'Ms. Marvel's Mehwish Hayat Talks Possibility of Clandestines Spinoff, Muslim Representation
After wrapping up the groundbreaking first season of Ms. Marvel on Disney+ last week, there are still plenty more questions surrounding 16-year-old Muslim superhero Kamala Khan's origins and powers. But one of the most surprising twists highlighted in the series opposing comic book lore is her relation to the Clandestines through great-grandmother Aisha — played by award-winning Pakistani actress Mehwish Hayat. While the Clandestines work hard to keep their secrets hidden from humans, the family line of elusive and powerful immortal beings from the Noor Dimension still holds plenty of wonder for a potential spinoff or prequel series.
But could it ever happen if the Marvel Cinematic Universe wanted to expand the mythology of Ms. Marvel further through these characters mistakenly referred to as Djinn, adapted from Arabic and Islamic lore? In an exclusive with PopCulture.com host Tania Hussain about the series, Hayat spoke about the show's strength rooted in authentic representation while weighing in on how a Clandestines spinoff prequel would be a great idea — though, in all transparency, she is not confirming any such production nor her part in it. But Hayat would love to see Aisha's backstory develop further in light of her finding the bangle off a possible severed Kree wrist.
"First of all, I don't know about it, obviously, if there is going to be a prequel or something, I hope there is. But there were a lot of questions that were left unanswered, like, 'What were we doing? Why were we not being able to go back home? Why were we stuck in that place where we were as Clandestines?' And Waleed [Farhan Akhtar] knows Aisha, when he meets Kamala, he says, 'Oh, your great-grandmother's stories of a legend.' How do they know each other? What happened? Exactly, how did they come in contact?" Hayat told PopCulture exclusively. "Also the fact that, when Aisha says, 'This bangle is not going to work, it's not going to work,' so how did she know that it's not going to work? And the fact that she decided to stay there with the family, but also she did not probably want the bangle to — because obviously, it was going to destroy the whole world."
