Disney Plus’ Ironheart is an underwhelming series for many reasons. It’s tonally inconsistent, zipping between whimsical singalongs and somber sequences tracking the long-term impact of gun violence. Like so many MCU shows, it’s more concerned with setting up the next part of the franchise than telling a satisfying standalone story. Its biggest fight scene takes place in a White Castle, reducing the impact with egregious product placement. But in the finale, it introduces an entirely new set of problems, demonstrating that the whole series has been riding on a twist that fails to land.

[Ed. note: Major spoilers ahead for the ending of Ironheart.]

In many ways, Ironheart follows the classic trajectory for a Marvel Cinematic Universe origin story. Mechanical genius Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne) hits a low point when she realizes she was wrong to trust charismatic thief Parker Robbins, aka The Hood (Anthony Ramos), whose allies nearly kill her, and destroy the Iron Man-style suit she worked so hard to build. Yet she’s lifted back up by the love of her friends and family, who help her rebuild and defeat The Hood in a fight that uses too much mediocre CGI.

But instead of being invited to join the Young Avengers, Riri gets a different sort of proposal. The Hood’s patron, Mephisto (Sacha Baron Cohen), offers Riri the chance to resurrect her best friend Natalie (Lyric Ross), who was killed in a drive-by shooting, accidentally resurrected as an AI, then unintentionally deleted when Riri powered her newest suit with magic. Even after seeing how poorly Parker’s deal with the devil turned out, Riri........

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