Although 2008’s Iron Man largely functioned as a standalone superhero movie, it was through Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury in the post-credits scene that we got our first major taste of the expansive mythology the Marvel Cinematic Universe intended to deliver to the public. And just like his Earth-616 and Ultimate Universe counterparts in their respective realities, Jackson’s Fury has become an integral character to the MCU mythology. Disney+ subscribers most recently saw the one-eyed character in the Secret Invasion series, and he’ll be back on the big screen in November for The Marvels.
With 12 appearances under his belt at the time of this writing (sorry, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. fans, I’m not counting the ABC series due to its questionable placement in the main MCU canon), there are a lot to keep track of concerning Nick Fury in the superhero franchise. That’s why I’ve put together this timeline breaking down the biggest events from the spy’s life, presented in the MCU’s chronological order rather than the order in which these projects were released. As such, we’re kicking things off with Captain Marvel.
Nick Fury Meets Carol Danvers And Loses His Eye
When Nick Fury met Carol Danvers in 1995, he’d spent the past six years at S.H.I.E.L.D. mainly working behind a desk. Once the superpowered woman came into his life though, he took his first steps towards becoming a more integral figure in the intelligence agency, as his experience with her, the Skrulls and the Kree made him realize that one day a team would be needed to protect Earth from intergalactic threats. The one downside to Fury’s adventure with Carol is Goose the Flerken slashed his left eye and permanently blinded it, but since he never divulged how this injury happened to Coulson and other S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, it would help strengthen the air of mystery surrounding him in the coming years.
Nick Fury Sets Up A Deal With The Skrulls
Although Carol Danvers left Earth with the Skrulls at the end of Captain Marvel to find them a new homeworld, this proved to be a more challenging endeavor than expected. By 1997, Talos and many of his fellow shapeshifting aliens came back to Earth, and Nick Fury promised to help Carol find the Skrulls a new planet in exchange for them working as his spy network to help keep Earth safe. Their aid helped Fury rise more quickly through the S.H.I.E.L.D. ranks, but one of those first recruits was Gravik, who would go on to become one of the spy’s greatest enemies, but more on that later.
Nick Fury Meets Varra, And They Eventually Marry
A year after the Skrull spy network formed, Nick Fury first crossed paths Varra, who’d disguised herself as the late Priscilla Davis. At first their relationship was strictly professional, with Varra giving Fury intel on the Red Room’s Dreykov (whom we saw in Black Widow), but as the years passed, they developed a romantic connection. Sometime after the events of The Avengers, Fury and Varra married and set up a home together in London, but Fury kept the marriage a secret. The two of them were also frequently apart due to their espionage activities.
Nick Fury Becomes Director Of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Although this wasn’t depicted onscreen in the MCU, it’s an important enough event in Fury’s life to mention. Sometime between Captain Marvel and Iron Man (likely the early 2000s), Samuel L. Jackson’s character became the Deputy Chief of a S.H.I.E.L.D station in Bogotá, and one day, members of the National Liberation Army took some political officers hostage, including the daughter of his superior officer, Alexander Pierce. While Pierce wanted to negotiate with the Army and forbid Fury from taking any action, Fury ignored those orders and successfully rescued the hostages. This impressed Pierce enough that he named Fury as S.H.I.E.L.D.’s new director when he became a member of the World Security Council.
Nick Fury Tells Tony Stark About The Avengers Initiative
After defeating Obadiah Stane, a.k.a. Iron Monger, and revealing to the public that he was Iron Man, Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark capped off his first solo movie by meeting Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury (which didn’t take long to shoot). The director of S.H.I.E.L.D. snuck into Stark’s mansion to inform him about the Avengers Initiative, which, as was later revealed in Captain Marvel, was named after Carol Danvers’ call sign in the Air Force. However, as we learned in Iron Man 2, Stark had no interest in joining Fury’s “super secret boy band.”
Nick Fury Sends Natasha Romanoff To Spy On Tony Stark
Since Tony Stark wasn’t interested in the Avengers Initiative, Nick Fury tasked Natasha Romanoff, a.k.a. the first Black Widow, in Iron Man 2 to infiltrate Stark Industries as Natalie Rushman a few months later so she could keep tabs on the industrialist. That proved to be a wise decision, as Stark’s palladium poisoning, his fight with Ivan Vanko and his drunken and destructive actions at his birthday party necessitated that Fury get involved. After informing him about his connection to Howard Stark and shedding light on Vanko’s past, the S.H.I.E.L.D director left behind some of Howard’s old materials for Tony to figure out how to synthesize a new element for the arc reactor in his chest. Fury then returned to inform Stark that he wasn’t Avengers material, but did agree to have him on retainer as a consultant.
Nick Fury Enlists Erik Selvig To Help Study The Tesseract
With Goose having coughed up the Tesseract in Captain Marvel’s post-credits scene, that left Nick Fury free to bring it back to S.H.I.E.L.D. so it could continue to be studied. Nearly two decades later, after the main events of Thor concluded, Fury recruited Erik Selvig, Jane Foster’s astrophysicist mentor, to the Tesseract’s research team. Unfortunately, he was unaware that Selvig was under Loki’s control.
Nick Fury Informs Steve Rogers About Being Frozen
With Steve Rogers having been frozen in the Arctic for nearly 70 years, Nick Fury thought it would be better to slowly acclimate him to the present day and set him up in a 1940s-looking hospital room so he’d still think he was in his native time. However, the first Captain America saw through the ruse, escaped custody and ended up in the middle of Times Square. Nick Fury arrived soon after and informed the World War II hero in the final seconds of Captain America: The First Avenger how long he’d been asleep.
Nick Fury Forms The Avengers
Following Loki’s arrival on Earth to steal the Tesseract and mind control various S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel, including Erik Selvig and Clint Barton, a.k.a. Hawkeye, Fury finally decided to form the Avengers. However, getting these heroes to collaborate was more difficult than anticipated, especially once Steve Rogers learned that been using the Tesseract research to build weapons like the ones HYDRA had in World War II. Fury was able to use Coulson’s death as the trigger to finally get Earth’s Mightiest Heroes to work together, albeit with some manipulation on his end by deliberately soaking the late agent’s Captain America trading cards in his blood. By the end of The Avengers, Fury willingly allowed Thor to leave Earth with The Tesseract and Loki in his custody.
NIck Fury Is Nearly Killed By HYDRA, Weathers S.H.I.E.L.D. Falling Into Disarray
Captain America: The Winter Soldier rocked the MCU by revealing that S.H.I.E.L.D. had been infiltrated by HYDRA since the beginning, and at first, it seemed like Nick Fury had been killed by the terrorist organization early on into the movie. In reality, he faked his death and later aided Steve Rogers, Natasha Romanoff, Sam Wilson and Maria Hill in stopping Project Insight. For Fury, this meant confronting and ultimately killing Alexander Pierce, who was HYDRA’s leader within S.H.I.E.L.D. In the aftermath of S.H.I.E.LD. falling into disarray, Fury embarked on to take down other HYDRA cells around the world.
Nick Fury Helps Evacuate Sokovia And Set Up The New Avengers Base
After retreating to the Barton farm to collect themselves after facing off against Ultron, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver in Johannesburg, the Avengers met back up with Nick Fury, who helped them fomurlate a plan to stop the robotic menace. During the climactic conflict in Sokovia, he, Maria Hill and other former S.H.I.E.L.D. agents helped out by evacuating civilians using the old Helicarrier. By the end of Avengers: Age of Ultron, Fury was seen helping set up the New Avengers Facility in update New York.
Nick Fury Is Dusted During The Blip
Although he didn’t participate in Avengers: Infinity War’s main events, he did appear in the post-credits scene to witness the Blip before being dusted himself. Before disappearing though, Fury was able to activate the spruced-up pager Carol Danvers had given her decades earlier, which brought her back to Earth, encountering the Avengers and eventually rescuing Tony Stark and Nebula from deep space.
Nick Fury Is Restored, Goes To Tony Stark’s Funeral, Then Heads To Space
Nick Fury was restored to life in Avengers: Endgame when Hulk used the Infinity Stones acquired from the Time Heist to undo the Blip, but he was only seen in Avengers: Endgame attending Tony Stark’s funeral. Then in Spider-Man: Far From Home, it seemed like Fury recruited Peter Parker to help him combat the threat of the Elementals, which was actually a ruse by Mysterio and his team. But by that movie’s post-credits scene, it was revealed that the Fury we’d be following along with was actually the Skrull Talos disguised as the spy, and the real Fury was actually running the S.A.B.E.R. space station, which was filled with Skrulls.
Nick Fury Returns To Earth To Deal With The Skrull Infiltration
Nick Fury returned to Earth in Secret Invasion when Maria Hill called him back to inform him about a rogue Skrull faction led by Gravik. Angry that Fury didn’t follow through on finding his people a new home, Gravik intended to start a war between Russia and the United States, which would lead to him and his Skrull followers taking over Earth. Fury’s efforts to stop Gravik cost him a lot, including the deaths of both Hill and Talos, but with the help of allies like G’iah and Sonya Falsworth, he was able foil Gravik’s plan, although he was disappointed when President Ritson issued a bill declaring all off-word speeches as hostile forces, and promised to eliminate any remaining Skrulls on Earth. Fury then went back to the S.A.B.E.R. station, but this time with Varra by his side to help negotiate a peace summit.
We’ll see Nick Fury reunite with Carol Danvers and share screen time with Monica Rambeau and Kamala Khan when The Marvels hits theaters on November 10. Stay tuned to CinemaBlend for the latest on what’s happening with Samuel L. Jackson’s character amidst our coverage of upcoming Marvel movies and upcoming Marvel TV shows.
