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.
I was very excited this morning to see the premiere of the first two episodes of Marvel Studios new Disney + series, WandaVision. I am, of course, a huge mark for Marvel and the Marvel Cinematic Universe and it has been too long since Spider-Man: Far From Home. That was the last time that we had any new content from the studio. With Covid-19 playing chaos with the schedule, the anticipation for this show only grew. I am pleased to say that the anticipation was well worth it. I loved WandaVision and I am completely on board with what they are starting.
However, I can understand if there are people out there who will not love this as much as I do because there is no denying that this is Marvel Studios taking a huge swing and taking their universe into a direction that you have never seen before. It is totally weird, original, unexpected…all in the best ways.
When the people at Marvel Studios said that this was going to be a sitcom, they were telling you the truth. The first two episodes are clearly reminiscent of the TV days of I Love Lucy, Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie, right down to the laugh track. The black and white helped set the tone of the series and it is unlike anything Marvel has tried up until now. It is a real gutsy move from Marvel to have this series be the first one out of the gate for the Disney + shows.
The show is an homage to the black and white sitcoms of the 50s and 60s. I was always a huge fan as a child of the reruns of these kind of shows so I enjoyed honoring them by including the sitcom tropes into this 2021 series. Plots of having to host a surprise dinner with the boss or perform at a city talent show are the type of plots one might have seen on these sitcoms.
Elizabeth Olson and Paul Bettany are absolute joys. They are clearly having a blast with these characters being placed in this setting. And they do it without sacrificing what made Wanda and Vision the fan favorite characters that they are. They fit seamlessly into the framework that the show is going for and I expect that their performances will only increase as the show progresses.
Kathryn Hahn as the nosy next door neighbor Agatha is a beautiful touch to the series. Her character is starting out as a trope herself, but there is so much more that is under the surface with Agatha that I am excited to see where this character is taken. I also loved having Debra Jo Rupp, a veteran of sitcoms from That 70s Show, appear as one of the women in the town of Westview. These touches really help to make WandaVision feel like a sitcom of the 1950s.
However, there are subtle (and some not so subtle) hints that there is something sinister going on with the show. It is not going to remain just a sitcom paying tribute to the days of TV lore. I would go as far as to say that there were a couple of distinctly creepy moments of reality among the black and white façade. When Mr. Hart (played by Fred Melamed) was choking, I was totally creeped out. There was a puppetmaster feel to the situation, as if someone was forcing him to choke, and the looks on the faces of Wanda and Vision truly helped cement the scene as bizarrely intense.
The appearance of the mysterious Beekeeper near the end of episode two was a moment that was really out there. The show does a remarkable job in such a few short, quick scenes of building the mystery of exactly what is happening to two of our favorites from the Avengers. There was also the radio that was asking Wanda what was happening. Another subtle point was the feel that the crowd at the talent show of people from Westview were more like the Stepford wives than we had expected. And the end of episode one with the person watching on the TVs gave a LOST vibe (and you know how much that hits with me).
When the second episode ended, I immediately wanted more. While I have been leaning more towards shows that are weekly in nature instead of the binge, WandaVision might have just made me reconsider that.
Oh, and I did not even mention the commercials. Yes, there is a commercial for each episode and I wonder how they may play into the narrative. A mini oven made by Stark Industries or a watch made by Strucker? The whole Strucker reference was great, since Baron von Strucker played a huge part in Wanda’s past.
EYG- Embrace Your Geekness 