Warning: This article contains SPOILERS for Wonder Man. The MCU‘s latest release, Wonder Man, has a legitimate claim to boasting one of the best individual episodes of Marvel TV ever made. Sitting alongside Loki Season 2’s finale and X-Men ’97‘s “Remember It,” Wonder Man‘s bold, creative “Doorman” episode is an incredible – and very funny – high point for the unexpectedly great series. And it also does terrible things to Disney royalty Josh Gad.
In the episode, Gad plays himself and allies himself with newly empowered Demarr “Doorman” Davis, an actual nightclub doorman who is given the power to teleport people and matter through his body by a Roxxon chemical spill. The pair make a pair of movies together, using Doorman’s powers, and in an on-set tragedy, Gad attempts to jump through Doorman only to disappear entirely. And apparently forever. We’re never told whether he survives the rogue teleportation or whether he’s even alive, but ComicBook sat down with creators Andrew Guest and Destin Daniel Cretton, who confirmed the somewhat harrowing truth. Josh Gad is alive, he’s just lost:
“Josh is very much alive. He’s just in Doorman. We’ve got to get him out. As long as Doorman is alive, Josh is alive.”
Official Confirmation Makes Josh Gad’s Fate in Wonder Man Worse
Alongside Joe Pantoliano’s very game self-parody, Gad’s performance is one of the best things about Wonder Man outside of the central relationship between Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s Simon Williams and Sir Ben Kingsley’s Trevor. He plays a caricature of himself, clearly very keen to enjoy the spoils of fame, who sings an EDM-infused cover of Olaf’s “In Summer” from Frozen during the episode, but who has genuine affection for DeMarr (played by comedian Byron Bowers). Though his cover plays over the episode’s credits, Gad is never mentioned again: his legacy is instead that the “Doorman clause” expressly forbids the employment of superpowered people on Hollywood productions.
In effect, Gad plays a central part in Wonder Man‘s Sokovia Accords replacement, unwittingly underlining the harsh reality that the shadow of Civil War still looms large. And on a more personal level, the idea that Gad is simply trapped within Doorman is pretty horrifying. And it gets a lot worse when you know that Doorman owes his powers to the Darkforce dimension, a realm outside of conventional dimensions that is so dark it actually absorbs light. It’s also an extremely hostile environment that not only makes anyone trapped there cold and tired but also forces them to live through their worst fears and memories in an infinite loop. So yeah, poor Josh. Probably wishes he wasn’t alive, to be honest.
But maybe it’s not all that bad? Guest also spoke to Dexerto after the episode’s release and revealed another potential sting in the tale: “It has occurred to me that maybe Josh Gad would have Doorman powers, after having been inside him for so long. Maybe Josh Gad becomes the new Doorman!” He also promised he’s not given up on Gad: “If we get a Season 2, my promise is to get Josh Gad out of Doorman, and back into the world.”
All 8 episodes of Wonder Man are available now on Disney+. What do you think of the series? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!
