wandavision: alternate realities of love and grief
this is part of my inspiration library, a public diary of art and culture I'm digesting.
“what is grief,
if not love persevering?”
—vision
WandaVision is a 9-episode TV series about two characters of the MCU: Wanda Maxinoff (a witch) and Vision (a robot) living a blissful suburban family life -- told through the narrative framing structure of sitcoms -- each episode set in a different decade, from the 1950s to the 2000s.
but: Vision died in an earlier film, so you know from the beginning of this show that this reality isn't "real." instead, each episode is an anxiety-filled, unfolding journey of part mystery, part psychological thriller with a dash of horror, and part emotional drama -- disguised in the shallow tropes of a sitcom comedy. this simple family bliss -- Wanda and Vision, with their twin kids -- isn't real in the sense of the conventional real; even though -- as an audience watching -- you desperately wish it was.
what is it about?
as an exercise in distillation, I'd say that this show is about the excavation of grief -- how Wanda processes (denies, gives body to, inhabits) her grief through alternate realities -- and at the same time, comes to embody her magical power (as the Scarlet Witch) through acceptance of her pain.
for me, this show was: deeply emotionally gripping, intellectually rich, and philosophical in the only way that really matters. by that I mean: relevant to the emotional experience of being human.
a log of first impressions
okay, that's my first distillation -- but I'm not writing this post as a critical, analytical, or personal-interrogation essay about WandaVision -- though given luxurious swathes of time and many rewatches, I hope to do that one day.
this is just a log of first impressions.
the reason it's hard to write about this -- is because watching it was such a deeply emotional experience, that intellectualizing it feels almost... wrong?
but I'll do my best.
the feeling of speechlessness
if most visual media I've consumed ranges from stimulating/gripping to more or less forgettable, WandaVision belongs to the rare sliver of culture which seeped into the marrow of my bones, and created earthquake-tsunami waves through my emotional core. it felt deeply personal.
I think I knew that it would do this - which is why watching each episode was so painful. And yet, I couldn't look away.
I'm reminded of a podcast episode between Ezra Klein and Kyle Chayka about taste as a reflection of who you are -- and the things you love with disproportionate passion as clues into the essence of your innermost self. for me, writing about that which I love -- attempting to digest it in words -- it is to give my thoughts and emotions a body to live in. ultimately, it helps me feel less alone in feeling what I feel.
The last thing I watched that made me feel this way was probably two years ago: Everything Everywhere at Once. I watched it in theaters twice, and afterwards, I couldn't talk about it to anyone, let alone write about it. the experience of it felt so singularly personal to me and my particular life experiences, that I felt like no one would possibly understand how I felt. I didn't just watch Everything Everywhere At once. I lived it. one day I must write about it, I thought. but not now.
the same story in a different language
after I finished watching WandaVision last night, I loved it so much -- I was so inside the story -- that I felt like Wanda's grief was my grief. Her coping strategies were mine. I went to sleep swimming in an irrational stream of tears.
what I'll say about this watching experience -- and what I say about the storyline of the show itself: it doesn't matter that it's a made-up story. your emotional reality is reality. emotions and relationships -- the intangible stuff in life -- is just as (if not more) real than the material.
perhaps my own emotional reaction is always the case when we find the culture that speaks most to us. it feels so achingly familiar -- and yet approaches the themes central to our sense of self from a completely new lens. it's experiencing the same story in a different language.
———SPOILERS BELOW——
the themes, philosophies, and questions of WandaVision
so, what are the themes and meanings behind WandaVision? I'll list some of my key impressions -- hopefully as pinned butterflies to unravel in later years.
- the truth of emotional realities: what is reality? what are the conditions for reality? perhaps Wanda's world is constructed and framed in narratives, but her relationships with Vision and her children are grounded in her emotional reality. "your love is real," says Darcy Lewis. reality is, more than anything, composed of immaterial, emotional experiences. I love how Wanda is portrayed not as some delusional, emotionally unstable (and therefore dangerous) woman -- but deeply complex and relatable.
- the pursuit of ordinary bliss: there's a constant tension between the ordinary bliss of suburban life and the magical powers that make her and Vision different from everyone else. after years of trauma and loss, Wanda uses her powers not for domination, but for the simple (yet impossible) bliss of a happy family life. I think this answers the question of "what is extraordinary magic for, anyway?" -- but that which is deeply, truly human; love, and relatedness?
- grief and pain as transformative power: wanda's initial magic comes from great and uncontrolled emotional pain. it's through reckoning with that pain: accepting her truth and her role in the creation of her own realities -- that she becomes the Scarlet Witch. there is so much power in that becoming, even though it's so bittersweet.
- a romance of two outsiders: I'm not usually invested in romances on screen, but I was deeply invested in this one. probably because Wanda and Vision are such outsiders in the blissful, Americana sitcom reality shows -- their performance of it only highlighted their self-conscious awareness of their differences. I found myself wishing, for them, the great gift of ordinary happiness.
- consciousness and love: the final scene in which Wanda and Vision say goodbye as her spell breaks was such a deeply philosophical excavation of consciousness on two layers: the basic question of AI having the capacity to love and feel emotions, and a sentient being created from the memories and inner world of another. can the projections we have of people -- actually be real enough to love us back? in Wanda's reality -- the answer seems to be yes.
I'll end these messy pinned thoughts with the dialogue from that last scene -- the season finale. I think, for whatever reason I'll hope to uncover later, this scene will always make me uncontrollably weep.
VISION: Wanda, I know we can’t stay like this. But before I go, I feel I must know. What am I?
WANDA: You, Vision, are the piece of the mind stone that lives in me. You are a body of wires and blood and bone that I created. You are my sadness and my hope. But mostly, you’re my love.
They kiss.
VISION: I have been a voice with no body, a body but not human, and now, a memory made real. Who knows what I might be next? We have said goodbye before, so it stands to reason…
WANDA: We’ll say hello again.
The Hex shrinks around the house. It begins to flicker back through all of its different iterations and Vision begins to dissolve.
VISION: So long, darling.
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