[Please note: there are FULL spoilers for the entire ninth and final episode of season 1, as well as all preceding episodes.]
Agatha Harkness still has Tommy and Billy restrained, as Wanda faces off with her in the Westview streets. As the twins attempt to escape, Wanda blasts Agatha with her magic orbs, and sends the boys away. Agatha reveals she can absorb the magical powers of any attacks against her, and Wanda notices her hand beginning to wither. Agatha promises to let Wanda keep Westview to herself, as long as Agatha can have all of Wanda’s power. Wanda hurls a car at Agatha, before an all-white Vision approaches.
Wanda believes it to be her husband, and he embraces her as she approaches, before grabbing her by the side of the head and squeezing, intending to kill: “And I was told you were powerful.” Suddenly, the ‘real’ Vision intercepts his white counterpart, and Wanda tells her husband that the boys are safe inside. Wanda goes to apologise, but Vision cuts her off, saying he understands why Wanda did what she did. White Vision emerges and Agatha reappears, as Wanda and Vision vow to fight for their home. The two Visions clash as they fly into the air, and Wanda follows Agatha into the town centre.
From Agnes’ home nearby, Monica calls out to Wanda but cannot be heard. Pietro is able to use his super speed to keep Monica in check on behalf of Agatha. High above Westview, Vision and White Vision continue to do battle, and prove to be almost perfect replicas of each other. At what remains of the S.W.O.R.D. base nearby, Director Hayward is attempting to track the battle between the Visions, as FBI Agent Jimmy Woo is brought before him. Woo manages to take a phone from a nearby table as Hayward is busy bragging, before Woo is thrown into a makeshift jail. Jimmy manages to call the FBI, and asks them to get to him as soon as they can.
In the centre of Westview, Agatha confronts Wanda once more, and tells her of the history of the Scarlet Witch: “She is not born she is forged. She has no coven, nor need for incantation.” Wanda denies the claims, but Agatha taunts Wanda once again by freeing the town inhabitants from Wanda’s control. ‘Dottie’, real name Sarah, asks Wanda for her freedom, or at least for Wanda to allow Sarah’s daughter out of her room. Agatha begins to release all of the inhabitants and they converge on Wanda.
Monica, still held captive by Fake Pietro is able to overpower him and discovers that his real name is Ralph Bohner, and he owns the house ‘Agnes’ was staying in. Monica frees Ralph from Agatha’s ‘crystallum possession’ by removing his necklace. Tommy and Billy, safe inside their home, are attempting to watch the Visions fighting above, but Billy’s powers cause him to feel Wanda’s distress, and the two rush to meet with her. Meanwhile, the fake Westview townsfolk are begging for freedom, or death, Wanda promises to let them all go, and begins to lower the Hex. Nearby, Hayward sees his opportunity and instructs his agents to enter the town.
As the Hex opens, Vision begins to weaken is overpowered by White Vision. Landing near Wanda, Vision begins to crumble away, as he did when leaving the Hex previously. Arriving to the town square, Tommy and Billy begin to crumble as well. Agatha explains that Wanda has tied her family to the Hex, and her family cannot exist outside of it. Wanda repairs the Hex, and her family stand at her side as S.W.O.R.D. agents arrive, led by Hayward, and the two Visions continue their fight.
Agatha attempts to dispatch of the S.W.O.R.D. agents, but Wanda protects them, and tells the boys to handle the military as she handles Agatha. Tommy and Billy incapacitate the S.W.O.R.D agents, but Hayward attempts to shoot the boys himself. Monica arrives and blocks the boys, luckily impervious to bullets herself. Out of ammo, Hayward attempts to escape in a vehicle, but is T-boned by Darcy in the circus van.
Crashing through buildings, arriving in the library, White Vision reveals his directive is to destroy The Vision, to which the Westview Vision states he is only a conditional Vision. Summarising the theory of the Ship of Theseus, the two Visions come to the conclusion that each are simultaneously the true Vision, and a copy. White Vision allows the other to restore his memories, and White Vision leaves Westview. Outside, Vision reunites with his children and Monica, as Wanda sneaks up behind Agatha and places her under a spell.
In a vision, Wanda has Agatha once again bound to a pyre to be slain by her former coven, a memory from Agatha’s own past. The other witches, however, turn on Wanda, and Agatha once again offers to correct the flaws in Wanda’s original spell over Westview, and will allow Wanda to live in peace. Breaking free of the spell, Agatha and Wanda soar high into the skies above Westview, where Wanda fires off numerous blasts, some hitting Agatha and some hitting the Hex. As Agatha believes she has won, Wanda reveals that she has placed runes into the walls of Hex, allowing only Wanda to use her magic inside. Wanda takes back all of her power from Agatha, and sends Agatha crashing down to the ground below.
Down below, Wanda, now garbed as the Scarlet Witch, opts not to kill or banish Agatha, but instead magically ‘locks’ Agatha into the role she show in Wanda’s series, that of the nosy neighbour. Reverting to her former character, ‘Agnes’ is once again cheerful. Slowly removing the Hex around them, Wanda, Vision, Tommy and Billy head home, one last time as the town of Westview returns to it’s original, and real form.
Tucking their boys into bed, Wanda and Vision let the twins know just how proud they are of them, and that family is forever. Downstairs, Vision and Wanda share one last kiss goodbye as the Hex collapses around them, and Vision fades from existence. The house disappears around Wanda, back tot he block of land it was before her arrival, and Wanda leaves Westview to the disapproval of the people who were caught up in her twisted fantasy. Monica offers some words of advice to Wanda: “They’ll never know what you sacrificed for them.” The two part as something like friends.
Following the battle in Westview, Agent Woo is taking point on the clean up. They discuss that Darcy has already left. Monica is approached by an FBI agent, who secrets her into the nearby cinema, before revealing herself as a Skrull, and telling Monica that Nick Fury needs to speak with her, “up there.” In a post-credits scene, Wanda has isolated herself to a lonely mountain, as she sips hot cocoa on the front porch. Inside, a sinister projection of herself is studying the Darkhold, as she hears her former children cry for help.
+ during the first Agatha/Wanda showdown, Wanda yeets a car at Agatha, just like Wanda did to Iron Man in Civil War. Agatha’s shoes are then left behind in the debris, in a clear nod to The Wizard of Oz. But that does raise the question: did Agatha actually lose her shoes, or waste time conjuring up some for a quick joke?
+ Vision vs White Vision action was good, but I thoroughly enjoyed the way it ended in a debate (even if the Ship of Theseus exposition dump was kind of clunky). Paul Bettany has been a hell of a standout on this show, though I just wish White Vision had some more Ultron in his voice. You might be able to tell from my weekly posts, but I really liked James Spader/Ultron in general, I just thought the movie sucked. I want Ultron to come back and to be an actual threat
+ hey, Dottie is still around. Remember when it seemed like she was going to be someone or something important? Haha, good times
+ the movie playing when the Hex is undone is ‘Tannhauser Gate’, a reference to the recently deceased Roy Batty’s line in Blade Runner. The parallels to White Vision should be obvious for anyone that has seen that film
+ Agatha claims that Wanda, as the Scarlet Witch, is “more powerful than the Sorcerer Supreme”. Surely that has to be an exaggeration, or else either: (a), the title of Sorcerer Supreme should go to Wanda, or; (b), Doctor Strange should have been down in Jersey really damn quickly once this all started
+ Wanda finally has a costume, even if it’s not quite entirely comic accurate (sadly for the perverts among us). It reminds me mostly of the updated X-men uniforms in those films, which may not be unintentional. Damn I love that crown, though
+ the loss of (fake) Vision, Tommy and Billy was an unfortunate necessity that just had to happen, and will definitely play into all further stories. Just look at that post-credit scene to see what I mean. Particularly if White Vision, who is for all intents and purposes now just ‘Vision’, doesn’t want to pick up where things left off
– how ridiculously dumb are those S.W.O.R.D. agents all of a sudden that they don’t see Agent Woo pick up a phone right in front of them? That is one of my most hated tropes, and worse still that so far this show had been avoiding it
– Evan Peters turning out to be some nobody named Ralph Bohner was a huge disappointment, and completely negates any links to the X-men film series. This was essentially a joke on the X-men film series itself, anybody who liked those movies, and all of us that wanted something more from an intentionally cast actor. I can’t help but feel that this was more of a ‘screw you’ to the viewers than it was to Wanda… and it’s all topped off by a dick joke
– Director Hayward was just some bad guy and looked like a cliched idiot villain in the final, despite being built up as far more competent and clever. What did he hope to gain out of shooting Tommy or Billy, least of all in front of everyone?
– Monica did literally nothing of note in the final episodes, ever since returning to Westview. She was not able to stop Agnes taking Wanda and she never found the Twins (as they were out of the basement by the time she was). She was overpowered by Fake Pietro (until magically she wasn’t?) and she didn’t even help against the military in the final battle. It seemed as if she was only there to save the kids, who shouldn’t have been in danger anyway, using a power we had never seen her have before. If this whole series was a longform advertisement for Captain Marvel 2 then I think it was a failure in that regard
– I cannot fathom anybody coming out of this thinking that what Wanda did was justified, especially Monica who is apparently the new hero of the MCU. Wanda was a misunderstood/misinformed mostly-villain in Age of Ultron and an anti-hero in Civil War, but she was a direct villain in this series, and there is no room for conversation. Hayward should not have shot at the children, but he was absolutely in the right in taking down Wanda. Remember, protagonist does not always mean hero
– the final questions of Westview and its inhabitants leave a lot to be desired. What happened to Fietro, does he remember everything? Do the other townspeople remember that ‘Agnes’ is actually an uber-powerful witch? I would have liked a montage of Ralph, ‘Agnes’, ‘Dottie’/Sarah etc all living their lives in some way
– in regards to the season as a whole, why did the show go to such lengths to tease characters or events and not pay them out? Who was Agent Woo’s witness protection person? “Ralph” was hinted at for ages, and was just “some guy” who lived in the house Agnes was in, and was not even a relation to her. Monica’s secret aerospace engineer was literally not even a comic book character, and we have not seen them again since their introduction anyway. Why did Hayward plant the idea of Wanda bringing back Vision if he was just a ‘dumb government man’? How was he tracking a vibranium decay signature, if Wanda’s Vision was entirely made up? What was the point of all the commercials (outside of them obviously referencing Wanda’s past)?
– I refuse to believe that all this happened and Doctor Strange didn’t even pop on down the road from New York to see what the fuss was about
Final thoughts: Though full of missed opportunities, either hinted at or made up my fans, this had good action and an ultimately satisfying (and necessary) conclusion for Wanda herself. I do question the need for Darcy, Woo and Monica in the later episodes. Paul Bettany is the clear standout in almost every episode he gets a prominent role, but his dual role took things to a new level.
MoshFish Reviews 