WandaVision's sitcom premises and tones have been tied to the emotions and mental state of Wanda since the beginning, so it makes sense that her at the lowest point yet things would start to become fractured and all over the place. And, as it turns out, the mockumentary style comedy of Modern Family and The Office turn out to be a great mix with these characters - the humor is far more subdued then before as well and much drier, fitting of this kind of show. The constant changing of the things around Wanda, her depressive mood - it's played very realistically, much more so then I expected, and the emotional beats hit hard.
But honestly what really sold this episode was everything around that - Elizabeth Olsen probably gives her best performance to date on the show here, and Paul Bettany's chemistry with Kat Dennings is surprisingly really great. Monica nearly steals the show here with a show stopping scene involving her gaining her powers, even if they haven't been shown yet, but Kathryn Hahn man. Her performance here is simply divine, and while I'm curious to see how this changes the show going forward (some explaining has to be done), if Hahn is having THIS much fun here I can't see why we can't.
PSA: hold ON through the credits there are TWO post-credit scenes
The thing I love the most about WandaVision's finale, and what some people aren't gonna like, is how straight forward it actually turns out to be. In the end, WandaVision was a show about grief and loss, and both Wanda and Vision were at the center of it. Because of that, the show wisely foregoes sudden reveals or shocking revelations in favour of emotional catharsis. And yes, while one answer in particular could be seen as a cop out, personally I think it was a wise decision to instead simply skip over it and instead hone in on the things that really make this show tick.
And both of the climaxes for Wanda and Vision turn out to be smaller conversational scenes amidst the more fantastical battles (which are standard Marvel fare, meaning very fun and well shot) - Paul Bettany in particular kills it here and the promise of seeing more of him is tantalizing. And yes, seeing the Scarlet Witch fully unleashed is worth the viewing alone, a moment and look ripped straight from the comics in the best way possible.
The five stages of grief brought forth in tangible form. Wanda's journey through her own trauma is as compelling as it gets - the kind of backstory that isn't exposition but necessary character drama. Probably some of the best written stuff to come from the MCU in awhile (a franchise that has had much better writing then most blockbusters), letting the audience feel her trauma and sadness from the core of her experiences rather then just a brief throwaway line. And they don't screw around either - Wanda is the one responsible here, in a very "House of M" esqe moment that feels earned and deepens her character.
Lots of other great stuff here too. Kathryn Hahn is still stellar as Agatha, and her opening scene in Salem is a highlight as it introduces us to the concept of witches in the MCU, while the mid-credits scene is a fantastic reveal of who the big final threat is likely to be. So far the show continues to be one of the MCU's finest offerings and I can't wait to see how it all ends.
[7.8/10] “Previously On” is the sort of episode that answers the questions fans have been asking from the beginning. Who caused the hex? (Wanda) What made her do it? (Cumulative trauma) Who’s controlling it? (Sort of Wanda, sort of not.) What’s the deal with Pietro? (Total fake). What about Vision? (Wanda recreated him.) What’s Agnes’s angle here? (A witch trying to attain more power a probably drain Wanda the same way she drained the rest of her coven.)
For a lesser show, these could be mechanical answers to mechanical questions. Instead, this episode answers those technical points while also getting at the why of all this. It confirms, once and for all, that WandaVision is a story about the slow accumulation of trauma, and the ways the shiny sitcom worlds on the television screens are an escape from it.
Agnes (or Agatha, depending on your preference), plays Ghost of Xmas Past with Wanda, forcing Wanda to guide her through major events of her history in an effort to uncover how she became this powerful. Rather than centering on incantations or magical artifacts (give or take an Infinity Stone), it hinges on the moments of both comfort and loss in Wanda’s life.
It’s a strong conceit, giving Elizabeth Olsen plenty of notes to play across the years and showing how Wanda has lost so much of the year. We start with a scene of serene domestic bliss, or what passes for it in a war-torn Eastern Bloc country, with Wanda and Pietro as children with their parents. Suddenly a bomb disrupts the peace of “TV night”, destroying the young kids’ lives amid a moment of happiness and depicting events described in Age of Ultron. \
That sets a pattern for these things, where each moment involves how Wanda copes with such losses. We see her becoming a freedom fighter (or terrorist, depending on your vantage point), out of an attempt to avenge her parents in a way. It leads her to connect with the mind stone (something that, alongside a shadowy figure, will no doubt be explored in more depth later). The experience heightened her powers, but was also a source of further trauma, of being experimented on and treated as disposable.
(Just my crazy theory: [spoiler]I predict that the shadowy figure Wanda saw in the Mind Stone will be Wanda herself, from the future, creating a stable time loop and deciding to set these events into motion, even knowing the hardships of where they lead, because it’s a way to let love persevere.[/spoilers].)
But then we get the best scene in the whole episode, where we jump to Wanda still grieving her brother’s loss, another unfathomable trauma, only to get some unexpected comfort from Vision. The writing and acting here is magnificent. The imagery of Wanda talking about grief as a series of waves, continually hitting her every time she tries to stand, is haunting and effective. But Vision’s retort, of not knowing what loss is given his origins, but appreciating the notion that it is love persevering, is just as beautiful a counterpoint. You can see the way the two of them are connected not just through the mind stone, but through their unique experiences of grappling with the human condition from opposite sides, of learning how to move forward together. The chemistry, easy rapport, and connection between them in those moments is off the charts.
It’s a minor miracle. Having lost everyone close to her, Wanda forges a connection with someone else, someone who helps fill that space. Only then, he’s taken from her too. The final flashback we see is Wanda barging into Sword and seeing Vision being torn apart. We see the man she expected to be waiting for her when she was un-blipped lying in pieces before her. She reaches down and can no longer feel her, the last thread of that connection severed.
It’s enough to send anyone sprialing. We witness the mechanics of what happens next -- a grief-stricken Wanda coming to Westview, uncovering what was meant to be the place where the rest of their lives together began, the ghost of a new chapter of domestic bliss that she was once again robbed of by chaotic forces.
So she snaps. She explodes in her grief, for her parents, for her brother, and for her love, each ripped away from her in the times she most needed comfort, most thought she could be safe and happy like those people on the television screens.
That’s the most piercing thread of “Previously On.” At each stage, Wanda watches these sitcoms as a form of relief, of escape, to have a glimpse of the life denied her by circumstance and tragedy. She’s watching The Dick Van Dyke Show and seeing a happy couple when her parents are killed. She’s watching The Brady Bunch and a couple of friendly but needling siblings when she and her brother are treated like lab rats. She sees the comical violence of Malcolm in the Middle where the father figure can endure large scale mishaps but come out unscathed because “it’s not that kind of show.”
The import is clear. The allure of these stories, this pristine or even hardscrabble sitcom worlds, is that even when the edges are rougher, tragedies rarely happen. Happy families get to persist, to flourish. They get to happen at all. It’s a world where the worst losses of the world are kept outside of the frame, made digestible and easily resolved, one half hour at a time. It is, a world where she can have the life that she dreamed of as a little girl, the life she and Vision imagined for themselves, back.
Who wouldn’t want to bury themselves in that world at a time when the universe has taken pound of flesh after pound of flesh from your body? Look, we’re talking about a famed Scarlet Witch using her “chaos magic” to rewrite reality for a small town in New Jersey. None of this is down-to-earth exactly. And yet there’s something that feels so relatable, even natural, to Wanda choosing (or instinctively reacting) to conjure the sort of place that’s bereft of the traumas she’s suffered again and again and again.
We know the ruddy details now: that Agnes wants power, that Hayward wants a Vision of his own, that Wanda is firmly the source of the Hex. But more importantly, we understand why it came to this. “Previously On” gives us all those stark moments of love and joy and happiness that Wanda was robbed of, and the comforting glow of a place where no such heart-wrenching thefts can occur. Whatever season-ending fireworks happen next week, no one can blame poor Wanda for retreating into her static-filled dream world, when so much of her life has been this crystal clear nightmare.
My God… that episode was AMAZING! There’s so much stuff to talk about. First, we now know that Wanda is in (at least 90%) control of everything that happens inside Westview and that Agnes also knows what Wanda is doing and she is (for some unknown reason) just going along with it. Does she have an ulterior motive or is she providing the means necessary to help Wanda? Vision just found out what is happening and he’s both terrified and worried, the woman he loves is controlling and hurting other people to fill her own selfish needs. That’s gonna blow up in her face… eventually. I’m pretty sure there’s a logical –in universe– explanation for the Pietro “recast” and the episode’s full with loads of proof:
You didn't see that coming?
Oh man pure chills down my spine when Vision said "what aren't you telling me?" to Wanda
man I absolutely love this show!!!
The beauty of WandaVision is how so far it's able to seamlessly transition from it's more MCU-esqe outside story to it's more experimental, trippy surreal horror and then to a more traditional sitcom, and this episode is easily the strongest yet in that regard. The way the episode moves the main plot along is stellar, giving us even more to chew on as the reality of what Wanda's powers are able to do grows. And the drama of the episode really hits it's climax with a final argument between Wanda and Vision that's among the best acting the two have done in the MCU. I can't also be more over the moon about that final scene, which is one of the biggest curveballs the franchise has ever done and changes the landscape of not just this show but the entire MCU as a whole.
And as always, the sitcom aesthetic is on point. We have hit the 80s, which is where the aesthetic of sitcoms becomes more similar to me as somebody who grew up in a household with stuff like Family Ties and Full House on in the background. It absolutely nails the feeling of a more "dramatic episode" of one these shows, in this case the death of a pet. Billy and Tommy are really likable as well, capturing the feeling of young sitcom kids wonderfully. Time will tell if they stick around to become Wiccan and Speed from the comics, but so far the show continues to really impress with it's quality.
Well, this episode got dark very fast.
First, the kids aging up is creepy weird. Second, Wanda emerging from the hex; that's freaky. And for a moment, I thought she was going to kill the head of S.W.O.R.D.
He wants some agency and Wanda isn't giving it to him. He wants to live properly. I'm feeling really sorry for Vision; let the boy be free!
TECHNICAL SCORE: 7/10
ENJOYMENT SCORE: 8/10
OH MY GOD IT'S FUCKING PIETRO!!!! EVAN PETERS PIETRO! Lowkey wish it was Aaron Taylor Johnson tho...... BUT I KNEW IT. Every time the door bell ring, I always wish it was Pietro and it wasn't, but I kept thinking 'oh, it's coming alright, it's coming' and then BOOM.
Also, I have never been more scared of Vision until he raised his voice as he argue with Wanda, like..... shit, I'm genuinely scared.
Spoiler Warning: Agnes: do you want to take it from the top ? Wanda looked nervous that Agnes knows what is going on. Great scene.
Plus Agnes probably killed the dog. I think Agnes is who Vision’s co-worker is afraid of, not Wanda.
Awesome 80’s like opening credits as well. Such an awesome episode. Quicksilver from the Fox X-Men movies. So weird.
OMFG! Its rare that I have a total full-blown unrepentant geekasm, but the last five seconds of this episode are the best five seconds of television since Buffy sang in a musical.
Holy crap... That episode was great! Evan Peters Pietro, but in the MCU? I am bonkers confused.
I love that Vision's finally figured it out. Also, baby Vision just crept me the fuck out.
Oh and also the part where Agnes slipped out of character was so, so good.
[9.0/10] There’s so much to talk about in this one. X-Men’s Quicksilver as Avengers Quicksilver! Bulletproof hotpants! 1980s TV spoofs! Scarlet Witch’s stand-off with Sword!
But here’s the thing that stands out to me, the thing that grabbed me the most while watching this “Very Special Episode” -- Vision confronting the woman he loves over what’s happening. That moment has extra oomph because of the effects. There’s something eerie about the two of them arguing over the end credits until they stop. There’s something scary about the two of them rising into the air at the same time they raise their voices to one another.
What stands out about it, though, is the emotional rawness in the moment. Vision isn’t just upset; he’s worried that he can no longer trust his wife, that she’s done something terrible to him, to everyone, and doing everything in her power to keep it from him. Wanda is trying to hold it together, feeling just as vulnerable and admitting she’s not even sure how this started. They are both just so messed up by what’s happening, so riven by it, but in ways that drive them apart over whether to tear this all down or do everything they can to continue propping it up.
The tenor of the scene is familiar to anyone who’s spoken with a loved one who’s unwell, who is not themselves, whether through grief or mental illness or some other trauma that jeopardizes their ability to process the world as it is. There’s an honesty to that scene, one that is frankly startling, and it’s the kind of place I never really expected an MCU project to go. It’s draped in reality-distorting fiction and the trappings of family sitcoms, but somehow that just makes it all the more disturbing and poignant when the truth of those moments bursts through those bracing layers of abstraction.
That’s bolstered by the second most stunning revelation of “On a Very Special Episode” -- that Wanda stole Vision’s corpse from Sword. More to the point, that he left a living will and wished never to be revived, not wanting to be anyone’s weapon. It’s plain that Wanda, either by herself or with the help of someone else, revivified him, and that he’s starting to reckon with the margins of what happened to him, if not the full picture.
He’s starting to see through the illusions and deceptions that Westview is made of. Again, the show does so well making the moments where it breaks the sitcom rhythms unnerving. Agnes’s “should I take it from the top” bit is eerie, and for once, Vision has a chance to realize it before Wanda resets things. Instead, she tries to play it off, tries to distract him with puppies and doorbells ringing and other head-fakes that Vision’s nevertheless noticing.
It comes through in the odd behavior of his coworkers, who respond to a Sword email by reading and laughing in unison. Vision briefly frees Norm, who is understandably frantic and undone and, most importantly, in pain over what’s being done to him. The secret truth of WandaVision is that it’s not a comedy show or sitcom homage or a superhero series. It’s a horror show, and Vision’s starting to realize that. He’s realizing that everything is wrong here, starting with him, what he can and can’t remember, and the mother of his children.
Meanwhile, there’s some more traditional but still cool developments on the outside. Monica Rambeau, Jimmy Woo, and Darcy Lewis are trying to save Wanda, trying to show her compassion despite what’s happening, while Sword Director Hayward thinks she’s just a terrorist who needs to be taken out. Meanwhile, our trio of familiar characters are finding solutions to the problem, realizing that 1980s tech can penetrate the Hex without being transformed by Scarlet Witch’s powers.
Of course, it doesn’t go unnoticed by Wanda, and she storms out of the Hex to threaten Heyward and everyone else when, unbeknownst to Monica, he tries to use their drone to eliminate her. It’s a scary moment, one only slightly cut by Elizabeth Olsen reverting to her dodgy Eastern European accent. We see definitively that Wanda has at least some control and awareness of her surroundings and what’s happening, enough to want to protect it from interlopers and those intruding on her surroundings.
It’s become increasingly clear why she’s so protective of her perfect bubble of happiness and what she is running from -- grief. The show channels that idea through 1980s sitcom pastiches in an amusing fashion, with Agnes as the friendly, albeit intrusive neighbor, kids growing up too fast, and dogs dying so that parents can give an important lesson about making peace with certain facts of life.
At the root of it, though, is a deep sense of loss and the artifacts of reckoning with death, something difficult whether you’re a child or an adult. Wanda says to her boys, and to herself, that she cannot reverse death, that they cannot turn away from it, because some things aren’t meant to be elided and some lines shouldn’t be crossed.
We confirm that she has brought the corpse of the man she loves back to life, presumably because she couldn’t deal with his absence and the tragedy of what happened to him. The commercial break this episode name-checks Lagos, the Nigerian city from Civil War where Scarlet Witch accidentally killed dozens of civilians when trying to redirect a blast, more mess than any paper towel could clean up. And she reflects, at her sons’ urging, on the loss of her own twin, Pietro, the only lifeline she had when she lost her parents at the same tender age Billy and Tommy are now.
So she does what she’s already done -- she brings him back, after a fashion. It’s an inspired bit of stunt-casting to bring in Evan Peters to quasi-reprise his role as Quicksilver. But beyond the jolt of the misdirect and reveal is a simple truth, that this whole thing is wrong. It is a coping mechanism, one meant to shield Wanda from yet another horrid demise marring her personal history.
So she, or some other force working with and through her, has constructed this place to evade that destabilizing realization. Vision is breaking out of it, shaking off the cobwebs of his violative rebirth and seeing through the comforting lies that Wanda is straining so hard to hold onto. It is difficult, hollowing, wounding to watch someone you care for undone by grief and trauma, dragging the world down with them. So much of what WandaVision does is clever or exciting or amusing. But what it does here is disquieting beyond words, and deeply, painfully true.
This felt a bit stronger than the pilot episode, but I’m still on the fence. It felt more like a jumble of disparate (but good) story ideas than a cohesive whole. I think the problem I have with this series, so far, is that we are joining it in media res. That’s an okay storytelling device sometimes, but with this series I think the story would have been better served if it had just started six months back with debris falling for the first time. Or with the first sighting of the ship. Having the story set at a time when there’s already an Orbital organization with a team ready and able to test debris levels and (somehow) shut them down via an app just feels like it cheapens things a bit too much. You shouldn’t be able to disable the weekly McGuffin with the press of a button.
I guess the Nattering Nabob's of Negativity have never heard of a "filler" episode, that is, one that doesn't add much to the advancement of MAIN the storyline, but, (if you look closely) does add to the information we currently have. To wit:
The Debris has cloning capability, thus a potential explanation for Finola's Papa being corpus vivum, rather than corpus mortuum.
The Debris DOES NOT have to come into contact with you to generate a clone.
The Clones are IMPERFECT segments of the whole personality of the original.
The Debris can manipulate and move surrounding metal materials to create primitive constructs as needed, although unfortunately, they shut it down before it actually did what it was trying to do. (heal the original, or transport him elsewhere???)
Transcription errors (e.g. Brundlefly) can occur if multiple data sets are introduced at the same time.
There are agendas WITHIN agendas on both the CIA and MI6 sides of the "cooperative" arrangements, with plenty of duplicitous liars all around.
Bryan (for now) is willing to play along, but, it looks like he may have a line he won't cross.
And last but not least,........ PEEPS!!
+
If only there was someone that had experience in rebuilding faces that could be motivated to help Kate out...
If that actually happens it'll look like it was all planned out from the start of the show, which would be funny as well as proof that the writers here know a thing or two, even if I thought they were dropping the ball with how meh S1 Kate was - also, very good on them for calling out how Kate kept making up excuses for letting Alice get away.
Great episode! This one I found to be of particular note. In a previous episode I was critical of a particular topic and some say it was Aram joking around. However in this episode there was a very clear distinction of Aram's wit and humour and it made me LOL, that's the Aram I remember (and the writing). Then we had a particularly intense moment pulling out all stops with Redington. I really love Spader in this role... Simply just Nails it Every time. Not too mention the writing is usually good, but this was exceptional. Too good to miss this episode.
Another good episode, I love the way the show balances all the characters. The brothers relationship is great and family drama is not overdone and actually concludes in a reasonable way. Finding out that Captain Luthor was married to Lois in his world is a great twist. Just a shame we have to wait 2 months for the next episode!! :face_with_symbols_over_mouth:
"How is my phone suddenly working?!" - winning line of the episode.
All in all, a decent head-shrinker episode with a sprinkling of comedy and action. I was entertained and only dozed off once. Also, didn't really see it before, but Safiya is actually kinda spicy, bit like a slow calculated burn... she seems to just make everyone as hot and bothered as she is... although, on a scoville scale, she'd be more of a Ghost Pepper while Alice is an out of control Carolina Reaper... LOL!
Yes, we're all mad here (you too!), you've got to be to keep watching this show.
Talk about re-opening old wounds -- and, I don't mean Ocean.
So Alice was held captive on an island when everybody thought she was drowned to dead, she learned to fight there and kinda gained superstrength. There is also some miracuru.. I mean miracle flower there. We get to see this with flashbacks bit by bit. Anybody watched Arrow yet?
ok but no one remembered to take a pic of the map before it was taken from them? c'mon it's 2021
The name of the big, evil ship is one of those incredibly on-the-nose things where I have to remind my adult ass that this is a kids show, and also Star Wars has always been incredibly on-the-nose. It helps when you get byproducts like this episode title, which somehow manages to be both ridiculous and cool.
It's like they want to have the show be like what comic books use to be. Like they aren't reimaginating the stories to fit some new socio-political agenda.
I thought the fighting was pretty good. He sure does take a kicking though. Who the hell was that guy?
Stop voting before the episode airs, you idiots!
I hadn't enjoyed an episode of the Blacklist this much in a long time. Beautiful tribute.
So Batwoman knocks out serial killer/hitman Victor Szasz, then takes off leaving him on the ground, yup that makes sense.
2021-01-01T00:00:00Z2021-12-31T23:59:59Z