YMMV / What If…? S1E5 "What If… Zombies?!"

• Alternative Character Interpretation: Did the Hulk really emerge at the very end because of Bruce's pleas for help? Or was it for purely pragmatic reasons, specifically that Bruce wouldn't kill them both by getting devoured by zombies?
• Angst? What Angst?:
  • Even if he admits he’s only resorting to Dad jokes as a way to deal with traumatic events, Scott seems to give no thought whatsoever as to what might have happened to his daughter in the apocalypse. Either that, or this is his coping mechanism for desperately trying not to think about it.
    • Scott also doesn't seem too horrified by Kurt's death at the hands of zombie Scarlet Witch and seems to quickly move on to his accidentally Waxing Lyrical, despite the fact Kurt is the only member of the survivor party to have actually been close to Scott pre-apocalypse and he is killed literally in front of him…
  • Bucky takes Falcon, Cap, and Sharon's deaths in stride, even saying that he should be sadder about Falcon and only giving a sad line after cutting Cap in half. Perhaps justified in that he is a very hardened soldier who has already repressed a lot of trauma so it’s likely all that pain is just internalized. (He's also not especially close with Falcon at this point, with The Falcon and the Winter Soldier not having happened.)
  • The rest of the team respond to Sharon's death by making multiple jokes about it despite her sudden and horrific gory end after being a close part of the team.
  • Peter Parker doesn't act like the apocalypse has affected him much at all in the grand scheme of things, going to the point of making a cheesy survival guide video with big smiles and jokes. While he does admit to mourning all those he lost, but "keeps smiling" because Aunt May told him that if one loses their happiness then they might as well be "dead" too, one gets the impression he isn't as broken up as he looks. But, then again, a lot of the people he cares about has died. So dealing with the concept of death isn't a stranger to him anymore.
• Cliché Storm: At the same time, despite the changes and inspired creative choices of the episode, the story is still a relatively by-the-numbers Zombie Survival story with a Dwindling Party, which has been pointed out by the reviews as its most significant shortcoming. Then again, being a pastiche of zombie films was part of the episode's point, so the use of these tropes is justified.
• Crosses the Line Twice:
  • Just after Bruce witnesses the (though well-deserved) slaughter of Cull Obsidian and Ebony Maw and is saved by Hope, we're treated to one of Peter's homemade videos á la Homecoming that, while much better edited this time around, features Pete taking the piss out of a still unamused Happy Hogan, a half-naked Bucky Barnes, and Sharon Carter taking a toy dart to the face, with her being less than amused at Peter's shenanigans.
  • "Guys, I'm covered in Sharon!" Yes, you just read that right. Hope essentially killed a zombified Sharon via shrinking herself to get inside of her, and then promptly returning to normal size, tearing her to pieces in the process. Sound familiar?
    • Add to that the joke made in response to the above statement, about losing a close team mate, about Spider-Man carrying hand sanitizer. Made even more sociopathic by the fact Hope was infected by this act and dies as a result.
• Iron Woobie:
  • Peter. Despite going through the hell that is losing pretty much everyone he's ever known (as not even Aunt May is safe from the maws of a zombie apocalypse, he's lost Tony much sooner here as well, and he's now lost Happy here to add salt to the wound), he's still as upbeat and quirky as he is in the Sacred Timeline. Hope and Peter both lampshade this for a bit.
    Hope: Oh, kid. How do you do it?
    Peter: See all these movies? AV club.
    Hope: (chuckling) No. No, how do you stay so… upbeat? After everything?
    Peter: Practice, I guess. My mom, dad, Uncle Ben, Mr. Stark. Now Happy. I've… I've lost a lot. But my Aunt May says… used to say, that if we don't keep smiling when they can't, then we might as well be gone, too. And… well, they'd want us to keep going.
  • Scott. Again, despite being as chipper as he always is, he's not only lost Hank and Hope, but it's very likely his entire family (Cassie especially) weren't spared from the zombie apocalypse like he was… even if he has to live out the rest of his days as a head in a jar, however.
• Platonic Writing, Romantic Reading: This might also be because Peter Parker is a huge Launcher of a Thousand Ships, but many fans have taken the (probably) sibling like bond of Hope and Peter to be romantic.
• Questionable Casting: A minor one, but given that Josh Keaton is on the cast for this series, it's a bit disappointing that they didn't have him reprise his fan-favorite role as Spider-Man. Although it's justified given that they wanted a voice match for Tom Holland's Spider-Man.
• Salvaged Story:
  • After a lot of complaints about the lack of mention of Uncle Ben in the MCU, this episode established that Uncle Ben does indeed exist, despite it being a simple name drop as Peter lists off his dead loved ones.
  • Fans weren't happy with the lack of the Hulk in Avengers: Infinity War, and especially the film's failure to make clear he was refusing to come out due to resentment of Bruce ordering him around and seeing him as nothing but a tool, which was made worse after a deleted scene showing Banner and Hulk "working it out" and Hulk reappearing to fight Cull Obsidian in Wakanda was released. Here, he does make an appearance after Bruce makes an impassioned, humble plea for help.
  • We finally get to see what capabilities the Mind Stone has on its own after the Infinity Saga only showed its powers being used inside Loki's scepter, embedded in Vision or as part of the Infinity Gauntlet.
  • A number of detractors of the Marvel Zombies comics have praised the episode, which takes inspiration from those comics, for largely avoiding the unrelenting darkness that turned some readers off of those books.
• Unexpected Character: Sharon Carter, of all people, shows up in this episode.

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