Watercoolering With WANDAVISION - EPISODE 5 (Patreon)

So, first, a dumb question: what do people think the 80’s was?

Sure I spent most of that decade as a little fuckin tater tot, and SURE, the entire point of this show is that these time periods are approximations, but it still IS that approximation. And the way people keep coming to regard it reminds me of how the specificity of things gets lost in time. I can remember I was working with a writers room where the average had to be, like, 25 or something, and we were talking about this specific reference to the past and I asked “was that during 80’s or 90’s?” and I was like “That was 2003!” But of course, everything that happens just gets morphed into this vague pastiche of the past. It actually reminds me of one of my all time Perry Bible Fellowship strips, “Now Showing”

There’s perhaps no other point to this than the fact it makes me feel dread. No, it’s not the idea of death. That’s fine and inevitable. It’s the idea of reality itself being lost. Though perhaps that's fine and inevitable, too.

Anyway! It’s amazing how much better the conceit of Wandavision feels with some cards on the table.

Again, it’s not so much about the fact we have “answers,” blah blah blah mystery box problems blah blah don’t worry I won’t be a broken record. It’s just that having clarity of motive / interiority with the characters finally allows for baseline tension. The guy’s break with reality and screaming out that he’s in pain because of Wanda’s psychic control? Wanda’s standoff with SWORD and training the guns on the dude? The very few scenes in this episode where Wanda and Vision could get real with each other? I’m like “Ooh! dramatic functionality! Yay!”

But if I’m being honest, it’s also all a bit sloppy. There’s those lingering questions about how much Vision knows, like the idea that they’re under her control, or the fact he doesn’t remember who is, etc. It’s not so much that we don’t know these things and want them “answered,” it’s just the way this show tends to toss out these kinds of things in a way that feels imprecise. Put it this way: I don’t feel like I’m experiencing a tight narrative’s twists and turns. I feel like I’m compiling vague notes as they throw them out whenever. Regardless, I acknowledge it all still gets us to baseline functionality, so I’ll roll with it. Besides, the big thing to talk about this week comes at the end of the episode. And I’ll say a caveat…

I tend to have 1000 yard stare when it comes to most big picture movie / show decisions because they are usually part of bare-boned economics. For instance, most people don’t realize “final green-light meetings” usually have nothing to do with creative. When you talk to the board and top brass, you don’t even have to pitch the movie / show (the junior creative has already handled that). You basically go in there and just agree to final points that usually address the big economic issue at the center of it. This can be subscription sharing, desired ratings, or even something funnier. Like, I’ll keep this vague, but one friend was telling me of the big final green-light meeting and the only concern from the board was when they asked if one of the main character (not a human) “could be fuzzy” so that they could sell more toys. It’s funny, but economically-speaking, these are the most important things in show business. Because it’s just that: a business.

For this, and for many reasons, the new Disney mega-monopoly is concerning. It is irrevocably bad for so much of the industry to be controlled by one company. It’s very existence makes me deeply, deeply uncomfortable. It consumes everything and even creates massive conflict of interest for anyone even tangentially a part of it. And as part of the ever-consuming, gaping maw of economics, they are going to keep pushing everything together. This is certainty. But most people don’t really care about this or the industry behind it. It mostly happens because this is exactly what most people want (the fact that there was disappointment when Fiege said there wouldn’t be Marvel / Star Wars crossover I just… I don’t… I… without words). It’s not that I don’t get it. Or that I’m blaming anyone. It just makes me sad is all.

But because of all this, we all knew the Fox superhero integration was coming. We just didn’t know how or when. And because of the size of that investment, we probably imagined there would be some fan-fair leading up to it. So, consider my surprise when Evan Peter’s version of Quicksilver shows as a “recast” Pietro in Wandavision. And as the guy with the 1000 yard stare…

This choice is weird even for me.

Granted, there’s a certain kind of logical genius to it. The “unreality” of so much happening in this show allows us to accept so much more sight unseen (and as I previously argued, the MCU is good at getting people who have a hard time going along with logic leaps, to leap their logic). And even in terms of choice, we get it. Because the late period X-Men moves don’t have a ton to offer (though I’m the kind of person who will go to the mattresses for First Class). What most people can agree on is that best thing that came out of them were Fassbender’s performance as Magneto (which he became increasingly bored with) and Evan Peter’s Quicksilver, which was just the delightful bright-spot anytime he showed up. So, of course, he was what got assimilated into the MCU. And of course it happened in this completely buck wild way. And of course, it was probably a part of some high-level discussion that led to its inclusion. Because how could it not be?

The truth is I don’t have much to say about whether or not this choice is good. You know, because we haven’t seen what they’ve done with it yet. Everything we can offer is conjecture, but if there’s anything else I’ve learned poking around the internet the last few weeks with this show, it’s that people almost seem to prefer conjecture to the actual experience… Thankfully, that’s an almost.

Next week, we’ll dig in.

RANDOM THOUGHTS!

-I’m seeing a lot of how this show gets talked about on social media and I’m realizing how much it plays into “what people see and don’t see.” For instance, everyone is talking about the shifts in performance when Wanda and Vision “get real.” And they should! They are good at it! But the thing that I really love is how good the cinematography is at effecting mood. Watch the camera placement shifts and subtle changes in light, particularly when they go for close-ups. They pick their spots so well. It really is the one thing in the show I would argue DOES feel surgical.

-Actual funny sitcom line: it’s not so much the exchange, “who told you that?” / “my ears!” But Paul Bettany’s confused / disappointed look right after. I laughed. He is a good actor.

-So far, I’d argue the biggest reason for all the time era shifts is so that the actors and people making the show can have fun with all the costume changes. The audience member in me is satisfied with this lark. The creative side of me wants there to be much, much more to it.

-For all the talk of interiority, I really want the show to finally get instead of Kathryn Hahn’s head and whatever’s going on there (Her one break this episode was one of the first times I felt like “oooh that’s interesting.”)

-Awwww, lil’ vision!

-Is it weird that everyone is a “big fan” of each other in these stories? Like, do people in real-life military and sciences crossovers do this a lot? It’s this intersection with superhero fandom that I think feels a little… weird?

-The idea of Wanda directly disregarding Vision’s wishes is a pretty big one. And what should be ripe for a major source of conflict, but we’ll see. It also brings me to my last big lingering concern…

-So. The big question I have about this show is pretty simple: “are they going to land the extended metaphor?” AKA - are they going to nail the theme? Because they tell us pretty directly in this episode that the feeling inside Wanda’s sitcom is that of hopeless grief. But how is that manifesting? Because we see the footage of her taking Vision’s body from the facility. We then see how much she’s aware of what she’s doing. We even see her full-awareness of telling the kids they can’t bring the dog back to life. Thematically, speaking, this moment is shouting, “see, it’s the same thing! She’s telling them what she can’t do herself!” and yet again, there’s an imprecise sloppiness to this because it keeps shifting her levels of cognitive dissonance to fit the tension. Is it denial or is it control issues or is it the desire to re-write history? The truth is it’s all sort of just this big sea of competing feelings. Which I get because people like to argue, “it’s just like life!” And yeah, okay, but it brings us right into the old adage about storytelling that “the difference between fiction and non-fiction is that fiction has to make sense.” And what that really means, thematically-speaking, is a show has to guide you through that emotional journey with clarity. Which is hard to do when you’re always on the outside of a character and only seeing these random stabs at it. Without the journey, it’s not that I don’t “get it,” it’s that the thematic messaging rarely lands with aplomb. But I also admit I’m giving them a lot of runway to nail this down in future episodes, particularly as they’ve been getting better at it every week. But let these questions stay in your mind…

What are you saying Wandavision? And is that what you’re really saying?

<3HULK