{"id":7241,"date":"2025-08-29T13:28:42","date_gmt":"2025-08-29T18:28:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/comicphilosophy.com\/?p=7241"},"modified":"2026-04-27T21:42:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T02:42:14","slug":"moon-knight-ethics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/comicphilosophy.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/29\/moon-knight-ethics\/","title":{"rendered":"Moon Knight Ethics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Let me cut right to it. I know<\/strong> Khonshu is unworthy of my worship or anyone’s. I know<\/strong> he tried to take over the world. I know<\/strong> he deserves to be imprisoned wherever the Aesir are keeping him, off in Asgard. But unworthy or not, I am his fist.<\/strong> I am the high priest<\/strong> of a god I am estranged<\/strong> from.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr. Knight, Moon Knight Vol 9, issue #1, by Jed MacKay<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I’ve been looking forward to this overview for a while now, as I’m a big fan of Jed MacKay<\/a>‘s current run of Marvel’s Moon Knight character. And I am clearly not alone – he recently passed the 50 consecutive issue mark, which is exceedingly rare in the modern comic world. That issue (Moon Knight: Fist of Khonshu<\/em> Vol 1, issue #10, 2025) just happened to be the 250th issue of Moon Knight by the Marvel legacy numbering system – in this 50th year for the character. That means that over the last four years, MacKay has written a full fifth of all the main Moon Knight stories (but in less than one twelfth of the character’s history). Clearly, he is on to something!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Exploring the moral philosophy of Moon Knight is also an opportunity to consider some less common normative ethics, especially on the deontological side – namely, divine command theory and retributive justice. The former is very rare in comics, and the latter is more commonly found among anti-heroes or villains. I will argue that Moon Knight does not fall into that category – but he isn’t your typical superhero either. In fact, he some may argue (including Moon Knight himself!) that he really isn’t a superhero at all, since he doesn’t have super-powers. Unless of course you want to count not dying as a super-power (which, it kinda is).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One reason I have held off until now is that the character’s history is complex, with lots of retcons<\/a>, revisions, and sometimes outright dismissals of earlier stories. The other reason relates to why that history is so muddled – the sensitive issue of mental health, which not all creators have known what to do with. As I have previously observed in my Doctor Strange<\/a> and Clea<\/a> ethics overviews, MacKay is particularly adept at rescuing characters with troubled or inconsistent histories, and weaving it all into a modern form that just works<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This overview is going to be a lengthy one, so you could skip the early comic<\/a> and modern comic<\/a> histories below if you aren’t interested, as I will reiterate the main points later in my section on MacKay<\/a>‘s run of Moon Knight. Of course, a big point of this article is to explain the ethics<\/a> (moral philosophy) of this highly unusual character at the end. And I have a final extra section on the science of mental health<\/a>, if you are interested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As always, if you would like to know more about the terms I’m using on this site, please follow the links throughout or check out my Ethics 101<\/a> page or Glossary<\/a> post.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Character introduction<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

The first appearance of Moon Knight was in Werewolf by Night<\/em> Vol 1, issues #32-33, 1975, created by Doug Moench<\/a> and Don Perlin<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n

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As the above opening panel illustrates, this was a different type of character originally (“the stalker called Moon Knight”). Here, “Mark” Spector was simply a mercenary who would take jobs-for-hire from unsavory characters, including the shadowy villains of this series (“The Committee”).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of note, these older Moon Knight stories – up to and including the fist issue of Moon Knight <\/em>Vol 1 in 1980 – portray certain cultures (and members of society) in very stereotypical terms that are painful to read. They also all have the following warning message on the Marvel Unlimited<\/a> site:<\/p>\n\n\n

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Although I don’t think they are explicitly referring to the depiction of Marc’s mental illness in these comics, that could also be covered in the broad message above too. Let’s dig in …<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Early comics<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

We get a proper introduction to the character in Marvel Spotlight<\/em> Vol 1, issue #28, 1976, again by Doug Moench<\/a> and Don Perlin<\/a>. Now, Moon Knight is “Marc” Spector, a self-styled vigilante. Moon Knight’s (slightly revised) history and background are explained in a series of expository panels by a henchman of this series’ villain (a very Bond-like Blofeld character, only with rats instead of cats):<\/p>\n\n\n

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This is also where his multiple identities are first described – with Steven Grant specifically named below:<\/p>\n\n\n

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This is also the first indication that these identities may not be conscious alternate identities, but some sort of “lunacy” (groan). Later in this issue, we are introduced to the now-named cab-driver identity, Jake Lockley:<\/p>\n\n\n

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Although Marc’s personality shifts considerably, it still isn’t entirely clear if he is putting on a role or has literally “switched” identities involuntarily (although the later is implied). This next series of panels seems to clear that up though, when millionaire Steven Grant has to switch into Moon Knight at a party:<\/p>\n\n\n

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Use of the term “schizo” (presumably for schizophrenia) strongly implies an intended mental illness at play in terms of these various personas. These panels also indicate that he gets his powers from the moon, which hadn’t been established previously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I suspect Moench was going for a “multiple personality” type illness for Moon Knight, along the lines of the popular American TV movie Sybil<\/em> that was released later that same year (based on the 1973 book of the same name by Flora Schreiber). This movie, along with the earlier film The Three Faces of Eve<\/em> (with a book of the same name by Corbett Thigpen and Hervey Cleckley) were considered to be based on true cases, and cemented the idea of “Multiple Personality Disorder” in American popular culture. But the research behind these cases was flawed, as briefly described here for the fraudulent case of the Sybil <\/a><\/em>book<\/a>. Scroll down or jump to my Moon Knight mental health<\/a> section at the end for an explanation of this mental disorder (which was renamed Dissociative Identity Disorder – DID – in the 1990s).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Moon Knight character makes a few guest appearances in the Defenders and Spider-Man stories of this era, before being somewhat rebooted with the launch of his own title: Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 1, issue #1, 1980, by Doug Moench and Bill Sienkiewicz<\/a>. Sienkiewicz’ moody and action-oriented art style proved to be very popular with fans – it is still often alluded to today as particularly emblematic for the Moon Knight character.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This series started with a new, more-detailed origin story, where mercenary Marc Spector (who seems like a pretty decent person, under the circumstances) died on a mission in Egypt, and was miraculously reborn at the foot of a statue of Khonshu, to become the “moon’s Knight of Vengeance”:<\/p>\n\n\n

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It was soon explained to the reader who his allies were – and his two specific alternate identities:<\/p>\n\n\n

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Note there is nothing in this issue to explicitly suggest he was mentally ill. But the theme that these alternate identities were not under his conscious control quickly resurfaced in this series. Eventually, they were referred to “alters”, using the same language as the Sybil<\/em> story and movie. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a few years, Alan Zelenetz<\/a> took over the title (having recently departed Thor<\/a>), and his first action was to try and stabilize the character around the Steven Grant identity. I was a big fan of Doctor Strange<\/a> in this era, so I couldn’t miss his first appearance in the first issue of Zelenetz’ run, Moon Knight <\/em>Vol 1, issue #36, 1984, by Zelenetz and Bo Hampton<\/a>. Here, Steven attempted to deny his previous reincarnation by Khonshu:<\/p>\n\n\n

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Doctor Strange (as an established magical authority) is thus a useful vehicle for Zelenetz to officially clarify Moon Knight’s relationship to Khonshu:<\/p>\n\n\n

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In the end, it seemed as if Moon Knight would continue as the “complete man” Stephen Grant:<\/p>\n\n\n

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This struck me at the time as a very sensible move for Zelenetz. So, I’m not sure why this didn’t stick – for some reason, Zelenetz soon relented, and he became Marc Spector again a few issues later – just in time for Zelenetz’ relaunched new series Moon Knight <\/em>Vol 2, 1985 (which only ran for six issues). From issue #1, by Zelenetz, Chris Warner<\/a> and E.R. Cruz<\/a>, which seemed to imply that Grant was just a phase in Moon Knight’s evolution:<\/p>\n\n\n

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Here, Zelenetz fully leaned into the mysticism aspects of Moon Knight, with some magical artifact upgrades in this issue (although is it just me, or does he also look more like a WWE wrestler now?):<\/p>\n\n\n

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Also, I believe this is the first time he has been referred to as the “Fist of Khonshu”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once this series ended, we didn’t see Moon Knight for a couple of years until he joined the West Coast Avengers (1987). This is followed a couple of years later with a new longer-running series: Marc Spector: Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 1, issues #1-60, 1989\u20131994, initially by Chuck Dixon<\/a> and Sal Velluto<\/a>. I guess they really wanted the Marc Spector name to stick!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During these years, he seemed to be a more traditional character, based simply on Marc Spector (I didn’t notice any mention of the other two identities). This series did introduce Marc’s brother Randall, who fights against Marc as the ShadowKnight<\/a>. Marc dies at the end of this series, but was resurrected four years later in a limited series, Moon Knight <\/em>Vol 3, issues #1-4, 1998, by character co-creator Doug Moench<\/a> with Tommy Lee Edwards<\/a>. In this series Moench reestablished his earlier “multiple personality” version of the Moon Knight character (sigh).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was a follow up limited series, Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 4, issues #1-4, 1999, by Moench and Mark Texeira<\/a>. But after that, Moon Knight had another extended slow period where he turned up in the Marvel Knights<\/em> series (2000-2001) and as a guest character here and there in other series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Modern comics<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Moon Knight didn’t get his own series again until Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 5, issues #1-30, 2006-2009, initially by Charlie Huston<\/a> and David Finch<\/a>. This series was very different in tone and style. It quickly ventured into gruesome, body horror-like territory, with a very physically and psychologically damaged Marc trying to regain his status. It was also revealed that Khonshu had been working behind the scenes to further torture Marc – in hopes of driving him to further extremes in his service as Khonshu’s instrument of vengeance. This series was significant as it first showed Khonshu as an explicit presence in Marc’s life (and painted him in a very negative light at that).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This series was restarted (with a continuing story line) as Vengeance of the Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 1, issues #1-10, 2009-2010, by Gregg Hurwitz<\/a> and Jerome Ope\u00f1a<\/a>. This series further expanded on Khonshu being an explicitly malign force within Marc, and one that his alternate identities (specifically Jake) were trying to push away from. From the issue #2 opening title page, which summed up the current situation well:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As Moon Knight, Spector prowls the night, meeting out brutal justice to those would prey on the innocent. But years of trauma have left Spector mentally unstable and he is haunted by visions of Khonshu, begging him to become the killer he once was. Now it’s up to his few friends and his on-again\/off-again lover Marlene to remind him of his innate humanity and to pull him back from the brink of madness …<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Eventually, this series ended with Marc stabilizing somewhat, and becoming a Secret Avenger, during Brian Michael Bendis<\/a>‘ Avengers run and Siege<\/a> cross-over event. However, Hurwitz and Bong Dazo<\/a> then took the character for a 3-issue limited series (Shadowlands: Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 1, 2010). In this series, a possessed Daredevil sicked the ShadowKnight (Marc’s bother Randall) on Marc. Marc had to enlist Khonshu’s help in trying to stop his brother but was forced by events to kill Randall instead – dealing another blow to his mental health.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this point, Bendis took over the character for an extended Avenger-era period in Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 6, issues #1-12, 2011-2012, written by Bendis, with art by Alex Maleev<\/a>. These stories (mercifully) focused on Marc simply being an Avenger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a brief pause, Moon Knight returned in a significant series, Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 7, issues #1-17, by Warren Ellis<\/a> and Declan Shalvey<\/a>. The first story arc featured the first appearance of the Mr. Knight persona, and reframed his complicated relationship with Khonshu (and other alternate identities). It began with this opening series introduction:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Mercenary Marc Spector died in Egypt, under a statue of the ancient deity Khonshu. He returned to life in the shadow of the moon god, and wore his aspect to fight crime for his own redemption. He went completely insane, and disappeared. This is what happened next.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Ok, that was a pretty blunt way to put it! Marc was seeing a psychotherapist in this series, who quickly concluded in the first issue that Marc didn’t have DID. From issue #1:<\/p>\n\n\n

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This was a new twist – and a very welcome one from my perspective. So, in this new retelling, Marc was actually suffering from brain damage from his exposure to Khonshu. The psychotherapist goes on to explain that as Marc cycled through the (newly defined) four aspects of Khonshu (Pathfinder, Embracer, Defender, and Watcher of overnight Travelers), his mind responded by creating explanations in the form of new identities. This is probably the best way to integrate a dissociative identity disorder into the character (jump or scroll down to the section on Moon Knight’s mental health<\/a> for more info on DID).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This series also had a great second story arc (issues #7-12, 2014-15) by Brian Wood<\/a> and Greg Smallwood<\/a>. Marc’s psychotherapist was revealed to be Elisa Warsame (with a complicated family history to Marc’s past life as a mercenary). Warsame betrayed Marc and succeeded in “stealing” Khonshu away from him for a while. Marc recovered himself – and Khonshu – and stopped Warsame. From issue #12:<\/p>\n\n\n

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This story put Marc back on the path as the official Fist of Khonshu – and, I would argue, represented the true modern origin for the character (and later, the jumping off point<\/a> for Jed MacKay). The series ended with a third story arc by Cullen Bunn<\/a> and Ron Ackins<\/a>, ending at issue #17.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not much happened until a … distinctive … new series came along a year later – which blew everything up again. Moon Knight <\/em>Vol 8, issues #1-14, 2016-2017, by Jeff Lemire<\/a> and Greg Smallwood<\/a>, began with Marc finding himself in a mental hospital, unclear of what was real and what wasn’t. Events get increasingly surreal across the first story arc. By the second story arc, you can see how the previous series’ opening description had changed (from Vol 8, issue #10):<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Mercenary Marc Spector died in Egypt under a statue of the moon god Khonshu. In the shadow of the ancient diety, Marc returned to life and took on Khonshu’s aspect to fight crime for his own redemption. In time, the many different identities he had carefully maintained began to slip out of his control … and so did his grip on reality itself.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Despite a successful resolution to Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 7, this new Vol 8 series basically showed Marc as being unable to distinguish delusion from reality, and he became a completely unreliable narrator of his own life. In this retelling, Khonshu had also visited Marc far earlier in his life, claiming to be Marc’s true “progenitor”. But this series did show Marc being at odds with Khonshu, and attempting to resist his influence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don’t have much more to say about this series – in part because I don’t think it was a helpful addition to the canon, but also because everything that happened was immediately retconned when a new team took over. Coinciding with the return to the Marvel Legacy numbering, the new Moon Knight<\/em> Vol 8, issues #188-200, 2018, by Max Bemis<\/a> and Jacen Burrows<\/a> upended everything, with the entire previous run wiped out as Marc being simply delusional. Here is a quote from Bemis on the subject:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Everything in the last arc took place in Marc\u2019s head or as an abstraction. Reconciling his illness left Marc able to reappropriate Khonshu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n