By Sam Cooperman ‘22 “WandaVision,” the newest entry to the Marvel Cinematic Universe that officially finished airing on Disney+, began shrouded in intrigue but concluded with a whimper. The show started with a mystery surrounding what the overall plot actually was. The trailer indicated that Wanda, or the Scarlet Witch, had seemingly married her love interest, the Vision, who was dead the last time we saw this franchise. On top of this, the show appeared to be presented as a 1960s sitcom causing massive amounts of speculation as to what could have revived the Vision, why the show’s format mocked sitcoms and why the other Avengers have not interfered. The first three episodes of “WandaVision” guarded the answers to all these questions closely as it parodied popular sitcoms while moving through the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. I personally loved the sense of limitless possibilities the show presented for its main questions while enjoying the unique format. However, episode four takes the viewers outside of the sitcom within “WandaVison” and pretty much answers all major questions completely killing the sense of mystery and replacing it with general confusion. **Warning: Spoilers Below** After episode four, the viewer knows Wanda mind-controlled an entire town in a massive bubble referred to as The Hex, and that she has full control over the town, turning the town into a sitcom. This means Wanda can rewind failed scenes if she does not like the outcome, amazing both visually and from a story perspective, and change the format or time period an episode is set in, such as using the interview format of storytelling popularized in the early 2000s by “Modern Family” and “The Office.”
Anyone who enters the Hex will be altered to fit the world Wanda currently is using. For example, when a high-tech agent in a radiation suit enters the Hex in episode two, he turns into a man in a beekeeper’s suit to fit the episode’s early 70’s aesthetic, and is now mind-controlled by Wanda to act on her show. This is why none of the Avengers could just walk in and tell Wanda to stop. The rest of the season flips between a group of characters on the outside trying to take down the Hex and free the town, and Wanda trying to keep Vision from discovering what she is doing and that he is still dead outside the Hex. For clarity’s sake, Vision is still dead as in the real world. Wanda created a copy of him using her magic when creating the Hex. This means when the Hex is gone, Vision and the couple’s children will go with it. While the outside characters try to take down the Hex, Vision is on the inside trying to discover the secrets of the Hex and what Wanda has done to the town. In terms of plot, watching a character discover something every other character in the show and the audience knows is not very interesting. This show, however, is simply magical as “WandaVison’s” plot is an absolute mess when viewed as a whole, but is intensely interesting and clean when viewed episode by episode. Towards the very end of the show, the person behind this whole situation from the start called the “Agatha all Along” is revealed. On its own, it is a masterful reveal that is so well made, the song that runs in the scene reached number one on iTunes that week. However, in the next episode, the show breaks its own logic by showing the viewer that Wanda had accidentally created the Hex herself and confirms that she controls the whole town. None of this is related to Agatha, the newly introduced antagonist, and effectively contradicts what was just explained in the conclusion to last week’s episode. The show continues to act as if Agatha has been the true villain pulling the strings since the beginning, when it seems to have been Wanda. The viewers never get an explanation for how Agatha managed to enter the Hex unscathed or how she found Wanda to begin with. Even when shown a flashback of Wanda creating the Hex by herself, the show does nothing to address what Agatha actually did to be considered this genius puppetmaster villain. These issues all compound in the boring waste of a series finale. Agatha wants to steal Wanda’s magic, so the two have a fight scene. This fight between two characters with the most visually exciting and powerful abilities in the MCU is a series of fireballs shot between Agatha and Wanda as they float in the air. The little tension created by this conflict is instantly deflated when the viewer is told Wanda happens to wield “Chaos Magic” making her the most powerful being in the universe. Even though the viewer is outright told Wanda is stronger, she still needs to outsmart Agatha to defeat her. Even the way Wanda defeats Agatha breaks the show’s recently established rules. Wanda lines the Hex with spells that prevent anyone but her from using magic while inside which causes Agatha to be turned into another sitcom character. This was established in the penultimate episode when Wanda enters Agnese’s lair and cannot use her powers. But then Wanda takes down the Hex, and Vision along with it, letting the townspeople go. This means the spells Wanda cast are gone and Agatha should have her powers back, but she just remains stuck as a TV character. Wanda just leaves and that is the end of the show. One final post-credits scene to concludes the series. In an effort to get back her family created in the Hex and now deleted from the universe, Wanda accidentally causes cataclysmic damage to the multiverse which sets up “Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness.” If this event is as major as it is in the comics “WandaVision” is based on, it is a literal Thanos-level threat yet is relegated to a post-credit scene teaser. To be fair, the finale has one of my all-time favorite MCU scenes that I will just refer to as “The Vision Debate”. I will not spoil it here, but Vision is developed into one of the best and most complicated heroes currently roaming the MCU and almost every line of dialogue he has is pure gold. “WandaVison” walks one of the strangest lines in television history. It sets up exciting mysteries but blows the surprise of all of them within one episode less than halfway through the total run. It then manages to have incredibly engaging and creative episodes that are almost perfect on their own. However, when you combine elements established in previous episodes, none of these individual moments make any logical sense. The finale is a boring, nonsensical letdown that certainly left a bad taste in the mouth of many MCU fans who have not seen their favorite franchise in well over a year. With all this said I'll give "Wandavision" a (slightly generous) 6/10. Hopefully, Marvel crafts a much better plot for their newest show “The Falcon and Winter Soldier.” |
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February 2022
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