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Watched the finale tonight. Really good. I'm honestly still processing the implications of it all.
One thing that has me a little perplexed:
Spoiler:
Is the Darkhold the same book that was in Agents of SHIELD Season 4? Because it sure looks like it. If it is, Wanda needs to put it down right now!
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ZergSmasher wrote:Watched the finale tonight. Really good. I'm honestly still processing the implications of it all.
One thing that has me a little perplexed:
Spoiler:
Is the Darkhold the same book that was in Agents of SHIELD Season 4? Because it sure looks like it. If it is, Wanda needs to put it down right now!
H.B.M.C. wrote:The Darkhold was used in Agents of SHIELD but Agents of SHIELD isn't part of the MCU.
Correct. Also I feel like the Darkhold was misused in AoS. It's WAY more dangerous then they implied in that show. The Darkhold in the comics is basically what if Mephisto and Dormamu wrote a spell book based on all their cruelest ideas. gak gets DARK in the Darkhold. This isn't the Ancient One tapping into the Dark dimension to survive for a long time. This isn't even sell your soul to get cursed to be a Ghost Rider. This is manifest Mephisto physically on Earth kind of gak. It's not giving the Earth to Dormamu in his Dark Dimension. It's giving Dormamu a foot hold here so he can actually leave the Dark Dimension. Real bad gak comes from the Darkhold.
These are my opinions. This is how I feel. Others may feel differently. This needs to be stated for some reason.
Though each time the book had a different design, apparently. So they could very well be different books, depending on whether you subscribe to them being the same canon or multiverse or whatever.
My favorite part is that the Vision fight is resolved not thru punches and laser blasts, but thru a philosophical debate. Just in the middle of a throw down and one dude just goes Stop and the other guy immediately does. Even when he’s “evil” he’s still polite.
A little disappointed he then just leaves without a word or helping anyone. Also in the post credit when she’s sitting on the porch, she is distinctly off center and I expected him to come out and sit next to her, but still no.
You know, in the vocabulary of lazy boring media slags, I think WandaVision has can genuinely and accurately be described as a rollercoaster.
Most importantly, whilst the main story has a satisfying beginning, middle and end, not everything is explained in excruciating, tedious detail.
There are bits and pieces left dangling. Hints and that of what might be to come. All there for other series and writers to pick up and run with if it suits their show.
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I must not have understood the conclusion of the series. It gave me whiplash.
Spoiler:
I thought the show had previously deftly built up the horror of what Wanda had done -- and for incredibly selfish reasons -- but apparently at the end Monica explains that the townspeople "will never know what (Wanda) sacrificed for them". What? WHAT?!?
You mean her fake holodeck family? Whom she chilled with while townspeople were turned into animatronic meat puppets, tears sliding down their faces as they silently screamed? All of that was VERY dark...but in the end let's forget about it...there's a boss battle that needs to happen and ultimately the townspeople ARE actually cardboard cutouts that don't matter compared to 'our heroes'.
Fly away Wanda! Meanwhile, we'll arrest the SWORD guy who undoubtedly was an a-hole and broke some laws, but mostly correctly thought that Wanda was an incredibly dangerous monster and that what was going on in the hex was horrific. And what's the post-credits sequence supposed to suggest? 'Oh no, she's reading the Darkhold...she's turning bad now'? She ALREADY made her heel turn -- I thought that was what the show was about, until she gets an emotional hero's ending without the overwhelming guilt that should have been there. "My bad everybody, but I really did miss them SO much."
Sorry folks...really liked this most of the way, but the ending felt like it had been changed in committee.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/03/06 14:46:30
Wanda got to get away scot free, and that execrable cop-out "They'll never know!" line from Monica does not absolve her.
And Haywood (unironically) did nothing wrong, yet he's the one that walks away worse off (not as worse off as the townsfolk, who get nothing but the memories of their torture).
There's only really a relatively short time that Wanda was consciously aware of what was happening. - Around the end of Episode 6 to Episode 7 time. Even then, it was a dawning conscious awareness.
There's also the idea that the 'fake holodeck family' was real to her. SO incredibly real to her.
Monica, who has been lost in her own grief herself, acknowledges what Wanda did, that grief and emotions are complicated. This is all despite the fact that the 'cardboard cutouts' as you call them, are staring in complete revulsion and hatred, the camera lingering and acknowledging that awfulness.
Then, ultimately, Wanda flies away, because ultimately, who can stop her? That, and there ARE innocents there who need protection and help. Innocents who Todd put at risk himself, for his own experiment.
Plus. of course, there's the whole gigantic witch battle thing too, there's probably some on-the-ground unclarity about who was fully responsible for it all.
I think the finale scene is less about being evil, and more about she's fully coming into her powers as the Scarlet Witch to show that Wanda's learning about fully fledged magic.
I mean haywood did drive her into it. Would wanda have lost her mind if haywood hadnt delighted in showing her visions chop shop or if she'd been allowed to bury him? Dude was willing to wipe out an entire town to get a working version of vision. So lets not pretend he didnt do anything wrong.
I know its the MCU and i know it happened relatively quickly in real time but im shocked literally no one was keeping tabs on her given her past. Also how do you punish superman? Thats the kind of question you're asking.when they let her walk away. Shes a grief strickened force of nature. Also there is no guarentee that she didnt "fix" their brains when she shut the place down.
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Thing is, the show DID mention the morality of it all. Even in this episode. It’s horrific. She did to an entire town what WW did to one dude and had fans bent out of shape. Except the particulars in Wanda’s case are more inhumane - they were conscious and tortured by nightmares.
But never mind the morality just 10 minutes later! Because after all, aren’t Agnes and SWORD dude the real baddies? No! They really aren’t!
Only thing I can figure is that dealing with Wanda honestly — which probably involves her breaking down and fully realizing in horror what a monster she’s become — would have put her in the “wrong” place for the DS movie. If that’s it, it underlines the weaknesses of shared universes. Or maybe the central committee decided ‘our hero’ couldn’t have an ending that dark. I dunno. Whatever that was made no sense to me.
Im not so sure. The show didnt shy away from showing Wanda as being a bit morally in the wrong even when they said that line. She did give up her family, including her boys, for an entire town. Im not so sure many people would do that. IT was selfless even if she did start it and was in the wrong.
Now to something different. ITs clear this will have effects on the MCU, and i was talking about it to some of the young kids i was working with and none of them saw it because it was weird. So i wonder how many are going to go into say, Doctor Strange and wonder why suddenly is looking for her kids they never knew she had.
I'm not TOO worried about that, the show is literally called Wandavision. I think if Wanda or Vision show up, it's quite easy for people to go 'well, stuff happened in the TV show named after them.'
I'm a little bit more concerned about Monica Rambeau showing up with superpowers in a film without at least some recap of (1) Who she is at all and (2) Why she has powers.
But this could be accomplished quite easily on the characters introduction scene - like Wandavision recapped us on who Darcy was, so I'm not really that worried.
So, Wanda has a huge mental breakdown and a powerful Witch is manipulating her pretty much the entire time. But Wanda is the bad guy. I grant she did bad things. But none of it was her actively choosing to do it.
Yeah, put simply evil requires intent, and there's zero argument for Wanda intending any of it. In fact she explicitly states she believes that the Westview folks were in a good place.
Although I can see the world at large utterly ignoring that fact and relentless hounding and persecution becoming a self fulfilling prophecy in the near future.
We find comfort among those who agree with us - growth among those who don't. - Frank Howard Clark
The wise man doubts often, and changes his mind; the fool is obstinate, and doubts not; he knows all things but his own ignorance.
The correct statement of individual rights is that everyone has the right to an opinion, but crucially, that opinion can be roundly ignored and even made fun of, particularly if it is demonstrably nonsense!” Professor Brian Cox
Azreal13 wrote: Yeah, put simply evil requires intent, and there's zero argument for Wanda intending any of it.
Who cares about 'evil?' Responsibility, guilt, repercussions... intent is a very small part of that whole package. Someone plows a kid over with a car, their 'intent' doesn't matter much.
Hulksmash wrote: I mean haywood did drive her into it. Would wanda have lost her mind if haywood hadnt delighted in showing her visions chop shop or if she'd been allowed to bury him?
I don't buy that at all.
It was her doing. Haywood didn't push her over the edge, and he was right that he can't just hand over potentially billions of vibranium so she can put it in the ground.
Hulksmash wrote: Dude was willing to wipe out an entire town to get a working version of vision. So lets not pretend he didnt do anything wrong.
He had a working version of Vision. He was (rightly) worried that Wanda had created a new Vision under her complete control, after she captured and enslaved an entire town.
But no, he gets arrested for *mumble mumble* reasons and Wanda gets off with a pathetic "They'll never know what you sacrificed for them!". Yeah I'm sure the woman who forcibly mind-controlled whilst having her daughter locked up in a room she couldn't go to for a fortnight is really cut up about what Wanda has "sacrificed".
Azreal13 wrote: Yeah, put simply evil requires intent, and there's zero argument for Wanda intending any of it. In fact she explicitly states she believes that the Westview folks were in a good place.
Every villain is the hero of their own story.
And we didn't say anything about Wanda being evil. Her actions weren't malicious, they were selfish. She did what she did out of her own grief and selfish desire to give herself whatever she wanted, and she didn't care who else that hurt along the way.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/03/07 03:31:57
Gotta agree with HBMC, regardless of Agatha's personal manipulations, Wanda was ultimately the one who was in the wrong here. It's not like Tony with Ultron where he was trying to create something to protect the world and it went off the rails once it went sentient, something that neither Banner nor Tony expected or actively worked towards. Tony also didn't double down on keeping Ultron around or creating another version of him. Wanda on the other hand proactively maintained the Hex on Westview even after it was clear she was forcing the residents to live out her perverse fantasy life. Grief is no justification for harming or subjugating other people.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/03/07 03:41:58
She certainly has no idea what she's done initially, there's a compelling narrative that suggests she isn't aware she's done anything detrimental until the finale.
Certainly the time between the townsfolk telling her what's actually going on to her relinquishing her control, ultimately sacrifing her family, is not long at all.
There's no arguing she's done a bad thing. There's no justification, but the show knows that and that's why she has that conversation with Monica. What's she's done is without justification, but Monica understands why she did it, and admits that given a reversed situation she may well do the same.
Trying to paint her as a villain or a victim is pointless because the whole show is too nuanced to allow for a clear interpretation of the facts, and that's part of its quality.
We find comfort among those who agree with us - growth among those who don't. - Frank Howard Clark
The wise man doubts often, and changes his mind; the fool is obstinate, and doubts not; he knows all things but his own ignorance.
The correct statement of individual rights is that everyone has the right to an opinion, but crucially, that opinion can be roundly ignored and even made fun of, particularly if it is demonstrably nonsense!” Professor Brian Cox
Hulksmash wrote: I mean haywood did drive her into it. Would wanda have lost her mind if haywood hadnt delighted in showing her visions chop shop or if she'd been allowed to bury him?
I don't buy that at all.
It was her doing. Haywood didn't push her over the edge, and he was right that he can't just hand over potentially billions of vibranium so she can put it in the ground.
Hulksmash wrote: Dude was willing to wipe out an entire town to get a working version of vision. So lets not pretend he didnt do anything wrong.
He had a working version of Vision. He was (rightly) worried that Wanda had created a new Vision under her complete control, after she captured and enslaved an entire town.
But no, he gets arrested for *mumble mumble* reasons and Wanda gets off with a pathetic "They'll never know what you sacrificed for them!". Yeah I'm sure the woman who forcibly mind-controlled whilst having her daughter locked up in a room she couldn't go to for a fortnight is really cut up about what Wanda has "sacrificed".
Azreal13 wrote: Yeah, put simply evil requires intent, and there's zero argument for Wanda intending any of it. In fact she explicitly states she believes that the Westview folks were in a good place.
Every villain is the hero of their own story.
And we didn't say anything about Wanda being evil. Her actions weren't malicious, they were selfish. She did what she did out of her own grief and selfish desire to give herself whatever she wanted, and she didn't care who else that hurt along the way.
We watched a different show. His version of Vision didn't work without Wanda's powers. He engineered her breakdown hoping she'd help him fix Vision and if not then he could take from her something to help. And then she created a new Vision and he had to figure it out and was willing to antagonize someone who could go toe to toe with brawler Thanos to figure it out with an entire town in the way. He got arrested because of most of the above.
Also, no evidence that line isn't referencing that Wanda would have fixed all of them. She's a master of the mind. Odds are good she fixed them but it's something we don't know yet. Not arguing she didn't do a bad thing. Just that Agatha and Haywood weren't innocent lambs. Also they aren't celestial power level beings like a certain someone.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/03/07 04:46:20
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d-usa wrote: Some replies offer a good view into how people view mental illness.
I mean I'm pretty sure Wanda experiencing grief isn't on the same level of having an actual mental illness, nor does it seem fair to equate that to a person who has literal reality warping power so um, I think you're kind of reaching there?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/03/07 06:09:50
Grimskul wrote: Gotta agree with HBMC, regardless of Agatha's personal manipulations, Wanda was ultimately the one who was in the wrong here. It's not like Tony with Ultron where he was trying to create something to protect the world and it went off the rails once it went sentient, something that neither Banner nor Tony expected or actively worked towards. Tony also didn't double down on keeping Ultron around or creating another version of him. Wanda on the other hand proactively maintained the Hex on Westview even after it was clear she was forcing the residents to live out her perverse fantasy life. Grief is no justification for harming or subjugating other people.
Tony DID double down and try to build a second one. The whole argument/fight in the room where Thor comes in and wakes up the Vision is a scene where Tony is trying to double down. Tony is the biggest villain in the MCU. He not only creates all his own villains he creates a bunch for everyone else because he is selfish and thoughtless as to the consequences of his own actions. And then when civil war rolls around he goes, "Hey guys, WE need to be put in check. WE need to accept limitations." No Tony, YOU do.
Villains who exist either because Tony was willfully ignorant or because he was thoughtless.
Obidiah Stane - Didn't want to pay attention to what his company was doing. Whiplash - Didn't want to pay attention to what his dad/company had done. AIM (the whole organization) - Didn't go on that rooftop date with Killian that one time. Ultron - Ignored all the arguments why he shouldn't. Got lucky with Ultron 2.0 aka The Vision Vulture - feth the little guys. Vultures speach about Tony is 100% correct. Tinkerer - See vulture Mysterio - Called his lifes work BARF. Zemo - See Ultron and consequences.
Villains that will probably be Tony's fault in Armor Wars Crimson Dynamo Titanium Man Whiplash 2.0
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/03/07 07:13:23
These are my opinions. This is how I feel. Others may feel differently. This needs to be stated for some reason.
Grimskul wrote: Gotta agree with HBMC, regardless of Agatha's personal manipulations, Wanda was ultimately the one who was in the wrong here. It's not like Tony with Ultron where he was trying to create something to protect the world and it went off the rails once it went sentient, something that neither Banner nor Tony expected or actively worked towards. Tony also didn't double down on keeping Ultron around or creating another version of him. Wanda on the other hand proactively maintained the Hex on Westview even after it was clear she was forcing the residents to live out her perverse fantasy life. Grief is no justification for harming or subjugating other people.
Tony DID double down and try to build a second one. The whole argument/fight in the room where Thor comes in and wakes up the Vision is a scene where Tony is trying to double down. Tony is the biggest villain in the MCU. He not only creates all his own villains he creates a bunch for everyone else because he is selfish and thoughtless as to the consequences of his own actions. And then when civil war rolls around he goes, "Hey guys, WE need to be put in check. WE need to accept limitations." No Tony, YOU do.
Villains who exist either because Tony was willfully ignorant or because he was thoughtless.
Obidiah Stane - Didn't want to pay attention to what his company was doing. Whiplash - Didn't want to pay attention to what his dad/company had done. AIM (the whole organization) - Didn't go on that rooftop date with Killian that one time. Ultron - Ignored all the arguments why he shouldn't. Got lucky with Ultron 2.0 aka The Vision Vulture - feth the little guys. Vultures speach about Tony is 100% correct. Tinkerer - See vulture Mysterio - Called his lifes work BARF. Zemo - See Ultron and consequences.
Villains that will probably be Tony's fault in Armor Wars Crimson Dynamo Titanium Man Whiplash 2.0
Tony is definitely not a perfect person and one who makes a lot of mistakes, but he's definitely not guilty of a lot of the things you're saying he's guilty of.
Gotta disagree with Vision, for one Ultron built him, not Tony. Furthermore, how is Vision in any way similar to what Stark initially intended with Ultron? Vision wasn't a worldwide defense system that he was envisioning in preparation for another potential alien invasion. He's basically saving what was left of Jarvis and using it as a tool rather than wasting a valuable asset that is, don't forget, made of vibranium, so it's not something you just dispose of that easily. Better to use it than leave it to be taken or hijacked by others.
To be fair for Whiplash, this was something that was more of a beef between Vanko's father and Stark's dad that was passed down to Ivan himself. Stark basically didn't even know the guy and the first thing Ivan does is try to kill him....soooooo I mean how would he know about this in any detail if his dad never bothered to share it with him? Not to mention Vanko's dad was the one who sold out military secrets which was why Stark's dad got him deported to begin with.
Obidiah Stane makes sense mainly because he was more or less a villain the whole time and Tony was in cahoots with the arms development up until he finally had a change of heart in the movie, so I mean, I don't exactly know how he wouldn't have remained a villain, even if Tony did fire him after he came back from being kidnapped?
He lied to Killian, which is an donkey-cave move, but frankly that speaks more towards Killian's instability as a person moreso than Stark. I mean if you get snubbed once, even if it's by your idol, I don't think that justifies someone creating a terrorist organization to push your bio-tech advancement and to try and control the US government. That's like saying that it's Jodie's Fosters fault that her stalker shot Ronald Reagan for not dealing with or giving into his delusions.
The one regarding the Vulture and the Tinkerer is kinda dumb since he's not the one who directly screwed Toomes over, arguably it's the people that he teams up with Damage Control are the ones who handled the situation poorly. Toomes never bothered actually reaching out to complain to Tony to begin with, Stark cleaning up dangerous alien tech seems more responsible overall IMO. Toomes also proves his point that regular people shouldn't have access to alien tech since it gets weaponized by them anyways.
Mysterio - Shows you didn't actually pay attention during the movie, if you compare the therapy scene during Civil War to the one from Beck's recollection in Spider Man: Far From Home, you can see Beck's take is far more exaggerated and how the audience laughing at him doesn't actually occur in the Civil War version, the audience is completely silent. Again, another sign of instability that Stark was actually right to call out and fire him over. If he had kept him, he could have become another Obidiah Stane.
Zemo - I'll give you this one, mainly because Ultron was definitely Tony's fault.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/03/07 08:02:09
Yeah, Wanda did a very bad thing by taking over the town, but she believed that none of the townspeople were conscious of it and, in her grief, convinced herself that it was ok, because the town was in such a terrible state before she changed it. So she’s not innocent, but also not a super villain. It was only Vision who had really seen the evidence that people were suffering over the last 2-3 episodes and he was separated from Wanda for the entire time, so she genuinely only finds out that the true situation when Agatha releases them temporarily, at which point she immediately agrees to end the hex and release everyone, which will result in the death of her Vision and their sons, all of whom are definitively independent, conscious, entities. To paraphrase a different comic; “Without condoning, or condemning, I understand.”
Ultimately I think this is actually the most human I’ve seen a comic book property. Good people doing bad things because they’re messed up and don’t realise the consequences? That’s very real.
Edit:
Spoiler:
Actually Haward is pretty much the same; you can argue how much he engineered the circumstances versus just taking advantage of the situation (I lean towards the second, because seems pretty neutral in the flashbacks, even from Wanda’s point of view, and I don’t buy that level of “just as planned” nonsense), but the plain matter of the fact is he is willing to sacrifice the entire town in order to get the Vision back online. He is not really trying to stop Wanda and when Monica, Darcy and Woo try to point out the best way to resolve the situation (I.e. talk Wanda down), he ignores and then arrests them. So yeah, he deserves the status of (secondary) series villain, because he actively chooses to keep doing the bad thing when confronted with other options, whereas Wanda choose to do the right thing when similarly confronted. Doesn’t mean he is inherently evil, just flawed.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/03/07 08:17:26
Zed wrote: *All statements reflect my opinion at this moment. if some sort of pretty new model gets released (or if I change my mind at random) I reserve the right to jump on any bandwagon at will.
~16000 Astra Militarum: 
~1200 | Imperial Knights: 
~2300 | Leagues of Votann: 
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~3400 | Stormcast Eternals: 
~5000 | Kruleboyz: 
~3500 | Lumineth Realm-Lords: 
~700
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