Eternals: Why The Avengers Owe A Huge Debt To Phastos

Warning: SPOILERS for Eternals!

All the main characters in Eternals were essential to the development of human society in the MCU, but Phastos was by far the most influential Eternal for the Earth, and especially, for the Avengers. Before Eternals, the Marvel Cinematic Universe had featured a fictional version of Earth with almost the same history as its real-life counterpart. The biggest differences used to date back to World War II with the rise of HYDRA and the creation of the Super Soldiers. Later on, the origin stories of powerful superheroes like Captain Marvel, Iron Man, and Hulk dramatically changed the world near the beginning of the 21st Century,

Eternals has instead revealed that Earth’s history has been completely different since the very beginning. Millions of years ago, the Celestials placed Tiamut inside the Earth’s core and ordered the Eternals to help humans evolve until the world had enough energy for the sleeping Celestial to emerge. Therefore, the Eternals are ultimately the ones responsible for humanity’s biggest achievements. For instance, Sersi introduced agriculture and Phastos introduced revolutionary inventions like the plow.

While all of the Eternals secretly played an important role in human society, the whole world owes its technological prowess to Phastos. What’s more, most of the Avengers wouldn’t have their powers without the creative Eternal. For instance, Tony Stark was the only supergenius who could create his Iron Man technology, but the resources he used can be dated back to Phastos. The same can be said of SHIELD’s Project Rebirth, which produced Super Soldiers like Captain America and inspired replicas like the Winter Soldier and Hulk. In fact, Phastos’ influence on Earth’s technological advancements paved the way for both Ant-Men and both Wasps, Vision, Falcon, the Black Widows’ suits and training, SHIELD, SWORD, Spider-Man and his villains, Black Panther, and even the Maximoff Twins, whose powers were awakened by HYDRA’s experiments on the Time Stone. Regardless of how much effort went into the innovations that gave them their abilities, all the foundations were carefully introduced by Phastos.

Eternals showed that Phastos was eager to introduce inventions like the steam engine since ancient times, but he just wasn’t allowed by Ajak and the rest of the Eternals. His ideas were so well thought out that he could have created Iron Man thousands of years ago, but he simply was ahead of his time. This makes the Avengers’ victory over Thanos seem much more miraculous, as everything really had to happen the way it did, not only since Tony Stark became Iron Man but also since the Eternals arrived on Earth. Phastos’ management of Earth’s technology caused a chain reaction that went from Howard Stark’s role in Captain America’s transformation, which led to Bruce Banner’s failed experiment, as well as Tony Stark’s invention of the arc reactor that powered Iron Man, which also led to War Machine, Vision, and Ultron — and all of it happened in just the right order to allow the Avengers to assemble at the right time.

Phastos was understandably shaken by the catastrophic side effects his powers had on the world. Eternals featured Phastos reacting to Hiroshima, a tragedy that he says wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t provided humans with the technology to do it. The Eternals seem to hold the Avengers in high regard, so it is odd that Phastos’ influence on Earth’s Mightiest Heroes isn’t acknowledged. Unlimited energy, time travel, interdimensional travel, and a wide assortment of powerful superheroes aren’t feats that could be overlooked so easily.

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