Dr Strange 2: In the Multiverse of Madness (Spoilers)

[Thomas Shey]

I do think the Darkhold is narratively important to get her there "so quickly". Without it, I could see Wanda getting there eventually, but I would need to see that progression (else we have another Season 8 GOT Dennerys heel turn). But the book acts as a catalyst, accelerating Wanda through that progression and making her more unable to listen to reasonable arguments than she might have otherwise. Considering that Strange used it for like 10 minutes and may already have corruption in his body....it seems very reasonable that a person using it for several weeks (months?) could be completely corrupted.

In fact, we pretty much know at least two other incarnations of Strange fell down completely that way.

Honestly, you can of course have an issue with the Darkhold as plot device, but that's pretty much how its worked out for anyone who messed with it for an extended period. Its well established in prior fiction. Of course they didn't have to give it to her, but once that was set up there's pretty much have to been active intervention on someone's part (say, Strange getting his oar in much earlier) for some awful outcome not to have been likely; Wanda's just been shown as someone who struggles too much with her better and worse angels not for that to be expected, given how the Darkhold puts its thumb on the scale (and frankly, one gets the feeling the nature of her maturing power didn't help).

 

[Thomas Shey]

Then show it.

How much flashback time do you want in a movie that's already two hours long, that needs to also show where Strange is at right now, and give at least some time to America Chavez?

Like someone else said, you can argue that the need to have seen Wandavision is a potential problem here, but I'm hard pressed to see where things pointed at the end of that and where they arrived here being dissonant.

 

[ART!]

Then show it.

This kind of reads as "FIGHT ME!!"

 

[Umbran]

Messing with minds to full on merciless murder.

So, I find this a misrepresentation.

She wasn't "messing with people's minds". She was committing mass torture. The children of Westview were taken from their parents. The people had their agency taken away, under threat of whatever Wanda's power could do to them. They were mostly not allowed to sleep, and when they could sleep, they had the nightmares of a woman who was traumatized in youth, was experimented on by Nazis, had her brother die, had the only person she loved die at her own hand, and then at the hand of another....

At the end of Wandavision, they literally beg her to either let them go, or let them die. Continued existence as her toy was worse than death.

The only mitigation on this was that she seems to have not been fully consciously aware of their state, but it looked like a significant amount of knowing denial was involved. Either way, in her grief, some part of her was willing to subjugate nearly 4,000 people to her will without regard to the impact on them. Killing a handful or two no longer seems a great jump.

 

[tomBitonti]

People are ignoring the real ending to wandavision. She ends that show using a illusion to hide the fact that she doce completely in to the darkhold, and is hearing the cries for help of her children. Sure, she regrets enslaving westview, but right after that goes after the power of a demonic relic. What she is in this movie was directly set up in wandavision

Yeah, I thought that was odd. The presentation at the end of WandaVision seems to be that she realized that what she did was wrong and was on a redemptive path. But, the DarkHold has been shown to be extremely corrupting. Most but not all succumb to its influence: Aide is wholly corrupted, while Radcliff sees his errors in the end. I'm thinking that the presentation at the end of WandaVision was of her reading from the DarkHold, while projecting an external "normal" scene. I had thought that to be her sitting outside her house while having an astral projection read the DarkHold. That ending scene wasn't clear enough in foreshadowing Wanda's corruption.

To me, a weakness is the gap between the end of WandaVision and Wanda's appearance in the movie. While I understand the movie is already quite long, the transition is not adequately presented. I wonder how folks who have not seen WandaVision will handle the transition. There is too much which is not explained unless WandaVision has been seen. I think some showing of Wanda gradually becoming worse and worse are needed. The scene with her and the boys is too small to explain what happened, and feel disconnected. Who are these boys? Where did they come from?

I would have handled the withered forest reveal differently: Have Dr Strange invite Wanda to the monastery. Have him twig to something being off, and figure out that Wanda has been corrupted just before she is to arrive, just in time to prevent America from being taken.

TomB

 

[Umbran]

Then show it.

Being traumatized as a child to the point where she becomes a terrorist and unleashes the Hulk on a city didn't show that?

Or, what, you think that goes away on its own when more trauma is dropped on top of it, and exactly no mental health steps are taken?

 

[Umbran]

Another way to see this...

Wanda's story is the best media version of the Dark Phoenix Saga we are likely to ever get.

 

[tomBitonti]

Being traumatized as a child to the point where she becomes a terrorist and unleashes the Hulk on a city didn't show that?

Or, what, you think that goes away on its own when more trauma is dropped on top of it, and exactly no mental health steps are taken?

Except, at the end of WandaVision, she lets her recreated Vision and children dissolve, effectively killing them, as a necessary loss to remedy her taking control over the town. She has a redemptive moment. There is a hint that she might see Vision again at some time in the future.

Also, she is aghast at her mistake in the market in Civil War (although, it is misplaced: There were many people in the market who would have otherwise died, and who knows how many would have died if the biological agent was released.)

What I see as a problem is that she recognizes that controlling the townsfolk is wrong, but then decides that killing America and (presumably) killing and taking the place of an alternate Wanda are OK. (And, killing lots of people along the way.) That's a huge shift.

TomB

 

[Umbran]

Except, at the end of WandaVision, she lets her recreated Vision and children dissolve, effectively killing them, as a necessary loss to remedy her taking control over the town. She has a redemptive moment.

Redemptive moments don't fix trauma. Redemptive moments are not a substitute for a few years with a good therapist.

Her first action after that redemptive moment was to run away and stew in isolation with a book of evil power. Good luck with that redemption.

 

[Umbran]

Oh. Another thought - I've seen folks mention that the Book of the Vishanti seems like a red herring. It is supposed to give the sorcerer whatever power he needed to face the threat. He gets it and... nothing.

Except he, the only Strange to get the book, is also the only Strange who doesn't dive too deep into the Darkhold, the only Strange to not try to kill America, the only Strange who lets others help him.

So, either he already had what he needed, so the book didn't have to give him anything, or the book gave him the little extra trust/willpower/bravery he needed.

Nobody said the Book of the Vishanti was about blatant power.