WandaVision has become what I look forward to the whole week. When I get home from work on Thursday, I know that the next thing I am going to be able to do is watch WandaVision.

Spoilers for WandaVision Episode 6

Where to start?

There are so many places that I could start. Maybe we start with the big cliffhanger from last week that seemed to break the Internet… the arrival of Pietro, Wanda’s brother, but played not by Aaron Taylor-Johnson as it was in the Age of Ultron, but Evan Peters, who played Quicksilver in the Fox X-Men movies. Theories abounded about what this meant for the MCU, for mutants, for Evan Peters himself. We still do not know what exactly this guy’s deal was, but he absolutely rocked the comic accurate costume with the unbelievable hair.

We see Pietro using his powers all throughout episode six, but is he truly Pietro? The show addresses the fact that he looked different, explicitly from Wanda herself and Pietro says he does not know. He does seem to know a lot about what his sister has done here, going as far as saying he was impressed with what she did. There were times that he felt like he was the MCU Pietro (like the time that he referred to their childhood or when he talked about getting gunned down in the street), but there were also a bunch of times where he felt as if he were pumping Wanda for info and doing things intended to gain a reaction from her.

Either way, Evan Peters was absolutely fantastic here and played the part of the fun-uncle in the 1990s/early 2000 sitcom perfectly. There were several times when Pietro himself commented on the tropes of the fun uncle within the dialogue of the show as if he knew what was happening. It is a brilliant piece of writing that continues to tie the show into the world of sitcoms.

Which, by the way, this week’s episode is honoring Malcolm in the Middle, from the theme song through to the changes in the camera work that was brought into by that show. We also had the twins, Billy and Tommy, both turning to the camera and talking about what was happening, just like Malcolm (Frankie Muniz) would on Malcolm in the Middle.

Speaking of the twins, Billy & Tommy gain their powers this episode as comic fans know will lead to them being Wiccan (Billy) and Speed (Tommy) in the Young Avengers. I’m not saying that these kids will be in those plans, but there is certainly a possibilities. Both of the young boys do an amazing job of acting in this episode. Julian Hilliard played Billy and Jett Klyne played Tommy and they have a couple of tough scenes and they bring the goods, which is important since Elizabeth Olson and Paul Bettany are consistently exceptional in WandaVision.

That brings us to one of the darkest moments in MCU history. An animated commercial for Yo-Magic yogurt. Yes, the commercial this week takes a bit of a turn and features a young boy stranded on a deserted island. The boy says he is hungry, and things look bad for him. However, a shark swims up to the island and offers the boy some Yo-Magic in a container. The boy tries to open it, but he cannot get his fingers to open the foil on the top of the container. We see a progression of time as the boy continues to try to get to the Yo-Magic, until he dies of starvation and is left behind as a skeleton, still grasping the yogurt container.

It was shocking watching the commercial. There a a ton of theories about what this commercial represents. As the previous commercials all pointed to trauma and bad experiences in Wanda’s life, this could represent the people of Westview, or Vision or Wanda herself. The magic can not be reached and the kid dies slowly because of it. Could this be a reference to the “big bad” that helped give Wanda the power to take over Westview, a power level that she had never displayed before? Is the shark a specific metaphor for something else in the story (I would say for sure)? No matter what, the commercial is quite sinister and devastating.

This week is the first week that I believed that SWORD Director Hayward had some ulterior motives in the story. I still do not believe that he is any sort of a maestro of what has happened to Wanda, but he is definitely looking to track Vision. I have seen a cool theory about Hayward being the person to create Sentinels in the MCU and that he was using the technology of Vision to do it. Hayward clearly had a grudge against super powered people, which he let slip in an argument with Monica Rambeau. There is something hidden behind his final firewall that Marcy had not breached yet. What is Project Cataract?

More points of interest this week:

• What is going on with Agnes? Is she more than what we think or not? The meeting with Vision in her car seems to have thrown the theories of her being connected to the big bad into chaos.
• Monica’s cells are being re-written? Is this how mutants are coming?
• Vision being ripped apart by the Hex was horrifying
• So was the image of zombie Pietro with bullet holes.
• Jimmy Woo is good for more than just getting coffee!
• Darcy gets swallowed by the Hex. What will happen to her?

• Monica’s “guy” is still coming. Who is this aero engineer? Blue Marvel? Reed Richards? Her skrull friend? etc.
• The Hex turned SWORD agents into clowns. Ha Ha Ha. Wanda throwing shade.
• There are kids everywhere now. Where did they come from? Did Wanda have them “tucked in their beds until she needed them”?
• The single tear of the woman frozen in place was heart wrenching.
• As Vision is getting torn apart, he thinks of the people trapped in Westview.
• People on the outskirts of town seem to be nearly frozen. Could it be that the farther you are away from Wanda, the less you are able to do?

I can not wait until episode 7!

This week…on a very special episode of WandaVision….

[EDIT: Here is something wild. I wrote this before I was aware that the title of the episode was actually “On A Very Special Episode.” When I saw that, it blew my mind. Obviously, they did a great job of working in that trope about special episodes of sitcoms because that is exactly where my head went.]

SPOILERS FOR WANDAVISION EPISODE 5

At least, that is the way it felt. As we moved into the 1980s style comedy heavily influenced by Family Ties, things are starting to crack in Westview. And we get a massive “recast.”

Vision is beginning to see things the way they are. It started with a strange encounter with Agnes and their crying babies (who…by the way… appear to be immune to Wanda’s magic). The moment where Agnes asks Wanda if they should “take it from the top” continued to plant the seeds of confusion in Vision that started last episode.

He discovers even more as he “freed” Norm for a moment while at work, revealing his true personality away from Wanda’s control. Paul Bettany is masterful as he portrays the confusion and the feeling of betrayal while still having deep feelings for his family.

His family, which includes the twins, Tommy and Billy. The twins age twice in the episode, once to stop crying constantly and once to keep the dog that they found outside. Sparky is named after the dog from the Tom King Vision series, though that one was a synthezoid as well. Tommy and Billy end up as ten-year old children.

This is the basis behind the “very special episode” comment I made earlier. When Sparky winds up dead (in Agnes’s arms…hm), Tommy and Billy have to deal with the death of a loved one, and they, quite rightly, think their mom could fix it. Back in the 80s, many of these sitcoms handled these deep subjects in, what would be referred to as, a “very special episode.” That was the feel given off here. Sparky’s entire presence here felt outside of Wanda’s control and she appeared to be uncertain about what happened. She does prevent the twins from “aging up” again, saying that people cannot run from their grief. Ironic.

This episode also contained two major confrontations. The first was with Wanda and SWORD outside of the Hex (thanks Darcy). Wanda let it be known that any further interference from Director hayward would not be tolerated. This scene gave us a bunch of tidbits, including the idea that Wanda brought Monica into Westview (as we saw last episode) as a way to get help.

There was a high level of stress with this standoff. Understandably, Wanda was ticked off. Hayward had sent a 80s style drone into the Hex to take out Wanda. It failed, of course, but it directly led to Wanda coming outside of Westview to warn him. The way she redirected the agents who had their guns set on her to direct the guns on Hayward instead was frightening. I really thought she was going to finish him off right there.

Then the second confrontation was between Wanda and Vision as he told her about Norm and how he knew she was behind this. Vision had said that Wanda could not control him and she implied that she could. This tense war of words were interrupted by the doorbell and the arrival of Evan Peters as Pietro. Darcy, watching on the screen, was surprised and said “she recast Pietro” confirming that Peters was not the MCU Pietro. We know he appeared as Pietro in the FOX movies, but there had been a ton of speculation about what his role would be here in WandaVision. Wanda seemed as surprised as anyone leading one to think that there might be more to this than we think.

This was a fantastic episode with so many things happening Things I did not include in the write up”

• Monica’s weird reaction to the comment about Captain Marvel
• Wanda’s use of magic in front of Agnes
• The credits rolling when Wanda wanted the show over to avoid the argument with Vision
• New commercial connecting to Lagos. Paper Towels- for cleaning up the mess you didn’t mean to make
• Confirmation that there has been no “Scarlet Witch” name in the MCU as of this moment
• Vision’s ability to break Norm out of Wanda’s control (although Norm never says Wanda by name. She only says “she”. Could it be Agnes?)
• Wanda’s line to the crying babies “Why won’t you do what I want?”
• Bulletproof vests
• No children in Westview
• Wanda doesn’t “know how this all started”
• Wanda steals Vision’s corpse.

This was a tremendous episode. I felt myself tearing up a bit when Sparky died. You know they have got me.

SPOILERS FOR WANDAVISION EPISODE 4

“We Interrupt This Program“

WandaVision took a turn this week and it was glorious.

This week, the show’s point of view flipped a couple of times. There is no sitcom this week (and I honestly missed it a bit) and the show focuses on Monica Rambeau, Jimmy Woo and Darcy Lewis. It shows you the strength of the MCU when you can bring in a group of characters like this and feature them in the middle of your superhero show.

This episode reminded me of LOST more than any other episode so far. When we first meet Desmond Hume in “Man of Science, Man of Faith,” we flashback over everything that had happened before, but from his point of view. We get the same concept in episode 4 of WandaVision.

The first point of view is with Monica and this cold open was just amazing. We see Monica coming back from being snapped and the chaos that ensued with the people appearing from nowhere after the blip. That truly emphasized how wild and traumatic that situation could be. Spider-Man: Far From Home showed the blip in a comedic manner but this feels how that situation, people being dead for 5 years suddenly being there, would play out.

Plus, the show gave us a painful reveal as we find out that Monica’s mother, Maria, who we met in Captain Marvel, died of cancer during the time when her daughter was snapped away.

We also are told that Maria founded SWORD. Monica is a captain in SWORD as well.

The arrival of Jimmy Woo and Darcy Lewis (that is Dr. Lewis, by the way) was awesome. This was actually my favorite use of both of these characters. I enjoyed Darcy in Thor, but was never a fan of Jimmy Woo. They worked so well together and brought some wonderful interactions. Darcy was the one who figured out what was going on with this Westview Abnormality and she did it with humor and showed how competent she was. It’s been a long time since she could not pronounce Mjolnir.

As they went through the episode, we see a great deal of what happened in the mysterious first three episodes. We find out for sure about the scene of the TV sets at the end of episode 1, the voice of the person asking “Who’s doing this to you Wanda,” the truth about Westview and several of the citizens, the beekeeper, the toy helicopter, and how much Wanda is in control.

Technically, that last one may still have some questions about it. Monica came out of the dome saying that it was all Wanda. However, I still believe that there may be someone whispering in Wanda’s ear, helping direct what is happening. Could it be Mephisto? That is still my belief, but it might be too much to introduce to the general public.

We still did not get any revelation of Agnes. Is she Agatha Harkness? I think so, but it could be a swerve.

Oh, by the way, the image of Vision that we get at the end of the episode is frightening and gives us a hint that Vision may not truly be alive.

This episode was tremendous and is going to send this series into the next act.

SPOILERS (of course) for WandaVision!

After seeing the first three episodes of Marvel’s first Disney + show, WandaVision, I, as a comic book geek, feel that I am at a point where I believe I can make a few inferences on what is happening on the show.

Understand, I could be completely wrong. That is one of the wonders of this show. It clearly has a plan in place for where they are headed, but it could be any number of places. However, I feel as I am ready to make some educated guesses on the core mysteries of the show.

#1. What is going on?

I believe that after the events of Avengers: Endgame, Wanda was feeling lost and alone. She had seen the death of her brother Pietro and her great love in Vision. It is at this point where she either is approached by or approaches a certain being for help. My guess is that Mephisto, Marvel’s “devil”, is the character involved here. It makes sense considering how important the character of Mephisto was in the comic storyline upon which this series is loosely based. Mephisto convinced Wanda that he could help her reunite with Vision and give her everything she ever wanted.

#2. What is the motive?

Why is Mephisto doing this? I do believe, as in episode 2, the reason is “for the children.” Much like the comic series, Mephisto wants Tommy and Billy as a way to steal Wanda’s reality warping powers for himself.

#3. Who is in control?

Wanda’s powers are what has created the sitcom world that she lives in with Vision. She has created this world and maintains it. I do not think she is consciously doing it, or, at least, realizes that she is doing it. I do not think that it is a coincidence that all the times when the outside world sneaks into the situation, Wanda has had some emotional moment. When Mr. Hart is choking, he had been pressing Wanda for answers about her past, which she did not know. I believe she subconsciously caused him to choke, and it wasn’t until her inner hero came out that she had Vision help him. Another example was from episode 2 with the arrival of the Beekeeper, mere moments after she discovered that she was pregnant. In episode three, the comment by Geraldine (aka Monica Rambeau) about Pietro being killed by Ultron came after Wanda was reminiscing about her brother while watching her twins sons. Elizabeth Olson has been brilliant in these scenes portraying Wanda’s confusion over these contradictory moments.

#4. What about SWORD?

In the MCU, SWORD stands for Sentient Weapon Observation and Response Division. In the comics, the W actually stands for “world.” In the comics, SWORD is based mainly as a space observation unit, but the MCU version feels as if it is more than that. I do believe that Wanda could be considered a “Sentient Weapon” and that SWORD has been watching her. They are not sure what has happened, so that is why they were trying to get Wanda to tell them “Who is doing this to you?”

#5. What about the town?

I am convinced that the town of Westview is a real town that existed in the MCU and was taken over by Wanda in an attempt to recreate her fantasy world. The people of the town are enslaved by Wanda’s powers but they do have some flashes of understanding of what is happening to them. I do think Agnes is more than what she seems (and maybe Herb too). I think it is clear that the people of Westview are not happy (and rightfully frightened) that they are being forced into living out this happy fantasy by Wanda.

#6. Why a sitcom (and ads)?

I would assume that Wanda, growing up a young girl in Sokovia, watched a lot of sitcoms as a youth and this embellished her understanding of a happy life in America. The ads are references to the most emotional/tragic moments of Wanda’s life. Thus, the connection to Strucker, the beeping bomb from Stark that tormented her and her brother as children, and Hydra. Plus, the Hydra Soaks soap does look considerably like the Tesseract. Another online theory that I live is that the two “actors” in the ads, who are the same in all of them, is actually Wanda and Pietro’s parents. That would make these ads all the more relevant inside Wanda’s potentially fractured mind.

#7. What is Vision?

I truly believe that this series is heading toward ripping our hearts out at the end because I do not believe that Vision is real/alive. He is a construct of Wanda’s mind and we are being set up to grieve his loss once more. I sure hope I am wrong about that. There are some hints in episode three that Wanda is able to subconsciously bring inanimate objects to life with her. We see Wanda’s magic give life to the butterflies over the crib and the stork from the painting on the wall. In fact, after the butterflies come to life, Wanda says “Oh, did I do that, I didn’t mean to.” I think that is an important piece of dialogue that I have not heard anyone talking about. So maybe she really did reanimate the dead body of Vision and he is truly back. Her power is based on the same energy from the mind stone that gave Vision life in the first place.

These are just some of my thought on the show. I have really loved WandaVision so far. As a huge fan of the classic sitcoms, I am enjoying seeing them play with the tropes and adapting them into this story that is way deeper than what it appears to be.

SPOILERS for WandaVision Ep. Three

If you haven’t watched the third episode of WandaVision on Disney +, then you do not want to read this article. We will be discussing some of the specifics from “In Color”

After two episodes in beautiful black and white, WandaVision finds its way into color, and takes a huge step forward in showing us exactly what is going on.

Episode three is clearly based on the 70s sitcoms. The setting of the house this week resembled the Brady Bunch homestead and the music is distinctly The Partridge Family. We also have the song “Daydream Believer” which seem to be giving us a hint about what is going on as well.

And one episode after discovering that she was pregnant, Wanda gives birth to twins.

Tommy and Billy.

Comic fans knows the relevance of the twins in Wanda and Vision’s life and their rapid development gives us an idea that things are happening.

This episode also featured “Geraldine” heavily. She is featured in much of the show’s most creepy-feeling moments. One of the biggest being how, after Wanda tells Geraldine that she was a twin and she had a brother named Pietro, Geraldine says to her that he had been killed by Ultron. This led to Geraldine being rejected from the sitcom world.

Other signs that Geraldine (who we know is to be a grown up version of Monica Rambeau, whom we met in the movie Captain Marvel) include:

• Geraldine has a necklace with the SWORD symbol.
• Agnes tells Vision that Geraldine has “No Home” or no family
• Agnes and Herb nearly revealed something to Vision
• Agnes clearly seems unnerved by Geraldine
• After she is rejected from Westview, Geraldine is surrounded by a military looking group (probably SWORD)

The moment of memory about Pietro was a powerful one for Wanda. She was conflicted at this point but the attempt at inserting the idea of Ultron in the show by Geraldine breaks that momentum for Wanda.

This week’s advertisement was for Hydra Soak, bubble bath, and, of course, a tie to the villainous Hydra that Wanda had worked for with Baron von Strucker.

Things seem to be firing up and next Friday cannot get her soon enough.