I Gave In and Watched "WandaVision" Again: Recap / Spoilers

This post contains WandaVision spoilers and such like.

Sometimes, I wish I could just watch a TV show and love it without my critical eye. Last week's double episode premiere left me thinking the show was cool, but also, what the hell? I think the major issue I'm having, upon reflection, is the short episode length.  

As someone who did not read the comics and knows these characters only through the MCU, perhaps I am too used to the longer format where we get to know the characters here and there, over time. Maybe I'm used to watching a two-hour movie that goes by fast instead of a short TV episode that packs a lot in and ends too soon. Although, at least in the third episode, something finally happened, more than just witty dialogue and perfect sitcom homages.

To balance out my complaints, I'll list of all the things I love, then I will give you an amateur recap, meaning I did not take notes when I watched this so it is from memory.

1. Wanda - LOVE her.
2. Vision - Paul Bettany is really funny!  I forgot that J.A.R.V.I.S. used to banter with Tony.
3. Wanda and Vision - they really are super-cute together, and it's great that the audience finally gets time with them individually and together.
4. Geraldine/Monica Rambeau (I accidentally referred to her last week as Ms. Marvel, but of course that's incorrect and a different Disney Plus show). More on Monica in a minute.
5. The dialogue, the acting, the scenes, the backgrounds
6. The homage to great sitcoms and attention to detail per decade
7. Telekinesis, my very favorite superpower.  I have waited to be telekinetic since I met TV's Uncle Martin from My Favorite Martian, pictured here (Ray Walston) along with his "nephew," Tim O'Hara, played by dreamy human Bill Bixby. There will be no discussion in this blog of the My Favorite Martian movie because it does not exist in my world).  

To do a more formally structured recap, recall in the first episode, the sitcom they were in was a 1950s style Dick Van Dyke Show setting, despite the fact that The Dick Van Dyke Show took place in the 1960s, roughly around the same time the sitcom setting for the second episode, Bewitched, took place.  Certainly the writers realize that color television was invented in the 1960s, and that while Bewitched started in black and white, it was in color by 1966.  But for WandaVision's purposes, we'll pretend th at color TV was invented in the 1970s. 

In this episode, there is no "Wanda, who is doing this to you?" The primary focus of most of the first part of the episode is trying to hide Wanda's instant full-term pregnancy. After Vision runs to retrieve the doctor for Wanda's sudden labor, Geraldine shows up and Wanda spends a few minutes trying to hide the literal stork from her before she can no longer hide that she is giving birth.

It was then, dear reader / viewer, that I remembered that Geraldine was not Ms. Marvel, but the grown-up Monica Rambeau from the Captain Marvel movie.  I'm just going to call her Monica, I think that's a safe bet after the ending this week.

After Wanda gives birth to a boy, Vision returns with the doctor on his back, having traveled at some sort of supersonic speed to get to Wanda in time. Monica and the doctor step out of the room to give Wanda and Vision a minute alone when surprise (to no one) it's actually twins. Then in the next scene, Vision walks the doctor outside, leaving Wanda and Monica alone with the twins.

After the doctor leaves, Vision sees the neighbors, Agnes and Herb, talking over the fence. Well, whispering, about Geraldine. Vision sees they are obviously gossiping and approaches them.  The scenes go back and forth between Vision and the neighbors and Wanda and Monica. While the neighbors indicate to Vision that there is something strange about Geraldine, no last name, no husband, no home (she came here because we're all tr-! Nothing, never mind!), Wanda sings to the twins and tells Monica that she is also a twin.  She remembered she had a twin brother, yay! Maybe next week she'll remember her accent. Also, why not name the twins Pietro and Tommy, or Quick and Silver?  

So it was all going fine, despite Wanda's pensive recollections, but then Monica had to go and ruin it by mentioning Ultron! Wanda is like OMG you know him? Monica tried to pretend she didn't say anything, but Wanda says simply, "I think you better leave."  Vision runs back in, freaked out by the neighbors' gossip, and asks Wanda what happened to Geraldine. She had to go, Wanda says, with her back turned so Vision doesn't see Scarlet Witch's "I took care of it" smile. Cut to Monica Rambeau landing in some sort of field.  I imagine it's a cornfield.  It seems like it's always a cornfield.  Helicopters, searchlights, the whole nine.  

I'm just glad something finally happened.  I tried to force myself to wait until there were more episodes so as not to be so frustrated by the little blurbs of action and lack of clear plot, but it didn't work. Let's see what next week brings.  I forgot what my ratings system is, and to stay aligned with my amateurishness, I'm just going to say 7 out of 10 for this week.