Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is on track to be one of the biggest films of the year. The film grossed over $600 million in a little over a week, and many critics (including our own Sam Niles) praised the movie for Sam Raimi’s direction and injection of horror into the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). However, fans are largely divided on whether the film works as a continuation of Wanda Maximoff’s (Elizabeth Olsen) character arc from the acclaimed WandaVision miniseries on Disney+. In revisiting the events in Westview, though, I’d argue that the problem goes even deeper than mishandling Wanda’s characterization. Multiverse of Madness not only fails to present a cohesive narrative for Wanda but also perpetuates misogynistic tropes that have haunted her comic book counterpart and other female characters for decades.
*Spoiler warning: the following contains spoilers for both WandaVision and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness*
Good Grief
Some viewers have defended Wanda’s villainous turn in Multiverse of Madness as a natural progression of the grieving process we witnessed in WandaVision. IGN’s Amelia Emberwing argues that Wanda’s transformation into the Scarlett Witch and her violent efforts to be reunited with her children show that that she has entered the anger stage of the five stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance). According to this argument, WandaVision depicted the denial stage of grief as Wanda used her chaos magic to create a facsimile of her deceased lover, Vision (Paul Bettany), and the family they never had together. Rather than accept that Vision died (at her own hands no less) during the events of Avengers: Infinity War, Wanda inadvertently transformed the town of Westview into an idyllic, sitcom-inspired world to cope with her trauma and loss. As a result, Multiverse of Madness simply represents Wanda moving on to the next stage in the grieving process, in which she unleashes her destructive anger on the forces of Kamar-Taj, the Illuminati, and anyone else who gets in the way of her reuniting with alternate universe versions of her children, Billy and Tommy (Julian Hilliard and Jett Klyne).
The problem with this argument is that WandaVision already depicted Wanda’s journey through the stages of grief and ultimate acceptance of the loss she had experienced. In an interview with The New York Times, WandaVision creator Jac Shaeffer shared that in her “initial pitch, the structure of the show was mapped to the stages of grief.” Later in the interview, Shaeffer indicated that Wanda’s decision to remove the hex distorting Westview and keeping her resurrected lover and magically generated children alive was meant to demonstrate that she had completed the grieving process. “This goodbye moment is her choice,” Schaeffer explained, “and she got to do it in her own way. That is what she needed to process everything she’s been through and reach acceptance.” In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, show director Matt Shakman echoed that idea, stating, “The story is about how to process loss — and how do we learn to move on from that?”
Wanda has already processed her grief, so the argument that Wanda has gone from the denial stage to the anger stage of grief in Multiverse of Madness clearly contradicts WandaVision. If Multiverse of Madness is truly meant to depict Wanda’s grieving process, then this narrative is either redundant to her arc in the Disney+ series or a sign of regression. At the end of WandaVision, our Sokovian hero has processed her trauma, so her turn to the dark side ultimately feels hollow, especially given her recognition at the end of the series that her actions have negatively impacted others in an unacceptable way.
We Don’t Trade Lives
In WandaVision’s final episode, Wanda is finally confronted by the people of Westview that she had enslaved. Hearing how much the townsfolk have suffered under the influence of her hex, Wanda comes to the realization that she has caused them immense harm and needs to release them from her spell. Even though Wanda’s transformation of the town was accidentally caused by her overwhelming expression of grief, she takes responsibility for her actions. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Elizabeth Olsen described this confrontation with her entranced neighbors as “the first time that she recognizes the pain in that world, and I think she feels terrible for what she’s doing to these people.”
If Wanda truly felt remorse about enchanting a town of people, then her sudden comfort with committing mass murder in Multiverse of Madness certainly marks a dramatic ethical shift. Having come to the understanding that she shouldn’t (even unintentionally) control other people to get what she wants, her willingness to eviscerate sorcerers, slaughter heroes, and kill a teenager not much older than her own children feels grossly out of character and ignores the lessons that the character has learned. While seeking America Chavez’s (Xochitl Gomez) assistance in being reunited with her children would have been somewhat understandable given WandaVision’s post-credits scene, Wanda’s insistence on lethally stripping America of her powers totally contradicts Wanda’s ethical realization in Westview.
Rambeau: First Blood
Wanda’s actions in Multiverse of Madness also suggest that one of WandaVision’s most unpopular characters was right all along. Director of S.W.O.R.D. Tyler Hayward (Josh Stamberg) is depicted as the villain of the series because of his insistence that Wanda is a threat to the world and must be assassinated as a result. However, Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) rejected this plan and believed that Wanda could be reasoned with. Monica’s belief that Wanda was suffering and remained redeemable motivated her to repeatedly risk her life to bring Wanda back to reality. As someone processing her own grief following the loss of her mother, Monica was empathetic towards Wanda and approached her from a place of understanding. WandaVision clearly wants us to side with Monica and share her conviction that Wanda is still a hero. But by having Wanda become the monster that Hayward painted her as, Monica’s entire argument and journey in the series is contradicted. Hayward being right in his assessment that Wanda is dangerous and destined for villainy ultimately undercuts WandaVision’s ethically and psychological complex depiction of Wanda. Inadvertently, Multiverse of Madness suggests that Hayward was the only one that saw her clearly and that Monica was either naïve or mistaken to defend Wanda.
Book Club
Of course, Multiverse of Madness suggests that the influence of the Darkhold is ultimately what caused Wanda to break bad. The argument is made that, despite how she has grown, the Darkhold corrupted Wanda and pushed her to new levels of cruelty that WandaVision hinted she might be capable of. However, this explanation ignores that Wanda’s actions in Westview were (at least initially) not deliberate and that she accepted that what she did was wrong. Furthermore, the only evidence we have that the Darkhold twisted Wanda’s will is the show’s short post-credits scene.
Yet, the writer of Multiverse of Madness, Michael Waldron, explicitly pointed to the post-credits scene in an interview with Gizmodo as an explanation for Wanda’s turn, saying, “I mean, it’s an accelerated descent into madness for her, but one that felt earned by the fact that she walked away from WandaVision with the Darkhold and the knowledge that she was the Scarlet Witch. The last scene of that show, their tag, is her reading the Darkhold and hearing the voices of her children. I think [in] this movie the Darkhold has got its hooks into her and really what it’s preying on and is maybe even less than her grief but her anger.”
However, the post-credits scene of Wanda reading the Darkhold via an astral projection was not intended to suggest that the character was succumbing to her inner demons. In the aforementioned Rolling Stone article, Schaeffer suggested that the post-credits scene had two purposes: “One, that she had reached some semblance of acceptance, and that she was able to be by herself comfortably; that there could be a measure of peace, […] and not, you know, be crying and self-medicating in any way, with her power or otherwise. And then the second goal was that what she’s learned through the course of the Westview experience, and specifically what she has learned from Agatha, would send her on this journey of wanting to know more about herself, and the Darkhold became the mechanism for that.” Reading the Darkhold, then, was not meant to portend a heel turn but instead demonstrate Wanda’s personal growth. Multiverse of Madness is thus a misinterpretation of WandaVision’s post-credits scene.
Order of the Dark Phoenix
The other issue with the Darkhold is that having one of the MCU’s most popular and powerful female heroes corrupted by an evil book strips the character of her autonomy and falls into toxic tropes that have haunted Wanda’s comic book counterpart for years. As detailed by Gizmodo’s James Whitbrook, Wanda has been transformed into a villain several times in her comic history, often as a result of her trauma and mental health struggles. Many people, including Michael Waldron, have used this history to justify the decision to make Wanda the grief-driven antagonist of Multiverse of Madness.
However, Whitbrook rightly points out that Wanda’s treatment in the comics has always been problematic and marred by sexism. And just because the comics have presented Wanda in this way didn’t mean the films needed to, much like how the MCU made changes to Thanos’ motivations and Hank Pym’s relationship with Janet Van Dyne. Yet Wanda’s villainy is the latest example of the trope of a heroic woman being driven mad and/or evil after harnessing tremendous power. Another well-known example from Marvel Comics is Jean Grey, whose corruption at the hand of the Phoenix Force has been depicted in not one but two films in the last twenty years. The repeated turns to villainy and madness by both characters reinforce a sexist theme that women can’t be trusted with power and will ultimately be overcome by it.
Wanda’s history also draws from the even older trope of women going insane from grief. This idea has been seen for centuries, including in classics such as Hamlet when Ophelia becomes detached from reality following the loss of her father. Even earlier than that, the very word “hysteria” has sexist roots in the belief that women are prone to emotional volatility and are highly susceptible to psychological disorders simply because of their sex. Even though the misogyny in such beliefs in now widely recognized, stories such as Multiverse of Madness still perpetuate this disgraceful idea.
That Multiverse of Madness fell into this trap is especially disappointing given that the creators of WandaVision tried their best to avoid this problematic narrative. In an interview with Fandom, Schaeffer explained that, ‘“We were not interested in a portrayal [of Wanda] that made her seem like her powers were too much for her, and she was crazy. The sort of crazy lady narrative is tired so I would hope as fans continue to watch the show what they will see is a nuanced portrayal of a very complicated woman.”’
Wanda’s portrayal in Multiverse of Madness thus fails the character both in terms of her characterization and on a thematic level. While WandaVision set up an opportunity for Wanda to reclaim her narrative, process her grief, and grow beyond her depiction in the comics, Multiverse of Madness ignores this opening. Despite all her trauma and loss, Wanda finally was given a chance to break the misogynistic tropes that have clung to her character for years. And yet what WandaVision avoided, Multiverse of Madness regrettably embraces.
