Who is Jake Lockley?
Moon Knight episode 6 finally answers the question viewers have been waiting for, and while we won't spoil all the details here (you can read on for more about that), the hints the series has been planting all along come to fruition in the show's finale.
And it seems that many of viewers worst fears about how Lockley could fit into Marc Spector's life seem to be well-founded - which is a bit of a departure from Lockley's comic book personality.
In Marvel comics, Jake Lockley plays a specific role in how Moon Knight operates and we've got all the answers to your questions about what it could mean for the Moon Knight finale and the future of the character in the MCU.
Who is Jake Lockley?
Originally, Moon Knight's opposing personalities were depicted as disguises taken up by Marc Spector to further his personal goals as a crimefighter (you can read all about how Marc Spector became the avatar of Khonshu and what that means here).
While the core identity of mercenary Marc Spector remained Moon Knight's traditional secret identity, he adopted the guise of posh millionaire Steven Grant to hobnob with the white-collar criminals at the top of society's ladder (a marked difference from Grant's somewhat timid portrayal in the MCU).
And on the other side of the coin, Spector took on the identity of Jake Lockley, a rough-and-tumble cab driver with his finger on the pulse of the deepest reaches of the seedy underworld and a wealth of criminal connections (not unlike Batman's alter ego Matches Malone).
While undercover as Jake Lockley, Moon Knight developed a network of informants and spies that allowed him to stay one step ahead of his enemies and criminal targets. But at the same time, the addition of Lockley to Spector's arsenal of disguises marked the start of his deeper struggles with his identity.
Stretched thin maintaining the ongoing lives of Moon Knight, Steven Grant, Jake Lockley, and of course his core identity cause Marc Spector to start psychologically fraying at the edges, with Khonshu's mystical influence complicating things even further.
Though Moon Knight's many personalities were initially shown as disguises and alter egos rather than full-on dissociative identities, he eventually broke down with his dormant Dissociative Identity Disorder fully fracturing his mind into separate personalities with their own interior lives, memories, and awareness.
Moon Knight still uses the various skillsets of his different alters as part of his mission, much like he's also developed different incarnations of his superhero identity such as the 'Mr. Knight' persona - but their relationships with one another are consistently evolving, sometimes contentiously.
Jake Lockley in the MCU - spoilers ahead for Moon Knight episode 6
Moon Knight episode 6 wraps up the showdown between the philosophies of Khonshu and Ammit, with Moon Knight and Arthur Harrow (their respective Avatars) finally duking it out in a superhero-size showdown.
In the end, it seems Marc Spector may be done with Khonshu. And though he initially fears that Khonshu will claim Layla as his new Avatar, something much worse for Spector actually happens - Jake Lockley arrives.
Waiting all the way until the episode's final scene, Harrow (with the essence of Ammit trapped inside him thanks to the villain's defeat) is escorted into a car where Khonshu is sitting. As Harrow tells Khonshu he can't interfere or kill Ammit, Khonshu signals the car's driver - who turns around to reveal Marc Spector's face, but who Khonshu introduces as "Jake Lockley."
Khonshu states that Marc Spector was much more broken than even Marc himself realized, allowing Khonshu to take on Lockley as the most violent aspect of his Avatar - a role it seems he's fully fallen into now that the fight against Ammit has ended.
With that, Lockley shoots and kills Harrow, and presumably Ammit with him, and that's it for the Moon Knight streaming series ... at least the first season, anyway.
In this one act, it seems all the violent outbursts and hidden murders committed by Marc Spector, which were implied to be the product of a hidden, third persona, are seemingly revealed as the work of Jake Lockley, as expected.
Lockley's emergence may signal bad news for the larger MCU - especially if Khonshu's bloodthirsty methods are amped up by his brutal new Avatar. The comic book story Avengers: Age of Khonshu may offer some clues to the worst possible outcome of Lockley as Khonshu's Avatar.
In that story, Khonshu empowers Moon Knight to take on the entire Avengers, as he tried to remake the world in his image to prevent the rise of the devilish villain Mephisto. Could Jake Lockley's arrival set up Moon Knight as an actual MCU villain in his next appearance?
We'll have to wait to see where that is. Moon Knight season 2? A feature film appearance?
Marvel hasn't revealed where Oscar Isaac, Moon Knight, and Jake Lockley will show up next, but the final scene makes it pretty clear he'll be back, perhaps to the detriment of the entire MCU.
Moon Knight is just one of the new characters coming to the MCU, including Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk, Dane Whitman-Black Knight, Jane Foster Thor, America Chavez, Blade, and Eros/Starfox.
