Moon Knight ending explained: what happened in the postcredits, who is Jake Lockley, will there be a Season 2?

Moon Knight came to a close this week, after six weeks of superhero antics with an Ancient Egyptian twist.

But how did Steven Grant escape from the Duat? What happened to Marc Spector in the Field of Reeds? Did Layla become the Scarlet Scarab? Who is Jake Lockley, and what does Moon Knight’s postcredits scene mean for the Marvel Cinematic Universe?

Here’s everything you need to know about Moon Knight’s season finale, what happened in the postcredits scene, and whether we’re going to see Oscar Isaac return for Moon Knight season 2.

What happened in Moon Knight’s season finale?

Moon Knight’s finale picked up where last week’s episode left off: Steven Grant was lost in the Duat, Marc Spector had found himself in the Field of Reeds, and Arthur Harrow was on the cusp of freeing Ammit, the Egyptian goddess of divine retribution.

Though at peace for the first time in his life in the Field of Reeds – the heavenly paradise of the Egyptian afterlife, also known as Aaru – Marc tore himself away to search for Steven. Reunited in the Duat and with a newfound understanding of one another, Marc and Steven managed to escape together, returning to their last moments alive in Cairo after

Appealing to the newly-freed Khonshu, Marc and Steven agreed together to become Moon Knight once again. As Khonshu’s avatar, the Fist of Vengeance, Marc and Steven confronted Arthur Harrow – but arrived too late to stop him releasing Ammit.

Ammit and Khonshu fight across Egypt, their avatars Moon Knight and Harrow locked in the same confrontation. The tide of the fight turns when Marc blacks out, reawakening to find Harrow bloody and bruised at his feet. It’s the same dissociative effect we’ve seen him experience already in Moon Knight, but it’s also clear that Steven’s consciousness didn’t take over there, and the mystery lingers for a moment – but there’s no time to try and work it out.

Moon Knight and Layla – acting as temporary avatar for Tawaret – cast a spell to bind Ammit to Arthur Harrow, in effect trapping the Egyptian god in the body of her avatar. It means that, if Harrow is killed, Ammit will be obliterated forever.

Khonshu urges Moon Knight to kill Harrow, but he refuses: a pre-emptive strike like that, taking away Harrow’s choice to change, is exactly the sort of retribution Ammit metes out, and exactly why they’ve been fighting against her. Marc and Steven insist on their freedom, and Khonshu grants it too them – perhaps too easily, after everything that’s happened…?

Marc and Steven wake up in Steven’s London flat – it’s not clear how much time has passed, or where Layla and Harrow now. Resolving to share their body and live a joint life, Marc and Steven start getting out of bed – and fall flat on their face, just as Steven did at the very start of episode one.

What happened to Layla? Is she the Scarlet Scarab?

Layla begins the episode reeling from Marc’s apparent death, and ready to take on Harrow alone – or die trying. Tawaret (the Hippo goddess who guided Marc and Steven through the underworld in last week’s episode) sends her a message, though: free Khonshu to bring back Marc, and have a better chance to stopping Harrow.

Hiding amongst Harrow’s follows, Layla sneaks into the Temple of the Gods, and frees Khonshu. She refuses to be his avatar, though, leaving him to confront Ammit alone. It’s a disaster: Ammit appears is laying waste to Cairo, and the gods are powerless without human avatars.

Layla agrees to become Tawaret’s avatar, and is transformed into a new superhero. The character Layal El-Fouly is, very loosely, inspired by a Marvel Comics character called the Scarlet Scarab – an Egyptian superhero granted powers by ruby scarab gemstone. May Calamaway, who plays Layla, has confirmed that Layla becomes the Scarlet Scarab in Moon Knight’s finale, saying she hopes “that all Arab women can watch that and feel like a superhero, and that they have that space on that big scale.”

There’s a small scene in Moon Knight’s finale acknowledging that: while Layla is fighting Harrow as the Scarlet Scarab, a young girl is watching, and asks if Layla is an Egyptian superhero. Her response is an emphatic “I am”.

What happened to Arthur Harrow?

Arthur Harrow frees Ammit, and is ready to be judged in turn – he’s truly come to believe in Ammit’s ideology of pre-emptive retribution, and expects to be sentenced for the crimes he may one day commit. That Ammit doesn’t immediately judge him seems almost to shake Harrow’s faith in her, but before it can truly sink in she makes him her avatar, embodying him in the fight against Khonshu and Moon Knight.

The episode ends with Ammit trapped inside Arthur Harrow’s body: alive, but locked away, and bonded to Harrow such that if he dies she would too. It’s not clear what happens to him next… until the post-credits scene.

What happened in the post-credits scene?

Moon Knight has one post-credits scene (or midcredits scene, arguably). It finds a disoriented Harrow committed to the Sienkiewicz Psychiatric Hospital (which is named in reference to Bill Sienkiewicz, an influential artist who’s done a lot work on Moon Knight comics).

Someone – it’s not immediately clear who, we don’t see their face, only that they’re wearing black leather driving gloves – collects Harrow from the hospital, escorting him out of the hospital in a wheelchair. There’s a dead body in the hallway: whoever has come for Harrow has killed someone already.

The man bundles Harrow into the back of a car, and gets into the driver’s seat. Sitting in the back of the car is Khonshu – Harrow taunts him weakly, pointing out that there’s nothing Khonshu can do without an avatar now.

Khonshu, however, is unmoved. He freed Marc and Steven, that’s true – but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have an avatar. “Why would I ever need anybody else,” intones the Egyptian God of Vengeance, “when Marc Spector has no idea how troubled he truly is?”

“Meet my friend Jake Lockley,” continues Khonshu. The driver turns around: Jake Lockley is another facet of Marc and Steven’s personality. He’s the cause of the unexplained violent blackouts – and he’s Khonshu’s new avatar.

“Today is your turn to lose,” says Jake in Spanish, shooting Harrow dead.

Who is Jake Lockley? Has he been hinted at previously?

Moon Knight has something that is a little like dissociative identity disorder (though it’s not necessarily helpful to map fictional character traits onto real-life conditions so directly). This means – in the comics and television series, at least – that Moon Knight has different personalities that aren’t always aware of one another. Or, put another way, it means that Moon Knight’s secret identity doesn’t know he’s a superhero.

In Marvel’s comics, Moon Knight’s ‘main’ identity is Marc Spector, an American mercenary and former CIA operative. His other primary identities include New York taxi driver Jake Lockley, and the billionaire businessman Steven Grant.

In the Disney+ series, Steven Grant has been reinvented as a down-on-his-luck museum employee (probably to cut off any more Batman comparisons), and from what little we see of Jake Lockley it seems his character has been tweaked a bit too.

The main difference is that Jake speaks in Spanish – maybe a broad “I’m walkin’ here!” Noo Yoik accent would’ve been a step too far after Isaac’s Karl Pilkington-inspired take on Steven Grant? Otherwise, though, Jake Lockley – a violent taxi-cab driver – seems basically in line with what you’d expect in his brief appearance here.

Is there going to be a Moon Knight series 2?

Good question. Maybe? The series finale is open-ended, leaving the character in a position where he might well return – indeed, the Jake Lockley post-credits scene almost invites a second series, a cliffhanger that offers a roadmap for what a potential return might look like.

Marvel’s Kevin Feige has been enthusiastic about Moon Knight recurring through the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and in 2019 confirmed plans for the hero to appear on the big screen in Marvel movies, but Oscar Isaac has been less committal – he’s been open about his worries about another big franchise role, describing a long-term contract as a “golden handcuffs” deal, and revealing that he wasn’t actually under contract for a second series of Moon Knight.

Notably, the series was nominated by Marvel for an Emmy in the “Limited Series” category, which is typically just for one-offs – for example, Marvel recently had to withdraw Loki from contention for that award because of a post-credits scene that lined up a second series.

On the other hand, though, these things aren’t as revealing as you’d necessarily think – HBO’s Big Little Lies was nominated for, and won, the Oustanding Limited series Emmy for its first series, having been renewed for a second series after voting had closed. It was controversial, but bending the rules in that way isn’t too unusual these days, so it’s possible Marvel might have one eye on doing the same here.

In theory, the fact that Khonshu can and does take on different avatars means it’d be possible for Moon Knight to return without Oscar Isaac as Marc Spector – but equally, that post-credits scene with Jake Lockley certainly suggests that they’ve got something planned with Isaac in the role.

Moon Knight is available on Disney+ now.