And with that, WandaVision has come to an end. Below, Ringer staffers discuss the conclusion and whether it’ll leave fans disappointed, while also speculating on what’s next for Wanda Maximoff and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I hope it goes without saying, but spoilers ahead.
1. What is your tweet-length review of the WandaVision finale?
Charles Holmes: WandaVision paying homage to sitcom finales of yore (by doing nothing the fans wanted) is the greatest gift of all.
Andrew Gruttadaro: It ended like most Marvel properties: with superheroes fighting in the sky and multiple post-credits scenes.
Alan Siegel: It would’ve been slightly cooler if such a novel show didn’t feel the need to stuff its final episode with the same CGI-filled fight scenes that are in every Marvel movie.
Aric Jenkins: A superhero genre show that managed to subvert expectations of what a superhero genre show should look like finally succumbed to classic superhero genre tropes.
Miles Surrey: It was a fun ride with poignant thoughts on grief, but in the end, Marvel’s gonna Marvel.
Tunde St. Matthew-Daniel:
Ben Lindbergh: It was my sadness and my hope. But mostly it was my love.
2. What was the best moment of the episode?
Siegel: I’m contradicting myself, but: Kathryn Hahn getting to face off against Elizabeth Olsen in a CGI-filled fight scene.
Gruttadaro: The quiet parts—Vision and White Vision talking about metaphysics and the Ship of Theseus, and Wanda and Vision saying goodbye to each other.
Surrey: I could do with at least 20 more minutes of two Paul Bettanys floating in a circle having a philosophical argument about the Ship of Theseus. This is not a joke.
Jenkins: Wanda, Vision, and their children lining up in a fighting stance, surrounded by the triple threat of Agatha, White Vision, and the military. Marvel inspires The Incredibles which inspires Marvel. It all comes full circle … all under the direction of Disney. Meta!
St. Matthew-Daniel: I loved that Vision v. Vision turned into a battle of wits and two synthezoids going bar for bar. Very true to the character—and also confirms Paul Bettany’s future in the MCU.
Holmes: Vision shedding a single thug tear as he’s about to be vaporized out of existence. Cue the music:
“I can’t see it comin’ down my eyes
So I got to make the song cry”
—Jay-Z (but also Vision, kinda)
Lindbergh: When Wanda almost smushed Agatha, Wicked Witch of the East–style, with Chekhov’s Buick Verano. I mean, it may have been another generic red compact car that got totaled, but this is how it happened in my headcanon. If only they built Buicks out of vibranium.
3. What was your least favorite part?
Surrey: We must criminalize MCU fight scenes.
Jenkins: Kitty from That ’70s Show saying to Wanda, “If you won’t let us go, just let us die.” I really hate to see Kitty sad.
Siegel: Wanda professing her love for Vision in the most treacly way possible.
St. Matthew-Daniel: Director Hayward going full villain by being willing to shoot kids (no matter how real or fake they may be) was even more vile than Agatha taking out Sparky the dog.
Lindbergh: When Wanda changed out of her sweatpants and hoodie and into her fancy Scarlet Witch costume. After almost a full year of pandemic-induced isolation, Loungewear Wanda was the hero we needed. (Also, serious side-eye at “They’ll never know what you sacrificed for them.” Come on, Monica. She enslaved and tortured an entire town.)
Gruttadaro: I really did not like looking at Wanda’s old-person hands. NO GROSS HANDS FOR ME, PLEASE!
Holmes: Runner-up: Crayola Vision beating White Vision with a goddamn paradox. This is why Thanos ripped that jewel out of my boy’s head so easily. He doesn’t have the heart for this.
First place? The entire “Who is Pietro” subplot ending in a boner joke.
4. Director Matt Shakman worried that people would be disappointed by the finale’s straightforwardness. Were you? Do you think others will be?
Siegel: No and not really. Because in the end, WandaVision is still a Marvel property. As offbeat as it could be, there was always going to be a limit to its quirkiness.
St. Matthew-Daniel: The show focused on giving its two main leads full arcs as opposed to paying off fan-made theories. However, since some of those theories were either fanned by the cast or seemingly teased in the show itself, disappointment from some is inevitable.
Surrey: Setting aside the Marvel fandom’s propensity for outlandish fan theories, it did feel like an all-too-tidy conclusion to the series that didn’t really wrestle with the fact that Wanda was holding an entire town hostage and effectively torturing them.
Gruttadaro: I’ve watched Game of Thrones, every season of Westworld, The Undoing … you Marvel fans merely adopted the darkness of TV disappointment—I was born in it.
But no, for real, one day we’ll learn to accept Reddit theorizing as a hobby that has zero bearing on what’s actually happening in a show.
Jenkins: Definitely. The finale was the most boring episode of the series. WandaVision was at its best midseason, when it was mostly playing as a case study of television history and the interpersonal dynamics of suburban America.
Lindbergh: It’s safe to assume that some segment of the fan base will be upset about any season (and seemingly, series) finale, especially one with so much franchise baggage. But in this case, it couldn’t be me. I’m not enough of a Marvel scholar to have hung my hopes on any particular theory. Largely out of ignorance, I let WandaVision wash over me without any expectations, which was really liberating. And I appreciated that by Disney standards, the series stayed surprisingly self-contained.
Holmes: The MCU shouldn’t be made by committee, no matter how much its fans want it to be. The WandaVision crew stuck to the game plan and any last-minute gambits—Doctor Strange busting through the wall like the Kool-Aid Man, John Krasinski debuting as Reed Richards, or any Mephisto nonsense—would’ve rang hollow. WandaVision is a TV show, not a Where’s Waldo book.
5. Let’s break down the post-credits scenes, starting with the first.
Siegel: I guess Monica Rambeau’s gonna have a big part in Captain Marvel 2?
Jenkins: Look, I’m a bit MCU-ignorant. I don’t know if I’m supposed to know who that green lady is. I’ll just say that Jimmy Woo is the man. Monica was right: authority does look good on you, Jimmy!
Surrey: Is Monica Rambeau going to space? Does this have anything to do with Alien Ben Mendelsohn or Captain “I would like to speak to the manager” Marvel? How many members of the government are secret aliens?
Holmes: From the start, it was pretty obvious that Monica Rambeau—a.k.a. Photon, Pulsar, or Daystar, depending on which comic book you’re reading—was being set up for a Captain Marvel sequel. It’s probably not great that most of WandaVision’s biggest chess moves, from the Agatha reveal to Monica gaining superpowers, were predicted like Beth Harmon was sitting across the board. But that’s how the corporate IP cookie tends to crumble.
Gruttadaro:
[Extreme Cornelius Fudge seeing Voldemort voice] He’s back.
Lindbergh: I know this scene was supposed to make me hyped for Secret Invasion, but after seeing “Tannhauser Gate” on the movie marquee in post-Hex Westview, all I could think about was Vision bidding goodbye to Wanda with the Tears in Rain speech. Sorry, but “Time to die” is a better last line than “So long, darling.”
St. Matthew-Daniel: The Skrull identity reveal is becoming the MCU’s version of the Mission: Impossible mask trick. Hopefully from here on they use it wisely and, ideally, sparingly.
6. And now the second one …
Siegel:
Jenkins: Can Wanda send me the link to that Airbnb? Looks lovely. And yeah, that duplicate Wanda in the cabin is pretty nuts, too.
Lindbergh: How do I learn to make my astral projection do work while my physical self serenely sips tea on the porch?
St. Matthew-Daniel: Is Wanda being a studious pupil and reading ahead of class with Doctor Strange or is she just trying to bring her kids back as quickly as possible?
Surrey: Seeing that Wanda Maximoff is going to show up in the Doctor Strange sequel, which is being directed by Evil Dead king Sam Raimi, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say reading from a mysterious book of the occult is a bad idea.
Holmes: Wanda’s kids were never going anywhere. Marvel’s announced that multiple Young Avengers candidates—Ironheart, Hawkeye, Miss America, Ms. Marvel—are getting their own shows or appearing in MCU movies. The minute Billy and Tommy started aging through the decades it was clear they were setting them up for future franchises.
Gruttadaro:
7. What is the biggest question you still have after this season?
Surrey: What kind of insurance did Wanda have on her Buick Verano?
Gruttadaro: Director Hayward was really trying to shoot some kids?
St. Matthew-Daniel: Who actually is the strongest Avenger now? Is it Wanda? Still Captain Marvel? Does Monica and her fancy-bullet-absorbing energy powers have a say? We need answers, Feige!
Jenkins: The entire season is a series of baffling questions. Like, what did Pietro actually bring to the show? Why do regular humans in the MCU insist on trying to stop incredibly powerful superpeople with just … guns? How did the Buick get restored to mint condition after Wanda smashed it into Agatha? But I guess my most pressing question is, how did Wanda’s children have any impact on the physical world, including stopping the bullets of acting director Tyler Hayward—a real, actual person—when they were just figments of Wanda’s imagination?
Siegel: It’s not a question but: Please give Agatha her own show. Stevie Nicks can costar as Kathryn Hahn’s witchy friend.
Holmes: Wanda’s kids screaming for her in the end credits sequence, coupled with the comic book source material, points to her being able to create human life out of nothing. So if Wanda can create human souls, then why can’t she bring back Vision and Pietro?
Lindbergh: Seriously: Has anyone checked on Agent Franklin?
8. What’s next for the Scarlet Witch?
Jenkins: By the looks of it, some nice R&R somewhere in alpine Europe. Much deserved.
Surrey: Well, whenever Wanda is ready to jump back into the dating pool, my DMs are open.
Siegel: She gets a nice break from the MCU discourse while fine-tuning her powers in her mountainside cabin. I’m envious.
Gruttadaro: I’m gonna need Daniel Chin to explain exactly what’s happening with Wanda’s kids, but we haven’t seen the last of them, we haven’t seen the last of Agatha, and we probably have to wait only 12 months to find out how they all fit together.
Lindbergh: “I don’t understand this power, but I will,” Wanda said. Presumably, so will we, when we see her in several more major motion pictures, starting with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (in which she may team up with the Sorcerer No-Longer-So-Supreme).
St. Matthew-Daniel: Wanda is probably off to the MCU’s Hogwarts in Kamar-Taj, where she’ll train with the good doctor. Once she gains the knowledge to match her powers, I suspect she’ll either become the cause or the solution, maybe both, of the multiverse and all its madness.
Holmes: I predict a lot of quips between Wanda and Benedict Cumberbatch as she tears apart the multiverse looking for her sons.
