The newest phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe hasn’t been shy about addressing trauma. WandaVision is an exploration of Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) going through the stages of grief; Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings addresses family trauma and the lasting effects of loss. Marvel Studios is pushing their characters to face the pains of life, and their latest series, Moon Knight, is no exception. Oscar Isaac plays Marc Spector, a man with dissociative identity disorder, and in the series’ fifth episode “Asylum,” he and his other persona, Steven, confront the traumas of their life during a trip to the afterlife.

What do we do to cope with the pain and horrors of life? For the Scarlet Witch, she took a suburban town hostage to live out her sitcom fantasy with Vision (Paul Bettany). For Marc’s mother, Wendy Spector (Fernanda Andrade), she turns to alcohol to drown out the loss of her son. For Marc himself, he runs from his past and ultimately separates himself entirely through the alter of Steven Grant. The brain is a fascinating organ of the body— it protects us in ways we can’t fathom, and for Marc Spector, it shields him through the creation of another identity. However, try as you might, the body can’t forget trauma. His memories are buried deep within his brain, as evidenced by Marc’s version of the afterlife.

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Image via Disney+

After being shot by Arthur Harrow (Ethan Hawke) in Episode 4’s “The Tomb,” Marc and Steven find themselves in the Duat, the Egyptian underworld. Because the human mind can’t comprehend the true nature of the Duat, Marc perceives this realm as a psych ward, where each room stores a different memory. Taweret (Antonia Salib), the goddess of women and children and a guide of the afterlife, escorts them through their journey and weighs their hearts to see if they can enter the Field of Reeds. However, their hearts are incomplete, unable to allow the Scales of Justice to balance with the Feather of Truth.

When Taweret tells Marc and Steven they need to balance their scales, she suggests that they look back at their memories and sort out the mess in order to make their hearts whole. Where Marc is reluctant to look back on his life, it’s Steven who has the natural curiosity to discover what Marc has been hiding. Steven needs to see it though; he has to face the truth in order to know why there’s a constant battle for control in them. Marc and Steven need each other to sort through their lives together. Marc is resistant to revisit any part of his life, which holds them back from balancing the scales; as Steven pushes for answers, Marc has bigger reactions to reflecting on different memories. After locking Marc out of one of the memory rooms, Steven discovers Marc’s backstory– how he had a younger brother, Randall (Claudio Fabian Contreras), who drowned while the two were playing in a cave together. Marc’s mother is distraught and resentful towards Marc; she blames him for Randall’s death and in turn, Marc internalizes that. Her resentment turns into abuse, so in order to protect himself from his mom and his own pain, Steven was created.

Steven also learns the origin story of Khonshu (F. Murray Abraham) and Moon Knight, witnessing Khonshu’s intervention before Marc attempts to take his own life. Watching the scene objectively, Steven has a decent separation from Marc, and he can see how Khonshu manipulated a dying Marc Spector to become his Moon Knight. Marc was in a dire situation and Khonshu used this to his advantage. Khonshu offered him a chance to keep living and be what he’s always been– a killer. He believes he killed his brother, but when Marc and Steven enter the cafeteria filled with the corpses of Marc’s victims, Randall is the only one very much alive; in fact, he runs into the room where the memory of death is kept and Steven runs after him.

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Image Via Disney+

Steven never experiences the abuse Marc endured, but he’s removed enough to see that all Marc really needed was to be told that his brother’s death wasn’t his fault. Marc didn’t get the chance to mourn that loss or have his parents guide him through this. He could only depend on himself, which he found the strength to do through dissociation. What Marc as a child needed was empathy, and Steven is the one to give that to him. By Steven looking Marc in the eyes and telling him that Randall’s death wasn’t his fault, that he was just a kid, the broken pieces in Marc start to heal.

In discovering Marc’s backstory, Steven learns his own origin story — he is the manifestation of his and his brother’s favorite movie character, a British archeologist who went on adventures (the MCU’s own Indiana Jones). Steven was never the primary identity, and that comes with its own reality check for him. However, the bigger bombshell for Steven is learning that his mother is dead, which is the reason why Steven has been in control for a while. Up until this episode, Steven was under the impression he spoke with his mother every day on the phone, that they had a great relationship. By being pushed by Dr. Harrow, Steven comes face to face with this truth, and he’s devastated by it.

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Image via Disney+

Steven facing his own reality is just as important as Marc facing his past. Immediately after letting his mother’s death sink in, he visits the memory where Marc is too distraught to go to his mom’s shiva. He witnesses how Marc’s pain consumes him to the point of switching to Steven. By not running away from the trauma of Marc’s relationship with his mom, Steven has the opportunity to care for Marc in the way he always needed. This also helps Steven see how Marc is part of him too. When the dead of the Duat come to claim Marc and Steven, Marc naturally begins to fight back. Out of the two, Steven isn’t the fighter, but after his own journey of exploring his shared past with Marc, he realizes that he’s also a fighter. Steven courageously steps up and fights back, saving Marc from falling into the sands of the underworld. In doing so, he falls in and becomes one of the many frozen bodies of the Duat. Steven’s last act in this episode is embracing all of himself and Marc to make Marc’s heart balance the Scales of Justice.

Steven Grant is how Marc’s younger brother, Randall, gets to live on. He’s everything innocent and pure, what Marc longed for his life to be. Randall never got to see Marc face the grief-driven wrath of his mother. He never got to know the pains of being so disconnected from your family that you can’t bear to walk into your mom’s shiva. When that pain comes for Marc, that’s when Steven emerges. He protects his other self from just drowning in the pain, like one brother stepping up for the other. The fictional Steven Grant was a hero Marc and Randall aspired to; the Steven Grant identity gets to be Marc’s hero. He saves Marc from the trauma he’s endured, he helps Marc face his trauma with empathy, and he ultimately saves Marc from being lost in the sands of the underworld.