“WandaVision” Falls Apart in the End

 by Ray Keating

Review – SPOILER ALERT

DisneyBizJournal.com

March 8, 2021

 

WandaVision – the Marvel Cinematic Universe show streaming on Disney+ - started off with a bang and much-deserved praise, but it fell apart in the end due to absurdity, major plot holes, and cowardice from its creators.

Indeed, the bizarre message to take away from WandaVision amounts to the following: If you’re really, really sad because of a personal loss, you’re allowed to behave like a villain, to the point of enslaving others. In fact, not only will you not even be considered a villain, but you’ll be embraced as sympathetic and misunderstood.

 

WandaVision serves up the story of Wanda Maximoff (or The Scarlet Witch) after her love, Vision, died (twice!) in the movie Avengers: Infinity War. No doubt, Wanda has had a tough time, when also considering that her brother died in Avengers: Age of Ultron. 

 

Using her enormous but not understood powers, Wanda has crawled inside a world she re-created from a town named Westview. The show’s creators and writers excelled in fostering questions, mystery and curiosity among viewers early on in the series, as each episode of WandaVision nodded to an episode from actual television sitcoms – from The Dick Van Dyke Show up to The Office, for example. It was a fascinating, off-beat idea. In fact, WandaVision worked exceedingly well – for the most part – until links to old sitcoms were basically left behind in favor of a more traditional effort to wrap up the story of this limited-run series.  

 

The shortcomings become rather numerous by the time we’re done with the final episode. Among the most glaring, for example, the character Tyler Hayward, the director of S.W.O.R.D., becomes the bad guy, but there’s no real reason why he does so. Motivation? Nah. And by the end, Hayward has gone from trying to stop Wanda to attempting to shoot children. Whoa. Why? Who knows? Apparently, we just needed some evil dude, perhaps to mitigate what Wanda actually is doing. One could argue that the character Agatha Harkness came to serve the same rather empty purpose.

 

And make no mistake, Wanda’s actions make her rise to super-villain status. She selfishly “resurrects” Vision and creates two children for them. She takes over the minds and enslaves an entire town – depriving them of free will, and imposing real and significant pain. To the credit of those creating and writing WandaVision, they actually didn’t shy away from this grim development, that is, until the story called for actually dealing with the actions and their consequences. Then the WandaVision showrunners didn’t just take a pass, but chose to whitewash the evil done by their main character. 

 

At the end of the series, Wanda walks among the people of Westview, and their wariness and hatred of this woman who controlled their lives and thoughts, who inflicted enormous pain, are unmistakable. But an emerging “hero” – Captain Monica Rambeau – steps forward to provide bizarre and cheap absolution. 

 

Rambeau actually says to Wanda, “They’ll never know what you sacrificed for them.” And Wanda replies, “It wouldn’t change how they see me.” Excuse me, what? There was no real sacrifice.

 

Wanda then asks Rambeau, “You don’t hate me?” Rambeau actually answers, “Given the chance and given your power, I’d bring my mom back. I know I would.” Given that the totality of Wanda’s actions are manifest at this point, one has to wonder about Rambeau’s moral compass, or lack thereof.

 

In fact, the moral obtuseness or bankruptcy of these two characters is quite stunning. After what Wanda did and then seeing this exchange, neither character should be considered a “hero,” but the show’s creators clearly want to leave viewers with that impression.

 

While coming down the stretch in WandaVision, there clearly are individual scenes that pack emotional wallop, but they turn out to be rather hollow. There is no redemption arch, and/or as noted, no true sacrifice. There are no real consequences – except that Wanda is sad, again, because the world she controlled is gone (or is it?). 

 

WandaVision’s creators ultimately chickened out. They set up a story that cried out for wrestling with evil actions taken by a “hero,” but viewers got nothing, other than a lame, passing “I’m sorry” from Wanda. 

 

Well, after getting viewers engaged with some enticing early episodes, each of the creators and writers of WandaVision owe viewers a real “I’m sorry.”

 

__________

 

Ray Keating is the editor, publisher and economist for DisneyBizJournal.com, and author of the  Pastor Stephen Grant novels and assorted nonfiction books. Have Ray Keating speak your group, business, school, church, or organization. Email him at raykeating@keatingreports.com.

 

The views expressed here are his own – after all, no one else should be held responsible for this stuff, right?

 

Keating has two new books out. Vatican Shadows: A Pastor Stephen Grant Novel is the 13ththriller/mystery in the Pastor Stephen Grant series. Get the paperback or Kindle edition at Amazon, or signed books at www.raykeatingonline.com. Past Lives: A Pastor Stephen Grant Short Story is the 14th book in the series. Get the paperback or Kindle edition at Amazon, or signed book at www.raykeatingonline.com. 

 

You also can order his book Behind Enemy Lines: Conservative Communiques from Left-Wing New York  from Amazon or signed books  at RayKeatingOnline.com. His other recent nonfiction book is Free Trade Rocks! 10 Points on International Trade Everyone Should Know. 

 

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