This Week’s WandaVision Left Me With More Questions Than Answers
After the 8th episode of Disney Plus and Marvel’s WandaVision, fans got a ton of new information, backstory, and heart-wrenching scenes between Wanda and Vision. But, even though we were inundated with some of the answers we finally craved, how is it we’re still left with more questions? What started out as an innocent attempt by Wanda and The Vision to live normal suburban lives despite being super-powered beings living in a TV show has turned into an Avengers level threat.
Scarlet Spoilers
Warning: The following article contains spoilers for Episode 8 of WandaVision. If you skip to the bottom and listen to the latest episode of The Other Identity, there are only light spoilers. Make sure you watch WandaVision before you continue reading!
With every new episode that releases, Kevin Feige continues to knock it out of the park with the newest week-by-week additions to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Episode 8 of WandaVision was all about Wanda Maximoff and her past.
Agnes, now revealed to be Agatha Harkness and who most considered to be the villain of the show, has control over Wanda. It’s important to note, however, that in the Marvel Comics canon, Agatha isn’t considered a villain. Though she can sometimes be antagonistic, she started out as a nanny for the Fantastic Four and actually serves as Wanda’s mentor.
Through this episode, Agatha takes Wanda back through her past, making her relive traumatic moments in an attempt to find out exactly where her powers come from. Agatha, also being a witch, explains that what Wanda has been able to do is far beyond the powers and capabilities of anyone. So, while Agatha is trying to figure out why Wanda is so powerful, Wanda is also being forced to reconcile with major events that have shaped her life.
She sees the night her parents were killed by a bomb in Sokovia and her and Pietro sat there helpless watching a bomb tick away. Or was she helpless? Agatha suggests that what she saw was a young witch unknowingly use a probability hex power to warp reality enough to keep the bomb from detonating. But how could Wanda have had these powers all along?
There are two answers for that; the first being the boring one, a ‘witch’ is just something you’re potentially boring as with connection and access to powers if they’re properly trained. Like Doctor Strange, magic users aren’t extremely rare they just need to be nurtured to unlock their potential.
The second answer is much more fascinating; she’s a mutant with an x-gene just waiting to be activated.
Mutants, Here All Along?
And that brings us to the next stop in Wanda and Agatha’s trip down memory lane. When Hydra recruited her and Pietro into their program to be test subjects using the Mind Stone. Her memory shows her approaching the Loki Staff and the Hydra scientists mention every subject who has gotten close to it, has died.
As it turns out, Wanda is the first one to live through it. She also sees a mysterious figure in the stone, a bright silhouette. The relevance of that could be anything, a premonition of her future as the Scarlet Witch? Something entirely different that won’t come into play until later Marvel movies?
But the important part at this moment, as Agatha learns, is that Wanda’s innate abilities (and Pietro’s) were jumpstarted with an Infinity Stone. My theory being that both of them had the X-gene, since they are twins, and being exposed to the Mind Stone activated it.
This does two things for the various mutant theories crawling around the internet. It explains how Mutants have been here all along. The X-gene has been around for years, but it takes a moment of extreme duress or power to properly activate it.
It’s not something that happens often, maybe a child being torn from their family and seeing them die in World War 2 prompts it. Maybe a Soldier too close to the radiation from a bomb at Hiroshima activates it. It’s just enough that you can explain mutants have always been around, but in small enough numbers that the government covers it up, or they turn into local urban legends.
But when Infinity Stones start popping up, when Thanos and the Hulk start snapping or the Scarlet Witch starts throwing hex anomaly’s up…the mutant population start’s to climb.
The Truth About Wanda and Vision
Finally, Wanda eventually makes her way to some events that are a bit closer to the present. We see her visiting the SWORD facility where the Vision’s body is being held after she comes back in Avengers: Endgame.
This is where things get interesting and despite all the answers we’ve gotten so far, more questions emerge. Wanda is granted access to the SWORD facility by Director Hayward and even shown the Vision’s body. She wants to give him a proper burial, but Hayward explains that he’s a weapon and he needs to be studied.
Wanda does have an emotional moment where she breaks some glass and has guns drawn on her, but Hayward allows her a moment with Vision’s broken corpse. She puts her hand on his head and whispers, “I can’t feel you.”
Now, in a previous episode, Monica and company are shown a security video of Wanda attacking SWORD and stealing Vision’s body. But at this moment, she simply walks out. This means Hayward manipulated that video for his own means.
From here Wanda gets in her car and opens a letter, inside is an address in Westview. It leads to a small piece of property with nothing but the foundation of a house that once was. The letter turns out to be a property deed with the note, “To grow old in V.”
In the final moments of the episode, Wanda succumbs to her grief, loses control of her power and we see her create the house, the hex, and a brand, new Vision. That’s why Vision doesn’t have memories of before because he’s NOT the Vision of before. It’s the same reason when he tried to leave the hex, he started to break down…he’s made out of nothing? Out of Wanda’s powers, he may not even be able to exist outside of Westview.
We also get a post-credit scene of Hayward at a staging area near Westview as he reveals…a white version of Vision. It turns out they’ve been trying to create their own Vision for some time but lacked a power source. Using the drone from earlier episodes which is brimming with Wanda’s powers, they are able to start it up.
What About Agatha?
So, what happens with Agatha through all of this? She’s supposed to be the villain of the story, or so we’re led to believe. But given her comic book origins, I have another theory.
Agatha isn’t a good guy or a bad guy. She watches out for herself and she wants what everyone wants, happiness, power, etc. She was drawn to Wanda because her power is on an entirely different level. Through her manipulation, she’s trying to make Wanda come to terms with her grief so she can get answers.
Throughout the stroll down memory lane, we even see Agatha shed a tear for Wanda. There are human emotions inside her. At the end of the episode when Wanda is done with her vision and demands her kids back, she finds them outside with Agatha, in her true form who says she knows what she is.
Agatha says, “I know what you are. You have no idea how dangerous you are. You’re supposed to be a myth, a being capable of spontaneous creation.”
“This whole little life you’ve made. This is chaos magic, Wanda. But that makes you…the Scarlet Witch.”
What does it all mean?
For as much of an antagonist as Agatha seems to be…it almost comes across as though she’s afraid of Wanda, that she wants to stop her. I believe that Agatha, who also seems to get her power from some dark source, is repeating the same mistakes her original coven made thinking she was too dangerous.
In the final episode, Director Hayward will no doubt unleash his White Vision upon Westview and Wanda. We’ll finally get our epic Marvel-patented fight scene between Wanda, Agatha, and both Visions, with some Monica Rambeau thrown in there as well.
Ultimately, I believe Agatha and Wanda will come to terms with one another and Agatha will sacrifice herself to save the day. In the original comics, this happens and the leftover power is what allows Wanda to create her children. But since they’re already created, perhaps Wanda instead finds a way to put her Vision inside the power of the White Vision?
The possibilities are endless and luckily, we don’t have long to wait for the final episode of Marvel’s WandaVision.
Disney Plus and Marvel’s WandaVision stars Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany as Wanda Maximoff and The Vision. The final episode airs Friday, March 5th on Disney Plus.
The Other Identity
If you want more on WandaVision, the MCU, or comics in general, check out the Other Identity podcast. Each week Robbie Landis and Ben Morse (former Marvel Alumni) dive into various DC Comics and Marvel Comics topics. Everything from the comic book pages to the heroes on the silver screen, the Other Identity celebrates the fan in all of us. Whether a veteran reader or a new fan of the MCU, the show is for everyone.
This week they give their thoughts on Episode 8 of WandaVision and then dive into the Justice League: Snyder Cut. Putting aside all their bias’ they attempt to have a fair and just conversation about the Justice League movie and who is at fault for its failure. Plus, can the movie even be saved? What would it take for Justice League to be a great movie?
Follow CheckpointXP on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram! You can also follow the hosts of the Other Identity, Robbie Landis and Ben Morse.
Feature Image, WandaVision by Disney Plus and Marvel Studios.