Moon Knight is an awesome, layered Marvel character that’s finally getting a cinematic version when the Moon Knight TV series premieres on March 30, 2022. He’s one of the rare characters that doesn’t have countless versions that completely differ from one another. Instead, all Moon Knight versions stem from the same guy who went through certain changes.
Sometimes, Moon Knight has superpowers, while sometimes, he’s just a human. It will be interesting to see what version will appear in the series, so let’s see what versions of the character exist in the comics and what version the writers will most likely use.
Moon Knight – The Fist Of Khonshu
The first version of Moon Knight to ever appear in comics is Moon Knight with superpowers. Marc Spector became Moon Knight due to mystical, supernatural forces.
Spector was a former boxer, CIA agent, an assassin, and at last, a mercenary. After one job went wrong, Marc was left in the Egyptian desert, mortally wounded. At the brink of death, an ancient Egyptian deity, known as Khonshu, felt pity upon the mercenary, so he healed Spector and made him the Moon Knight.
Khonshu was a lunar god, also known as the God of Vengeance. He gave Marc Spector particular superpowers to cast justice on Earth in his name. Moon Knight’s superpowers included super strength, endurance, stamina, agility, and reflexes, but they depended on the lunar cycle. His powers were the strongest under a full moon.
Marc Spector returned to the United States to work as Moon Knight – a vigilante roaming the streets at night, fighting crime and punishing those who he thought deserved it. However, the powers didn’t come without a price.
You see, the Fist of Khonshu, or Khonshu’s spirit, became a part of Marc Spector, like a voice inside his head. On top of that, Spector developed a dissociative identity disorder – he had at least ten known different personalities emerge throughout the comics.
Some of them were violent, even masochistic at times, as Moon Knight doesn’t care about taking damage and getting hurt, as long as he gets to inflict damage to his enemies. He’s brutal aggressive, and while the “Marc Spector” personality tries his best to be a hero, other personalities don’t care that much about morals or ethics when fighting.
The willingness to take damage resulted in Marc dying more than once, but Khonshu resurrected him with his incredible mystical powers. However, Marc’s relationship with Khonshu wasn’t always great, though. They had different opinions numerous times, so Khonshu sometimes refused to help Spector in battle, leaving him without any superpowers.
That led Spector to abandon Khonshu’s spirit several times, leading to the second version of Moon Knight we’re about to talk about.
Powerless Moon Knight
When Marc Spector abandoned Khonshu – or when Khonshu refused to help Marc – Moon Knight was left without any powers. He continued to do the superhero vigilante work but did it as a regular human with no superpowers. However, Spector is still a very dangerous individual for many reasons.
First, his mental state remained the same. Moon Knight still had numerous personalities, some more humble and heroism-oriented, while others were more violent and aggressive. It makes Spector very unpredictable, especially in combat.
Also, he still has incredible wealth, which he used to develop astonishing equipment. Plus, the resources helped him not only with gadgets and high-tech stuff but also with gathering the intel needed to complete his missions.
Apart from that, Marc Spector is still a highly skilled ex-mercenary, assassin, secret agent, and martial artist. He’s one of the best hand-to-hand combatants on the planet in peak physical condition due to constant training and sharpening his skills.
Be it hand-to-hand, weapons combat, or simply detective work, Marc Spector is the cream of the crop. And, when you pair that with his insanely indomitable will – Moon Knight remains a deadly superhero, even without the Fist of Khonshu.
The Age of Khonshu Moon Knight
The Age of Khonshu is a recent Avengers storyline where the most powerful version of Moon Knight ever had been introduced. In this particular storyline, Marc Spector received magical ankhs and other Khonshu powers.
Those mystical artifacts allowed Moon Knight to absorb other heros’ powers, making him unfathomably powerful. He’s absorbed powers from Ghost Rider, Doctor Strange, and many other superheroes, along with having his regular abilities and the powers of Khonshu.
That made him not just one of the most powerful mortals in the universe, but rather one of the most powerful beings in the universe, too. Imagine having the combined powers of the Sorcerer Supreme and the Ghost Rider? Those powers only would make one almost invincible – and Moon Knight had so many additional powers to go with those.
It was enough for him to wipe out over half of the Avengers team. To make things even more complicated, he wasn’t all bad. For instance, Spector wanted to absorb Black Panther’s powers as well, but after realizing that the Panter’s powers come from his blood and that he’d have to kill T’Challa to take them, he refused to do so.
Finally, Moon Knight in The Age of Khonshu had a very potent lunakinesis/geokinesis ability. He could control and move different moons across the universe and objects made from them. That allowed him to control Mjolnir even better than Thor himself, as the Hammer is made out of Uru, an enchanted stone from an ancient moon.
Imagine what kind of brutal consequences a power like that could have. If Moon Knight moved Earth’s Moon away – and he could do it at will – it would instantly disrupt the tides and have disastrous results on our climate. Eventually, it would mess up the entire biosphere in a chain reaction that would certainly wipe out a huge portion of life on the planet – at least as we know it.
He didn’t do it, but still, he had the power if he wanted to, for any reason. It was a weird storyline that I’m still torn about, but nevertheless, it was by far the strongest version of the Moon Knight we’ve ever seen.
Which Version Will The Moon Knight TV Series Present?
Based on what we’ve seen from the first trailer for the upcoming Moon Knight series, it seems that we’re getting the first original Moon Knight version in the MCU. There’s a tiny glimpse where we can see the spirit of Khonshu, as well as Steve/Marc embracing it.
It seems that Moon Knight will start with the powers of the Fist of Khonshu, which makes me incredibly excited. Now, having such a powerful entity within himself will clearly drive Moon Knight insane, just like in the comics, so it remains to see if he’ll abandon Khonshu at any moment, and we see the powerless version of the Moon Knight in the series as well.
I highly doubt that would be the case, but we can safely assume that the Age of Khonshu version of Moon Knight won’t get an introduction in this series – at least if we’re judging by the trailer.
I haven’t seen mystic ankhs or any sight of Moon Knight absorbing someone else’s powers. We can’t know for certain it won’t happen in the show or later in the MCU, but as things are, the only certain thing is that the Fist of Khonshu is coming on March 30, 2022, exclusively on Disney+.
