Credit: Disney Plus
Under Her Eye
WandaVision: this new Disney+ show has nothing but absolutely glowing reviews
5 years ago
Whether you’re a Marvel fan or not, WandaVision – aka Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany’s trippy new Disney Plus series – is your next must-watch TV show.
Updated on 12 January 2021: It seemed, for one hot Covid minute, as if we wouldn’t be getting any new films or TV shows this year. Thankfully, though, the streaming platforms have come to our rescue time and time again, with new titles dropping on Amazon Prime and Netflix on an almost daily basis.
Now, Disney+ is getting in on the action with Marvel’s WandaVision. And trust us when we say that early reviews of the series are…
Well, they are very, very positive indeed.
Describing the show as “truly unlike anything the MCU has put out before,” the people at ComicBook.com have branded WandaVision as “awesome.”
“It is a blast to watch,” reads their initial response.
“It is so committed to the sitcom structure of storytelling that it feels like a bold risk… but it pays off and builds a mystery.”
Elsewhere, respected film critic Wenlei Ma promises: “There’s a lot to like in WandaVision, especially Olsen and Bettany’s performances, but what I appreciated the most is the chance to experience a relationship that was mostly developed off-screen between MCU films.”
And Decider’s Brett White notes: “WandaVision is everything I wanted it to be and more. It is not a parody or snarky take on classic sitcoms. It’s the most respectful, sincere celebration of that art form that I’ve seen…. ever?”
As reported on 26 December 2020: The first proper trailer for WandaVision shows Wanda Maximoff aka Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) and Vision (Paul Bettany) trying to live out an idealised life in a suburban neighbourhood of Westview, until they begin to suspect that everything it not quite as it seems.
Of course, when we last saw them in Avengers: Endgame, Vision was dead and Wanda was still struggling to come to terms with her grief over the loss of her beloved.
Now, though, the duo are happily married and seemingly living an idyllic sitcom-like life in the suburbs.
“This is our home now,” says a smiling Wanda. “I want us to fit in.”
Credit: Disney Plus
When the pair sit down to dinner with Debra Jo Rupp and Fred Melamed, though, it quickly becomes apparent that this perfect black-and-white world isn’t all it seems.
Because, as Wanda and Vision struggle to come up with answers for their nosy neighbours’ invasive questions (“How long have you been married? Why don’t you have any children yet?”), the smiles on their faces fall away. The world around them begins to shift. Things get…
Well, they get blurry, for want of a better word. Like an old-fashioned TV that’s stuck between channels.
It isn’t long before Wanda and Vision are busily touring through multiple decades of television, constantly switching through a series of instantly-recognisable outfits and hairstyles from the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s.
All grasp on time is lost as they pace the rooms within their home. The days, weeks, months, years seamlessly blur into one. And the couple seemingly only ever spend time with the same few people, including the sinister Kathryn Hahn, over and over again.
On top of all that, though, some dark and invisible threat looms over them, making it basically impossible for them to relax and enjoy their brief respite from reality. It doesn’t matter how many bracing walks they take, or rearrange their furniture, or get all dressed up for an evening on the sofa, that unspoken dread is always there, pulsating at the edges.
And that feels pretty damn relatable right about now.
Check it out:
Of course, it’s unlikely that Wanda and Vision are experiencing lockdown-induced cabin fever, although stranger things have happened.
However, it’s been predicted that the show’s title is much more than a play on the lovers’ names: instead, it alludes to Wanda’s preferred vision of reality. Because, as we’ve seen in House Of M and other comics, this oh-so-powerful superhero has form when it comes to altering the world around her.
Whatever you think of the concept, there’s no denying that WandaVision feels genuinely exciting and experimental, pushing the boundaries for Marvel in a way we have never seen before.
With such critically-acclaimed star power as Olsen, Hahn, Bettany, and Teyonah Parris in the mix, we here at Stylist HQ feel pretty confident predicting that this series is destined for greatness. And that’s in spite of the fact that… nay, actually. It’s especially because of the fact that so many of us have experienced homebound time loops of our very own over the past six months.
Anyone else counting down the days, then, until we can sink our teeth into this weird and wonderful show?
WandaVision premieres on Disney+ 15 January 2021.
Images: Disney Plus
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