Specifically, we’re in Modern Family mode, with Elizabeth Olsen doing a pitch-perfect Julie Bowen impression. This was the comedy era inspired by both Malcolm (single-camera, no laugh track, characters addressing the audience directly) and Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s original UK version of The Office (mockumentary style). With “Breaking the Fourth Wall,” we arrive in the mid- to late-2000s. But it’s hard to shake the feeling that WandaVision is usually spending the wrong amount of time on any one concept, sitcom or MCU. Had the Brady Bunch or Bewitched segments been as brief as last week’s Malcolm in the Middle homage, it might be less noticeable. And these last couple of episodes offer only the slightest hints of how well Team WandaVision can mimic more contemporary comedies, before tossing the parody aside in favor of moving the story along. (More on the circus in a moment.) Early installments dwelled too much on sitcom pastiche that wasn’t always funny enough to sustain a half-hour. It’s a tough balance of elements this show is going for, and the production only sometimes pulls it off like a good circus acrobat should. But it’s not hard to imagine a more compressed version of this season, featuring multiple sitcom eras per episode at first, before giving way to later installments that are half-sitcom, half- MCU adventure. Perhaps that speculation was wrong (in a 2019 red carpet interview, Elizabeth Olsen suggested the show would be “six hours,” which may have been misconstrued), or maybe Marvel took advantage of all the extra time in quarantine to re-edit and expand the series. We didn’t even know until last month that the show would be airing nine episodes, since much of the early reporting suggested a season with only six. A review of this week’s WandaVision, “Breaking the Fourth Wall,” coming up just as soon as I show you this mole on my back…Įvery Marvel project arrives shrouded in some degree of mystery, and that shroud was particularly foggy when it came to WandaVision.
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