TELEVISION REVIEW: WandaVision Season 1

 (Shadows Of Mouldwood - Gareth Coker)

In its nearly 13 years of existence, Marvel hasn't slipped up very often.  Some of the MCU's films have been weaker than others. That's bound to happen.  Thor couldn't seem to find his stride until the third film, Iron Man's third film was almost single-handed ruined by someone named Trevor, and Ant-Man...

We don't talk about Ant-Man.

Still, in a stable of over 20 movies and several television shows that have, all of them, been pretty decent, statistics says there's bound to be the occasional low-point.

That, I'm afraid, is where we find WandaVision.

The two-episode pilot to this show was equal parts tragic and painful.  Worse, the third episode was on the same track until about the last 5 minutes.  (I cover this train wreck in greater detail in my Preview post.). For those of you keeping score at home, that's a full third of season one's nine episodes.  A full THIRD is wasted. While you're rewarded in the next few episodes for showing what feels like endless amounts of patience, the reward is in no way compensatory for the sheer agony of putting up with schlock television and our two Principles acting like absolute morons.

Poor choices continue to mount as the show careens through its seventh and eighth episode of the season, culminating in an event that would have been a brutally emotional right hook ... if you hadn't seen it coming since the end of that third episode.

Perhaps worst of all is Marvel's ham-fisted treatment of Wanda Maximoff herself.  Instead of ending up triumphant, she comes off as the biggest try-hard Mary Sue of the entire MCU to date.  I could give all of this just a little bit more leeway in terms of a 'perhaps season two will clear some of this up?' if it weren't for the fact that Kevin Feige, Mr. Marvel himself, has already pretty strongly indicated that a second season is most likely not in the cards.

WandaVision isn't a bad show on its own, but when you stand it up against everything else that's come out of the MCU since 2008, "Isn't A Bad Show" isn't saying much.  That's a damn shame because the show is riddled with elements that deserved much, much better.  Here's hoping they get it in future shows or movies.

....We're gonna talk about Spoilery stuff now, so...yeah.

HERE THERE BE SPOILERS!

- What a criminal misuse of Agatha Harkness.  My. GOD. Kathryn Hahn deserved so much better, especially after having knocked it out of the goddamned park in this show over and over and over again.

- 'Wonder Woman' comes out in mid-2017 and spends most of the movie blowing on the Girl Power trumpet as hard as it could.  Then 'Black Panther' comes out in early 2018 and doesn't blow on a damned thing because all the Dora Milage have to do is show up.  They don't have to tell people they're powerful women.  They just get right on being powerful women.  Period.  I was really proud of Marvel showing, not telling.  Then they go and turn Wanda Maximoff into the biggest, most bumbling shit-show of a Mary Sue that the comic book movie-verse has ever seen.  She's just a magical savant, eh?  Between that and the powers the Mind Stone gave her, she's more powerful than Dr. Strange so it's all good.   This is the Mandalorian-esque "Luke Skywalker' moment that Marvel has been talking about Wanda getting for the entire series?! It's nowhere close!  Don't ever mention those two names in the same breath ever again!

- White Vision was cool and all -- and that bit about the Ship Of Theseus is solid gold -- but there's so much "What The Fuck" going on there that I'm not sure how to put it all in order.  Ultron worked with a specialized team using a one-of-a-kind piece of machinery to build The Vision's body, but some goons in a hastily erected SWORD facility can not only understand Vision's technology enough to take it apart, they can put it back together again, re-write its programming, and somehow power it using 'Energy' from Wanda?  As though they understood how to harness her magic?  What the hell is powering it?  What the hell allows it to phase through crap?  Those abilities were all gifts from the Mind Stone.  But that's okay ,because SWORD has a mystic piece of blue rock candy that can do the trick!  Still, dude had a cool voice...

- Can we go back to the fact that Wanda is a psychological train wreck with untold amounts of power please?  "Wanda's not the bad guy! Wanda's not the villain!  Sympathy for Wanda!" Uh...no.  No, thank you.  Wanda willingly elected to enslave an entire city, to the permanent detriment of some of its inhabitants.  Then she dug the hole deeper by re-creating her lover out of thin air and magicking up two children because she was so certain that she would live out her life there in the Hex, the lives of others be damned.

- Darcy was a lovable moron in Thor 2.  She's a genius in WandaVision, which wasn't that long after Thor 2.  She was also horribly wasted in this show.

- Monica Rambeau was an idiot.  And was also wasted. And was the subject of I don't know how many loose plot ends.  At least she got a post-post credits scene to try and make up for a tiny amount of it.

- Yay!  We finally got The Scarlet Witch with her goofy-ass headdress!  Good news, Elizabeth Olsen!  You won't have to wear the leotard thing from the comics as her hero outfit -- we're gonna make you wear it at least twice in two episodes though, so don't freak out -- but don't worry, you still get really horrible hair from the '80s!

- Uh...Where the hell did The Whision fly off to after falling prey to one of the classic blunders with his colorful twin?  Is that something that's gonna come back up in Dr. Strange 2?  "Hey Wanda, I know the last time you saw me, I tried to choke a bitch, but it's all good now!"

- Well, Speed was clearly a speedster like his uncle but does anyone even remotely understand what Wiccan's powers were?  Sorry, Tom and Will.  Or is that backwards?  I lost track.

- How in the blue fuck does Quicksilver lose a fight against Monica Rambeau?!  And what?  And why? And did Marvel seriously just do a pump-fake at me by saying, "Surprise!  This villain was actually an actor too!  But we gave him the last name 'Boner', so it's funny this time!"  AGAIN?!  You didn't learn. your lesson with fucking TREVOR?!

- Where the hell were the other Avengers?!  You're telling me a city-sized event like the Hex was happening and no one called an Avenger in?  You're also telling me that the National Guard or other military element wasn't called in and that someone didn't put a bullet in Wanda's head the moment the Hex vanished?!

Loki and Falcon & The Winter Soldier better bring the goddamned heat is all I'm saying.