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“WandaVision,” Marvel’s first live-action series to be fully integrated into the interconnected and on-going storylines of Marvel Cinematic Universe films, has captivated audiences since its debut on Disney + earlier this month. The series, which stars Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany as Wanda Maximoff and Vision, respectively, is a tribute to classic sitcoms, with the two lovebirds going through different decades of television history in each episode for reasons that viewers do not yet fully understand. But we don’t need to know why the two seem to star in their own sitcoms to appreciate the fact that the series is capable of doing what no movie has ever done before: explore the characters, their romance, and their relationship. in a deep and meaningful way. .
While some Marvel characters like Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) have had plenty of screen time across multiple films to explore the emotional baggage and development of their characters through arcs of Deeply personal story, writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely were forced to develop Wanda and Vision’s romance in quiet, stolen moments between action series and combat sequences in “Captain America: Civil War” and ” Avengers: Infinity War “. They did a sufficiently adequate job that by the time Vision sacrifices himself to stop Thanos (Josh Brolin) at the end of the last movie, his connection with Wanda lent a decent amount of emotion to the scene.
However, it was not as effective as Tony dying to save the universe or Cap time traveling and getting a happy ending. Fortunately, Wanda and Vision now spend their time in the sun. However, this is not the first Marvel series to develop vitally important supporting actors, from movies to TV.
In January 2015, ABC released “Agent Carter,” a 1940s spy series starring Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter, the character in “Captain America: The First Avenger,” and up to “WandaVision. It was the best Marvel series. (“Jessica Jones” deserves to be congratulated on a great first season, but the character and the series are ultimately too far removed from the stories of the MCU movies to compare here.) The eight-episode first season of “Agent Carter” was the first major project within the Marvel Cinematic Universe to be titled by a female – which was distressing for fans of Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow, which premiered in 2010’s “Iron Man 2” – but despite the low ratings of series, it served as a proof of concept for the future.
Created by Markus and McFeely, the series, which aired during the mid-season hiatus of “Agents of SHIELD”, was set in 1946 in the aftermath of World War II and Steve’s apparent death at the end. of “The First Avenger”. The premiere used archive footage of Evans from the film to set up its story, linking directly to the films no other Marvel series, not even “Agents of SHIELD,” which resurrected Agent Coulson. (Clark Gregg), hasn’t been able to boast until now.
Showrunners Tara Butters, Michele Fazekas and Chris Dingess then used shots from the film and Marvel One-Shot “Agent Carter” to develop a complex, layered story that took advantage of the extended runtime offered by serial television. to reflect explore not only Peggy as a person, including her lingering grief over Cap’s disappearance, but also the challenges and triumphs she experienced during her career as the first female agent of the Strategic scientific reserve (SSR). In the hands of the writers and with eight 40-minute episodes at their disposal (18 if you include the 10-episode second season), Peggy became a fully developed and competent woman who excelled in a world dominated by inferior men. And she did it outside of the context of her relationship with Captain America, erasing any lingering doubt that she could have been a truly exceptional, charming, and intelligent sweetheart.
The series did all of this by tackling several difficult but universally known topics, like sexism in the workplace, which is still relevant in 2021, and the search for its purpose, especially after the war. The writers also never missed an opportunity to prove that the eponymous heroine of the series was the smartest and most capable person in the room. And while the series ran thanks to Atwell’s dynamite performance, the writers cleverly surrounded it with characters who were either familiar to viewers, like Dominic Cooper’s young Howard Stark, or who would work as a support system without stealing. the series, like James D’Arcy. Edwin Jarvis, the man for whom Tony Stark would later name his artificial intelligence, and agent Daniel Sousa of Enver Gjokaj.
The links to the Marvel movies couldn’t have been clearer, but fans ultimately didn’t show up for “Agent Carter” as they apparently did for “WandaVision”. It’s easy to blame him that Marvel didn’t see him as being on par with the movies, and therefore didn’t market him as such. But another explanation for the different reception is the disconnect between the events of the series and the films in progress, a consequence of its periodization. While that could be seen as a strength – it meant the series could be seen as an extension of the MCU or a standalone series, depending on the viewer, so knowledge of the MCU didn’t matter much – it also meant that it wasn’t imperative that viewers tune in every week.
And one of the reasons the MCU has been so successful, aside from its storytelling, is that every new movie (and now TV show) ties into the other movies in some way or another. Even “Agents of SHIELD” has dealt with the fallout from the events of the films, as major HYDRA reveals in “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”. The show has even featured a few appearances from characters like Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders) over the years to feel somewhat tied to the ongoing arcs of the movies to get people to come together. listen. “Agent Carter” understandably had a harder time doing this, so while it was connected to the movies in several major ways, it was not deemed necessary – neither by the network nor by Marvel, and therefore not by the fans. And that’s a shame, because what the writers created was as vibrant and fun as Peggy herself.
Why talk about it now? Because “WandaVision” basically follows the same formula and functions just like “Agent Carter”. While the series is directly tied to the upcoming “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” and Spider-Man’s third film, it may also be stand-alone as a separate property. Viewers, at least so far, haven’t needed additional MCU knowledge to enjoy the series, in large part because it’s so different from what has happened before. Like “Agent Carter” and even “Jessica Jones” before it, the series succeeds because it doesn’t look like a traditional Marvel superhero product. It’s trippy and fun, playing with reality in a way that explores television as a form of comfort as Wanda seemingly creates her own illusion of a happy life in order to survive her grief over Vision’s death in “Infinity War”, which followed losing its twin, Pietro (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), in “Age of Ultron”.
As any comic book fan can tell you, Wanda is one of the most powerful characters in the MCU, but as she has been forced to be a supporting actor in the stories of other characters (white men) over the years. for years, Marvel hasn’t been able to, or simply chose not to, explore the extent of its capabilities before now. Much like how “Agent Carter” successfully revealed the depths of Peggy Carter following the death of a loved one, “WandaVision” expands and reveals the inherent strengths of its own female head in a similar fashion. It even brings up familiar faces from the MCU like “Agent Carter”. Kat Dennings’ Darcy Lewis and Randall Park’s Agent Jimmy Woo both appear, while new characters, like Kathryn Hahn’s Agnes, are bound to have a lasting impact on fans, if not the future of the Extended Universe. . In a way, it feels like “WandaVision” is what “Agent Carter” could have and should have been from the start.
However, “WandaVision” also feels like a natural and necessary next step in the evolution of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which is now in Phase 4. So what is perhaps the most interesting about the series is does that ultimately mean for Marvel. The boundaries between television and film have become increasingly blurred over the years, a development that has sparked a thousand Twitter wars over what is considered television and what is considered film. There’s no real drama surrounding “WandaVision” – it’s an episodic TV made for a streaming service, with each episode telling a serialized yet stand-alone story, but it’s also intrinsically linked to the MCU’s movies, s’ tapping events from previous movies and installing a few more. In doing so, the show is even more blurry of lines that have already been quite messy. And with several other Marvel series slated to debut on Disney + this year, that’s really just the start.
“WandaVision” releases new episodes on Friday, while the full “Agent Carter” series is available to stream, both on Disney +.
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