[The following story engages with Agatha All Along’s marketing campaign and does not contain major spoilers.]
Jac Schaeffer’s WandaVision wasn’t supposed to kick off Marvel Studios’ foray into television on Disney+, but that pandemic-related pivot in early 2021 ended up going so well that the showrunner spun off her wildly successful series into the Kathryn Hahn-led Agatha All Along. Besides Loki, the Emmy-nominated WandaVision is widely considered to be the crown jewel of what is now labeled as Marvel Television (Kevin Feige’s version), but as the bellwether for the MCU on Disney+, there was one fly in the ointment that Schaeffer never saw coming: an overabundance of fan theories.
Of course, anytime a show or film can garner that type of energy from the audience, it’s ultimately a positive given how difficult it is to capture anyone’s attention these days. But the theorizing around WandaVision reached extremely rare levels, rivaling the intense speculation that came out of Star Wars: The Force Awakens back in 2015. Fans had convinced themselves that the demonic Marvel supervillain Mephisto was the real big bad of the series and that Al Pacino was going to play him. There was also a reference to an unnamed “aerospace engineer” that some viewers believed was going to lead to the MCU’s introduction of The Fantastic Four’s Reed Richards. These are just two of many examples that never came to pass.
As a result, Schaeffer, who didn’t want to disappoint anyone over something that was never actually promised, couldn’t help but view fan theories as a double-edged sword at first.
“At the time, with WandaVision, I took the fan theories a little personally, and I feel like I’ve changed since then,” Schaeffer tells The Hollywood Reporter. “Everyone at Marvel during WandaVision was so relaxed about the fan theories, and I now understand that there are always going to be theories. You just have to do your work and do it as best you can and hope that the audience enjoys the journey of it.”
Agatha All Along has plenty of material for fans to chew on, such as the identity of Joe Locke’s character, however, Schaeffer still took a few precautions to avoid something insignificant being turned into another lofty expectation.
“The short answer is there are a handful of things that of course I can’t explain. I have been very careful with the language that I use in order to protect things,” Schaeffer says.
Below, during a recent conversation with THR, Schaeffer also expresses her one regret from Agatha’s upcoming series premiere that prompted her to say, “Now I wish I could reshoot the pilot.”
I last spoke to you for the WandaVision finale, and I mentioned to you how Wanda tucking in her kids as the hex collapsed was very reminiscent of a similar moment in Titanic. And while you insisted that you didn’t realize it until that moment, you acknowledged that there was a subconscious influence there. Thus, as Agatha All Along’s marketing put out there in the very first teaser trailer, I wasn’t surprised that you were back in Kate Winslet territory with a play on Mare of Easttown.
(Laughs.)
Was the idea to have Agatha All Along briefly do for prestige drama what WandaVision did for classic sitcoms?
First of all, I remember the Titanic thing. I hadn’t thought about that in a while, but yeah, you rocked me with that. I was like, “Ooh, that nugget that was deep in the subconscious just came rattling forward.”
But, yeah, that was totally the idea that I wanted to do. I was like, “Get me inside of a prestige true crime drama,” and I’m just so delighted that you used the word prestige. When I was pitching it and explaining to Kevin Feige what I wanted to do, I kept being like, “But it’s prestige. It’s going to have that patina, that gritty True Detective thing that we’re all super showing up for these days.”
Rio Vidal (Aubrey Plaza) in Jac Scaeffer’s Agatha All Along
Courtesy of Marvel Television
And then there’s the Evan Peters of it all. Aubrey Plaza, as the marketing also shows, basically stands in for his Mare of Easttown character. But was there at least some discussion around having Evan’s WandaVision actor character, Ralph Bohner, play the role of Aubrey’s visiting detective, creating crazy degrees of meta-ness?
(Laughs.) That literally never occurred to me, but it’s such a good idea. I love Evan Peters so much. He’s such a spectacular performer, and he’s one of those performers where I could see him do that role forever. If he just kept performing as that character, I would be thrilled. So I’m embarrassed to say that it did not occur to me, and now I wish I could reshoot the pilot.
You admitted to me previously that the fan theories surrounding WandaVision were pretty overwhelming at times. You obviously don’t want to discourage fan engagement on that level — and Agatha All Along does have material that will be theorized about — but did you take any measures to prevent people from blowing something inconsequential out of proportion again?
It is true. At the time, with WandaVision, I took the fan theories a little personally, and I feel like I’ve changed since then after walking through the WandaVision experience. Everyone at Marvel during WandaVision was so relaxed about the fan theories, and I now understand that there are always going to be theories. You just have to do your work and do it as best you can and hope that the audience enjoys the journey of it. So I am not as preoccupied with them as I was. But, yes, the short answer is there are a handful of things that of course I can’t explain. I have been very careful with the language that I use in order to protect things.
(L-R): Jennifer Kale (Sasheer Zamata), Teen (Joe Locke), Agatha Harkness (Kathryn Hahn), Lilia Calderu (Patti LuPone), Mrs. Hart/Sharon Davis (Debra Jo Rupp), and Ali Ahn (Alice Wu-Gulliver) in Agatha All Along
Chuck Zlotnick/MARVEL
I love the Lilia (Patti LuPone) character because she’s always railing against misconceptions and stereotypes involving witches. That said, the closing credits show where a lot of these ideas originated. Was the goal to be both a tribute and a subversion of on-screen witches?
That was exactly the idea, and I am remembering now how much I love your questions because you have such an understanding of what we are trying to do and what I’m trying to do. So that is just so gratifying. That’s also what we were trying to do with sitcoms [on WandaVision]: “We love sitcoms for all of these reasons, and sitcoms are also ridiculous for all of these reasons.” So we will simultaneously celebrate but also send up. I admire a lot of content like that. Galaxy Quest is one of my favorite movies, and I feel like it does that so elegantly. It is at once an excellent example of a Star Trek-type story that also makes fun of it the entire time.
So, with this show, we weren’t doing sitcoms; we were doing witches. There are other allusions woven in, too. But there’s a lot of ridiculous ideas of what a witch is, and it feels to me that you want access to all that. These witches, if they want to be a trope, they get to be a trope. If they want to be something different and unexpected, they get to be that, too. They get to be all of the things, so that’s the ethos of the show.
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Agatha All Along two-episode premiere is now streaming on Disney+.
