I saw this on twitter and I loved the thought of them just getting distracted from their search for Tommy by Billy showing off his magic tricks to Agatha. So adorable of them.
It really only takes Agatha a little over 24 hours after she escapes the enslavement spell to get back on top. If the spell hadn’t been actively holding her down for 3 years, she likely would have been back on top in quick order after her WandaVision defeat.
It seems like a combination of the universe favouring Agatha by presenting her with ripe opportunities and her own personal willpower that allow her to ascend back to the top in record time. Upon waking from the spell she regains her power, gains freedom from death’s pursuit, and becomes the mentor and witchy mother to the most powerful witch alive. Agatha really is a testament to being a scrappy underdog who just won’t stay down.
It’s one of the things that makes Agatha so easy to root for. She doesn’t sit around waiting for things to happen or wallow in feeling sorry for herself. When life knocks her down she gets right back up again, brushes herself off and heads back for the top. She lost centuries worth of stolen power and the Darkhold. She accepts they are gone and doesn’t dwell or lament losing things that can’t be recovered. Agatha just looks at what she can get instead to make herself whole again. She can refill her empty tank with new power, while Billy and his chaos magic is both a new opportunity to explore rare and powerful magic now that the Darkhold is gone and a way to forge a legacy for herself with a worthy protege.
In fact Agatha’s mindset allows her to not just regain her spot at the top but maybe even surpass the position she was in when she first entered the Westview hex. Lilia tells Billy that he has the power to turn all of his goals into reality. Minus the chaos magic, maybe Agatha does too. They both seem to be able to will what they want into being, just each in their own way.
Joe Locke answered some questions today with Esquire Session regarding his career and he mentioned working with Kathryn Hahn on Agatha All Along. It sounds like they were both so committed to getting Agatha and Billy’s relationship right. Kathryn was actually encouraging him to scream in her face. It’s one of the beautiful things about their relationship. They really are chosen family because only family can feel comfortable screaming hurtful things in each other’s faces one minute and then be ready to die for each other shortly after.
He also says working on Agatha was a coveted memory for him and praises JAC’s writing as well as working with Kathryn, Patti and Aubrey.
Video is posted on twitter by @dailyjlocke and the subtitles were automatically added
It is a small detail but I think it’s cute that during and after the final WandaVision battle Billy is always on the side of Vision that is closest to Agatha while Tommy is on the side of Vision closest to Wanda. Sort of a symbolic foreshadowing. That despite everything that happened in the final 2 episodes, that Agatha and Billy’s bond not only survived the conflict but will also endure for 3 years apart and will draw him back to her so they can reunite and be closer than ever.
Even though Agatha and Billy’s relationship likely wasn’t anticipated to be as important and fundamental to both their character arcs while WandaVision was being filmed, it’s still interesting in retrospect that this visual groundwork was laid and just now becomes more meaningful after AAA. It also made a lot of sense even at the time of airing as Billy and Agatha did have a special closeness during his childhood. Billy was the only person in the hex that cared to try to understand and connect with the real Agatha instead of the caricature Agnes. While Agatha had obvious favouritism for Billy and was actually taken aback when the feeling was so mutual that he bothered to study her to try to figure out that there was something more to her under the surface of her campy performance.
It’s nice to think that when the finale for WandaVision was being staged that Billy was intentionally placed as close to Agatha as possible to honour the realness of their relationship in the hex. It also acts as a hint that even after Agatha’s defeat, Billy is still on Agatha’s side. This is all a great little visual cue leading into AAA as it is Billy that spearheads their reunion and is determined to restore, understand and bond with the real Agatha, flaws and all.
I love how Agatha literally comes at Billy with a big knife and he doesn’t even back up. He’s just absolutely so trusting of her and so certain that she would never hurt him that he has no natural instinct to even back away. Agatha isn’t even gentle about taking his blood either because she’s not that type of mom. She isn’t going to coddle Billy and make him afraid. She’s always about building confidence in her boys to do whatever has to be done no matter how unpleasant.
This little interaction really is a microcosm of what Agatha has always been teaching Billy. The “get used to this feeling”. As far back as holding him hostage in the hex to as recently as bargaining with his life with Rio. Agatha is always teaching the same lesson that sometimes it’s necessary to inflict a little pain in the short term in order to ensure their survival in the long term. Billy really is Agatha’s perfect protégé as despite her repeatedly giving him harsh lessons, he remains unafraid of her and he continues to trust her intentions.
A trope that explores that a creation is not a possession or extension of their creator but their own person who has their own thoughts and feelings that can actually be in complete contrast to that of their creators.
Smallville. Lex makes a clone of his brother Julian who died in infancy. The clone Grant Gabriel was meant to sooth the trauma and loss Lex had experienced by not only losing his real brother but also having distant and abusive parents. The clone gets tired of Lex’s demands and actually mocks him for being so lonely, sad and pathetic that he had to build himself a brother. The final insult is when the clone distances himself from Lex but wants to have a relationship with “their” father Lionel who shows contempt for Lex but gravitas towards Julian’s clone. Lionel and the clone bonding as father and son sets Lex off and he orders a hit on his brother’s clone as he would rather see him dead than be rejected in favour of “their” father.
Agatha all along. In wandavision Wanda was so unhappy and lonely that she magically bore twin sons Billy and Tommy to fill a void in her life and make her feel loved and needed. Wanda sacrifices the twins when she takes down her hex at her enemy Agatha’s prompting. Wanda goes insane and appears to kill herself because she can’t handle not having children to love her. However Billy who survived denounces Wanda as his mother and disregards her struggles. Instead he fixates on winning over Agatha’s affections. Billy follows Agatha around everywhere like he’s her surrogate son, cuddles up to her to tell her she’s not bad and even forgives her all her wrongdoings on behalf of her son Nicky in order to cement their coven 2.
As Agatha had such an awful mother in Evanora and then was subsequently on her own since she was a teenager, she never really knew what it felt like to be the one looked after and out for. Lilia is probably one of the only witches who is older than Agatha and sees her as the baby witch in need of support, guidance and understanding.
I think Lilia saw good in Agatha as far back as in WandaVision. That’s why she sigiled Billy and entrusted his care, life, magic and future to Agatha. Lilia gives Agatha the warning about hitting the deck and then died vanquishing Agatha’s enemies because even after Agatha killed Alice, she still saw someone worth protecting in Agatha as she continued to believe in Agatha’s potential to redeem herself and be better than her worst moments.
Lilia needed her coven but her coven needed her too. Agatha has always had a void in her life that Evanora left her with, a void to be taken care of, not written off after mistakes and to be presented with opportunities to be good. Agatha needed that, she needed Lilia. It’s one of the beautiful things about covens being families. Witches that have lost their original family like Lilia or had a terrible birth family like Agatha can find a new family in a new coven.
Even though their time together as a coven was short lived, Lilia has positively influenced Agatha so much by giving her that opportunity with Rio to prove she is capable of being good and setting her up to secure her enduring coven with Billy. Agatha is finally putting her witch killing career behind her and is dedicating herself to nurturing the potential and safeguarding the future of a fellow witch. Evanora never believed that Agatha had it in her to make that change for the better but Lilia did and she enabled Agatha to do it. Unlike Agatha feeling like she had to be a good mama to Nicky to distance herself from Evanora’s abusive parenting. Agatha being a good witch mom to Billy is proving Lilia right to have had faith in her.