WANDAVISION (EPISODE 8): DENIAL AIN’T A RIVER

Denial ain’t a river. A friend of mine (that has since passed) used to tell people who refused to face reality, “You’re in denial (pronounced ‘Da Nile’) and I ain’t talking about the river”! As it always made me laugh, the metaphor stayed with me. Where acceptance is the last stage of grief, denial is the first. The old adage, “Never forget where you came from” comes to mind when rationalizing what I’ve seen in the “Previously On” chapter of WandaVision. We all know someone who’s reinvented themselves while severing any real connection with their past; for whatever reason. Whether it be a traumatic childhood, a toxic relationship or an oppressive environment, chaos comes in all shapes & sizes. What one person calls “chaos”, another calls a masterpiece. It all depends on the beholder’s point of view, doesn’t it? What is undeniable about this episode are the Emmy worthy performances from Elizabeth Olsen (Wanda Maximoff), Kathryn Hahn (Agatha Harkness), and Paul Bettany (The Vision). Centering around the origin of the true star of The WandaVision Show, we’ve entered a magical space where the truth be told and answers to many questions we’ve had since (AOU) Avengers: Age of Ultron are provided…or are they?

This show has finally put us in a position where practicality & logic rule over imagination, dreams, wishes & selective amnesia. The best that some of our theories have done to predict what is happening in this story arc is to give the creators of the shows (and movies) ideas for future projects. We may have also shared how to seamlessly implement said theories into MCU canon. Other theories we’ve created have proven to be fruitful & justified. However, just as Wanda Maximoff chose to believe her life was saved by a Stark missile misfiring instead of her accepting that she was different and had powers, you are free to believe what you will about the mysteries of The Scarlet Witch. Refusing to believe what is in front of your eyes will only deprive you from getting the most from each moment, scene, act & episode. Denial isn’t a river but it only leads to deeper and more turbulent waters.

Along with a purple & metal Marvel Studios banner (I once would have solely attributed this to Black Panther), the story begins in the year of 1693, in Salem, Massachusetts; the location & era of The Salem Witch Trials. I had believed that the eldritch purple energy exhibited by Agatha Harkness in Ep. 7 was a possible indicator for a specific entity (Shuma Gorath) in my previous article. It’s being made clear that the color is a statement but has a deeper significance and is being used broadly. I no longer believe that there will be one or two “big bads” derived from the events of WandaVision. I believe a Ghostbuster/Avengers level event will be unleashed on The 616 going into (MOM) Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness.

Agatha is being taken to an alter to stand trial for ‘stealing knowledge above her age and station’. Surrounded by 8 other witches from her coven, she plays coy to bait them. There is no indication as to her actual age or what was stolen, but there was a book given prominence in her reveal to Wanda in the prior installment. I am encouraged that this book in question is not The Darkhold due to revelations made by Agatha at the end of the third act. Keeping with my theory that said book is The Necronomicon, I am aware the book could also be one of a few other options. However, the knowledge & skills Agatha exhibits are the only marker we can use to determine what she’s stolen as of yet. She denies the accusations only to arrogantly admit she committed the crimes. Agatha is above their rules. As the coven began to chant the Latin phrase, “Mors Monstra Naturale” (“Show natural death”), they all focused their light blue energy upon Agatha, cooking her insides. Agatha proves more powerful than all 8 witches combined, including the Queen Witch, Evanora Harkness, whom she called “Mother”. She easily turns their magic against them. Draining the life force from her coven with eldritch purple energy, Agatha then removes the broach she is seen wearing in the earlier episodes from her dead mother’s corpse. I cannot isolate enough info to determine the meaning of the image on the jewelry. I once thought that it symbolized the The Salem Witch Trials, but since it its now shown to predate that event, I am hedging that it’s possibly a symbol of The Norns, the three female overseers of The Ten Realms from Asgardian lore. It is made clear that this iteration of Agatha Harkness is evil (and not the babysitter type) as she flies off.

This excerpt of Agatha’s origin gives us a better idea of how powerful she possibly could be. It, like her, only lets us know as much as the narrator wants. Before casting a memory spell on Wanda, the eldritch purple cloud clears taking us from the past to present. Agatha laughs with her rabbit at Wanda’s expense. She makes it clear that the silence of her spirit & mind alluded to by Billy (Maximoff) is by design. Wanda is powerless due to Harkness’ vast experience as a witch and craftiness as a master strategist. The one thing I dislike about Wanda’s character is that she is so used to being the most powerful in the room that she comes off like a punk when anybody actually stands up to her. Demanding that Agatha tell her where her twins are, Wanda makes the mistake of misreading the room. For that, Agatha manhandles Wanda with a binding levitation spell and proceeds to give Wanda her first lesson in Magic. The room is surrounded with rune symbols that prevent anyone from using magic besides Agatha. In Marvel, runes are magical artifacts used to give the possessor heightened knowledge. They are labeled by an old pre-Latin (Runic) alphabet. We were shown more symbols last episode, but here we seem to be shown two specific runes. I am not well versed in this ancient language, but it appears that the first letter is an “M” and the last is an “O”. If you’ve been reading my articles thoroughly you know that there is only one word or name that came to mind for me: Mephisto.

I am clear that we have been baited, mercilessly teased and misled throughout the first season by the writers, directors and prop masters and critics alike. I have clearly stated that even though I believe Mephisto to be an orchestrator behind the chaos in Wanda’s life, we may not actually see the character appear in this series; expecting him to be built up like Thanos for an appearance in MOM & beyond. We also know Chthon is another demon with major interest in the “nexi” that is Wanda. He is the prime source for her Chaos Magic in the comics. The taxidermy of a giant bat decorating the basement taunts Dracula as well. The image of a tree of life on a book behind the cicada-fed Señor Scratchy paired with the runes inspires the question: Could Agatha have connections to Asgard & Yggdrasil in The MCU? My point is that there are clues everywhere in this basement. The likelihood of any of these paying off in the season finale is very unlikely, except for possible tag scene teases for the next chapter to this story arc in Loki (Disney+), Spider-Man: No Way Home & MOM.

Explaining her motives, Agatha performs a mind control spell and a transmutation spell on a cicada to teach Wanda some more magic. We finally learn that the creation of the Hexus over Westview caught her attention. The “Magic on auto-pilot” was too good a trick to resist. She sought out the source of the power finding Wanda. As powerful as we see Agatha is, Wanda’s feats dwarf everything she knows. She wants the power for herself. She wants to learn Wanda’s secret. Still in deep denial, Wanda is useless with providing answers. Agatha slowly reveals that she has been spying on her and was behind “fake Pietro” (Fietro) endearing himself to Wanda’s family. Does this kill the theory of a Fox X-Men introduction in The MCU for you?

Where the closed caption reads Agatha’s description of her spell on Fietro as a “crystalline possession“, I heard and read her lips to be saying saying “a Crystalium possession” which makes perfect sense because Fietro has made no sense at all to me yet. Crystalium is an alternate magical reality that eventually became a part of the zany Weirdworld, a magical floating island ruled by Morgan le Fay, and part of Battleworld from Hickman’s Secret Wars story. Although Secret Wars is way off in the future of The MCU, it’s nice to find the first clue that speaks to a part of the actual world building in the story. I have all of the Weirdworld comics and never read them. Now I have good reason! LOL. It’s clues like this that get me excited. Knowing WandaVision is the gateway into the MCU’s world of magical fantasy & alternative storytelling, do you think Marvel is really ready to tell a story like Weirdworld? Or did they just pull another nonstarter clue out to mess with us? Anyway, Necromancy is mentioned by Agatha. This strengthens my belief that the mysterious book could be The Necronomicon. The MCU Pietro is still dead and is not being resurrected…for now. Hopefully more people will actually want to read the comics and research the facts I am referring to. I’m just enjoying the good stories & following the clues.

Wanda’s grief, self doubt and denial has made herself a prime candidate for Agatha’s spells. A strand of hair, an incantation (“Repetere memoriam”), a magical door and a good old-fashioned blackmail gets Wanda to walk Agatha through her past. Here are the key points:

• Oleg & Irina Maximoff are truly Wanda & Pietro’s parents in the MCU. Wanda had an obsession with sitcoms since childhood. That and her close knit family seem to have been the only comforts she had in her life while living in a poverty & war stricken Sokovia. I believe that Wanda still identifies as her 10 year old self even more than the rest of the stages in her life as this is the only scene in which she clearly experiences the events in first person.

• The infamous Stark missile that kills her parents, setting her & Pietro on a dark path hits their apartment and destroys my theory that Jocasta was even an idea in Jac Schaeffer’s (writer) mind. The sound of the Stark missile is identical to the toaster in the Toastmate 2000 commercial. I don’t think there is anymore to that metaphor anymore. (I still think the clock was an easter egg for Rocket Raccoon & High Evolutionary though. LOL) Denial on 100, Wanda still believes that she & Pietro were just lucky that the missile didn’t explode. Agatha pulls her out from the memory and shares her bystander point of view that Wanda used a probability hex spell to stop the explosion, save her brother and herself. (There are flashing specks of light surrounding the twins that could be mistaken for ash but they reignite. I believe this is the sign of the hex Agatha was referring to.

• Knowing that the power to create the Hexus wasn’t developed there, they move on the the next stage of development: Hydra. We see a disheveled Wanda volunteer to touch an unidentified object (at the time) that we all now know to be The Mind Stone from Loki’s scepter in (AOU). Before she can step close enough to the Infinity Stone, it dislodges itself from the scepter and floats toward her. This tells me that the theory Tony Stark & Bruce Banner had about The Mind Stone being sentient is canon to hither and forevermore in the MCU. LOL Wanda touches it in mid-air and it shatters its encasing, irradiates her with cosmic energy, shows Wanda a vision of herself (dressed in full Scarlet Witch attire), floating towards her causing her to faint. The footage of the incident is inexplicably missing in the same way The WandaVision Show broadcast skipped things that Wanda would rewrite during commercials. Agatha rationalizes that The Mind Stone amplified Wanda’s gifts and that they would have disappeared had it not been for the experiment. We know the latter part of the theory to be false by the end of the episode. Wanda was born this way, right?

• Having the power but missing the impetus to create Westview in her own image, they fast forward to post-AOU/pre-Captain America: Civil War. We see a touching moment in the budding relationship between Wanda & Vision. Wanda has lost the last member of her core family at the hands of Ultron and Vision is the perfect, non-emotional and child-like personality to connect with her. The show does an incredible job to show how a witch whose lost everything and synthezoid that never experienced lost could fall in love. Read that back again and understand that pulling this off the way they did is what makes this episode (and series) Emmy worthy. Having those feelings fresh in her heart and mind, Wanda remembers going to SWORD Headquarters to find Vision’s body.

• As Wanda tries to convince the security guard to let her in to claim Vision’s body. Wanda’s pleading for permission from a stranger (with no powers) for the body of her true love when she could have taken it with ease. The Sokovia Accords, though not stated are being held over superhumans’ heads. They dare not use their power to exert their will if they want to be able to live in peace. This would be oppressive to someone like Wanda and add to her grief. Director Hayward smugly shocks Wanda by showing her Vision’s dismantled head & body without warning. He expresses awareness that she has the power to resurrect Vision when Wanda doesn’t even know she has that power yet. How does Director Hayward know Wanda’s powers better than she does? Is he AIM, Hydra, Kree or Skrull? Remember that we still don’t know what happened to Agent Franklin (Beekeeper Guy) in Ep. 4. I do believe we will get this answered in Ep. 9. Wanda breaks in the lab to see if she can find any sign of life from Vision, but she can’t.

• The memory cast continues. Once returned to her car in the parking lot, Wanda realizes that she still has a piece of Vision left: the deed to a plot of land Vision bought for them to build a house and grow old in together (as if Vision could grow old). She drives from what appears to be Florida to New Jersey; to WestView, specifically. It appears Westview existed before Wanda got there…interesting. We see John Collins (RIP Herb as High Evolutionary), Harold Proctor (RIP Phil Jones & Dottie as Arcanna?), Sharon Davis (Mrs. Hart), and Dennis The Mailman. While these appearances are here to clarify that these characters have no special significance to the story going into MOM, I notice the word, “Alakazam” written on Dennis’ paper bag. This is a easter egg for The Alakazam Squad, an extremely short lived & failed team of magicians that included Scarlet Witch & Agatha Harkness. Remember that Dennis was wearing a shirt that said “Presto” last episode, along with a hat with a bunny racing on it in Ep.7. Do you think there is something to this? If you do you’re in denial, and I ain’t talking about the river! HA!

• As Wanda passes the pool we see how much she changed (and upgraded) Westview; albeit against their will. Once she is alone on her plot of land, her acceptance that Vision is gone is beat back by the grief & denial of her loss. The chaos ensues. We see Wanda build 2800 Sherwood Drive into a brand new home with energy from her chest and hands. The second round of energy transmutes all of Westview, puts them under mind control and creates a complete new version of Vision out of thin air! It was Wanda all along! We see the the inception of The WandaVision Show. Agatha has seen enough. She gives a round of applause and snaps out of the studio, which appears to be the inside of her house. It took me a second to remember that the memory cast began in Agatha’s basement.

• Agatha now has the twins in the middle of the street by their necks using an eldritch magic wire while floating above. As the boys cry for their mother’s help, Agatha says she knows what Wanda is. She says that she thought it is was a myth. This line tells me that the book I think to be The Necronomicon most likely isn’t The Darkhold because there is no way Agatha could have the actual Darkhold and think that Chaos Magic wasn’t real. She recognizes what kind of magic Wanda used to make The Hexus; Wanda Maximoff is The Scarlet Witch. But where are Monica & Pietro? Where is Vision? Where is Darcy? And once again, where the hell is Agent Franklin?

• In the tag scene we learn that Hayward is truly indeed every bit of the scumbag we all predicted. The Stark Drone must’ve been made of vibranium alloy because it retained Wanda’s energy blasts and has been scintillating for days. White Vision is brought online by transferring the CMBR (Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation) to its sensors. We are left with the conundrum: Which Vision is the real Vision?

This was my favorite episode thus far. It gave me the full ride in unexpected ways. I feel like I got the best consolation prize for all the letdowns too. This truly is the episode that speaks for itself and represents Kevin Feige’s dream for Marvel TV on Disney+. I can’t imagine the amount of chaos magic it took to pull this endeavor off. I can’t wait to watch the season finale!

How did you like Episode 8? Did any of your theories come to fruition? Did any of my theories that came to fruition improve your experience of watching the show? What do you expect from Episode 9 and beyond? Let us know in the comments here and on Twitter. Thanks for keeping the site on your reading list. Manchild out.