsworth, one of the Howling Commandos from the first "Captain America" film), but we do know based on the first episode that she is an MI6 agent and a former friend of Nick Fury. More importantly, we know she is a delight to watch on screen, and Colman brings a much-needed chaotic energy to the show.
Comedy done right
From the moment Colman walks on screen, she immediately commands it and makes it hers. As the Oscar winner told Yahoo, Falsworth "does quite like to bully [Fury] with her heavies," and in her own words, her character is "quite funny. And she's potentially a little bit not that nice sometimes." Indeed, this is what makes Falsworth so hilarious and such a key element of "Secret Invasion": She is a very serious woman who comes across as very stern, but considers herself a comedian.
The MCU has long had a bit of a comedy problem. Ever since "The Avengers," it has essentially stopped having comic-relief characters and instead have practically every character deliver witty quips at the worst possible moment, undercutting whatever tension or emotion might be present with lame punchlines. That's not Falsworth. Colman, not at all a stranger to comedy, knows how to make even a dark torture scene funny with the right delivery and timing. The result is some of the best comedy in the MCU since "Thor: Ragnarok," because it restricts the comic relief to a character and makes the comedy part of her personality rather than just interrupting tension and emotion with one-liners.
Falsworth is incredibly charismatic, even if you immediately know she is not to be messed with, but she knows how to find humor in her line of work, so she delivers threats with gusto and exciting energy. She is one step removed from Joker levels of psychopathic comedy, but it's Colman's motherly energy that makes Falsworth irresistible to watch and a fantastic counterpart to the very stern Nick Fury.
We don't know where the story will take Falsworth (probably nowhere good), but in one of the most serious and grounded MCU titles in years, Falsworth is making every moment she's in a riot.