The Disney Plus (Disney+) mini-series, WandaVision broke HUGE ground both in subverting genre norms as well as in how much story can be told in tight constraints. There is rich material here for writers of all genres/interests. If you haven’t seen it—do, go, run-run-run.
*Obviously, this article contains spoilers.*
You’ve been warned.
For those unfamiliar, (or unmoved by my entreaty above) WandaVision follows super-heroes, Wanda Maximoff and The Vision, (Vis, from here on) seemingly, in life after death. More precisely, we follow Wanda’s life after witnessing Vis’ death.
Twice.
Yet, in idyllic Westview, he is alive and well and just as devoted to the love of his synthezoid (Vis isn’t a typical dude) life, albeit without the burden of explanation. If that’s not a wide-enough canyon to suspend disbelief over, the whole show is lensed through television sitcoms with just enough of The Prisoner thrown in to keep you awake long after the final credits roll.
In nine stingy episodes at 20-odd, (very odd) minutes each, we learn how these two kids got to the Jersey sticks. How it is that they are passing their journey through sitcoms (The Dick Van Dyke show to Malcolm in the Middle) is as poignant as it is brilliant. Most importantly, though, by episode eight all the pieces are in place, (including a wildcard) for a HUGE end game. Yes, I mix metaphors and sometimes metafives.
Fairly early we know that what we’re watching is Wanda’s grief process. Each episode showcases one of the seven stages of grief: shock/denial, pain, anger, etc..
That sacred process is the guide that Jac Schaeffer, (series creator) Matt Shakman, (director of all nine episodes) and a squad of writers use to plot their course. The ending should be foregone. However we’ve seen this train go right off the tracks in other groundbreaking series to remain nameless.
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| This was NOT in the outline. Trust. |
Rather than trash someone else’ efforts—all writers struggle with endings, ask the King—we will focus on what the writers on WandaVision did right.
Familiar is your friend
When a writer is working to subvert a trope, turn a different phrase, or make an old story new, (pretty much what all of us attempt with every piece we write) the familiar is your friend. Most of us have seen at least a couple of the sitcoms that WandaVision uses to transport the plot. Some of us have seen all of the sitcoms and they are at once old-shoe familiar while managing to convey the sense of dread LONG before the first government agent pops up.
The twist should fit the road
We’ve all read the story where the plot twist swings in from the trees like the band, (complete with full drum kit) in Elvis movies. WandaVision writers make sure that their twist is a natural expansion of the road or, in this case, story. No, Vis is not back from the dead. Yes, the sitcoms are real, sorta. Agnes is NOT who she seems. Meanwhile, the rabbit is, for lack of a Freudian analogy, a rabbit.
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| Probably not a direct quote from Dr. Freud. |
Guides keep your passengers from getting lost
If your protagonist, (antagonist?) is gonna be unreliable, your guide better be true-blue. WandaVision guides, (we have three) as aces. FBI Agent Jimmy Woo, (this guy really needs his own show) astrophysicist Dr. Darcy Lewis, (she should NEVER have her own show) and the valiant SWORD Agent, Monica Rambeaux, are our faithful guides in Westview.
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| Only one has a clue and she's been attacked by eyeshadow. |
These are not disinterested narrators reciting the “see, what had happened was…” Monica especially suffers right along with us emotionally and through some bone-bruising lumps independent of us. With these vantage points we get the info as they do, as Wanda does and the impact is often much harder than some gimmick “jump” scene.
Hit your marks
You can touch someone’s heart without ripping it out. No, Vis, the Vis who is, is not likely to ever be the Vis who was. Wanda will have to accept and deal with a lifetime of loss as well as the pain that her actions have caused. There’s no need to heap on the agony when it doesn’t serve the story. If you’ve written her/him well, there’s no need to dial the big-bad up to 11 in the final act, either.
Acceptance and hope and agency
Yes, there is a final boss-battle but in the end the villain isn’t Agatha/Agnes or White Vision or even Tyler Hayward. Grief and pain are the villains here. Wanda is a henchman to her grief in taking Westview captive.
Spoiler alert
Monica does not save Wanda. Neither does Jimmy. Darcy...no, no, no. Wanda saves Wanda. In the process, she becomes the hero but only when she allows her grief to pass through her and she steps outside of her unhealthy, (but comfortable) cocoon.
Does Wanda live happily ever after?
Assuming the mantle of “Scarlet Witch,” harbinger of destruction doesn’t entirely bode well. However, that she is no longer subverting freewill to sooth her pain, that she has taken agency for herself imparts hope.
Hope is the best possible ending for any story.
I own none of the images here. All are used for illustrative/educational purposes covered by the Fair Use Act.
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