Warning: SPOILERS for Ms. Marvel The episode “Seeing Red” is ahead!
During her trip to Karachi, Pakistan on Ms. Marvel In the episode “Seeing Red”, Iman Vellani’s Kamala Khan learned about the Red Daggers, an organization dedicated to protecting our world from the secretives. Aramis Knight’s Kareem was the first person to hold the Red Dagger mantle that Kamala met, and soon after she came face to face with Farhan Akhtar’s Waleed, the leader of the organization. With Ms. Marvel marking his Hollywood debut, Akhtar compared his stint on the Disney+ show to his years of experience in Bollywood while talking to CinemaBlend.
I got a chance to talk to Farhan Akhtar about his work on his fourth episode Ms. Marvel (which can be streamed now with a Disney+ subscription), and among the questions I asked him was how he was going through the critically acclaimed Marvel series compared to the heavy-hitting projects he’s done in the past. Akhtar replied:
It really felt the same to me. I say that with great pleasure, because I wondered after working on films here and there when I do a show like Ms. Marvel, will the reaction be different? Is there something else going on there that we don’t have here? These are the questions that come to your mind. But I was very happy to see it. There’s Gary Powell, who is incredible at what he did as the director of the second unit and the guy who created the whole sequence that you see in episode 4. It felt like I was on set in Bollywood. That’s really what it felt like for me, so it was great.
For Farhan AkhtarThe first Hollywood project that practically feels the same as the action-related projects he has worked on in Bollywood, whether as a performer or a behind-the-scenes person, is a lucky one. This was largely thanks to Gary Powell, who was also second unit manager Ready Player One, Morbius and its underwater unit Skyfall. And Akhtar was certainly not short of action in this one Ms. Marvel episode. While much of Waleed’s screen time in “Seeing Red” was revealing new information to Kamala Khan about the Clandestines, these antagonists eventually infiltrated the headquarters of the Red Daggers, which was an all-hands-on-deck ensemble.
Waleed put up an adorable fight against the Clandestines, both at Red Dagger HQ and on the streets of Karachi, but while protecting Kamala and Kareem, he was killed by Najma, the leader of the Clandestines. While there are certainly plenty of instances in the MCU where someone’s injuries weren’t truly fatal or their death was undone in some way, for now, it unfortunately looks like Waleed’s death is permanent. However, this is not the last time we see Akhtar in Hollywood as he was among the standouts of ‘Seeing Red’.
There are only two episodes of it Ms. Marvel left this season and it has not yet been announced if another season of the show will follow. Fortunately for fans of Iman Vellani’s Kamala Khan, she will return on July 28, 2023 for The Marvelsone of many upcoming Marvel movies.
