‘Secret Invasion’ Stars Emilia Clarke and Ben Mendelsohn Were Relieved to Learn That Their Time in the Skrull “Pig’s Head” Would Be Minimal
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[This story contains mild spoilers for the first episode of Secret Invasion.]
When Emilia Clarke played Qi’ra, her fan-favorite Solo: A Star Wars Story character, she wrote countless pages that detailed her character’s unseen past and future. For Secret Invasion and her latest apostrophe-name character, G’iah, Clarke opted to take a more improvisational approach to backstory alongside her co-star Ben Mendelsohn, who played Young G’iah’s Skrull father, Talos, in Captain Marvel’s 1995-set story. So, in addition to their scripts, the duo used their storytelling instincts to fill in nearly three decades’ worth of off-screen story.
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At the start of Secret Invasion, the Skrull father and daughter are estranged, as the entirety of the Skrulls are at odds, resulting in rival factions. G’iah is currently associated with Gravik’s (Kingsley Ben-Adir) Skrull rebellion, and she helps him carry out his violent objective of seizing Earth since Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) failed to fulfill his decades-old promise of finding the Skrulls a new planet to call home. G’iah’s allegiance ultimately changes when Talos reveals to her that her mother was killed by Gravik.
In the first couple episodes of Secret Invasion, Clarke and Mendelsohn spend virtually no time in Skrull form, and the Kyle Bradstreet-created show devised a good reason for it. G’iah mentions to a new recruit that Skrulls become harder to identify by Skrulls and humans alike if they remain in their human form. As actors, this revelation was music to Clarke and Mendelsohn’s ears, in that they wouldn’t have to wake up before the crack of dawn and spend two hours in the hair and makeup trailer.
“When we first went in to do the meeting, Kevin [Feige] said, ‘You won’t have to wear the pig’s head that much this time.” And I was like, ‘Yes, bring it on!’” Mendelsohn tells The Hollywood Reporter.
Clarke adds: “You’ve heard it 9,000 times already, but [Secret Invasion] is a grounded show. It’s very relatable, in that whilst we are Skrulls, the viewer is looking at our human forms more than anything else.”
Below, during a recent chat with THR, Clarke and Mendelsohn also discuss how they arrived at the current versions of their characters, including Talos’ age-related decline.
Emilla, you, your characters have had a variety of nicknames: Queen of this, Mother of that. Well, with G’iah and, of course, Qi’ra, can we now add Queen of Apostrophe Names to the list?
Emilia Clarke: (Laughs.) Oh my God, me and the names. You know what? Yeah. Both of these ladies went through the wringer in trying to find a name. They went all the way around the houses, all the different names, and for some reason, I am an apostrophe kind of gal. And I don’t know why!
Ben Mendelsohn: (Laughs.)
Clarke: They couldn’t just have one name and then another name. Never mind that. They popped them together, put a little apostrophe, and there we are.
Mendelsohn: But G’iah is named after Earth.
Clarke: Mother Earth!
Mendelsohn: That’s how deep [the Skrulls] feel about this spot.
Clarke: It’s pretty deep. I got roots!
Ben, Talos is now 136 years old, and he truly looks great for his age …
Clarke: How good does he look!?
And similar to Nick Fury, he’s struggling with the fact that he’s lost a step.
Mendelsohn: You’re the first person to point this out!
Was this your way into the current iteration of the character?
Mendelsohn: It didn’t really strike me properly until we’d started to get into it. I then felt it and the drag down in this, but yeah, [Talos and Fury] have lost their way. They have lost their way. They are up against stuff. They’re in the surf and that wave is above them, and it’s going to break on top of them. So they are up against it, and it was really awesome to be able to see them not having their shit together.
Emilia, a lot has happened since we last saw G’iah and Talos together in 1995 by way of Captain Marvel. Did the writer in you dive deep into those missing years at all?
Clarke: Yeah, I definitely did. We had the luxury of having some rehearsals together, and it ended up being a kind of improvisation as such. Ben Mendelsohn is a living God legend and acting king, and so the information that came out of that was completely instinctual on both our parts. It allowed us to fill in a lot of the gaps, and personally, who he is allowed me to fill in a lot of the gaps. His role dictated to me a certain type of upbringing that was regimented with training. We’re a warring species. Let’s be real. That’s what Skrulls are. We come from a land of fighting, and that’s the main thing. So that’s mixed with G’iah’s fierce need for her own independence, and it’s a judgment on her father’s choices, let’s put it that way. And it has made for some really interesting stuff.
G’iah has a line that explains the advantage of Skrulls remaining in human form. Were the two of you quite happy to read that since it meant you wouldn’t have to be up at 4 am to get Skrullified?
Clarke: Preach!
Mendelsohn: When we first went in to do the meeting, Kevin [Feige] said, “You won’t have to wear the pig’s head that much this time.” And I was like, “Yes, bring it on!”
Clarke: It’s a long thing. It’s heavy. It has those contact lenses. You can’t hear. You can’t see. It’s a full situation.
Mendelsohn: Yeah, it’s a thing.
Clarke: You’ve heard it 9,000 times already, but [Secret Invasion] is a grounded show. It’s very relatable, in that whilst we are Skrulls, the viewer is looking at our human forms more than anything else.
***
Secret Invasion is now airing every Wednesday on Disney+. This interview was edited for length and clarity.
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