Heroes aren't born, they're forged.
Before we get started, I’ll point
out that I’m going to do a few more posts this month, but I’ll be doing My Hero
Academia. I kind of prefer getting all these episode posts in a single month if
I can. And before you ask, I’ll probably do the Snyder Cut of the Justice
League eventually, but, and I need to stress this, I don’t really like Snyder’s
work so I’m not rushing to do it. I don’t want to make you feel bad if you like
it, that’s good for you, I’m just not a fan. Got it? Good.
Last time on WandaVision, we got a
brief history of Wanda Maximoff, curtsy of Agatha trying to uncover how Wanda
made the Hex. We saw how her parents were killed, how she first got her powers,
how she bonded with Vision and ultimately how she formed the Hex after being
shown the corpse of her love. Agatha then reveals to Wanda that she’s the Scarlet
Witch while holding a pair of nooses around Billy and Tommy’s necks. Let’s get
to it, shall we.
We open on Agatha strangling Tommy
and Billy. Wanda, not being a fan of seeing her son’s threatened, blasts Agatha
back, freeing them. She tells the boys to go to their room, and while they
initially object, Tommy does finally high speed then back to said room. Wanda
blasts Agatha again, only to notice that Agatha seems to draw in her red energy
with each hit. Agatha comments that she takes power from the undeserving. The
drain also causes Wanda’s hands to shrivel and rot. Agatha tells Wanda to
surrender her magic and she’ll leave Wanda this little corner of the world. Wanda
then uses her magic to hit her with a car. Try absorbing kinetic force, hunny!
Wanda goes to check on her and only sees a pair of boots.
You know, I've seen worse reunions.
And that’s when things get really
complicated, when the new White Vision lands. Wanda goes to her reanimated love,
and they have what might have been a tender moment that’s ruined when White
Vision’s face cupping gesture turns into a skull crushing gesture. Vision flies
in, henceforth referred to as Hex Vision, and knocks his albino counterpart into
an RV. He turns to his wife and asks if their boys are okay. Wanda confirms
they are and apologizes for not telling Hex Vision about what happened when she
figured out what happened. He accepts the apology just as Agatha returns. She
mocks the situation of Wanda being metaphorically at a party with her new guy
and her ex. Hex Vision says that this is their home, they should fight for it. Hex
Vision flies off after White Vision and Wanda goes after Agatha. Monica sees
them fly off from her prison, Fietro’s attic mancave. She tries to leave but he
superspeeds over and knocks her back.
Hex Vision tries to converse with his
White counterpart, wanting to discuss things like rational synthoids, but White
Vision’s directive is to destroy him and Wanda. The two synthoids wrestle in
the air, using their phasing powers to wrestle and crash into the ground. Hex
Vision tries to fly off, but White Vision grabs him and the fight continues.
Outside the Hex, Hayward’s team has
captured Jim Woo and are monitoring the brawl. Jim points out that this is a
hell of a thing to cover up, all to cover up him grabbing a cellphone. Hayward
is rather smug about the whole thing, claiming that since Wanda isn’t
broadcasting any more, there’s no proof that White Vision isn’t the only
Vision, and he’ll blame the whole thing on Wanda. Jim tells Hayward that he’d
go along with this, but his friends at Quantico will be arriving within the
hour and they won’t be cool with all this. He has Jim taken away and put into a
makeshift prison. Once he’s alone, Jim uses his close-up magic skills to get
out of the cuffs, calls his friend at Quantico and asks if they can be there
within the hour. Because, you know, you have to deliver on a threat when you
can.
Wanda lands in the downtown area,
and looks around a bit before Agatha pops in. She hits Wanda with a magic blast
and complains that Wanda doesn’t realize how important she is. She explains
that there’s a whole chapter on the Scarlet Witch in the Darkhold, her book of magic.
She reads an exerpt from it that claims the Scarlet Witch is more powerful than
even the Sorcerer Supreme. Bet Stephen Strange is feeling personally attacked.
Wanda continues to deny that she’s a witch, so Agatha decides to give her a
lesson on how witchy she is, by breaking Dottie out of her trance. Dottie, real
name Sarah Proctor, begs Wanda to at least let her daughter out of her room.
Apparently, one side effect of Wanda’s Hex that Vision commented on but wasn’t
really elaborated on, the lack of children in Westview, was because Wanda had
them sequester in their rooms. That’s fairly messed up. Agatha releases more of
the towns folk and they start surrounding Wanda.
She's clearly had it up to here with Fietro.
Back at the attic, Fietro is making
a smoothie and seems to be pretty chill about holding Monica. She sees some
bills and a head shot and it’s revealed that this man is actually named Ralph
Bohner. Huh, so he was probably the Ralph that Agatha was referring to in her
Agnes disguise. Yes, this is disappointing. Anyway, Monica tries to make a
break for it, but this time when Ralph tries to stop her, she flips him onto
his back and pins him to the ground. Using her new vision, she’s able to see a
magical aura around this necklace Ralph is wearing. She rips it off, breaking
Agatha’s control and presumably stripping him of his powers.
The Visions continues to fight,
while Tommy and Billy watch from their window. Billy senses that Wanda is in danger
and the twins race off to save her.
The towns folk are gathered around
Wanda, revealing what her control has done to them. Some of them are clearly in
need of psychological counselling, as Wanda has accidentally poured her
nightmares into them and, you know, puppet mastered them for an indeterminate amount
of time. Wanda gets overwhelmed and begins magically strangling them. She stops
almost right away, with Mrs. Hart, aka Sharon Davis, begs Wanda to kill them if
she’s not going to let them go. Wanda says she’ll let them go, and Agatha encourages
her to do it right now. Wanda unleashes her power and starts bringing the walls
down, telling the towns folk to run. Which they do. Outside, seeing a widening
gap, Hayward has his team move into the Hex.
Hex and White Vision are still
battling, but as the cracks widen, Hex Vision starts weakening and falling
apart. He takes a hard hit and crashes into the ground near Wanda. They boys
arrive too, and they’re also falling apart. Agatha reveals that they’re so tied
to Wanda’s Hex, that they can’t exist without it. Wanda stops trying to end the
Hex, and the walls close again, restoring Hex Vision and the boys. Outside, Jim
Woo’s FBI team arrives.
I know what'll solve this, a philosophical debate!
The Maximoff’s gather. Wanda
protects her boys from a blast from Agatha, whom further drains her of magic.
The SWORD Team arrives and pulls guns on them. Hex Vision admits to his sons that
they weren’t prepared for this, but Wanda thinks they were made for it. Hex Vision
flies off to do battle with White Vision again. They fly into a library and Hex
Vision gets White Vision into a headlock. White Vision reveals his directive is
to destroy the Vision and Wanda Maximoff. And that’s when Hex Vision reveals
that he isn’t THE Vision, but a conditional Vision. White Vision breaks free
and it looks like they’re going to fight some more, but he then requests elaboration
from his other self.
Agnes tries to kill the SWORD team,
lifting them off their feet, musing how they’re the modern witch burners before
dropping them to the ground. Wanda stops them from hitting the concrete. She
tells boys to handle the military while she goes after Agnes. The boys do
incredibly well, with Billy freezing the soldiers in place while Tommy zooms
around, taking their guns and one dude’s hat and sunglasses. They high five
right as Hayward gets out and pulls his gun on them. Thankfully, Monica had
just run up and seen Hayward getting out, she dives in front of the bullets.
What would normally be a pretty fatal shooting turns into not a big deal as we
learn that Monica’s powers include things besides magic vision. Her body seems to transform into an energy
field as the bullets hit her, her body stripping them of inertia and them
falling out of her back as they pass through. Billy stops the one that went by
her and they compliment each other on their tricks. Hayward tries to get away,
but Darcy hits his truck with the Funnel Cake truck before he can, telling him
to have fun in prison.
Hex Vision debates White Vision with
the Ship of Theseus Thought experiment. The experiment is fairly simple, it describes
a museum that has the ship of the acclaimed Greek Hero Theseus. The ship, over
the centuries, starts to rot, and as it does so, the museum caretakers replace
the wood. The experiment then asks, once the last piece of wood is removed with
a new plank, is it really the ship of Theseus? Later philosophers then ask the question,
if you took the old planks, removed the rot and then rebuilt the ship, is that the
Ship of Theseus? White Vision states the paradox of the thought experiment and
their existence, both and yet neither of them are the ship of Theseus aka The
Vision. Hex Vision points out that White used to be, but White doesn’t have the
Mind Stone. And, while Hex Vision has the Mind Stone, not one molecule of him
is an original piece of their body. He suggests, that the ship of Theseus is
the made the ship by the experiences, the rot and all, the wood that Theseus
himself touched. White Vision claims he doesn’t have memories, even if he has
the data. Hex Vision then, using the powers he has here in the Hex, touches his
counterpart’s forehead stone and unlocks the memories. White Vision remembers
his entire life, up until and possibly beyond his second death. His eyes change
from a creepy neon blue to their original color. He states that he is the
Vision, and flies off. Probably to figure out what that means now.
Outside, Wanda is able to sneak up
behind Agatha and traps her in an illusion. Wanda takes Agatha to one of her worsts
moments, that time when she killed everyone she knew. I think she was going for
the psychological tactic, but that backfires when the corpses get up and start
denouncing the Scarlet Witch. Wanda gets put onto the stake and Agatha rather
snarkily remarks that power was never Wanda’s issue, but knowledge is. Wanda
manifests this crown thing as Agatha talks, the villainous villainess tells
Wanda that if she just surrenders, Agatha will correct her spell and leave her
in Westview. Wanda is able to break free and out of the illusion. The two
witches take off, battling into the sky. Hex Vision tries to follow Wanda, but
she holds him back with magic. He lets her do her thing.
Elizabeth Olsen is a master of the Girlboss look.
The two battle, with Wanda lobbing
balls of red energy at Agatha, missing about as often a hitting her. Outside
the Hex, Jim and his crew can see the explosions as the energy spheres hit. The
energy that hits, Agatha absorbs. Wanda visibly ages with each hit, rotting
away. Agatha absorbs another big chunk of Wanda’s magic, and then starts
gloating. She reveals that when a spell is cast, there’s no changing it, this
world will always be broken, just like Wanda, and laughs maniacally. She goes
to finish Wanda off… but nothing happens. Wanda begins recovering, and the
smoke clears around them, revealing that her wild blasts were actually very
accurate. She was carving Anti-Magic runes into the walls of the Hex, blocking
Agatha from her powers. Wanda re-absorbs her stolen power, and gives herself
some fancy new duds in the process.
They land, with Agatha claiming
that Wanda has no idea what she’s done. Wanda, not wanting to kill someone that
might have information for her, elects to stick Agatha into the role she chose
for herself. She uses her powers to force Agatha back into Agnes, confident she’ll
always know where to find her. The smile she has looks painful now. The Maximoffs
reunite, but it’s not entirely happy, as Vision knows she’s going to make
things right… just not for them. The family return home. While it’s night
outside the Hex, Wanda makes it evening as they walk back to the house. As the
Hex shrinks, they put the boys to bed. Wanda and Vision tell their sons that they
love them. She tells them that family is forever and that real family can never
truly leave each other. As they go, she thanks her sons for choosing her to be
their mom.
MCU, she's had to watch him die THREE times.
No more!
In their living room, Wanda tries
to turn off the lights, but Vision clicks them back on, saying that he heard it
is bad luck to say goodbye in the dark. This is BS and Wanda calls him on it,
and he admits he just wants to see her before he goes. As the walls of the Hex close
in, he asks what he is. Wanda cups his face and tells him that he’s a physical
manifestation of the piece of the Mind Stone within her. He’s her sadness, her
hope, and most of all her love. They kiss one more time. Vision points out that
he’s been a voice with no body, a body but not human, and a memory made real,
who knows what he might be next. As he disintegrates, he points out that they’ve
“said goodbye before, so it stands to reason,” and Wanda finishes “we’ll say
hello again.” And he vanishes.
Wand is left standing in the
foundation of her daydream. She walks back downtown to say goodbye to Monica.
It’s a little awkward, but I think they leave on good terms. At least, Monica
admits that given the same power Wanda had, she’d bring back her mom. Wanda
apologizes for the pain she’s caused, promises that she’ll better understand
her power in the future. She flies off in costume.
The credit’s roll, but in classic
MCU fashion, that’s not the end of the story. We’re first shown Monica seeing
Jim Woo organizing the relief effort. They enjoy seeing Hayward being dragged
away in cuffs. An agent comes up to Monica and tells her she’s wanted at the
theater for a debrief. She goes in, only to discover that her guide is a Skrull
in disguise. The Skrull tells Monica that she’d been sent by an old friend of
her mothers whom had heard she was grounded, and wants to correct that. Monica’s
smile is a strong indicator of how up for this she is.
Her mama sense is tingling.
In post credit scene two, we’re
shown Wanda having tea in a mountain side cabin. What seems like a pretty
domestic moment is revealed to be much more than that, as while her body is
drinking tea, she’s doing that high-speed astral projection study thing that
Doctor Strange did while training. But she’s doing it while her body is awake. She’s
reading the Darkhold, but is distracted suddenly. Why? She hears her boys crying
out to her. Dun dun duaahhhhh!
Okay, that was a good finale. Not a
great finale, but a solid ending. I liked the battles between Agatha and Wanda
and the two Visions. Like, Vision defeating his other self with a logic puzzle
is just so… Vision. It’s not completely clear in the episode, but the showrunners
have revealed that while White Vision now has all of Hex Vision’s memories, it’s
like Hex Vision’s memories of pre-Westview, it’s like remembering a story he’s
been told. He’s got the data but not the emotional attachments. So, he’s got to
figure things out. Hopefully, when he and Wanda meet again, it’ll be a good
occasion. Wanda fighting with Agatha is a bit more straightforward, but the reveal
that she carved giant Runes into the sides of the walls to stop her was
brilliant. And the tease of her hearing her boys and probably setting up Dr. Strange
2 was just brilliant. For those who don’t know, Wanda is going to have a big
role in that sequel, and given the title “Multiverse of Madness,” there’s some
crazy stuff on the way. And showing her do something like Dr. Strange’s astral
projection trick, but better with her doing it while awake is a good indicator
of how powerful she’s grown in what seems to be a really short amount of time. I’d
say my only real complaints are the reveal of Ralph Bohner and Hayward’s plan.
Like, I know all the stuff about Fake Pietro was mostly the internet
speculating, but you get the actor who played Quicksilver in another franchise
and then just have it end on a dick joke? Seriously? And Hayward, what was your
plan, exactly? It really seems like he was just making this up as he went. And
he jumped really far from framing a woman for reactivating Vision to attempted
child murderer. Like, seriously, dude, da hell. Monica’s end wasn’t perfect,
either, as it seemed like her part in the plot pretty much stopped when Ralph
grabbed her, and she just reinserted herself at the end… because. She’s going
to appear again in Captain Marvel 2, so her story isn’t over, it just kinda
fizzled out. Overall, I liked this series and enjoyed the finale. I’m excited
to see more of what the MCU’s Disney Plus shows have to offer. But we’ll get
into that next month with The Falcon and The Winter Soldier.
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/49170793
Twitter: @BasicsSuperhero
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