![]() ![]() ![]() In order for a character’s death to count as an example of it, they must be female and their death must only serve to advance a male character’s story (if it does that but also serves a purpose for a woman’s arc - including the one dying - it doesn’t count). The story from which fridging got its name was far from the first example of the trope it’s been going on in storytelling for years. The name actually refers to another story from the world of superheroes, a 1994 Green Lantern comic tale in which the titular character’s girlfriend, Alexandra DeWitt, is murdered by the villainous Major Force, who subsequently stuffs her corpse into a refrigerator. The term fridging is shorthand for “women in refrigerators," a trope referring to a female character being killed purely for the sake of furthering a male character’s arc. With that, Maria was the latest in a relatively long line of MCU characters to become a victim of “fridging." The History of Fridging Explained DC Comics Her purpose in the show is purely for Nick Fury’s character arc she warns him that danger could be ahead if he didn’t stay on top of his game and is proven right about this at the end of the first episode when she is shot and killed by a Skrull disguised as Fury himself. When Smulders was confirmed to be returning as Hill for Secret Invasion, it seemed like the character might finally get some long-overdue development. Her biggest role after The Avengers is in Spider-Man: Far From Home helping out Peter Parker, only for the film’s post-credits scene to reveal that she was, in fact, a Skrull (Soren, who is the wife of Talos and is killed off-screen before the events of Secret Invasion, to be precise) for presumably the entire movie. She shows up in all of the Avengers movies, teases the heroes at a party in Age of Ultron, gets Blipped by Thanos in Infinity War, and attends Tony Stark’s funeral in Endgame. Up until Secret Invasion, the first Avengers film remained Maria Hill’s most prominent appearance in the MCU apart from Agents of SHIELD. She doesn’t get much to do in terms of action scenes either (those are mainly reserved for the titular Avengers), but seeing as there were so few female characters in the MCU up to that point other than Black Widow and a handful of love interests for the male heroes, it was nice to see her involved in the Battle of New York, even if it wasn’t on the frontlines. In the movie, audiences see her working for SHIELD, mainly interacting with Nick Fury and delivering expository dialogue. Maria Hill, played by Cobie Smulders, first appeared in The Avengers back in 2012. The Life & Death of Maria Hill Marvel Studios However, the franchise still has some work to do when it comes to its use of women, as evidenced by how Secret Invasion handled the return of Agent Maria Hill. While the Infinity Saga had few female leads, the Multiverse Saga has given characters like the Scarlet Witch the spotlight and introduced many new ones like Yelena Belova and Kamala Khan. Marvel Studios’ Multiverse Saga has been quite the departure from its Infinity Saga, and one change that it has brought upon the Marvel Cinematic Universe is featuring women more prominently, both on- and off-screen. ![]()
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