Moon Knight's psychological minefield: Marvel takes on dissociative identity disorder

Marvel's cinematic universe has taken us on journeys to outer space, galaxies and the multiverse but now with Moon Knight, it journeys into previously uncharted territory – that of the mind.

Head writer Jeremy Slater and lead actor Oscar Isaac take on arguably one of the MCU’s biggest challenges yet with this six-part Disney+ series.

Moon Knight follows a timid London museum gift shop employee named Steven Grant (Oscar Isaac) with the unusual bedtime habit of strapping himself to the bedposts.

He has been bumbling aimlessly through his life but lately, Grant has been losing time, waking up in strange surroundings with no memory of how he got there.

Over the course of the series, we see Grant lose what little control he had over his life and hurtle towards an astounding and subversive internal quest.

"While looking at mental illness through the lens of comic book characters has a long, and messy, history, it’s something that Marvel adaptations have rarely touched on until recently through WandaVision’s exploration of grief and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Hawkeye’s look at PTSD"

He eventually comes to realise that he is harbouring an alternate, and far more sinister personality named Marc Spector, also known as Moon Knight, who serves as a vessel for the Egyptian god Khonshu.

Marc and Khonshu are at odds with a religious cult leader named Arthur Harrow (Ethan Hawke), but Steven wants nothing to do with any of it and struggles to reclaim control over his own body from his alter Marc.

Marc Spector (Oscar Isaac) is a person who suffers from Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) and shares his body with other personalities, the most active being Steven Grant.

While looking at mental illness through the lens of comic book characters has a long, and messy, history, it’s something that Marvel adaptations have rarely touched on until recently through WandaVision’s exploration of grief and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Hawkeye’s look at PTSD.

DID has been an alluring subject for Hollywood since the beginning of movies. Multiple personalities have been depicted in varying degrees of success in movies like Three Faces of Eve, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Psycho, Fight Club, Split, The United States of Tara to Ratched.

Unfortunately, most depictions of DID tend to be inaccurate on account of exaggeration and usually DID is either used as a tired trope for heightened drama or a cop-out in the climax of psychological thrillers.

This condition is also often confused with schizophrenia since both disorders involve hearing voices.

However, Moon Knight has taken on a more empathetic and intricate approach that navigates the mind of a person with Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) which has historically been portrayed in a caricature-like manner in Hollywood.

The spectre of childhood trauma and grief looms large in Moon Knight in a far more visceral way than is expected from a commercial studio like Marvel.

In DID, the alters are typically diametrically opposite to each other. This is evident in the series since while Steven Grant is a meek gift shop vendor, his alter Marc Spector is a violent mercenary.

In Moon Knight's first episode, every time Grant awakens from an episode of dissociative amnesia, he's met with the carnage left behind by Spector.

"Moon Knight takes an empathetic and intricate approach that navigates the mind of a person with Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) which has historically been portrayed in a caricature-like manner in Hollywood"

Studies reveal that DID is often the result of intense, persistent childhood trauma. When the mind experiences overwhelming emotions that it does not feel equipped to handle, it dissociates and splinters into another personality in a bid to protect us from unsettling emotions.

Many psychologists posit that DID is most often the result of some form of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Paradoxically, our mind uses dissociation as a coping mechanism to keep our psychological balance intact.

An important characteristic of DID is that initially, the alters are not familiar with each other which is why as soon as one alter takes reign, the other one experiences amnesia or memory loss.

The goal of therapy then is to introduce all the personalities to each other and integrate them into one cohesive whole.

Marc and Steven go from fighting Khonshu in Egypt to a psychiatric ward run by “Dr Harrow” (Ethan Hawke) who’s treating Marc/Steven as his patient. (Is he really the villain masquerading as a doctor or did Marc just paint him as a villain for being an authority figure?) We will have to wait for the next season to get clarity on that.

Since it is after all a Marvel project, the majority of the series focuses on high action sequences.

It is only in the last two episodes that we get to peel the layers of Steven’s complicated inner world. Dr Harrow asks him some poignant questions that give us clues into the origin of his alters.

Moon Knight, in Marvel's typical fashion, is a superhero origin story – the only difference is that it is steeped in psychological trauma.

To avoid spoilers, suffice to say that Marc created Steven to hide from his unrelenting guilt regarding a childhood mishap with his brother and how it irrevocably changed his relationship with his mother.

In an integral scene, Dr Harrow asks Marc/Steven, “Do you think you created Steven to hide from all the awful things you feel you’ve done in your life, or do you think Steven created Marc to punish the world for what your mother did to you?”

(Spoilers ahead).

One of the highlights of Moon Knight for me was that in one of the flashback sequences, we get to see the exact moment Steven was born.

Marc’s mother, inebriated and livid, pounds at his door while a young Marc crouches in his room, petrified. When the pounding does not stop, suddenly we see Marc’s eyes roll back and he transforms into Steven Grant – a character he subconsciously creates based on a hero from the film Tomb Buster (the poster hangs on his wall).

So, this is the answer to one of the key questions – why create Steven?

That flashback serves as a key turning point in the series since that is when Steven realises that his existence is just to be a buffer between Marc and his painful past. He is outraged and asks Marc, “The point of me is to be a stress ball?”

Marc can only look on in despair as his imaginary friend learns the truth. The flashback scene proceeds when Marc’s mother breaks through the door and starts beating him. “You’re not meant to see that, that’s the whole point of you,” Marc explains to Steven. “You got to live a life… believing that your mother loved you… that she’s still alive!”

We cut to mother’s funeral and see Marc bitterly lingering outside. He breaks down and then suddenly transforms into Steven, who happily calls his (imaginary) mum and tells her he’s lost.

In these sequences, the series sensitively portrays contradictions and conflicting urges that led to Marc’s fractured sense of self. Since after all this is Marvel, there are moments when the DID portrayal gets a bit too theatrical.

However, keeping in mind that this is a work of fiction and not a documentary, Marvel has done a brilliant job of bringing a nuanced portrayal of a controversial and complicated psychological disorder on screen.

Rabeea Saleem is a Karachi-based freelance cultural writer and literary critic for numerous international publications including The Irish Times, Chicago Review of Books, The National UAE, the Spectator, and Book Riot.