WandaVision: What’s hidden in plain sight in Episode 3
By Mike McNulty
As the population of Westview increases by two, we look at some of the tantalizing clues from WandaVision’s third episode.
A sudden pregnancy and even quicker birth. A neighbor cutting through a brick wall with a hedge trimmer? Household appliances turning on and shorting out in time with Wanda Maximoff’s (Elizabeth Olsen) labor pains? An abrupt editing splice just as Vision (Paul Bettany) was starting to ask questions? The arrival of a literal, albeit CGI, stork? What the town of Westview, New Jersey really looks like. All sandwiched between an opening credits in the style of The Brady Bunch and The Partridge Family, and closing out with The Monkey’s “Daydream Believer.” Did I mention what a weird show WandaVision is yet?
It’s also loaded with more references and callbacks than you can imagine, and not just the moment the happy couple strike the same pose they do on the cover of Vision and the Scarlet Witch Vol. 2 #1. Like the two episodes before it, Disney Plus‘ WandaVision contains some hidden gems which may hint towards its larger narrative and its comic book roots. So let’s look at what the third episode tried to sneak by, starting with that very special and sudden delivery. And, of course, if you haven’t seen the episode yet, there will be SPOILERS!
Wanda’s rapid pregnancy
Episode 2 ended with the revelation that Wanda was somehow pregnant. Episode 3 begins with Vision and Wanda’s doctor saying she’s four months pregnant despite it only being (apparently) a day later. The most obvious question is why is Wanda going through nine months of pregnancy in less than week? Moreover, how did she even conceive children in the first place since Vision is an android and doesn’t have human sex cells?
As it so happens, the original comics hold the answer: Wanda’s pregnancy and children are the direct result of her reality warping “chaos magic.” In this case, she subconsciously took soul fragments from a super villain named Master Pandemonium, a washed up actor who made a deal with the demon Mephisto to restore his missing limbs after a near fatal car crash. It also turned out those soul fragments were actually portions of Mephisto’s own soul.
In other words, Wanda’s kids are literally the devil’s offspring. Or, if you prefer something less horrific, figments of her own imagination come to life. Either way, the revelation drove Wanda into a complete mental breakdown, which isn’t a good thing to have if you can literally move and rearrange molecules with your mind. Hence why her mentor, Agatha Harkness, gave Wanda magically-induced amnesia to make her forget that she ever had children, which, eventually only made things worse as depicted in both Avengers Disassembled, House of M, and Avengers: The Children’s Crusade storylines.
As an added bonus, in the comics Tommy was also born first and no one, not even Doctor Strange, knew Wanda was carrying twins until after William’s birth. The main difference between the comics and WandaVision is that Wanda may know the truth behind her seemingly miraculous (or is it sinister) birth. Whether they’re also the result of taking bits from the devil – or some other donor – we’ll have to wait and see.