Wandavision Episode 3 “Now In Color” jumps from the ’60s to the ’70s, but those aren’t the only big changes in store for Wanda and Vision. While Wanda is rapidly getting more pregnant by the second, expectant father Vision is freaking out as he prepares for the impossible prospect of having children. And in the middle of everything, the mystery of who Geraldine is, and what’s really going on in Westview expands in a big, big way.

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Full Episode Transcript:

Alex:                 What’s up, y’all? Welcome to MarvelVision, a podcast all about the MCU, Marvel TV shows, specifically WandaVision. Third episode…

Justin:              We’re in a Wanda world right now.

Alex:                 It’s Wanda’s world, Vision’s just living in it, and so are we. I’m Alex.

Justin:              I’m Justin.

Pete:                I’m Pete.

Alex:                 And as mentioned, we are going to be talking about the third episode of WandaVision that just dropped on Disney+. It is very creatively titled Episode 3, I believe.

Justin:              Whoo.

Pete:                Oh-ho.

Justin:              See, there’s a clue.

Alex:                 Yeah.

Pete:                There’s a clue.

Alex:                 I got to tell you, before we get into the episode, and regular note, we’re going to talk about spoilers here for the entire series up until now. We’re not going to recap every little plot point. So go watch the episode first, then come back here, because we’re going to get into it.

Justin:              Yeah.

Pete:                Yeah.

Alex:                 But doing a little bit of pickup from the first week, from Episode 1 and Episode 2, I got to admit, I-

Pete:                Wait, Justin, do you have any corrections that you want to give first, or…

Alex:                 Hold on, I’m not into the corrections. You are jumping ahead of the narrative here, Pete.

Pete:                Oh. My fault. My fault. Sorry, sorry.

Alex:                 It’s fine. You’re very… Pete is very excited, because I told him before we got on that I had made some errors on previous episodes.

Pete:                Yeah?

Alex:                 He’s just excited that he was not the one that made errors.

Justin:              Oh, no, he made errors, it’s just he didn’t clock them.

Alex:                 Oh, yeah. He didn’t check them. He didn’t fact-check them at any point.

Pete:                Nobody cares if I make errors, but…

Alex:                 The one thing that I wanted to say first, though, I got to admit I was a little bummed that the episodes don’t have titles, that they’re just calling them Episode 1, Episode 2, Episode 3. It felt like an opportunity for some fun and creativity there that’s a little missed, personally.

Justin:              Yeah. I hear that. I think that’s a very modern thing. I would argue that while older TV shows did have titles, most often, we would never hear them or see them.

Pete:                Also, it’s very Kendrick Lamar, you know what I mean? Just releasing an untitled album, just kind of giving you the track numbers. I like Marvel on the cutting edge of what’s hot and cool.

Justin:              Plus, there are clues here, like Episode 1 is obviously like, “Oh, this is the beginning. This is where it all starts.”

Alex:                 Episode 2 is the one that follows up on Episode 1.

Justin:              Exactly. And Episode 3…

Alex:                 Episode 3.

Justin:              Everything changes, specifically the number.

Pete:                Oh, wow.

Alex:                 I mean, it’s kind of like, if you think about it, Episode 3 is like two plus one, which is pretty cool.

Pete:                Wow.

Justin:              Exactly. You got to think. You got to think. Open your third eye in Episode 3, specifically.

Alex:                 By the way, we should mention this week’s episode is sponsored by the Children’s Television Workshop.

Pete:                What?

Alex:                 Yeah, we’re teaching her how to count in this episode.

Pete:                Oh, okay, okay.

Alex:                 So I don’t know. That was a little bit of a bummer. I just wanted to mention that right off, but it’s fine. I think we’ll all move on emotionally from there. The corrections and additions that I wanted to mention that I thought were interesting, first of all, I messed up. That was not Saul Rubinek as Mr. Hart in the first episode. Very different character actor. That’s actually Fred Melamed in the episode. My bad there. Also, there was the sign in the opening credits to Episode 2 in the supermarket, which I thought maybe was milk or cereal or something like that. It’s actually Auntie A’s Kitty Litter, which is an even stronger indication, because you got a black cat, you got Auntie A, that Kathryn Hahn is probably some form of Agatha Harkness going on there.

Alex:                 Another couple of things that I thought were interesting that I didn’t pick up on, now that other people have seen Episode 1 and 2, they did. One, this is a little dicey, I think, but also in the animated credits, some people noticed what looks like maybe the Grim Reaper’s headgear in the opening credits. Now, this is getting pretty deep into comic book stuff. Yes.

Justin:              Yeah. I was going to say Grim Reaper, famously in the Tom King Vision story is sort of the villain.

Alex:                 Yes. Yeah. So Grim Reaper is the brother of Wonder Man, who in the comics is the template… His name is Simon. He is the template for Vision’s brain patterns, or am I reversing it?

Justin:              Uh, no, I think that’s accurate. And it’s sort of a weird thing. Wonder Man is not a super-popular character. He’s an actor who’s very powered. In the last like 15 years in Marvel comics, he’s been way powered up. Because before, he used to be just super-strong, he could shoot some lasers out of his eyes. And then, yeah, I think the Vision’s brain patterns were modeled on Wonder Man. So that has created in the comics a weird relationship between Wonder Man and Scarlet Witch and his brother, Grim Reaper, who hates them.

Alex:                 Yes. And Wonder Man has had romantic relationships with Scarlet Witch. They’ve kind of switched off between Vision. So it’s definitely possible he could be mixed in there. It might just be a weird Easter egg. I guess we won’t know until later. The other theory that I thought was kind of neat that I wanted to throw out there, we talked about the people in the commercials. Right? There’s two people. We see them again in Episode 3.

Pete:                Same two.

Alex:                 Same three people. They seem very separated from everything that’s going on. I thought this was an interesting catch, and I don’t know if I’m 100% sold on this theory, but I like it anyway, is that those are Wanda’s parents. Now, in the MCU, we never met Wanda’s parents. We just know that a Stark bomb blew up, killed Wanda’s parents, and Wanda was trapped there with, I believe, Pietro for about two days, staring at her parents’ dead bodies before she was finally rescued in Sokovia. And the fact that you got this toaster in the first episode that’s doing a very bomb-like beep, and it’s a Stark toaster, seems to indicate that might be a potential there.

Justin:              So are we saying that those are manifestations of her parents, maybe dealing with all that… She’s dealing with trauma, with Vision having just died, perhaps, and maybe these are other traumas in her life coming out? Because that would explain the Strucker stuff, since he’s dead in the current continuity.

Alex:                 Mm-hmm (affirmative). I mean, I think so, and I think the fact that they’re walled off, like they don’t exist in the same part of the reality as everybody else in… it’s Westview, right? I’ve been very terrified about getting it wrong.

Justin:              Yeah.

Alex:                 But Westview.

Justin:              Terrified, you say?

Alex:                 Yeah, terrified. Might mean that they don’t actually exist. They are figments of her imagination, perhaps in a different way than everybody else is. Pete, what were you going to say?

Pete:                I just wanted to say, this is my new favorite part about doing a podcast with you, is the part where at the beginning, you admit your flaws and that you’re not perfect. This is really…

Alex:                 We’ve moved on from there. That was the last topic.

Pete:                Well, I’m just saying.

Alex:                 We’ve now moved on to theories, Pete.

Pete:                This is really enjoyable. I got to say, as a long-time listener of the show, this is my new favorite section.

Justin:              Oh, Pete, news flash, you’re actually on the show.

Pete:                Oh, dang it! Oh, man. Busted!

Justin:              But Alex, we would love to hear an official apology for your mistakes, if possible.

Alex:                 All right, everybody. Before we get into talking about Episode 3, I want to look all of you in the eyes here, and I want to say I’m sorry for everything…

Pete:                Wow, he’s looking right into…

Alex:                 Pete has gotten wrong for 14 fricking years.

Pete:                This is great [crosstalk 00:07:09].

Justin:              Didn’t want to swear, buddy? Hold it back in the end there.

Alex:                 No. I want to keep this safe for kids.

Pete:                Could actually apologize.

Alex:                 Children’s Television Workshop, again.

Justin:              Yes.

Pete:                Oh, right, right.

Alex:                 We have a lot of kids tuning in this episode. I know we’ve spent a lot of time here at the beginning of the episode. I do want to move on to actually talking about episode 3 in a second, but the last little thing that I thought was kind of neat, after Episode 1 and 2, they released this behind-the-scenes thing to tease the episodes that are coming up. And at least for the first episode, the one set in the ’50s, we knew it was filmed in front of a live studio audience, but I didn’t know until they showed the behind-the-scenes stuff that everybody on set and in the audience is wearing vintage clothing as well.

Pete:                Wow.

Alex:                 Which is crazy.

Justin:              I mean, the thoroughness with which Marvel makes their products is admirable.

Alex:                 I do wonder…

Pete:                I wonder…

Alex:                 I was just going to say, I do wonder if that’s just for fun, they were like, “Have a little fun with it and live in the moment,” or if we are going to loop back to the ’50s thing, see the studio audience at some point, and kind of break that fourth wall. That seems like a place the show could go.

Pete:                Yeah. Otherwise, it would be kind of like a waste. I don’t think that Marvel would just waste money like that, so I feel like we would have to see something.

Alex:                 Yeah. Marvel, famously frugal.

Justin:              The House of Frugal Ideas.

Alex:                 Let’s get into the episode. There’s so much to talk about here in Episode 3.

Pete:                About time.

Alex:                 Broad strokes, the sitcom plot here is Wanda is now pregnant. They’re dealing with the fact that she has a much-expedited pregnancy that’s going on, to the point where it takes under a day for her finally to give birth to twins. Our new… I keep blanking on her name. Is it Gabrielle? Is that what we’re calling her? Teyonah Parris’s character?

Justin:              Geraldine.

Alex:                 What?

Justin:              Geraldine.

Alex:                 Geraldine.

Pete:                Yeah, Geraldine.

Alex:                 I don’t know why I keep messing that up. Geraldine is coming into the house, and Wanda’s trying to keep the pregnancy secret. Meanwhile, Vision is going to get the doctor, who’s about to head off on vacation. So lots of stuff going on there, and by the end of the episode, we’ve gotten a lot more information about what’s going on outside this bubble that’s been created or whatever’s going on. We’ve certainly found out a lot more about what’s going inside the bubble as well, and the town. They’ve given birth to twins. They are Tommy and Billy, who fans of the comics know grow up to be Scarlet Witch’s twins, so great not just Easter egg, but plot point there.

Justin:              That’s just a regular egg. It’s an egg.

Alex:                 Yeah, it’s just an egg.

Justin:              It’s an egg.

Alex:                 Yeah. Maybe even omelet, to be honest. Like something that’s come to fruition. I don’t know [crosstalk 00:09:40].

Pete:                Don’t make omelets out of your kids.

Justin:              Whenever I eat an omelet, I’m like, “I’m so happy these eggs came to fruition on my plate.”

Alex:                 Oh, boy. Okay. So that’s broad strokes about the episode. A lot of stuff to dive in there. What do you guys want to start with? I mean, I think-

Pete:                The fun new intro is what I want to start with.

Alex:                 Go for it, Pete.

Pete:                I like how every episode, we’re getting a kind of different time period intro. I think it’s kind of a cool thing to look forward to with each ep. Also, now, we got the kind of “WandaVision in color,” which was something they actually did back in the day when television went to color. “It’s in color!” So that was just kind of a funny bit. And also, the house is different. It seems like it’s a completely different house, which is kind of fun.

Alex:                 It’s basically… Maybe you’re about to say this, Justin. It’s basically the Brady Bunch house.

Pete:                Yeah, it’s the Brady Bunch house. [crosstalk 00:10:37]

Justin:              I was going to say our TV references, to me anyway, are Mary Tyler Moore, Brady Bunch here. Especially with the opening credits. And I do think the set is a slightly tweaked version of the reference show in each episode, I think. In the first two, same thing. But I would also argue it’s a slightly purposefully uncomfortable version of the set. Like the way that door is on the left, and the stairway is awkwardly in the shot the whole time, and maybe I’m reading too much into this, but it feels like it’s oppressive, like it’s being laid on them in a way that’s awkward. And I think that’s true of the previous sets. Like the double doors that opened in the first episode were way too big and felt unruly and sort of oppressive when they were in the kitchen, and I think that’s perhaps an intentional thing to show that these shows are really bearing down on our heroes.

Pete:                Now, let me ask you guys. You both have kids. When your wives got pregnant, did it feel like same day, just shooting out babies? Does it go by so quick?

Alex:                 Certainly to me.

Pete:                Yeah?

Justin:              Wow. Uh, let’s bring Alex’s wife into the stream, just to [crosstalk 00:11:48].

Alex:                 She’s ready.

Justin:              Yeah.

Alex:                 No. I do think… We talked about with the previous episode how well this is balancing the whole MCU nature with, thematically, does it work as TV episodes? And certainly, I think that’s where my head is really at when I’m looking at this, is, “Does this work as a TV show?” Or the thing that makes me super annoyed when people say it, “Is it more of a six-hour movie, but on TV?” And right now, I actually think they’re doing a good job of making it episodic. Specifically, what they drive in immediately, and particularly with Paul Bettany’s performance in this episode, is the panic of being new parents.

Alex:                 It’s sped up, it’s magical, so they get to go through all of the different parts of it very quickly, but that feels like a sitcom episode that they would’ve done back in the ’70s with some sort of magical couple, with all of the emotional… To your point, Pete, all of that panic that you potentially feel as a father, “What am I going to do? Do I know how to do it right? I’ve got to practice putting on the diapers so I get it right, so I know what I’m doing.” And then, it all changes when you actually have the kid in your hand, and it becomes something entirely different, which is exactly what happens over the arc of this episode.

Pete:                Now, did you guys both practice on dolls, putting on diapers and stuff?

Justin:              Nah. The diaper stuff, you sort of figure it out, and then once you do it once, it’s like, “Well, I’m going to do this 1,000 times going forward.” But this parenting workshop, if I can put it on hold for one second, I feel like when last episode’s… I feel like the reference was Pleasantville. This one feels almost like Too Many Cooks, the Adult Swim sketch that was released like maybe 10 years ago now, which was about the circular nature of sitcoms and how it’s almost… family sitcoms over the years, and it’s sort of how they make you crazy by the end. I feel like that is so accurate for this.

Justin:              And then, as we’re moving into this sort of 1970s sitcom world, no more workplace. All the workplace people have moved to become neighbors or people that they bump into. I think that’s very accurate for the decade. And that’s when we start to see the reality really start to degrade around Vision and Scarlet Witch.

Alex:                 Yeah. I mean, in terms of references, this could probably be applied to all three episodes at this point, but it really drove home to me with Scarlet Witch’s reaction to… oh, my God. Why… Geraldine?

Justin:              Geraldine.

Pete:                Geraldine.

Alex:                 Geraldine. I don’t know why I haven’t been… I think my mental block there is because I know her character’s name is Monica Rambeau, and I know who Monica Rambeau is, and the fact that she’s using a different name, I’m like, “Oh, I can’t shove that in there.” But Geraldine, her reaction to her, and how she looks at her, and is like, “What are you doing here? What’s going on here?” And clearly, even though we don’t get to see it, kicks her out of this bubble, it felt very… I don’t know if you guys have seen the Twilight Zone episode It’s a Good Life, the one with the kid who has basically wish powers and sends people into the corn and stuff.

Justin:              Yeah.

Alex:                 Everybody being very careful, also Kathryn Hahn and everybody else being very careful around Scarlet Witch and everything going on, I got a lot of shades of that, of sort of this wish-kid who they don’t want to piss off in the wrong way, or things are going to go very badly.

Pete:                Just to correct you, Alex, I haven’t seen ahead, obviously, but I’m pretty sure when we get to the ’90s era, you’re going to find that she Fresh Prince of Bel Air-style threw her outside of the house. DJ Jazzy Jeff style.

Alex:                 Oh, okay. That isn’t really a correction so much as just a thing you’re saying.

Justin:              That’s not a correction. Yeah.

Pete:                Well, I’m just saying, when we get to the ’90s, they’re going to show it, and then you’ll be wrong. So you don’t have to do a whole corrections thing again, I’m trying to help you out.

Justin:              Oh.

Alex:                 Oh. Thanks, Pete, I really appreciate it.

Justin:              Like a pre-correction, also known as being a dick.

Pete:                Well, I’m a precog, you know what I mean?

Justin:              Yeah, definitely, that’s what that means.

Alex:                 Uh, I did figure out one other reference while we’re talking about comic book stuff. This was mentioned to us by Stray Ward on YouTube. And I don’t know if they’re specifically pulling on this, but I do think this is a fun one to read, anyway. There was this book called Avengers Standoff, where all the villains were sent to a small town called Pleasant Hill. They were living there, their minds were wiped, and I think Winter Soldier shows up and is like, “What is happening here?” And it slowly starts to unravel. Spoilers, you find out S.H.I.E.L.D. is behind it, and they’re trying a new type of prison for the villains, but it’s a very fun crossover that probably has similar themes, if not necessarily what they’re pulling on for this show.

Justin:              Yeah, that was one of those sort of micro-crossovers from three or four years ago that just sort of came and went and was a good story.

Pete:                Yeah. That was probably when Micro Machines were popular, you know.

Justin:              Yeah, probably that. That’s probably [crosstalk 00:16:33].

Alex:                 Thanks. Just want to do a little correction: no.

Pete:                Yeah, but I want to get back to Paul Bentley in this episode-

Alex:                 Just a little bit of a correction, his name is Paul Bettany, Pete.

Pete:                Oh, thanks. Yep.

Alex:                 No problem.

Justin:              This is spinning out of control.

Alex:                 It’s a good bit.

Pete:                PB&J was… I really liked his like, “How did this happen?” to the doctor moment. Really funny, his kind of playing catch-up to everything happening so fast was a very kind of a cool theme that was happening throughout this episode.

Justin:              And sort of on that, the way that the reality falls apart throughout this episode I thought was great. Hub working on his hedges and cutting into the fence I thought was very cool as a way of just…

Pete:                A cement brick wall.

Justin:              Yeah. Just being like, “Uh, what’s happening here?” And it’s unsettling, and you see it unsettle Vision, and us the viewer being like, “We know this is wrong, because we know the format of these sitcoms.” You get her water breaking as rain.

Pete:                Sprinklers. It was almost like sprinklers going off.

Justin:              Yeah. Sprinklers are inside rain, so I think…

Pete:                Well, it was raining inside their house, so I figured it was a sprinkler system.

Alex:                 I think it was rain. I think the joke was that she was creating rain because she was doing… I don’t know if you know, this is a little bit of an Easter egg. She was doing magic throughout the show.

Pete:                Oh!

Alex:                 Yeah.

Justin:              Very little Easter egg. More of an egg, really. I hope we can bring it to fruition.

Alex:                 Well, actually, this is something that I wanted to bring up. Not to interrupt your flow here, Justin, but we’ve already done it, so I’m going to go ahead. One thing we haven’t really talked about with the show is we haven’t seen Scarlet Witch’s powers manifest this way in the MCU. She has been able to move stuff, she’s been able to mind-control, she created that dream in Tony Stark in Age of Ultron a little bit. But she hasn’t had reality-bending powers the way that she does in the comics, which is what we’re getting here. So I don’t know, this is getting into speculation, and I don’t really have an idea, but what do you think is going on here? Is this all imagined? Has her powers been amped up? What’s your best theory at this point?

Justin:              I think it’s going to be that there’s a shift in her power set because of the trauma of Vision dying, and this is her way of dealing with it. And that’s why I think Agatha Harkness being part of this, I think, is key, because she’s maybe trying to shape it. Maybe has more of an understanding of the powers, while Monica Rambeau is in there purely as a like, “I need to try to fix this.” Sort of doing the full superhero thing.

Pete:                It’s Geraldine.

Justin:              Uh, yes. Great. Corrections Department. Let’s mute the Corrections Department until we need it, which I guess will be next episode. Yeah, so I think it will be considered a new manifestation of her powers.

Alex:                 Pete, what’s your take?

Pete:                I don’t know. I’m still thinking that she has kind of formed this protective bubble over herself and just kind of locked out everything as she’s dealing with these problems. And I think that’s why she threw out Geraldine, because she’s not fitting into her… everything that’s going on. She’s starting to kind of question it. And the fact that Vision was kind of restarted or mind-wiped, and it was like he said, “Something is wrong,” and then she kind of re-did it, was very telling that… For me, it feels like this is all her doing.

Alex:                 I’m definitely leaning towards that at this point, but I did want to jump back and talk about the Geraldine/Wanda conversation, exactly what you’re talking about with Vision as well. All that stuff was fantastic. We got a sense… we talked about this with Episode 2 a little bit, that Geraldine is kind of poking at them very gently, and it feels like when she mentions Pietro, first of all, kind of a maligned storyline from Age of Ultron that I think comes back here phenomenally, in a very emotional way that’s very surprising. But it feels like, based on Teyonah Parris’s performance, that I think she realizes she goes a little too far. She thinks she’s hooking into Wanda remembering things, but she pushes her too hard. We’ve seen this beekeeper who had the S.W.O.R.D. logo on it. We’ve seen the helicopter, very invasive, with the S.W.O.R.D. logo on it, and now…

Pete:                Her necklace.

Alex:                 Yeah, now she sees the necklace with the S.W.O.R.D. logo on it. I think Wanda’s assumption is that these are people attacking her and attacking her town, and she pushes back on that. I still think they’re good guys, but I don’t think Wanda knows that yet, and I don’t think Vision knows that yet.

Justin:              And I think to her, it probably doesn’t matter, because whatever it is, it’s a threat to what she’s trying to do here. And to get into sort of how our theorizing may be changing, before, we had talked about it as like a pocket dimension, they’re the only real people. I feel like this episode sort of put this in the direction like this is a real town. The residents of the town are trapped there, and they are forced to go along with it. I think Hub’s line in this episode where he’s like, “It’s hard to escape a small town.”

Pete:                Small town, yeah.

Justin:              “A small town’s so hard to escape.” I thought… and you could see he’s clearly upset, and Kathryn Hahn talking to him. And I think the strategies between Geraldine and Kathryn Hahn’s character are interesting. Kathryn Hahn feels like she’s doing everything to preserve this environment. She’s trying to keep the game going, keep the sitcom stories moving along, as quickly and cleanly as she can, while Monica Rambeau, Geraldine, is in there trying to push, trying to be like, “Hey, there’s a real world out there.” And here, she sort of punctures the reality too much too quick and gets punished for it.

Alex:                 Yeah. The thing that I thought was interesting about Kathryn Hahn… What is the name of the guy who’s trimming the hedges? What was his character?

Justin:              Hub.

Alex:                 Hub? It made me feel like Kathryn Hahn, like we’ve been kind of talking about, is not necessarily the villain, not necessarily the bad guy, like you’re saying, Justin. They seem scared of something, and my best theory, I think the show is leading us along this, but it certainly feels like they’re living in the sitcom reality, maybe they think they can escape at some point. They can get out. Some people certainly seem to be more cognizant than others. We have that break with Dottie in the previous episode, where it seems like she came back to reality a little bit, versus Kathryn Hahn, who kind of seems to know what’s going on.

Alex:                 But I do think the birth of the children is the thing that set them back. Particularly with the doctor, he has the very dumb, very sitcom-y line of going, “Bermuda, baby!” earlier in the episode, which I thought was very funny and on point. And then his reaction at the end, it seems like once he sees the babies are born, he knows, “We’re not getting out of here anytime soon. Whatever this experiment is, it’s moved on to the second phase, and now we’re going to continue to be trapped here.”

Pete:                Yeah. The doctor’s the one that says, “Small towns are hard to escape.” But the doctor’s arc was really fun, of like this, “Oh, yeah, no,” and then, “This is fine, everything’s good,” and then when he is basically Flash-run in to deliver, and then once the baby is delivered, that whole demeanor’s changed. Like, “We’re all trapped now.” Which added a real kind of interesting, scary element to it, to see this fun doctor go through that.

Justin:              It almost… Maybe it feels like that Kathryn Hahn’s strategy and maybe some of the townspeople’s strategy is to “finish the story.” Finish each sitcom story, and that will be their escape, like she’ll almost release them once she’s lived out everything she needs. While Geraldine, Monica Rambeau, is there to be like, “We need to solve this now. I don’t think this is… She just keeps regressing, keeps getting deeper into this false reality.” But I thought it was interesting when the twins were born, that’s a real moment between Vision and Scarlet Witch. You can see she’s genuinely happy. He’s genuinely happy. And I think that’s what her goal is. If the Vision is dead or dying in this moment, in this town, and she’s preserved this moment, she’s living out their lives as best she can, and so these moments are what it’s all about.

Pete:                Yeah, that’s interesting. It’s almost like before he dies, she’s slowing down time to give them a life together, and then he can die at the end.

Justin:              Yeah, it’s sort of… I said this earlier, but Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge is an old… I think it’s an O. Henry story, and then a film I saw in like elementary school, where a guy is dying. He’s being hung because he was a criminal of some sort, but you watch, and the rope breaks, and he escapes, and the story’s all about his journey, how he… he gets away, he dodges all these close calls, and then at the very last minute of the story, it flashes back, and he just dies. So it’s like living out that bit of your life in the last moment of your life.

Alex:                 Yeah. Do you wonder if they would go back to that moment in Infinity War? It does feel like maybe regressing it a little bit, but I also, on the same note, don’t know how past Endgame, you get Scarlet Witch… She’s not necessarily in this distraught place at the end of the movie, so if this does take place after Endgame versus what you’re saying, Justin, in that moment in Infinity War, what triggers it? Is it just spiraling grief of, “We’re past this massive war with Thanos, now I can sit down, and I realize what’s happened,” or is it something else? And I’m just not sure at this point.

Justin:              Yeah.

Pete:                All right, we-

Justin:              It could also be a break later, past Endgame, where she just fully hasn’t dealt with all this, and it’s a full disaster.

Pete:                Okay. We got to start talking about the real hero of this episode, the stork. I mean, come on, that’s just comedy gold.

Alex:                 That bit went on a little too long for me. I’m just going to throw it out there. I liked it, there was good beats, there was a good pickup on… Geraldine.

Pete:                Geraldine.

Justin:              Geraldine.

Alex:                 Jesus Christ! What is that? Oh, my God.

Justin:              Pete broke your brain. I’m so sorry.

Alex:                 I think so. Geraldine wearing those fish pants, and that paying off with the stork kind of picking at them, that’s fun. It all feels very ’70s sitcom, but there was something about that bit where I was like, “Let’s move on.” Just from a comedic perspective.

Pete:                You didn’t like when the stork got right up next to the picture of the stork and kind of stood there? You didn’t think that was…

Alex:                 I think it was that I liked other bits earlier on better. I think the fruit bowl is a fun little thing. I think the jackets changing while she’s going through labor is a lot of fun.

Justin:              Yeah.

Pete:                And when she stopped to enjoy the mink, that was hilarious.

Alex:                 That was a great beat as well, and I think even little things like when she starts to go through… I think it’s the Braxton Hicks at this point, and the kitchen goes crazy, and they’re screaming and running out of the kitchen. It all felt very in the ’70s moment, down to her poses at the end and everything. This episode, to me, I’ve loved Paul Bettany in the previous episodes, and I thought he was great here. Here in particular, I noticed how much Elizabeth Olsen has been modulating her voice every episode to embrace the era, and I was very impressed.

Justin:              Well, I think just the detail work, performance-wise, and the pacing of the story is really amazing. The way they’re able to tweak their performances as they move in an out of the sitcom stuff and then in these moments where reality starts to come in, like that back-and-forth montage between Vision outside talking to Kathryn Hahn and Hub and Wanda inside with Geraldine is so great. The performances are sort of ping-pong-y back and forth. The shots are changing as it’s getting out of the sitcom world and more into the stressful reality of the false world they’re in. And even in the end, when we switch over to the letterbox, and it goes into movie form, which I guess is meant to be the real reality, and Monica Rambeau flies out of the town, military surrounds her…

Pete:                Geraldine.

Justin:              Geraldine. My name is correct as well. Daydream Believer playing, which I think is such a fun song choice.

Alex:                 There were a couple of interesting things about that moment, I thought. I mean, first of all, just visually, you kind of see the energy crackling around as she gets thrown out of the dome. I know we keep calling it a dome. We don’t know that it’s a dome. I just kind of assume that. But you see sort of this TV test pattern as she’s being pushed outside, but then when she’s outside, two things happen that I’m not quite sure how to parse. One is you definitely see the Scarlet Witch energy signature crackling around her and swirling around her, so that seems pretty clear. But also, her clothes didn’t change back. They stay. I kind of expected her to suddenly be in a S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform, or a S.W.O.R.D. uniform, or a beekeeper’s uniform, or something like that, but nope, she’s still got the Geraldine outfit on, and I thought that was an interesting detail to kind of hold onto going forward.

Justin:              Well, I think that points to what we were saying earlier, that Kathryn Hahn and all the townspeople were in the town when this happened, and that’s why they’re main characters, and Geraldine, Monica Rambeau, has inserted herself. So I think she’s sort of undercover. She put on those clothes so she could blend in with the era of sitcom that they’re dealing with.

Pete:                Yeah. I kind of want to talk about… like in three episodes, just short episodes, we’ve gone through so much. So much has happened, but because of the TV show format, they were really able to pack a lot of stuff in. It’s really impressive, everything that’s gone on in these three episodes, and the arcs, and all the stuff that has happened. I went from, after the first episode, being like, “I don’t like this. This is scaring me,” to really-

Justin:              “Wah, wah, I’m scared. This is stupid. I need smelling salts to wake me up, because I’m just not doing well right now.”

Pete:                Yeah, thanks for recapping all that. But I just feel like from where it started to where we are now, in three episodes, is really impressive.

Alex:                 Can you… I’m sorry. Can you say, “How it started, how it’s going”? That’s kind of the internet meme, so.

Justin:              Oh, nice, dude, yes.

Alex:                 It’ll be much more fun to do that.

Pete:                Yeah, I’m not going to do whatever.

Justin:              Yeah, brand manager. So let’s take that back. We’re just going to rewind, because you sort of fucked it up in the same way Vision does in this episode. “Something is wrong,” and then speak only in internet speak, if possible.

Alex:                 Yeah, that would be good.

Pete:                Yeah, yeah. Cool. So I-

Alex:                 Can you talk about Bean Dad real quick?

Pete:                I just think that…

Justin:              Don’t…

Pete:                It’s impressive what they’ve done so far, and I know that I started off not enjoying myself, but man, I can’t wait for the next episode, and it’s really awesome.

Alex:                 Awesome. I’m glad you’re coming around.

Justin:              You just got to trust. You’ve been on a journey. The one thing I think we haven’t talked about in the episode is the commercial, and that felt like… the other commercials felt very specific about certain things. This one felt like a big clue for the overarching situation. Like, “Do you need a break? A world all your own? Want to get away but don’t want to go anywhere?” That feels very commentary on literally the story and what’s happening.

Pete:                But it’s-

Alex:                 Yeah, 100%. And… Oh, go ahead, Pete.

Pete:                But it’s also called HYDRA Soak, which made me think like, “Oh, HYDRA, that could be an interesting idea that’s injected in there.”

Alex:                 Like the organization from the MCU?

Pete:                Yeah. Yeah, just-

Alex:                 Or the mythological creature?

Pete:                Ooh, it’s hard to tell.

Alex:                 It is hard to tell. So here’s what we got in terms of commercial clues so far, right? The first one is the Stark toaster. We talked about that a little bit, potentially that being the Stark bomb. The second one, we got the Strucker watch, which does have HYDRA on it. It has the HYDRA symbol on it, which could indicate a bunch of things. It could indicate they’re behind it, like we talked about. It could be an offshoot of HYDRA. It could be A.I.M., that it dresses like beekeepers in the comic books, so you certainly got that indication there. Or it could just be Scarlet Witch’s history, where she was taken in by HYDRA, and that’s part of her. That could be the same thing with the HYDRA Soak in this episode, where it’s just kind of as she walks through her own personal history, it’s riffing off of that. Or it could be indicating the bad guy behind it.

Justin:              Yeah, it’s also… It’s a commercial break. You call them a commercial break. That’s also like she may be having a psychotic break. Maybe those are sort of lining up.

Alex:                 I certainly feel like that every time I have to watch commercials.

Justin:              Yeah.

Pete:                Oh, wow.

Alex:                 Speaking of which, thank you to this week’s sponsor, Children’s Television Workshop. “Me want cookie.” They asked me to say that. I don’t know why.

Justin:              They make you say that.

Alex:                 Yeah, every time.

Pete:                I want cookie, too.

Alex:                 As we start to wrap up here, any other moments you want to call out? I just wanted to mention we talked a lot about the supporting cast, and I wanted to mention them by name. I wrote it down so I wouldn’t forget, but Asif Ali as Norm, Jolene Purdy as Beverly, and we’ve been calling him Mustache Guy, but David-

Pete:                Mustachio!

Alex:                 Mustachio. David Lengel as Phil Jones, and I thought it was such a weird but funny reveal that it turns out he’s married to Dottie. There’s that great scene in the middle where she comes in and asks, “Do these earrings make me look fat?” And his deadpan…

Pete:                The power goes out.

Alex:                 “Oh, thank God.” Very funny.

Pete:                Yeah, the power goes out, and then he goes, “Oh, thank God.” Ah, that was-

Alex:                 He’s the real hero of this show right now for me. I’m enjoying him quite a bit. Any other moments you guys want to mention that we may have skipped over?

Pete:                I just feel like if somebody knocks on your door and asks for a bucket, you can just be like, “Go fuck yourself, all right? I’m not going to give you a bucket.”

Alex:                 You could cut out a couple of words there and say, “Bucket? Fuck it.”

Justin:              Nice. Okay, I’ll know not to darken your door when I need something to bail out my house.

Pete:                Well, I feel like there’s real things, and then there’s, “What do you mean, you need a bucket? How do you not have a bucket? How do you exist without a bucket?”

Justin:              What are some things I could borrow from you that would be reasonable to your mind?

Pete:                Uh, sugar. If you were like, “Hey, man, I really need to get drunk right now,” I’d give you some of my booze or beer or something. Like normal things you ask somebody. But a bucket was just so out of-

Justin:              So if I came over to ask for a bucket, you’d be like, “Fuck this guy”? I’m concerned about this. If I came over and was like, “Hey, I need to get drunk right now,” you’d be like, “Totally normal. Come on in.”

Pete:                Yep. It’s happened. It’s happened.

Justin:              Okay, makes sense.

Pete:                I always have extra booze just in case friends need it.

Alex:                 Let’s wrap this up with our Vision Boards. What are on our Vision Boards for the next episode? Justin, let’s go to you first.

Justin:              Well, I mean, if we’ve done Brady Bunch, are we moving into ’80s? Are we going to get perhaps a Mr. Belvedere situation?

Pete:                No doy.

Alex:                 Mr. Belvedere? I feel like the reference is probably Full House, right? That’s what they got to go for.

Pete:                You got an Olsen. Come on!

Justin:              Family Ties. I feel like Full House you could edge into ’90s. ’80s TV sitcoms are like… What are the big ones? Family Ties.

Pete:                Charles in Charge.

Justin:              Charles in Charge, perhaps.

Pete:                Webster.

Justin:              I feel like that’s the world. And in the preview image…

Pete:                Diff’rent Strokes.

Justin:              Some of the preview images from what I assume is the next episode, it does look like Mr. Belvedere’s house, so I’m just throwing that out there.

Alex:                 All right. It’s possible. Saved by the Bell?

Justin:              So, I’m just look… That was the ’90s. I’m looking forward to how they sort of show us that world, very much so. And also because of the timeline… there are nine episodes in this series. Episode 3 is ’70s. Four, we’re assuming, ’80s. Five, ’90s. Do we get into aughts in the sixth episode? Then there are three more episodes.

Pete:                Nobody cares about the aughts.

Alex:                 Yeah, I think by the time we get to the final episode, we’ll be in the 2020s, so it’ll be, what, sea shanty TikToks?

Justin:              Good. Yeah.

Pete:                Oh, my God.

Alex:                 Maybe Quibi? It’ll be Quibi-style?

Justin:              Wow.

Pete:                Quibi?

Alex:                 Seven minutes long and canceled?

Justin:              Quibi’s last stand. I do think that we’re going to eventually push through into whatever the final battle is, so I’m really enjoying the move through the decades before we get to whatever that is.

Alex:                 On my Vision Board, I want to see more of the outside at this point. Now that we’ve gotten past the first act of the show, I want to see a little bit more of what’s going on. I love the sitcom stuff, I think it’s a lot of fun, but I think there’s an opportunity to change up the format over the next three episodes and kind of split our time between inside and outside and reveal a little bit more of what’s going on. I love a good mystery, but there’s going to be a point where it’s feeling like it’s dragging on too long. And-

Justin:              This is a classic-

Alex:                 Go ahead.

Justin:              Sorry to interrupt. This is a classic Lost fan ask. Like, “Oh, I want to live with the Others for a season,” or whatever. It’s like, no. Stick with the team.

Alex:                 No, I do want to see it. I want to see S.W.O.R.D. I want to see what’s going on outside. Now that we’ve gone outside the dome, let’s keep following… Giselle?

Justin:              Geraldine, you asshole! Geraldine!

Alex:                 I don’t know.

Pete:                Oh, my God.

Justin:              [crosstalk 00:37:20] Clearly. Clearly.

Pete:                Yeah, clearly.

Alex:                 Let’s follow whoever that is. See what’s going on out there.

Justin:              Yeah, you’re like, “Let me list some esoteric Wonder Man facts,” but you can’t remember the name that we’ve said many times.

Alex:                 That’s… I hate that. I hate that about my life. It’s terrible. People are like, “Oh, hey, do you remember this person that you met last year? They’re doing this thing now.” And I’m like, “I have no memory of that.” The other day, my kids were like, “Hey, real quick, can you name every Robin in order?” And I was like, “No problem. Here it goes. Here’s the alternate universe versions.”

Justin:              That’s so crazy. Your son Gerald and your daughter Geraldine must’ve been so mad that you…

Alex:                 Who?

Pete:                Yeah.

Alex:                 Pete, what’s on your Vision Board?

Pete:                Well, there’s a lot of bubbles. It’s very blue. It’s really about breaking through and finding out what’s real and what’s not. But I got to give a shout-out to Mustachio. You kind of took that thunder from me, but even though we got just a little taste, it was so worth it, and that really made my episode. I thought that was just so funny. As far as cutaway shots go, that was legendary.

Alex:                 And that’s what you want to see more of going forward? In the Vision Board section, it’s new.

Pete:                Oh.

Alex:                 We’re talking about next episode. We’re looking forward.

Pete:                Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So I think that… But sometimes, you got to break through before you’re ready to look forward. So I hope when we do move forward, we still get cutaways to Mustachio. But yeah, I think that we tasted the outside world, but I think it will start inside, and then we’ll kind of get more and more of the outside kind of breaking in or breaking out. But I’m excited to see how this moves forward. I don’t want to immediately just drop the fun openings and the different eras. I feel like a slow transition will work.

Alex:                 I don’t think we will, and I think we’re in for a wild ride here as we continue our way through WandaVision on MarvelVision. We’ll keep putting out the episodes as quickly as we possibly can on Fridays or over the weekend, so stay tuned for those. If you want to support us, patreon.com/comicbookclub. Also, we do a live show every Tuesday night at 7:00 PM to Crowdcast and also the Comic Book Club channel on YouTube. Come hang out, we would love to chat with you about WandaVision and the rest of the MCU.

Alex:                 Socially, you can follow us @marvelvisionpod on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. iTunes, Android, Spotify, Stitcher, or the app of your choice to subscribe and listen to the show. comicbookclublive.com for this podcast and more… Oh, sorry, geraldine.com, that’s what I meant. [crosstalk 00:39:57] Go to geraldine.com for this podcast and more. Until next time, Marvel you later. I’m still working on it.

Justin:              Count it. That’s a good one.

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