WandaVision gave us a series finale worthy of the Marvel Cinematic Universe last week, but we still have an entire multiverse-worth of questions that need answering. Luckily, the show dropped a few clues as to the direction of the Scarlet Witch’s future story arc, and the roles some of the supporting characters might play in future MCU movies.
So, put on a kettle of tea and project your astral form because we’ve got a lot of thoughts about where Marvel should go after the events in Westview and nothing but time — an entire year in fact — to theorize on how Doctor Strange, Captain Marvel, and Spider-Man might fit in.
Bow Down To The Most Powerful Avenger
If Kathryn Hahn is telling us Wanda Maximoff aka Scarlet Witch is now the most powerful Avenger, stronger even than the Sorcerer Supreme, then that’s the MCU gospel and it’s above reproach. But even if Agatha Harkness didn’t spend the show’s finale harping on about Wanda’s limitless chaos magic and cackling over her chance to score some of that sweet red juice, what Scarlet Witch was able to do — reverting Westview back to its former glory, spelling runes to keep her enemy in check, crafting a sick-looking costume for herself, and retreating to the woods to do some Darkhold studying — proves there’s a new magic-user on top. (Sorry, Stephen Strange.)
The problem is, now that Wanda’s discovered what she really is, it’s likely other beings have to. Of course, chief among them should be Doctor Strange, whose whole job is to monitor threats from magical entities. There’s no way he didn’t feel that disturbance Wanda caused in Westview, and with Scarlet Witch in possession of one of the forbidden ancient tomes, it’s likely he’ll be seeking her out (or vice-versa) when the Multiverse Of Madness kicks off. We know Elizabeth Olsen is slated to appear in that movie, and we’re betting that her character’s recent embrace of her seemingly unchecked power might have stirred more interest from some seedy characters, ones that probably don’t come with their own cutesy theme song and aren’t as deliciously wicked as Agatha.
Yes, we’re talking about Mephisto, the Satanic villain who caused all kinds of hell in Marvel’s comic book series. We had good reason to believe he might pop up during WandaVision, but the show smartly stuck to giving us one baddie (Kathryn Hahn doesn’t need an evil sidekick anyways) this time around. That might be because Marvel already has plans to introduce Mephisto in the Doctor Strange sequel. After all, they’re going to need someone who can go toe-to-toe with both the Sorcerer Supreme and Scarlet Witch which means their roster of genocidal maniacs is severely limited. If Mephisto has been hanging around with nothing to do and no worlds to destroy, the battle between Agatha and Wanda might’ve landed on his magical radar which makes Agatha’s prediction that Wanda will need her help soon feel even more ominous.
Not The Baby (Arms)!
In the second post-credit scene of the WandaVision finale, while Wanda brews herself a cup of tea and gives us major cottagecore vibes, the astral form of Scarlet Witch is downloading all of the information the Darkhold has to offer. (Side Note: We know a bunch of college kids who would kill for this ability come finals week.) Before the screen cuts to black, the voices of Tommy and Billy (Wanda’s twins who she had to say goodbye to so that her spell over Westview could be lifted) can be heard begging their mother for help.
Marvel’s done some pretty awful things — killing Black Widow, making us suffer through Hawkeye’s mohawk for an entire movie — but getting rid of Tommy and Billy just when we were starting to really love the rascals is cruel, even for Kevin Feige and company. Our bet is that the boys are stuck in the multiverse somewhere, which might be what spurs Wanda to seek Doctor Strange’s help in rescuing them. That theory also ties into a comic book storyline that sees Mephisto (this guy, are we right?) absorbing their powers and using their tiny bodies as his new arms. Graphic novels can obviously get away with weirder plot points, but the idea that Mephisto might seek out Tommy and Billy, wherever they are, to not only gain their abilities but also lay a trap for Wanda — who’s the most powerful being in the MCU right now — isn’t that far-fetched. And really, who doesn’t want an encore of that “Boys, handle the military. Mommy will be right back,” scene, right?
Will The Real Vision Please Synthezoid Up?
It’s a rare thing when a climactic epic superhero battle can take a pause and give us a philosophical lesson using two synthezoids who like reading about ships but that’s exactly what WandaVision did when it had Wanda’s Vision and Hayward’s Vision square off in the town hall. The Ship of Theseus thought experiment asks the question: If an object has all of its parts replaced, does it remain the same object? The two bots ponder this for a bit while Wanda and Agatha throw hex bombs outside, but eventually, Wanda’s Vision is able to use some of the powers from his Mind Stone to unlock memories Hayward has kept from the being that’s now referred to as White Vision. As soon as he’s able to remember everything up until Thanos destroyed him, White Vision flies off to parts unknown but there’s no way the MCU is going to let Paul Bettany glide off into the sunset after he put so much work into making “attraction to synthezoids” a new sexual orientation.
This new Vision has popped up in both the West Coast Avengers comic series and in Tom King’s “The Vision,” so there’s material to pull from should Marvel want to give the character a completely new look. The biggest question will be this: how do you keep that suit clean?
Monica “Un-Grounded” Rambeau
WandaVision gave us one of the more compelling superhero origin stories when they introduced Monica Rambeau to audiences as both a kick-ass S.W.O.R.D. agent and Wanda’s unofficial, non-licensed therapist this season. Monica was the only character who could empathize with the overwhelming loss and suffocating sense of grief the young Avenger was feeling and she inadvertently gained some extraordinary powers when she broke through the Hex in an attempt to save her friend from herself. The finale’s first post-credits scene saw Monica being called to Westview’s abandoned theater by an unknown S.W.O.R.D. official who turned out to be a Skrull in disguise. She told Rambeau, “He heard you’d been grounded. He’d like to meet with you,” before pointing up to the sky. Monica gives her a little smirk, likely signaling she knows who this mysterious “he” is. We do too. It’s Nick Fury, who’s been chilling in space ever since Spider-Man: Far From Home’s end-credits revealed he’d swapped places with Skrull leader Talos for some intergalactic R&R. It’s likely Monica will head to the Skrull’s base where she’ll learn more about her new abilities and reunite with Auntie Carol aka Captain Marvel. Their current relationship seems a little strained but it’s nothing a good space battle and super-powered training montage can’t fix, right?
Pietro Fake-Out
Okay, we refuse to believe Evan Peters came back as Pietro Maximoff just for the payoff to be a pretty weak boner joke. Maybe this “Ralph” wasn’t the real Quicksilver, but that doesn’t take the X-Men tie-in option off the table entirely. In fact, it seems strange that WandaVision dedicated an entire episode to revisiting Wanda’s childhood trauma and revealing she had powers before her HYDRA experiment kicked off, to just nullify all that potential crossover work for some crude high school locker room humor.
Other Marvel works like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. have implied there are people with dormant abilities whose powers can be awakened, and Agatha referred to this herself when she said Wanda’s magic might have “died on the vine” if it hadn’t been charged up by an Infinity Stone. Maybe the key to bringing about mutants to the MCU isn’t the multiverse, but all of the energy released by the stones post-Blip?
Whatever happens in the future, WandaVision has been a worthwhile experiment for Marvel. It’s given fans a needed deep-dive into specific characters so that they could make emotional connections to these heroes — similar to what those early origin story films did for Captain America and Iron Man — and whether everything connects or some storylines are just contained to these spin-off series, this feels like a fresh, new future for the MCU.
