7

In a previous question, I asked about why many extra-terrestrials in the MCU seemed familiar with humans, even though Earth hadn't yet had a space faring civilization, and wondered about the origin of some of the human appearing characters (e.g. Stakar, Aleta Ogord, and other Ravagers...). The response (which made sense) was:

  • A few stray humans (Peter Quill, Carol Danvers,...), along with the fact that the Kree had been to Earth several times were enough for the Galaxy to be aware of humans.

  • The human appearing characters I mentioned were all humanoid, not human.

Since the time, I posted that question, I re-watched The Avengers, and I noticed one very small detail:

At the very beginning of the movie, when The Other is explaining to Thanos that they have located the Tesseract and how they plan to retrieve it, it is located on "a human world." Not "the human world," "a human world" – implying that there are other human worlds besides Earth.

This seems to contradict the earlier response, and I am wondering if there is anything in the Marvel canon (since there are no additional details in the MCU itself) that can clarify whether in fact there were other humans in the galaxy besides the humans of Earth?

To specify the questions:

  • Is there anything in the extended Marvel canon that indicates that there are multiple human worlds, and not just Earth? Is there any evidence of some sort of Panspermia, or that humans migrated to Earth from other worlds?

  • Or did The Other just mean "humanoid" not human, since from other species perspectives the other humanoids are still more or less in the same category as humans compared to Thanos, Drax, the Chitauri, etc...?

4
  • 1
    “Earth hadn't yet had a space faring civilization” — that we know of. Commented Apr 22, 2020 at 1:31
  • 1
    Since it seems unlikely that they're speaking English, perhaps this is just an artifact of "translation"?
    – DavidW
    Commented Apr 22, 2020 at 3:00
  • I just took it to be a casual, non-scientific, classification. "A world of bilaterally symmetrical, bipedal mammals" sort of thing. I wager that Xandar, Gamora's homeworld, Drax's homeworld, and others we've seen would all be lumped as "a human world". As opposed to "an insectoid world" or "a reptilian world"
    – Blaze
    Commented Jul 7, 2020 at 23:59
  • @Blaze The analogue for "insectoid" or "reptilian" would be "humanoid" not "human".
    – T.J.L.
    Commented Jul 8, 2020 at 18:22

1 Answer 1

7

In the comics, Earth-616, there are many different origins given to humankind. However, they all seem to have the same thing in common: humans are specific to Earth but there are other humanoid races. For example, the Xorrians claimed to have created humans, Skrull, Kree, etc.

The Xorrians claim they created humanoids
Thor Vol. 1 Issue 215

The same thing seems to hold true in the MCU, we only ever see Humans of Earth, every other "human" is actually just humanoid, for example, the Xandarians. So when The Other states "a human world" it is likely a translation error in what we are seeing on screen, a mistake made by The Other or an out of universe mistake by the writers. He either meant "the" or "humanoid" instead from the evidence we have at the moment.

It's worth pointing out that The Other doesn't seem to be the best with grammar or even really care for it. A simple mistake, which is probably quite a common one (I would probably say a), isn't exactly out of the realms of possibility here.

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.