Coffee's Corner

There we have it, folks. Our villain has finally emerged from the shadows as none other than not-so-friendly neighbor Agnes, or rather, Agatha Harkness. A popular assumption since the first episode, Agnes revealing to be Agatha at this junction sets up the final two episodes rather nicely. Who exactly is Agatha Harkness? What happened to Billy and Tommy? Is Monica a superhero now? Episode 7 “Breaking the Fourth Wall” addressed some major plot points and sprinkled in some interesting Easter eggs. Let’s dive right in!

Another Magical Girl

The presumed big baddie of WandaVision has finally announced themselves: Agatha Harkness. In a wonderful musical rendition, Agatha goes into detail how she’s been manipulating people and events around Westview. When she first met Wanda, she pushed the idea of “seduction techniques” for her and Vision, which could be seen as a connection with the twins being born. She bewitched the rabbit to appear on stage during the talent show. It’s unsure whether she brought Fox Pietro or if she’s just merely mind controlling him, but she did something to him when he first arrived at Wanda’s home. She clearly faked her moment of distress with Vision at Ellis Avenue. She was the interviewer with Wanda when the person in the background said “maybe you deserve it” when Wanda rhetorically asks why she can’t fix anything. Oh, and of course, she killed Sparky, too.

So who exactly is Agatha Harkness? In short, Agatha is a witch. In fact, she was one of the original witches persecuted during the Salem Witch Trials, but apparently she sorta orchestrated the trials in order for magical people to get stronger. It’s unknown where she learned her magical abilities, but Agatha has extended her life through such abilities. Agatha first appeared in a Fantastic Four comic as the nanny of Franklin Richards. Agatha cared for the boy and assisted the heroic family in defeating many foes, such as Annihilus. In addition to normal nanny duties, Agatha eventually helped Franklin control his powers when they started to emerge. Aside from helping Franklin with his abilities, Agatha was also the mentor of Wanda Maximoff. Eventually, Agatha was forced to wipe Wanda’s memories, because it was revealed that Billy and Tommy were actually fragments of Mephisto’s soul. However, Agatha eventually restored Wanda’s memories and when Wanda confronted Agatha about her children, Wanda killed her.

All in all, the MCU version of Agatha Harkness seems to be a bit more sinister than her comic counterpart. Agatha might’ve flirted with being an anti-hero, but doesn’t seem as though she’s ever gone full villain. So her seemingly embracing the dark side would be a change. When Wanda enters Agatha’s basement, she notices a book shrouded with magical energies. Out of the possible magical texts found in the Marvel universe, it’s likely that this is the Darkhold. Written by the Elder God Chthon, the Darkhold contains a wide variety of dark spells, including the ability of controlling the will of others. It’ll (hopefully) be revealed next episode, but Agatha getting her magically powers from the book would be a decent guess. Interestingly enough, this wouldn’t bet the first live-action appearance of the Darkhold. Previously seen on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., the Darkhold was used when Coulson and company were fighting against the Life-Model Decoys and the The question now becomes what exactly does Agatha want with Wanda? For that answer, let’s put on own theorizing caps and talk about Chthon.

Godly Possession

As stated above, Chthon is the author of the Darkhold. Otherwise known as the Book of Sins, the Darkhold was prominently featured in season 4 of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Aida used the Darkhold to improve upon the Framework designed by Holden Radcliffe and created a virtual world. Aida continued to use the Darkhold to give herself a human body (she was an LMD) and fell victim to the book’s mind-controlling corruption. Robbie Reyes, Ghost Rider, eventually took possession of the Darkhold and took it to hell. If Agatha’s book is the Darkhold, it’s unlikely we’ll get any AoS references, but we can hope!

So if Agatha’s book is the Darkhold, what does that mean? Well, it could mean that Chthon is trying to possess Wanda. Quick background on Chthon is they were born an Elder God, but eventually became a demon. Before Chthon escaped to another dimension, the demon wrote the Darkhold, containing all of his arcane knowledge for whoever to read it. The Darkhold also serves as a physical link for Chthon to potentially return to Earth. How does this relate to possessing Wanda? However many years later, Chthon returned to Earth, but was bested by the High Evolutionary and his Knights of Wundagore. But before Chthon was fully defeated, the demon marked an infant girl to be used as a future vessel to come back to this world: Wanda.

Let’s say Agatha learned her magical abilities from reading the Darkhold. Essentially, that means she learned her abilities from Chthon. Given that the book corrupts a person’s mind, Chthon might be operating through Agatha to deliver Wanda to the demon. During Dark Reign when Chthon was summoned by Modred, the demon possessed Pietro’s body. In this scenario, what if we swap Modred with Agatha? Agatha clearly did something to Pietro when he was on Wanda’s doorstep. At the very least, she’s mind controlling him so she can gather information as to how Wanda did what she did in Westview. Or, which maybe it’s a bit of stretch, there’s demonic possession involved. Why it’s the Fox Pietro, I don’t know. There could still be a multiverse concept to unravel in the last two episodes, but it’s looking like we’re in for a more standard supernatural story than interdimensional shenanigans. In the Chthon Theory, Agatha influences Wanda to have children with Vision, because their energies might be needed for the possession ritual. Agatha completes the ritual and Wanda (Chthon) turns into a magically wielding villain that only the Sorcerer Supreme can battle. Enter Doctor Strange.

Supercharged

Photon has arrived. Or is it Spectrum? Regardless of what superhero name she’ll go by, Monica Rambeau is officially supercharged. By forcing her way back into the Hex, Monica’s cells completed that molecular adjustment Darcy mentioned and received superpowers as the result. Monica has an interesting power set that, quite frankly, puts her in the upper echelon of heroes: Energy form, appearance alteration, flight, super speed, intangibility (phase through solid matter), invisibility, energy duplication, energy absorption, energy blasts, hyper-cosmic awareness (space Spider-sense), and eidetic memory (photographic memory). So far, all we’ve seen is how the environment around her looks through her energy gaze. This could be her cosmic awareness identifying all the energies around her. Based on how the episode ended, Monica might be in for a crash course on how to use her abilities battling Agatha, and possibly “Pietro”, in order to save Wanda.

But why is Monica the only one with superpowers as a side effect from being in the Hex? Short answer is that she’s the only one to have left. When Darcy was reviewing Monica’s medical records, she said her cells were changing on a molecular level, due to her crossing to and from the Hex multiple times. So it’s possible that the stress of traversing between both realities was the direct cause of Monica’s cell mutation. But what about the people still in Westview? There must be some consequence for how long these people have been inside Wanda’s false world. Monica’s cell mutation might’ve started while being inside Westview, but the process accelerated by crossing the barrier multiple times. Could the side effect of being in Wanda’s altered reality be the development of the mutant gene? Or the catalyst for how Inhumans are created with the aid of the Terrigan mist? Kamala Khan lives in New Jersey, so it’s not completely out of the question to wonder if she’s somewhere in Westview.

Quick Hits

The more I write these weekly rewinds, the more they’re going to be adjusted. So for this week, I’m introducing a new segment for the end: Quick Hits (name is subject to change). Here I’ll list random Easter eggs found in the episode that I found interesting, but not enough to do a full analysis over.

• Nexus commercial: Refers to Nexus Beings, rare individuals with the ability to affect probability and possibly the future, which can alter the flow of the Universal Time Stream. These beings are the keystones of the Multiverse. They’re monitored by the Time Variance Authority (appearing in Loki show, Owen Wilson was one of them). Only one Nexus Being can supposedly exist in each universe. Scarlet Witch was the Nexus Being of Earth-616 (main Marvel comics universe).
• 5 Stages of Grief: Wanda is experiencing the 5 stages of grief throughout WandaVision. She was in denial over Vision dying and created the false world to bring him back. She’s angry at Hayward and S.W.O.R.D. for trying to interfere with her business. In episode 5 when Vision is trying to ask Wanda what exactly is going on, she asks him if being the twins’ father and her husband were enough, aka bargaining. Throughout this episode, Wanda is clearly depressed and mops around the house until Agatha comes to scoop up the boys. And finally, I think Monica represents acceptance. She tries telling Wanda that she lost someone close to her too and there’s no way to fix it.
• Billy and Tommy: Highly convinced that the twins are either not real or have been “killed” by Agatha. Either way, Wanda is definitely going to lose it.
• Sugar Snaps: Wanda’s cereal of choice is an interesting one. Would’ve thought seeing the word “snap” would remind her too much of Vision getting his head caved in by Thanos before snapping half of existence away.
• Missing child on milk carton: When Wanda is making her bowl of Sugar Snaps, the milk changes between different appearances. When it settles on the carton, there’s a missing child notice on the side of it. Not sure if this has any importance, but still think it’s worth noting.
• Hexagons: Still not sure what the whole deal with these hexagons are. Wanda’s bed sheets were in a hexagonal pattern. Could be a reference to Wanda’s Hex powers? But the hexagons appeared outside of Westview also, so really this one is a stumper.
• Ralph/Señor Scratchy: I don’t know who this guy is, but if he’s the husband of Agatha Harkness then he must be up to no good. Same goes for the rabbit, too. Not fooling anyone…