WandaVision: The Series Finale Review

WandaVision "The Series Finale"

A common sentiment among MCU fans for years is that these characters are so strong, hangout stories with no action would be welcomed. WandaVision goes some way toward fulfilling that notion, but in its series finale, action comes crashing through the town of Westview. It's an almost jarring development, seeing so many powered characters exercising their abilities in combat, after so much of the season playing out sitcom tropes. And after the dust settles, "The Series Finale" wraps up the series with a poignant bow.

A lot of magic is exercised and changes hands in the episode. Wanda and Agatha take their magical duels to the skies, and in another pairing of power sets, Wanda's simulacra Vision and the white "sentient weapon" Vision also cut across the sky. Agatha absorbs Wanda's powers to varying degrees, emphasizing her belief that Wanda doesn't deserve her magic. 

But Wanda's magic is galvanized, and she levels up once again. She gains a new costume a little more reminiscent of her comics outfit, and ends up trapping Agatha in the Agnes sitcom character. During the fireworks that make up their witches' battle, Wanda throws a car like in Captain America: Civil War. And for the first time since Avengers: Age of Ultron, Wanda breaks out her old undercranked walk-up mind manipulation! 

Speaking of that movie, the two Visions' Ship of Theseus conversation cannot help but recall the wonderful philosophical discussion between Vision and Ultron in the Sokovian forest. Both Visions are shades and echoes of the original, while still retaining some essence of him. Both wield a mere approximation of the Mind Stone. Wanda's Vision achieves the classic Star Trek victory of using logic kung fu on a computer, and the white Vision flies to parts unknown.

Elsewhere, S.W.O.R.D. director Hayward begins an acquaintance with his comeuppance, after Darcy intercepts him. Her "have fun in prison!" is perfectly in character. As if to give Hayward's villainy a coup de grace, he sees two kids and his first instinct is to shoot them. Some of his bullets are ameliorated by Monica and her new "photonic" powers. As with Luke Cage, there is a loaded quality to a Black superhero with an immunity to bullets.

Monica uncovers that Evan Peters' Pietro is in fact a Westview resident bewitched by Agatha - the plot thickens for mutants coming into the MCU. The townsfolk regain their memories and confront Wanda, which proves quite uncomfortable for them. What is with Disney+ heroes and inadvertent magical choking? First Grogu, and now Wanda. In the aftermath, the people of Westview understandably look at Wanda with resentment, and Wanda and Monica's conversation brings a measure of closure to this disquieting aspect of the show. It's a tearjerking moment when Monica wonders as to the lengths she would go to be with her mother again.

More emotional moments are in store when it comes time for Wanda to say goodbye to Tommy, Billy, and Vision. In a poignant monologue, Vision reflects on the different forms he's taken, which also functions from Paul Bettany's perspective. The "voice without a body", referring to Jarvis, is a reminder of how far Bettany has come in the MCU. 

And WandaVision has come far as a show, in the finest tradition of multi-layered storytelling. The sitcom pastiche is a gimmick, but also one directly springing out of Wanda's childhood nostalgia. That word, nostalgia, means the pain of remembering home. A home that was destroyed by a Stark Industries warhead, always in her thoughts as Wanda built a new home in New Jersey. And now in a new chapter of her life, Wanda's rich story continues as her pain grows alongside her power. And over the course of this season, she has begun to process that pain. 7/10.

Stray observations:

- Time for some Darkhold talk. This "book of the damned" has information on the legendary figure of the Scarlet Witch, including her apparent destiny to destroy the world - whatever that may come to mean. It made its screen debut in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., connected to a Ghost Rider storyline. Later, Wanda is seen isolated in a cabin in a beautiful valley, Edward Norton Bruce Banner style. She's researching the Darkhold, presumably for a possible avenue for her children to live again. Significantly, a strain of Michael Giacchino's Doctor Strange theme plays over Wanda's research, probably setting up their team-up in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. But as to the provenance of the Darkhold, this is an extremely rare occurrence of an element from pre-WandaVision Marvel TV crossing over into the "mainstream" MCU, as opposed to the reverse.

- There are two allusions to The Wizard of Oz. Agatha's boots are seen under the car like she's the Wicked Witch of the East. And the movie theater marquee shows Oz the Great and Powerful playing, featuring Black Widow star Rachel Weisz, as that same Wicked Witch of the East!

- The white Vision's Mind Stone beam is colored blue, to differentiate from the other Vision. This is reminiscent of wight Viserion's blue fire breath in the latter episodes of Game of Thrones.

- The mid-credits scene features a Skrull making contact with Monica, making reference to an "old friend" of Maria Rambeau. That's got to be either Talos or Nick Fury inviting Monica to space.

- Paul Bettany has appeared in the first installment of all four MCU "phases". Iron Man (One), Iron Man 3 (Two), Captain America: Civil War (Three), WandaVision (Four).

WandaVision: Previously on Review

WandaVision "Previously on"

The universe of WandaVision has expanded gradually but surely, and the story begins to culminate by looking backward and filling in vital backstory in "Previously on". It's a tour de force episode that contextualizes the entire series both logistically and emotionally, making for a poignant and powerful episode of essential television viewing.

We open on a slice of backstory not for Wanda, but for Agatha Harkness. Her almost uncontrollable magical talent is showcased in 17th Century Salem when she crosses the line by the standards of her coven. But as Agatha's magic is presented as learned mastery, Wanda's magic is contrasted as not being from any book, any Malleus Maleficarum tone. It comes through pain, and choices born out of trauma.

Agatha guides Wanda to four periods of her life to understand, essentially, the full prelude to the creation of her sitcom version of Westview. First comes a traumatic tour of the moment Wanda and Pietro lost their parents, militant factions using Stark Industries ordnance just as was established in Avengers: Age of Ultron. It had been "TV night" in the Maximoff residence, drawn from their collection of sitcom DVDs. (I have that same edition of I Love Lucy Season 5. It's a great season.)

The family was watching The Dick Van Dyke Show at the moment it was forever torn asunder. So Wanda's recreation in Westview is a return to the comforting moments of her childhood. More than that, the last comforting moment.

Next comes the Hydra experiments that gave Wanda her powers, followed by a bonding scene between Wanda and Vision at Avengers HQ taking place shortly after Age of Ultron. In Wanda's room, she's watching Malcolm in the Middle while bearing the crushing weight of her brother's death, pulling from possibly the very same DVDs her family had in Sokovia. So the episode wonderfully demonstrates how TV was always a part of her life, always there for her, even in the Hydra-occupied castle. It's eminently relatable, like how WandaVision is here for us.

Finally, we see Wanda coming to Westview shortly after a traumatic trip to S.W.O.R.D. HQ and right before the events of the show started, deed in hand for the property where she creates her home with a construct of Vision. (It's a bit tricky to figure out when in the MCU timeline that deed would've been set up.) In the same burst of energy that reconstructs Vision and builds a house, the Westview hex/bubble roars into black and white life. And because of what this episode builds, we deeply understand what's behind this fateful moment, and why a 50s sitcom.

The other flourish of the episode sets up a new perspective on Wanda and her powers. We hear terms like "probability" and "chaos magic", familiar from the comic version of the character, only now spoken of in the MCU. We are given to understand that Wanda was born with powers, and the encounter with the Mind Stone in Loki's Sceptre only strongly enhanced what was already latent.

It's a retcon that may have mutant-shaped implications for the MCU. It's also a retcon that I'm not the biggest fan of. I personally prefer the version of the story where Wanda volunteers to make the total artificial jump from "normal person" to "enhanced", in order to compete with the Avengers, and specifically merchant of death Tony Stark. Implicit in comments that Wanda and Pietro are the first to survive Mind Stone experimentation is that it's quantifiable; that because of latent mutations they were exceptional to begin with. In that way, it's reminiscent of the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 retcon that I'm also not overly fond of: that Peter Quill could handle the Power Stone not because of the power of friendship but because he's half Celestial. But in any case, it's still very much a workable arc, and it all culminates in the episode's ending. That, reader, is the first time the words "Scarlet Witch" have passed anyone's lips in the MCU.

In a mid-credits scene, Director Hayward powers up Vision's previously lifeless body, making for a Dr. Manhattan-like spectacle. So it appears Hayward was lying to Monica, Jimmy, and Darcy about Wanda stealing the body...

In "Previously on", WandaVision has its best episode yet, foregrounding the pain and power of the real Wanda Maximoff. Not a character in a sitcom, but an Avenger and superhero that has gained a real depth through this show. 9/10.

WandaVision: Breaking the Fourth Wall Review

WandaVision "Breaking the Fourth Wall"

"I've been watching WandaVision for the past week..." - Darcy Lewis

In Westview, reality is glitching. After Wanda's expansion of the bubble, it seems that her mastery over the town's reality is harder to maintain. This has the knock-on effect of a greater sense of self-awareness on her part, as delivered in direct address to the camera, The Office-style. Complete with cutaways and a new logo reminiscent of Modern Family, the WandaVision sitcom has adapted to a house style of the new millennium. And with it, the show balances humor and hexcraft in delivering its most dynamic episode yet.

The more modern format of the sitcom enhances the humor; see particularly Tommy and Billy's reactions to Wanda's non-explanation of what's been going on. There's also the sense that as TV history has progressed, the show-within-a-show version of Wanda is allowed to be more of a human being, more relatably imperfect.

Meanwhile, Monica Rambeau makes her way back into Westview, confronting Wanda and coming to realize that the rewriting of her cells is making her a "sentient weapon" in her own right. As they face off, they reckon with the central issue of the show: Wanda's villainous culpability in holding the townsfolk hostage. The show as a whole has challenged me, in the sense that as a big Wanda fan, I'm challenged by her decidedly non-heroic actions as presented in the show. As Wanda engages with that and flirts with owning it, it's an electric moment.

And that's not the only monkey wrench in the situation. It is revealed that Agnes is really the powerful witch Agatha Harkness. We're informed through song that she has been responsible for manipulating a lot of the situations in this situation comedy, not least of which, conjuring Pietro. So if nothing else, I am also relieved that the show may have an arch villain for Wanda to fight, besides herself.

Vision, aside with Darcy in the circus, also has a poignant moment as he pieces together the history that he can't remember. As Bruce Banner reinforced in Avengers: Infinity War, Vision is a "complex construct of overlays". Vision, in another new configuration of life, wonders, "What am I now?" Darcy offering that it must have been hard for Wanda to watch Vision be killed after having made the impossibly hard decision to kill him herself is another rich example of the show incorporating fan conversations of the characters' histories into the text of the MCU.

The episode is the broadest canvas yet for the show to display everything it can do: offbeat humor, poignant character moments, malevolent mystical atmosphere. It's also revealed that Agatha/Agnes killed Sparky the dog. I did think it was weird that dog just up and died! 8/10.

WandaVision: All-New Halloween Spooktacular! Review

WandaVision "All-New Halloween Spooktacular!"

There is no leaving the town of Storybrooke from Once Upon a Time (another Disney-owned show), and so it is with WandaVision's Westview. So does that cast Wanda in the role of the Evil Queen, the imperious woman solely aware of the true nature of the town's reality...?

Stage-managing from that role, Wanda has created a town that runs on TV tropes, and the latest one embraced by WandaVision is the seasonal special. But while Halloween is right there in the title, tricking and treating is merely a launching pad for an askew escalation in Westview. Plot threads continue ticking on: Vision's suspicions about his reality; the S.W.O.R.D. agenda; the hostage townspeople; leading to a finale where Wanda expands Westview's borders even more, encompassing the S.W.O.R.D. operation and Darcy.

The latest meta touch in the show is Wanda, Vision, and Pietro wearing Halloween costumes that reference their iconic costumes from the comics. (Interestingly, the Vision Halloween costume is red makeup on Paul Bettany's normal face, as opposed to using Vision's purple face.) If these characters appeared in an 80s TV movie adaptation of the comics, these are not far from the costumes they likely would've worn.

But in a new twist, that meta quality extends to someone within Westview. Evan Peters' Pietro calls out the formulaic goals of his character in the context of a TV show, and comments on the sudden proliferation of kids. Unlike everyone else in the town, he is self-aware. And even as the show plays with the subtle differences in his and Wanda's memories of childhood (complete with cutaway to Wanda and Pietro as the Gretel and Hansel of Sokovia), it appears that this version of Pietro recalls dying in the very manner of the Aaron Taylor-Johnson Pietro.

Elsewhere, Maximoff kids Tommy and Billy develop powers (Pietro-like super-speed, and Wanda-like mind abilities), and Vision investigates hostage townspeople who appear to be glitching the closer to the outside world they are. He comes across one neighborhood where residents are stopped in their tracks, My Fair Lady style.

The moment where Vision ascends into the sky to observe the town is reminiscent of his birth in Avengers: Age of Ultron. High in Avengers Tower, he quietly contemplated the cityscape, making a silent connection with the mayfly members of humanity. As he said, "It's a pleasure to be among them", but does that pleasure extend to humans whose personalities have been suppressed? Vision risks his life to warn of the townsfolk's plight, but finds himself back in Wanda's reality-altering bubble, capping an episode of consistently intriguing intertextuality and supernatural unease. 7/10.

Stray observations:

- The 80s setting apparently does not retro-fy the video games Pietro plays with the kids, nor their Dance Dance Revolution setup. Speaking of video games, did I spot a kid in a Mortal Kombat Sub Zero costume?

- The local theater is called the Coronet, possibly an allusion to the theater in San Francisco that was one of the fewer than 40 to carry Star Wars the weekend of May 25, 1977. Playing are two Disney-owned films, The Incredibles and The Parent Trap (Original or remake? Unknown.). The former (co-starring Nick Fury himself, Samuel L. Jackson) features Dash Parr, a child with super-speed. The latter revolves around twins.

- Is that Night of the Living Dead being shown to (the newly materialized) kids?

WandaVision: On a Very Special Episode... Review

WandaVision "On a Very Special Episode..."

The Lopezes deploy a kitschy 80s theme song. The Maximoff kids continue rapidly growing, and gain and lose a dog named Sparky. But the cracks in Wanda's sitcom reality are ever more pronounced, and "On a Very Special Episode..." starts twisting the knife on Wanda's culpability in holding the people of Westview hostage, and ends on a whopper of a twist.

In Avengers: Endgame, a wonderful sequence saw the Avengers figuratively cast in the roles of screenwriters in a mind-numbing story-breaking session. They hashed out the mythology of the movies in order to formulate how their plot would go forward. As last week's episode of WandaVision established, Darcy, Jimmy, and Monica are cast in the roles of viewers, if not fans of the MCU in general. So we hear Monica's argument that Wanda would've won in one-on-one combat against Thanos if he hadn't called a bombardment from his ship. It's a righteous moment of vindication for Wanda's heroism as established in the movies - and Wanda sure needs it because a judgmental eye is cast on her actions in this show.

The episode continues to frame Wanda as almost the villain of her own show. We see footage of her stealing Vision's lifeless body (is this a step removed from necrophilia...?) for use in Westview. The party line from S.W.O.R.D. regarding her history with the Avengers is not flattering for her (even though as viewers we rightfully take Wanda's side in, for instance, the Lagos incident). Most disturbing of all, Vision unlocks the suppressed personality of his coworker Norm, held hostage as a marionette in Wanda's fantasy town.

Vision is more and more skeptical of his wife's role in fabricating their situation, and the two almost come to uncanny blows. Shortly afterward, the doorbell rings, and in walks Wanda's brother, played not by the MCU's Aaron Taylor-Johnson, but Evan Peters, who filled that role in three X-Men movies.

It's a stunning moment, opening the door for a multiverse officially bringing the X-Men into the MCU, and not only that, but potentially the very versions of those characters from movies like Days of Future Past and Dark Phoenix. I'll likely get more into this in the future, but this is a can of worms. Yes, I'm excited by the metaconnectivity and the opportunity for those actors to continue in their roles. But that's potentially outweighed by my protectiveness of the MCU's "purity". The quality control that's defined the MCU doesn't extend to the last 20 years of X-Men movies. Additionally, is the average viewer supposed to have seen multiple movies from an entire other cinematic universe for this twist to fully land?

Reservations aside, the shock appearance is a statement of intent that WandaVision's metanarrative knows few bounds. And with Wanda appearing outside the bubble for the first time, in her iconic outfit no less, the ground is laid for more and more action in this wonderfully strange season of television. 7/10.

Stray observations:

- This is the first time Captain Marvel's superhero name has been spoken in the MCU. On that subject, attention is drawn to the fact that Wanda doesn't have a superhero name, likely setting up the deployment of the Scarlet Witch moniker later. I've enjoyed the absence of that title to date, so we'll see how that goes.

- The scene where the boys implore Wanda to resurrect the fallen dog Sparky reminds me of the Nora Ephron movie Michael. William Hurt (the MCU's erstwhile General "Thunderbolt" Ross) demands John Travolta use his angelic powers to resurrect a dog who was killed in an accident.

WandaVision: We Interrupt this Program Review

WandaVision "We Interrupt this Program"

"So you're saying the universe created a sitcom starring two Avengers?" - Jimmy Woo

Whether the fictional Marvel universe did or not, the filmmakers behind the Marvel Cinematic Universe certainly did. That tension between the text and metatext of WandaVision is constantly at play in "We Interrupt this Program", an episode that contextualizes what we've seen so far and gives the audience a riveting look at events in the "normal" world; that is, events outside the sitcom Westview bubble.

Geraldine, expelled from Westview at the end of last week's episode, is seen expelled again, this time through a recognizable burst of Wanda Maximoff's power. (That familiar CGI effect depicting her telekinesis appears for the first time in the show.) But this time, we have a new perspective. Geraldine is actually S.W.O.R.D. agent Monica Rambeau, sent to investigate the uncanny events in the town.

One of the chief pleasures of the episode is catching up with events on normal Earth. For a fan of the MCU, each character reveal is a crowd-pleasing moment, no action sequence required. Monica Rambeau! Jimmy Woo! Darcy Lewis! Monica is formally introduced to us through tragedy. The S.W.O.R.D. organization was founded by her late mother Maria, who died in hospital while Monica was blipped for five years. As for the other two competent but comedic characters, Jimmy is seen to have kept up with his close-up magic lessons when he presents his FBI business card, and Darcy has now finished her PhD!

After Monica is subsumed into the sitcom, Jimmy and Darcy observe, becoming audience surrogates. Darcy becomes "invested" in the story. The two gradually identify the supporting cast by their real-world identities and pin their headshots on a whiteboard, in a meta take on assembling a cast for an actual TV show. Jimmy namechecks the show's production design, which actually becomes a plot point, as clothing and objects are transformed into something era-appropriate when they cross the bubble's threshold.

The comedic tone of the previous three episodes is thrown on its head in this episode. We're back to an equilibrium of a standard wry procedural rather than a comedy with canned laughter. The sober tone is set with Monica re-materializing in a hospital, which is desperately over capacity (sound familiar?), and even in the sitcom world, we are privy to more of the darkness underneath it: Wanda briefly sees a vision of Vision as she really left him, an empty, grey husk.

The show continues to nimbly sketch out an intriguing scenario and go some way toward justifying the comedy pastiche within the plot itself. This episode in particular gets a lot of mileage from casting Darcy and Jimmy as ersatz audience members, further developing a unique meta quality. An 80s setting is likely next week, as the focus will probably swing back to Wanda. 8/10.

Stray observation:

- In the audio montage that accompanies Monica's reappearance after the Blip, we hear clips from Captain Marvel, from Maria Rambeau and Carol Danvers herself.

WandaVision: Now in Color Review

WandaVision "Now in Color"

A lot of "Now in Color"'s humor comes from the acceleration of Wanda's childbirth. A suddenly pregnant, suddenly showing, suddenly due Wanda gives birth to twins, and her birthing pangs interact with her powers by wreaking havoc with nearby appliances and household items. Paintings spin on their axis on the walls, an effect you might see in a theme park dark ride like The Haunted Mansion. Or the set of a 70s sitcom. So the show highlights the artificiality of Wanda and Vision's reality by highlighting the artificiality of sitcom reality. But of course, on this show so far the two have been one and the same.

Beyond the gags (maybe even broader than last week), there is a vein of stark emotion, standing out even more by contrast. The birth of twins is played initially for laughs, but even as Wanda brings new life into the world, she is reminded that she and the late Pietro Maximoff were twins. When Wanda remembers her departed brother with true sadness, there's the sense that this is a poignant and heartbreaking glimpse of the "real" Wanda, not a construct of her from the show-within-the-show. In fact, that theme of "who you really are" runs through the episode. See the touching moment when Wanda invites the human-guise Vision to meet his son as his true, synthezoid self.

The unsettling elements on the fringes are even more pronounced, and it's surprising just how much of a peek behind the curtain we get. Geraldine is essentially kicked out of the show, after threatening to break the characters' suspension of disbelief with her talk of the pesky real world. She falls onto a field staked out by an entire military/scientific operation. My guess is that a succession of characters from outside the "TV world" will infiltrate it to try to burst Wanda and Vision's bubble.

Geraldine's invocation of Ultron's name, as the murderer of Pietro, is jarring in context. But the plain-spoken, hard-to-hear truth is preferable to the mask of joviality worn by Agnes, who's revealed as a subtly malevolent force for the first time. Her conspiratorial neighborhood whispering touches a specific Twilight Zone nerve.

Kristen-Anderson Lopez and Robert Lopez are three-for-three in writing new theme songs for each installment, paired with variously styled title sequences that take pastiche to the level of an art form. WandaVision can't be accused of not committing to the bit, and maybe that also goes for Wanda herself. 7/10.

Stray observations:

- Despite Vision being referred to as a synthezoid in publicity materials since Avengers: Age of Ultron, this episode is the first time in the MCU the word has been spoken aloud.

- Wanda accidentally turns the baby's mobile into living butterflies. This is reminiscent of the moment in Avengers: Infinity War when Thanos uses the Space Stone to send a Mirror Dimension shard vortex at Doctor Strange, who turns it into harmless paper butterflies.

- Pietro Maximoff is mentioned by name for the first time since Age of Ultron. He was last alluded to via his picture in Wanda's room in Captain America: Civil War.

- Last week's episodes were retroactively given titles: "Filmed Before a Live Studio Audience" and "Don't Touch that Dial".

WandaVision Episode 1 & 2 Review

WandaVision Episodes 1 & 2

So it came to pass, that the first Marvel Cinematic Universe release since July 2019 was not Black Widow, nor Captain America follow-up The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, but a half-hour sitcom - this week, in black and white, and filmed before a live studio audience. Wanda Maximoff and Vision are shown in the familiar yet incongruous confines of a suburbia-set 1950s sitcom, complete with era-appropriate theme music and Bewitched-style sparkle effects when phasing powers are used. The opening salvo of WandaVision is a pleasure to watch, a refreshing change of pace for comic book storytelling that unlocks the comic potential of Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany as performers.

Indeed, the two leads' adaptability to broad comedy is a delightful discovery, especially because their careers to this point haven't paved much of a path towards this. (Ingrid Goes West is the closest thing to a precedent in Olsen's case, but still an inadequate comparison.) Their mugging for the camera pairs with solid comic timing, and without this element of genuine performance quality, the sitcom pastiche would ring false.

Interestingly, Olsen drops Wanda's Sokovian accent in the show so far, but her powers are present and correct, telekinesis rendered with disguised strings. Hiding Wanda and Vision's powers from their neighbors is what a lot of the episodes' action is concerned with, but that doesn't keep at bay the strange elements on the fringes that make it clear something is very amiss. (The talent show is a benefit "for the children", to a cult-like extent, but actual children are nowhere to be seen.)

A clear template for these early episodes is I Love Lucy, including a subversion of that show's "standards and practices" two bed setup. (There are also vintage ads for fictional products.) The episodes function as effective pastiche precisely because they commit to those shows' setups, the first episode a particularly tight execution of a simple comic premise.

Cast members like Kathryn Hahn and Emma Caulfield Ford modulate their performances well, so the show would function even without the rug-pull we know must be coming. But that rug-pull is unavoidable, and as well-done as the retro comedy is, it achieves the effect of an eerie rictus grin simply by being so relentlessly good-natured. But for now, WandaVision is breezily entertaining. It's ironic that one way to be radically unconventional is to embrace the conventionality of a different era. 8/10.

Stray observations:

- Nice to see Frozen song masterminds Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez contributing the two pieces of theme music.

- The voice saying "Wanda? Who's doing this to you, Wanda?" sounds to me like Randall Park as FBI Agent Jimmy Woo from Ant-Man and the Wasp. 

- There's a new Marvel Studios logo (!), but ironically given that it arrives with WandaVision, it seems to have dropped Wanda from it?!