Five WandaVision Predictions

There are spoilers galore, so read at your own risk….

I like the MCU. I like longer stories which focus on characters, their individual weirdness, and their interactions among each other. I prefer the plot development to explosions and high-wired action scenes. I like mysteries and easter eggs and obsessing over them for a week until the next episode of a series airs.

Which is to say: my love of WandaVision knows no bounds, so much so that I spend whatever free time that I have brainpower for contemplating what’s next, where this is going, and what I may have missed in watching the episodes. I feel good about my predictions record so far, so here’s what I’m thinking about the rest of the series.

One — Agatha is the main villain, at least right now

7/9ths of the way through this miniseries, we don’t know the villain’s intentions. We didn’t even get confirmation until the end of the last episode. Was the entire point of the Hex to convince Wanda to walk into Agatha’s basement? Can she control Wanda there? I imagine this next episode crystallizes Agatha’s plan, but it also means we have more development left to go in a very short period of time.

Not that I’m complaining — Kathryn Hahn deserves Emmy nominations for both Agnes and Agatha.

A lot of speculation during the season centered around the potential for dual villains — Agnes as Agatha Harkness, and some combination of Ralph or Dottie or even Tyler Hayward as the comic book villain and Marvel Devil-like Mephisto. I don’t doubt that Mephisto arrives during this Phase of the MCU. It seems likely even, given the links he has to multiple elements of the WandaVision-ish arcs from the comics.

But given the lack of timing left to close so many holes, it would feel incredibly rushed to introduce a bigger, badder bad than Agatha now. I imagine that there’s a mid-or post-credits scene featuring Mephisto or something similar, which then serves as the lead-in to Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. Marvel always needs to set up the next big thing. The only time it didn’t was in Avengers: Endgame, and even then Marvel Studios smartly positioned Spider-Man: Far From Home after the climax of the first three phases of the MCU in order to build up suspense for what would follow.

I also imagine whoever plays Mephisto is the long-awaited mystery actor that Paul Bettany has been selling. That said, maybe Hawkeye shows up to help, given his connection with the Maximoffs. Maybe Dr. Strange appears a bit early, given what I think happens to Wanda following this.

Two — Billy and Tommy are the key to whatever Agatha needs

Vision appears to be an inessential piece to Agatha’s puzzle, given that her acting was what convinced Vision to try and escape the Hex in the first place. But Agatha’s actions were clearly designed to try and accelerate the development of the twins. I am not sure the twins are able to exist outside of the Hex either, but between “For the Children” and Agatha’s assorted twin-related activities, whatever the twins are they must be a key part to her plans.

Now, did Wanda create the twins by the force of her will, or did Agatha? Did Agatha age them, or did they age themselves? I lean toward the latter, given that they are magical, but then I still don’t understand how they can live outside Wanda’s dream world. The twins are tripping me up, because while the MCU has magical properties and doesn’t obey the laws of physics on an alarming scale, the MCU hasn’t magicked humans out of thin air before, and the idea of that still seems farfetched to me.

Billy’s telepathic senses seem specifically important. It’s possible that Agatha tries to use those for her own sake. Or maybe she works to expand the Hex with Wanda and them in tow, and aim for a world that aims to exist around her. That actually sounds kind of like a plan.

Evan Peters’s Quiksilver is an incredible wink and a nod, but this series doesn’t result in the true rebirth of an X-Men series

Again leaning into the theme that Marvel has a lot of work to do and isn’t going to use the once-least-anticipated Marvel television series to get there, Evan Peters was a shocking and sly point to the eventual reality that the X-Men are going to show up, but this isn’t a lead-in to a series. The X-Men will be back for sure under the MCU. But a sitcom trope is not the path there.

Maybe I’m wrong and Magneto shows up — and this would be a major indicator that the multiverse is wide open right now — but otherwise I feel confident that it won’t happen. Peters is simply a sitcom recasting trope used as a teaser for people like me.

The, ahem, endgame for this series is Vision saving Wanda… and convincing her to end the Hex and his faux-life

I subscribe to the theory that the episode themes follow the line of the five stages of grief. Denial is creating a new universe and living a fake life, believing that a normal family life with your synthezoid husband and twin superpowered kin is possible despite the ‘zoid dying twice in front of you. Anger is taking the grief out on a trespasser and anyone trying to break up your dreamland. Bargaining is discussing the ethical implications of removing free will from 3,000 people, and deciding that the children can walk in the street for a moment. Depression is realizing the synthezoid husband has free will and wanting to stay in bed all day. Acceptance? Acceptance is Wanda shutting down the Hex as Vision convinces her to move on.

She won’t be able to do it alone. Agatha seems to have Wanda — the strongest avenger — completely under her grasp. Vision will work to save her, along with Monica and Darcy. They’ll likely have to withstand targeted attacks from S.W.O.R.D., but this seems to be the logical next sequence of events. S.W.O.R.D. would likely fall due to Hayward’s violation of the Sokovia Accords, or at the very least switch to a Monica Rambeau-led unit, which could lead into Captain Marvel 2.

Wanda’s fallout results in an exile

Given that Wanda has, again, removed the free will of over 3,000 people in a random New Jersey town, built a barrier to protect her world, and continued to insist on keeping that world safe regardless of the effects on the people in the town, I think she will still be charged with significant responsibility for the Anomaly — even if Agatha engineered it following the Blip’s reversal. Even if the twins can exist in the real world, as arguably the most dangerous and powerful Avenger, it likely wouldn’t be safe for her to generally exist in the regular population, and she’d probably admit that herself.

Maybe something like a Magneto-esque helmet goes with her going forward? Maybe she lives in a bubble? Maybe in another dimension in the multiverse? Regardless, prior to the events of Avengers: Infinity War, she was a fugitive. After the Hex, she’ll bea clear and present danger if corrupted by the wrong hands. It won’t be happily ever after for Wanda, because even in the reality she created for herself that couldn’t exist.