Through figures like Doctor Strange and Loki, the MCU established its rules for magic. However, WandaVision causes Wanda to destroy them all.
WARNING: The following contains spoilers for WandaVision Episode 8, “Previously On,” streaming now on Disney +.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe took a tentative step around its mystical side in its early stages, leaving Thor and the rest of Asgard in a mixture of magic and advanced science. It wasn’t until 2016 Doctor Strange that Marvel’s magical aspect finally got what it deserved. Now WandaVision investigated the hidden rules that define witchcraft in this superhero world, giving Agatha time to show off while tormenting Wanda. But Agatha’s stylish illustration of how magic works also creates a backdrop to reveal how Wanda’s powers break all of these rules.
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It is not worthwhile that only the magic of the Earth has very clear rules so far. Asgard has since accepted his magical nature in things like Frigga’s witchcraft, although it is still unclear how his study compares to Earth witches. And Loki’s illusions are appropriately subtle, sometimes marked with a movement of the hand, sometimes not. A thousand years or more of study leaves these wizards of other worlds in a category of their own, along with Krugarr, the sorcerer Ravager seen in Guardians of the Galaxy 2.
Doctor Strange he took his injured neurosurgeon into the hidden corridors of Kamar-Taj, a place of great magical study. The Masters of the Mystic Arts present a form of monastic and highly ritualized magic. Many of their skills are linked to the ancient artifacts they use, and even teleportation magic is linked to the magic rings that each sorcerer uses. The golden spells that Strange shows have geometric patterns, visually suggesting a regimented order behind how these spells work. But some of Strange’s magical powers are more practical, and of particular interest is the portal he creates Thor: Ragnarok, his magical intention powered by a lock of Thor’s hair.
Agatha Harkness has a reintroduction of flashback in this week’s episode of WandaVision, placing it in the heart of Salem. But his judgment is not in the hands of frightened villagers. Instead, she turns against the women of her own clan, including her powerful mother. The scene is a great taste of the wildest magic of witches. Like Wanda, they use their hands to create a powerful flow of the magic they exercise, although the chants of Latinized spells offer an additional structure to naturalist movements. The choice of language refers to the Latin and sometimes Greek roots of the Marvel comic book spells, details that usually go back to the hidden Atlantean roots.
Agatha’s anger at the puzzles of Wanda’s power leads her to sarcastic seminars. She uses Wanda’s prison to illustrate rune magic and how she protects witches in their places of power, frustrated because Wanda doesn’t know this basic skill. It exhibits illusions and transfigurations, and even discusses necromancy. There is also a strong link to Kamar-Taj’s magical methods, as Agatha creates a portal out of a lock of Wanda’s hair, a spell cast similarly to the Strange portal in Ragnarok. Instead, this spell is imbued with Agatha’s darkest powers. All of this is underlined with Agatha’s centuries-old effort to hone her skills. Wanda breaks all of these rules, everything that Agatha and Strange – and to a lesser extent, Loki – established over the years of the MCU.
The revelation that Wanda’s innate power comes from an Infinity Stone, by itself, does not overwhelm Agatha. She has already seen potential in a frightened Wanda trapped by the Stark Industries bomb, a nascent witch in a world that hasn’t offered much room for magic. Agatha suspects that Wanda would never have reached her magical awakening without finding the stone. But the sadness and emptiness that emptied the poor woman, together with the Stone of Infinity and the promise that she envisioned within her, unlocked something she had been waiting for all along.
It is unclear whether Agatha witnessed the silhouette that Wanda saw in his flashback to experiments with Hydra. But at the end of the episode, it’s a moot point. Agatha recognizes that Wanda is a game changer in a world of magic chained by ordered rules. Wanda’s power is pure chaos, intention shaped, a singular entity of magic like no other. It’s been a subtle construction for the series, setting the rules just to reveal exactly how Wanda destroys them all. The Scarlet Witch, an avatar of pure chaos magic that can rewrite all of reality with just one word, is embodied within the MCU.
But with Wanda still under the control of Agatha, her twin sons prisoner of the wicked witch, it remains unclear what the final limits of Wanda’s new power are. The most terrible possibility of all is that there we are without limits – and with Doctor Strange due to return to the big screen, the ramifications in the Multiverse could be incomprehensible.
Written by Jac Schaeffer and directed by Matt Shakman, WandaVision stars Elizabeth Olsen as Wanda Maximoff / Scarlet Witch, Paul Bettany as Vision, Randall Park as agent Jimmy Woo, Kat Dennings as Darcy Lewis, Teyonah Parris as Monica Rambeau and Kathryn Hahn like Agnes. New episodes air on Fridays at Disney +.
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