WandaVision will directly set up Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness

Go behind the scenes of WandaVision, the incredibly strange-looking Marvel show about Wanda and Vision living inside a sitcom. I don’t understand it but I want it.

WandaVision wasn’t always going to be the first Marvel TV show to air on Disney+. Originally, Disney planned to air The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, a pretty straightforward-looking series about how the two title characters get on in a post-Avengers: Endgame world. But production on that show was delayed due to the coronavirus and WandaVision sounds like it was a little easier to make, so it was the first series across the finish line.

Why was it easier to make? Well, according to a new Entertainment Weekly story, a lot of the show is filmed on closed sound stages and resembles sitcoms of yesterday, from I Love Lucy to Full House and maybe beyond. In fact, the whole premiere episode was filmed like a 50s-style sitcom, complete with black-and-white coloring and a live studio audience (all of whom signed strict NDAs, naturally). Crew members even wore ’50s-era clothing to complete the illusion.

It’s probably not what you’d expect for the MCU’s TV debut, but it sounds like it energized the actors. “It was insanity,” said Elizabeth Olsen, who plays Wanda Maximoff, aka the Scarlet Witch. “There was something very meta for my own life because I would visit those tapings as a kid, where my sisters were working [on Full House].”

Paul Bettany, who plays Wanda’s husband Vision, was also thrilled by the change of format. “We were all so high by the end of it, we wanted to keep on running the show,” he said. “Maybe take it out on tour or something. WandaVision on ice.”

Yes, you’re reading that right: Wanda and Vision are married on this show. “But didn’t he die in Avengers: Infinity War?” you ask. Why yes he did, and Disney is not sharing how he came to be alive and living with Wanda in a time-hopping sitcom-themed suburb, hiding his powers from nosy neighbors like Agnes (Kathryn Hahn). “The show is a love letter to the golden age of television,” said head writer Jac Schaeffer. “We’re paying tribute and honoring all of these incredible shows and people who came before us, [but] we’re also trying to blaze new territory.”

All I know is that the show sounds incredibly weird, and I cannot wait to see how it fits in with the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. And Marvel boss Kevin Feige promises it will fit in. In fact, he even says that the show will directly set up the 2022 movie Doctor Stranger in the Multiverse of Madness, where Wanda will play a key role alongside Doctor Strange himself (Benedict Cumberbatch).

At the same time, the show will be welcoming to new fans. “If you haven’t seen any of them and just want to step into this weird thing because you love The Dick Van Dyke Show, it’s going to work,” Feige said. “But if you’ve been tracking the 23 movies we’ve made and following along the stories into Phase 4, there’ll be a wealth of rewards waiting for you as it all unfolds.”

The Dick Van Dyke reference isn’t just for kicks, by the way: Feige and WandaVision director Matt Shakman (who directed “The Spoils of War” on Game of Thrones, FYI) actually took Van Dyke out to lunch and asked him questions about his classic sitcom, which ran from 1961-66. WandaVision is taking its sitcom aesthetic very seriously.

The sitcom angle came from Feige himself, who took to watching episodes of classic sitcoms before going to work. “I would get ready for the day and watch some old sitcom because I couldn’t take the news anymore,” he said. “Getting ready to go to set over the last few years, I kept thinking of how influential these programs were on our society and on myself, and how certainly I was using it as an escape from reality where things could be tied up in a nice bow in 30 minutes.”

But WandaVision isn’t just a sitcom throwback. Obviously there’s something weird and sinister going on beneath the surface. You can pick that up from the trailer:

What exactly is going on? We have our theories.

The show is also a chance for the actors to explore their characters in more detail. “It’s been the biggest gift that Marvel’s given me, getting to do this show,” Olson said. “You get to just focus on her and not how she felt through everyone else’s story lines.”

"I already felt like I had ownership of her because Marvel always encourages you to be part of the process. But even more so now, I feel I have a really strong sense of ownership. If anyone wanted to ask me a question about the future or just a question about what she would think, I feel like this time has provided that."

As for Bettany, he thought his time as Vision was over after Infinity War, and was shocked when Feige broke the news that he was going to be the male lead in a new TV show. “I thought I was being brought in to be let go,” he remembered. “I thought Kevin was doing the decent thing and bringing me in, and he and [executive producer] Louis [D’Esposito] were going to tell me, ‘It’s been a great ride, and it’s over.’ So it was a really pleasant surprise for me and my bank manager, too, obviously.”

WandaVision will consist of six episodes, which cast member Teyonah Parris describes as “six Marvel movies packed into what they’re presenting as a sitcom.”

Parris will be playing Monica Rambeau, who appeared as a little girl in Captain Marvel (she was the daughter of Carol Danvers’ pilot friend). What is she doing in WandaVision? Like everything else about the show, it’s shrouded in mystery, but man, do they have me eager to find out more.

WandaVision comes out this December, although we don’t know an exact release date as of yet. All I know is that I’ll be watching when it premieres, because I am officially curious.

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