Can you elaborate? Maybe my memory is failing, but I’m not sure which event created that timeline.
Since we’re denigrating people who have a different experience in this thread (not you specifically, but you know…), my counter-point is that the people fawning over this show are such MCU fanboys that they can’t give a fair and honest assessment about what they’re watching. They will drink any koolaid that Disney pours out. Certainly the tone of the push back to any criticism reeks of toxic internet fanboyism.
So you’re saying we’re too stupid to have a valid opinion?
Hmm, I suppose that’s how one could interpret that. How about that. Probably not constructive, but certainly instructive.
Nebula and Rhodey (War Machine) went to 2014, clocked Star-Lord and took the Power Stone. Rhodey went back to the prime timeline with the stone, but Nebula was captured by 2014 Thanos. Thanos sent the 2014 version of Nebula back to the prime timeline in her place, who then used the quantum time machine to bring him and his flagship (and the first Nebula) to her. They were all eventually destroyed by Iron Man using the Gauntlet.
From the point of view of the people living in that version of 2014, Thanos simply vanished. Since the movie expressly said that you can’t change the past, one must assumed that he stayed vanished.
I actually am incredibly bored by the usual MCU stuff. I expect to be similarly bored once we get to the ‘real’ story. This stuff, though, I’m loving. It’s at least trying to do something interesting. Whether or not that pays of, we’ll see.
Not everyone enjoys a slow burn. I prefer it. It’s not an insult to intelligence to suggest that everyone may not.
Some people like Breaking Bad. Some prefer The Wire. There are different ways a story can be good.
It’s quite generous to call this a slow burn. Better Call Saul is a slow burn, but you get a mountain of character development for your time. The critique isn’t that it’s not moving fast enough, the critique is that it’s not moving at all while simultaneously forcing this redundant, grating parody concept on us. We’re not learning anything at all about the characters. We’re not learning anything about the world. We’re watching a spoof of the Dick Van Dyke Show and aren’t even being asked to laugh at it, we’re just enduring it.
Here’s what I think is happening in the show. And, yes, this means there is a larger story, but it’s being developed subtextually. The key points will be clearer retrospectively, after the mystery has been fully unfolded.
Hiding behind spoiler fog, in the unlikely event this is accurate speculation and “ruins” the experience for anyone.
The miniseries is set post-Endgame.
The backstory is, Wanda didn’t want to accept Vision’s death. She retrieved his body and went seeking magical assistance in resurrecting him. The lost infinity stone turns out to have been critical to the gestalt of his identity, so she finds no easy answers.
Eventually, she was approached by a powerful mystic. I’m assuming this is Agatha Harkness, due to the comics connections. Agatha offered a deal where she will try to resurrect Vision, in exchange for Wanda bearing a child which Agatha will take custody of.
Wanda accepted the deal, but it didn’t work out for whatever reason: maybe Agatha failed, or maybe Wanda realized Agatha’s intentions for the future child were nefarious.
As a result, Wanda defensively manufactures a pocket universe, trapping herself, the incomplete Vision, and Agatha. The specific nature of the pocket universe is informed by Vision’s half-recovered programming; he spent a lot of time consuming media in an attempt to understand people, and that is now being surfaced. Essentially, Wanda’s attempt to pull Vision’s self out of his ruined body has wound up creating this false reality using his imperfect, and now fragmentary, conceptual model of human experience.
This would explain a lot. It provides a basis for the sitcom world. It explains why the Agnes character is so pivotal as a motivator/explainer/mentor to Wanda, because she’s actually Agatha. It explains the anachronistic racial makeup of the supporting cast; these are real people who have been pulled into the reality bubble. Some of them, like the “Geraldine” character, may actually have been deliberately inserted into the bubble, rather than being pulled into it by accident; she’s Monica Rambeau, and may be working with the SHIELD-adjacent group SWORD in an attempt to rescue Wanda from the outside. That would explain the radio voices and the injections of cross-reality elements, like the toy helicopter, which could be an adapted manifestation of a drone or an actual helicopter or something else from the outside.
Ultimately the key conflict will be Wanda’s refusal to let go of any hope for Vision’s return, versus her friends on the outside trying to get her to release control and return to the real world.
All of this is basically a mash-up of the “House of M” storyline with a bunch of other comics stuff. It’s not a direct point-by-point adaptation of anything, but it’s closely inspired by key developments throughout Wanda’s history as a character.
This predictive speculation does require some familiarity with the comics. However, if I’m correct, then all the necessary reveals will have been made by the end of the miniseries, and there’s nothing here that will demand extratextual comics knowledge after all the cards are played.
And if I’m right, then we’ll be able to go back through the first two episodes and see that there are lots of little hints being dropped as to the larger story, in terms of why Wanda and Vision are doing what they’re doing and behaving the way they are. I’m pretty confident there’s more going on in those first two episodes than what seems obvious from a cursory initial viewing.
FWIW I’ve not watched most of the MCU movies, and didn’t think Endgame was so great. I’ve felt season two of The Mandalorian was tilted too heavy to fawning to the established fans. I’m not fawning over this show but I am enjoying the concept so far and feel it invites me as a newer viewer to a greater extent.
Just one viewer but …
I think, to me, a lot regarding my overall assessment of the series will end up depending on whether the soap-opera stuff actually mattered, in and of itself, or not. If large chunks could just be replaced by ‘insert generic 50s/60s/etc soap-opera plot here’, with the plot advancement only being carried by the small out-of-place elements, then to me, that’ll be wasted time. But if it sets up anything—some vital bit of character development, some coded reference to what actually has been happening—then this might be great.
However, if it’s the latter, then they’re really playing their cards close to their chest—not that I’d claim being a particularly great spotter of such clues, but as of right now, I really don’t see any reason why, say, Vision’s stint as stage magician couldn’t have just as well been, say, some ill-fated attempt at making friends with the neighbors, or whatever other soap-opera plot one might think of. But who knows, maybe the (literal) gumming-up of his inner workings becomes relevant?
Perhaps I was too subtle.
I think Cervaise has got the gist of it right in his spoiler-boxed-prediction. Something like that, anyway. I do think that Emma Caulfield is magical and involved as well.
DYeah, Ep 2 is definitely much like the Stevens home - open staircase into the living room, dining room in the back, etc. The couch faced back though (I think the Stevens’ had a conversation nook, instead).
You mean sitcom, not soap-opera, right? Two completely different genres, especially in the period in question.
Someone had pointed out that these were not sit-coms, but rather horror shows. I’m not sure I agree completely, but there are definitely horror elements.
“Stop it! Stop it!”
“Do you know how a housewife gets blood out of white linen?”
I’m appreciating the yucks, but these little disturbing moments are what will bring me back.
And “for the children”
Oh yeah, meant to mention this in my spoiler-obscured speculation above: If I’m right about the backstory, then this would be a key bit of context leaking into the fake reality.
There’s nothing worse than a fan who thinks only their opinion is correct and perfect and anyone who disagrees is either dumb, or someone that cannot be honest and just agree. Art is subjective. If you hated it, cool. If you loved it, cool. If you were meh, cool. But if you are insulting others because they don’t feel exactly like you do, then you are being a huge jerk and you should stop it.
Yeah, sorry, got them confused.
Question for anyone surprised/disappointed by the sitcom format: Did you see any previews before watching or go in blind? Not judging, just curious.