'Agatha All Along' Episode 6 Deep Dive | House of R
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Welcome back to House of R. I'm Joanna Robinson and I encourage you all to, uh...

pitch a tent, throw some potatoes in the air fryer, because Mallory Rubin is here with me to talk about Agatha Allong, episode six. Hey, Mal, how you doing? You must be Bonerific69.

Um, that's Mr. Bonerific to you. Please respect me. Okay. Hello. We're here to talk about Mallory and I have not pre-gamed about this episode, but I am going to say a phenomenal fucking episode of television. That is what we're here to talk about today. And we're thrilled to do so. Before we do so, programming reminders. Mm-hmm.

The Midnight Boys are covering Agatha and Penguin sort of smooshed together in an extravagance of an episode for you that you'll want to pay attention to. Next week, we're like every...

Ever so slightly light on the programming, you might hear other Ringer folks talk about this thing called Core Week. We're all going to LA. It's a whole thing. So we're going to be a little lighter, but we will be back to talk about Agatha. The Midnight Boys will be giving you their instant reaction to Venom 3. And then Mallory and I will also be covering Venom 3 on a deep dive. I genuinely cannot wait. If anything deserves a deep dive, I think it's Venom 3. So that is something that we're going to talk about. I'm actually genuinely thrilled.

We're all supposed to go watch it together next week as a team. Wonderful. So it's going to be really fun. So that's, I mean, that's a few things going on. It's not as swamped as it is sometimes, but how can folks keep track of all that? How can they make sure they don't miss a single Venom take? You don't want to miss a Venom take. Who knows? Maybe there'll be like some photos of the gang hanging out.

If I get Joanna to watch a Ravens game, we'll see. See what happens. Will I meet Halo? That's a big question. Standing invite, as I always like to say. How can people follow along? Thanks for asking. Here's what I would recommend. First, follow the pod. Follow the House of R.

on Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow us. Give us those five stars. Then head over to the YouTube channel, Ringiverse YouTube channel. Hit subscribe. Full episodes of House of R, Midnight Boys, Pew Pew, available for your viewing pleasure on both the YouTube channel and Spotify. Then while you're at it, your phone's in your hand. Follow the Ringiverse on the social media platform of your choosing. TikTok, Instagram.

Twitter. And then you're like, I don't want to put my phone down yet. No. I'm not ready to close my computer. No. I have an addiction. Send us an email. Oh, yeah. Hobbitsanddragons at gmail.com. We have somehow, shockingly, dismayingly, only three episodes. Two weeks. Two more weeks of Agatha. Of Agatha left because it's a double finale. Episodes eight and nine will air on the same week, Halloween week. So get the Agatha theories, thoughts, emails in while you can.

Because our time on the road is limited. Did you have a bar or bat mitzvah? We'd love to hear from you. In fact, we did hear from some of you. Yeah, what was your theme? My theme was jello, as I have told you before. Yes, we've discussed this before, which is why I'm not shocked. I already went through that trial and tribulation with you. Okay. So, yeah, hobbitsanddragons.gmail.com. Please do send us your thoughts, your theories, and we will get into it all. Let's go now.

Spoiler warning first. Spoiler. Yes. Through episode six of Agatha all along and anything that happened in WandaVision and anything that happened in the MCU at large, including Multiverse of Madness, it's on the table today. Your favorite, yeah. Comics canon. We have some thoughts. We'll be talking about it. So that is what is up today on this podcast. Let's go now to the opening snapshot. You really used your back to you in the studio voice for that.

Let's go now to the opening snapshot. And then today's sports report. And then Tiffany with the weather. Okay. Um, we were talking about episode six, familiar by thy side. Yeah. Written by Jason Rostovsky, who actually doesn't have a ton of writing credits under his name. And then directed by, uh, I'm going to try it. She's a beautiful Brazilian name. I'm going to try not to mess it up. It's Ganja Montero. Great name. Great episode of television. Uh,

This is a long boy. Last week was a shorty. This is over 40 minutes once you take away the previously on and the credits and all that sort of stuff like that. So this is a meaty episode full of a lot of information, a lot of lore download, a lot of Easter eggs, a lot of theory fodder. We're going to get into all of that. But before we do, Holly Rubin, did you enjoy this episode of television? So...

We talk a lot on the pod, really regardless of what we're covering. There are a few things we look for, right? We love a character on an arc. We talk about this a lot. Conflict in the human heart? Conflict in the human heart is the only thing worth writing about. Every now and then, in discussing these things, some hyperbole might enter the chat. There might be a moment where someone, could be either of us. Could be literally anyone on this call. Could be either of us. Could be Steve, possibly. Could be. Could be.

This is the most important thing that's ever happened in the history of television. Right, right, right, right. Unfortunately, we will now have to retire that phrase because officially, forever, the most important thing in the history of television and the most important installment in We Love a Character on an Arc is the return of Ralph Boner. And I will honestly not hear any argument to the contrary. I won't. This was like...

The way they bonered us again, but we were so excited this time. Yes. This was, I mean, obviously there was a lot of others in the episode, all of which I also really enjoyed. It was a genuinely very exciting talk, but I thought this was great. Like top to bottom, really great. It's smart. It's confident. It's assured. It's funny. It's poignant. It's everything. Ralph Boner, to me though, the return of Ralph Boner is, it tells us everything about Ralph.

the sure hands guiding the story. Because something like the Ralph Boner saga and scandal swept the viewing public during the WandaVision days could be the kind of thing, and we've talked about this again, like in other fictional universes, where you get scared. You lose the courage to do the thing you want to do because maybe people didn't like it or it didn't go the way that you thought it was going to go. And this is like,

It's two things in tandem. One, it's a thing that you have made this point many times in other Marvel conversations over the years, and I think it's a great one to keep noting, the Feige-ism, right? It's like... The Feige fix it. Yeah. Yes. If something didn't work, you don't have to abandon it. Lean in, figure out how to improve and tweak, and then make it work. Yeah. But also, this was still...

A joke. And like the essence and core of what Ralph Boner was in the first place was actually preserved intact and amplified. Yeah. And Jack Schaefer and the team making Agatha all along have the confidence in the thing that they are doing. Yeah. And know that it is good. And that is a wonderful thing as a viewer to know that like you are marching towards something, even like there, this is a really small example, but like,

seeing a moment as crucial as like the car crash, right? Which obviously we're going to discuss. We get a look again at the anomaly, at the hex. When, when William is, Billy is showing Eddie the hex and they're talking about the anomaly. He's like, no, well, this is like, look, it's a rune, you know, witchcraft. And William,

after Ralph Boner, one of the things that people complain, and of course, let's not be kind of like, people loved WandaVision, but one of the things that people complained about the most was, God, at the end, at the finale, in the final moments, we still had to do big battle in the sky. We still had to CGI it up and splash runes all over the place in a big red box. And like, that was resurfaced so that a character could understand his own identity. Yeah. That's just brilliant. Like, I loved that. So I thought this was great. I'm honestly like,

that it's almost over. I just don't want it to end. But I also am kind of like, you feel that the nine episode length here was right. We also, we often talk so like about, is it too short? Is it too long? I feel like we are marching methodically. Is that how you talk about Ralph Boner? Exactly. When you were saying like, it's a meaty one. I'm like, well, this was, I mean, we had double boners. I don't know what to tell you. I would hope it's a meaty one. My goodness. Yeah.

But yeah, I just thought this was great. I'm so excited to talk about it with you today. It has also just inspired... I mean, you are like, in general, one of the... You're one of the lords of Theory Corner, you know, across the podcasting universe. But this episode of television inspired you to...

Eight pages of bullet points in a Google Doc about something that I am just like, I just actually cannot wait for you to talk about. So this is just exciting. What fun. Yeah, Mallory is still going to regret taking duties from me. No. Why were the notes late today? I don't know. Joanna rewatched the entire show. Okay, so...

listen, I thought this was an extraordinary episode of television. This is the best the show has been since the opening of this season. WandaVision was my favorite Marvel show. This is my second favorite Marvel show with so much love for Loki. But I think that Jack Schafer... So that means Secret Invasion moved down to four. No, no, no.

But Jack Schaefer and Mary Lovano's, who's like the consulting producer on, uh, that's not her official title, executive producer. I'm sure, uh, on this show, those are like, you know, and we didn't know how much of WandaVision was Jack Schaefer and how much was Matt Shackman, because that was like a, you know, a head writer, director of the whole series co-production. But I have to say that I feel like with love for Matt's work, um,

The spine of WandaVision is still here in Agatha all along. And so that has to come from Jack. And Jack is the storyteller I am most excited by in the Marvel storytelling universe right now. I am just like really thrilled by what she's doing with comics lore, taking comics lore, complicated comics lore.

The soul of one kid wound up in the body of another kid. Simplifying it, refining it, making it less weird. We don't have to say the word shard of a soul or anything like that. And putting it inside of an episode of television that is both incredibly sad, especially when you rewatch it and you watch like 13 year old

William Kaplan like being hoisted aloft on the chair at his you know bar mitzvah like it's just it's tremendously sad and like side splittingly funny the boner the bonering in this episode is just it's historic I want to let you know that originally the opening

quote I picked for this episode was an Agatha Billy conversation, which we'll hear later. I mean, but I was like, come on, I need to give Mallory. Come on. Her dose of boner right at the top of the episode. I did that for you. Thanks. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks. I do have some bad news for the Mephisto truthers. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Speaking of like,

The shot of Ralph Boner from behind in the bucket hat and the trench coat made its way into the latest trailer that they put out right before this episode. And people were screen grabbing it and they were like, Mephisto? And I just can't believe they got Bonered again. I just like it just actually brings me entirely so much joy.

As for the Mephisto truth is out there. I regret to inform you that now all of the title cards in the closing credits have been filled out. We had a couple of blank spaces and now we know that those blank spaces were reserved for Evan Peters, Maria Dizia, Paul Adelstein, and Miles Gutierrez Riley, who were playing Ralph Boner.

the Kaplans, Rebecca and Jeff legends and Eddie. Um, so that's, that's what we were waiting for. Um, so I don't think we're going to see Sasha Marcona's Mephisto or Elizabeth Olsen returning or something like that too. I would just like tuck those hopes and dreams into bed and say, good night, Tommy. We'll see you. We'll see you in another show.

Oh man. Yeah. Uh, anything else you want to say in this sort of table setting manner? I don't think so. Let's, let's dive in. Let's go now to the deep dive. So the dossier, AKA the Billy all along theory. Uh,

usually in these deep dives we go beat bite beat through an episode we are going to do that but first i just want to talk about this like very irresistible theory that is like percolating in our emails percolating on reddit percolating in my uh brain i don't know why i said that that way multiple times um i'm not we're not going to skip the magical mitzvah of william caplan that is an event that we must pay due respect to i'm very excited about it um

Something that we've been talking about from the beginning, just given the way that the portal to this world opened up in the first place, is the question of like, are we actually on the witch's road? Or are we somewhere else? I thought maybe hell. I don't think that anymore. But the question that this episode inspires is, are we stuck in another world?

Maximoffian hex powered by Billy's love of pop culture, his fascination with Wicca, his need to connect with Tommy. And again, this is stuff from Reddit stuff from our listener emails, stuff from my theory brain. As I rewatched the episode, sort of with this idea in mind, just from the, from the top before I get into any specifics, Mallory. Yeah. We know, we know that there's this idea that like the road changes for the coven.

That has been an excuse for like sort of the shape that some of the things have takes. But after seeing the items in Billy's room, which we're about to go over, how are you feeling about this idea that this is, is this the road or is this not the road? How much is Billy shaping the story we're watching? What are your initial feelings here? I think that the return of Ralph Boner in this episode, in addition to being just a pure pleasure and delight is a good thing.

reminder for me, for viewers to do what you always like to say, which is hold a theory loosely. Yes. Right? In general. Just like, not that it was, actually part of what I loved about it was it was not there in a scolding way, right? But like, hold a theory loosely. Yeah. Necessary caveat issued. I would now like to say, I feel as close to 100% that this is the case as like I have with anything in a long time. Okay. It just feels like the supporting evidence is...

and you're you're gonna outline this in a way that i think will be very very very convincing and helpful that said it's confirmation bias because i'm like it feels like what's happening right so feels right feels right yes right the part of i'm compelled by a number of the things that you're going to run through um a couple of the the ones that are like just kind of categories buckets of things that you're going to hit that are most compelling to me though like

if we will hit some of this as we go, like if we return to the conversations between Agatha and Wanda from Wanda vision, the way that Agatha discussed what Wanda had created, I feel like that really helps explain her curiosity about what's happening here. And like her interest in Billy, though, obviously their relationship is, we are reminded in this episode traces further, but,

but the idea of like two pop culture obsessed, I kind of can't get past the, like you're the tell the thing about the tell in this episode, you have the same tell as your mom. And it's like the idea of magical beings manifesting this,

illusion and this reality to work through their own sense of loss and desire to and desperation to find someone they're close to again uh not just a manufactured illusion that brings people they have come across together but through the frameworks of some sort of pop culture experience that's kind of like the the biggest bucket but the other one to me that i just like sort of can't shake is

is this explains every episode basically so far. It's had a line or two where we were like, what's that about? What was that? And in a way that like, because again, the show is so deft and well-paced and precise and intentional. Those aren't sloppy lines. Yeah, there's no wasted moment. No, whether it's the language or the way a character looks at another character, all of that is...

By design. Yeah. And so now if you reassess some of those lines with this, this, through this lens. Yeah.

I just feel like it kind of explains all of them. So I'm all in on this, but I'm prepared for it to be something else. And if it is, I'll be fine with it. We're hot off the presses of us being like, Billy totally cast a sigil on himself. And then right away we were like, oh. But dude, you called the car crash thing. Well, the internet was in on that. So like, I don't, I'm not taking credit for that, but like. Wonderful stuff. Yeah, really good stuff. But actually that's like,

That was another one where the Agatha car crash line from episode one felt so, it just stood out. Yeah. Right. And so, and then it bore fruit and paid off. And so all of these other lines, it just, I think it gives us even more confidence that they're, they're going to,

All right. I'm going to leave somewhere. Let's do this. And at the end, at the end of laying this out, I do want to talk about whether or not we feel like it would be satisfying or dissatisfying to watch. Yes. A redo of WandaVision in a sense. Right. You know? Okay. So the most compelling argument, other than the fact that Billy is Wanda Maximoff's son, is the avalanche of Easter eggs that we get inside of both William Kaplan's room and Billy Maximoff's room three years later. Say what you put, say what you put in the doc.

Thank you. And the way that Alice, Lillia, and Jen all touch on Billy's life pre-road, there's a couple of classic Portal World storytelling stories

uh touchstones here and i'm i was so happy that we did an entire episode on portal world storytelling um and you can go back and listen that if you want to a tropes course we did on on a portal worlds which is like a story where you go down the rabbit hole through the looking glass any kind of thing where you're sort of find yourself in this other world and um so the the the

the one that they've been driving home the hardest, the one that crops up the most in Billy's room to the point where I'm like, Billy, what's, what is your obsession here is the Wizard of Oz. And like seeing first Alice and first Lillia, then Alice, then Jen, and then Sharon all, all in this like time leading up to going into the witch's road and

has to make us think about the film The Wizard of Oz where the farmhands, Hunk, Zeke, Hickory, Mrs. Gulch, the professor, are all like become the scarecrow, become the cowardly lion, become the wicked witch, become the wizard inside of Dorothy's dream. That's a movie conceit, not a book conceit. But like...

Return to Oz, the 1985 Nightmare Fuel extravaganza also does a similar thing, only they add a mental hospital. It's extra fun. Um,

The way that Alice in Alice in Wonderland creates her whole wonderland out of tea parties, playing cards, chess pieces, flowers, things from her life. This is the one that really pinged for me just because I've seen this movie so many times. In the film Labyrinth, the main character Sarah, played by Jennifer Connelly, her room is just stuffed with stuff.

stuffed animals, toys, figurines that all become characters inside of the labyrinth when she goes into the labyrinth. So, and this idea that all of those portal worlds, Alice is dreaming, Dorothy's dreaming, you know, Sarah questionable, but that's the beauty of the labyrinth. It's ambiguous. So if we look at the,

easter egg extravaganza that is uh billiam's uh room we get the oz references like so like i

so many oz references on every wall just in case we were looking down at our phone um you know just to make sure you get it but let's go through some of the other stuff we see here we see uh in in uh billy maximoff's room we see a saw poster which connects to the sort of like diabolic illegal timed puzzles that the coven have to unlock um we get an alice in wonderland poster we get a

off-brand goonies poster called goofballs but it is the goonies poster essentially and that speaks to like a sense of adventure going underground on an adventure where they're supposed to be treasure at the end of this sort of like underground journey um we get the craft which you know we've been talking about a bit it shows up in the closing credits but this idea that

Billy will go on to say in the road, witchcraft emphasis on the craft. We get the very same Fleetwood Mac poster that we saw on the wall in Alice's episode trial. We also get, of course, the very same record that is playing in Alice's trial. We get the Eastview pennant that we saw in Agatha's trial.

If that was Agatha's trial, uh, we get board games are stacked all over the place and they could not enhance enough to find a Ouija board, but I bet there's one there. Uh, we got a moon phases poster. We got phases of the moon chair. We got posters of trees that look like the ones on the road. We've got trees around the record player. There's a carry poster, which is the story of a telekinetic teen. Um,

A Black Cauldron poster, which trailer spoilers to the Black Cauldron poster. Bedknobs and Brunsticks, which is about an incredible film that I absolutely love where Angela Lansbury plays a witch who takes in these like war orphans. So about like a witch teaching, guiding children. Jennifer's Body, queer horror classic. An Evanescence poster.

but I can talk about it in a second. There's not a ton to represent Jen, but there is like some of the moon lamps that show up in that house are there. And I also just like have to believe that,

Rebecca Kaplan, the Gen X legend that she is, watched Big Little Lies with her son. Like had Billy watch Big Little Lies with her. Right. And obviously we'll see Jen on, you know, the YouTube when he opens the computer, but also when he went into the shop, we got the great, like, I'm a huge fan of your Insta. So Jen is in Billy Oum's life in another way, if not via Easter eggs plastered on the walls. Yeah. So this idea of like the

the road changes for the coven is all well and good, but why is there Billy all over everywhere, every single trial? Um, so let's say that like, like his mom, Wanda, you're so like your mother, right? Um, that Billy has unintentionally created the witch's road to match his fantasy. And, um,

There's two big Agatha lines in this episode that pull this out for me. One is when she says... He's like, fine, I'll do it myself. I'll walk the witch's road. I don't need you. I'll walk the witch's road alone. And then he tries to make his blue power go in his hand and it just fizzles and she cackles. And she says, oh, sure. With all that power, you can't control without throwing a temper tantrum. And then...

And if we go back and we talked about this at the time, the opening of the portal was so odd to us. Yeah. The portal, as we know at the time, it doesn't open up until Billy overwhelmed and panicking.

at being chased by the Salem Seven, needs an escape. He's upstairs. We don't see him when the portal appears, but he needs an escape. The portal is glowing blue, which we took to mean blue for Jen's water trial, which it is. You know, the road is coated different colors. But blue is also the color of Billy's magic. So if Billy in...

Like his panic at being attacked creates this portal into this portal world. I love the idea of he's like clutching

senior scratchy right before he does it that makes him which we also remarked yeah we were like why so the bunny is there right before this and then not there yeah so alice in wonderland coded of course yeah and then also the title of that episode is circle sewn with fate unlock thy hidden gate circle i have some questions about but so with fate like billy is essentially sewn up

By Lilia, who is like the standing in for the fates inside of this episode. So like, yeah, he's, he's the thing sewn with fate and he unlocked the hidden gate here. I'm willing to accept that.

An idea that, and we'll talk about this later with the black heart emoji, that Billy actually was just the missing piece of the coven and they needed him in the room in order to unlock the portal. But we got some other things to talk about when it comes to clues. But how are you feeling so far about some of the stuff laid out here? Compelled. I think on the portal front as well, in addition to like the Alice and all that, it's not just the initial entry. If we think back through the trials, it's,

something involving Billy is always what opens the portal back to the road, right? Like we have, it's his blood is like the crucial final thing to get the plastic bottle laden potion exactly where it needs to be in the first trial. And then in the,

So with the... We talked last week, like, oh my God, he touched the Ouija board alone. He's not supposed to touch the Ouija board alone, but it's only when he does that after he shouts, Nicholas, scratch, that the stairwell exits, portal within portal opens, and then went out of order. But it's his...

wound that ends up bringing them back out to the road. Obviously, like, when we're tracking what is fueling the success of the ballad and the song in real time, it seemed like Billy was maybe the one risking them not completing it. But now, like, through a slightly different lens, it's like he was the reason that they actually moved forward and left. So it's interesting to kind of consider all of that again through that idea of, like...

is he the one forging the path? Is he the one forging the reality? Yeah. And when he goes, he's the one who goes to the door and he's like, this is the moon phase. This is the element we're dealing with. He is opening the door. He's opening doors here and there and everywhere. Yeah. And I think also this would be per,

particularly helpful in answering our question from last episode about why would this be the setting for Agatha's trial, if it is Agatha's trial. Because we're going to hit later the very sweet moment where his mom asks about watching the movie together. But pop culture, you already said, pop culture posters all over the room, plastering the room. It's like, Billy is a consumer. And so the idea that that would be his context for how Agatha might work through an issue with her mother. Yeah.

Feels really right. Feels right. So I like all of this. I like all of this. On the Oz front, did you see by the... This is important even outside of the Theory Corner here. Katherine Hahn is on Instagram. Attention, bad babies. Katherine Hahn is on Instagram. This is a crucial moment in our shared history. I love it.

She posted a very Ozzie and picture of her feet and Joe Locke's feet with some red shoe action. Ooh. Yeah. Okay. Very exciting. Check it out. Check it out. Ruby slippers. Ahoy. So the other thing that Agatha says in this episode, I mean, she says a ton of very important things, but the other thing that really pings for me is when she's talking to Billy, she's covered in mud.

And she says this. Do you really play this clip? Gosh, you really are a Maximoff. Otherwise, none of this would be nearly as dramatic. It's quite rude, but true. Wonderful.

Worth noting, this is an audio clip. She is gesturing sort of all around her as she says this. She's not saying this conversation. She's saying all of this. None of this would be nearly as dramatic. As in, you've created quite the cornucopia of pop culture references for us to travel down in this particular setting. I think that's wonderful. And then we need to get to all of these little moments that we've been like, what's that mean? What's that? What's going on there? Yeah.

So if you go back and you watch episode two, where Agatha, when they open the portal, Agatha sort of squats down, kneels down, and picks up some dirt. She's very much in her Mare of Easttown detective mode. She's sifting through the dirt. She's like, what the hell is this? Right? Because this is not...

This is not the witch's road that she is familiar with. Right. And that's like, so the performance, she's like, what is this? She's sort of bemused as everyone is just sort of like, we got to go. She's like, okay, let's go. Also, there's a scary demon lady after me. So I guess I'll go down here. She goes down. She walks down. They stand on the road. She's standing in front.

She looks quizzically at Billy and then he just smiles broadly at her. And she's like, I never doubted this for a second. Let's go. It plays very much like this is not the witch's robe, but whatever this is, I'm so curious about it. And whatever you've done here, Billy, I'm very interested to see what it is. And when immediately at the very beginning of episode three, this is the first thing we hear. See if we play this. That's exactly how I pictured it. Yes. Suits you. Mal, what do you want to say about that?

I went back to WandaVision and some of the key conversations between Wanda and Agatha, a lot of which are about... All of which feel newly significant and a lot of which are about the specific nature of Wanda's magic. Tell me. And what she is able to do. And how, first of all, covetous Agatha is of that, but also how unique it is. Now, obviously, like...

The big reveal, right, is not just Agatha all along. It's the buildup to this is chaos, magic, and you are the Scarlet Witch, which is like a distinct thing. Yes. That said, this is all being bundled for us in the like you are so like your mother, right? And so it's reasonable for us to think not only about what Wanda and Billy share, but

but about what Agatha would see in those similarities, right? Or what she would be looking for in pursuing and seeking those similarities, which I found particularly notable. And I mean, it was helpful that Billy was like, when did you know? And then to hear Agatha's answer to that and kind of like assess it through that lens, if she was suspicious or thought this might be the case from the jump. So like,

When she's just kind of like, here's how this works, your magic, here's what you can do. Quick incantation and a feeble psyche and you're good to go. With thousands of people under your thumb all interacting with each other, according to complex storylines, well, that's something special, baby. And of course, there's transmutation, years of study to achieve even the smallest convincing illusion. But Westview through your lens, Wanda, is the best.

Every little detail in place down to the crown molding. You're even running illusions miles away at the edge of town. Magic on autopilot. What's your secret? Magic on autopilot feels like so much what's at play here for Billy and very much like the thing that would be driving the, yeah, it suits you kind of

Yeah. Like, if it's magic on autopilot, then it is your essence. You just manifest this. Yeah. It is something that reflects you. Yeah. And so, like, it suits you feels like just the extension of what he said to her mother. Yeah. I love that. And I love that you went back to WandaVision to study that. And I think that, like,

thinking about when we meet Agatha inside of the detective story that she has sort of like semi-crafted for herself. It's not that like, it's not like Wanda on her way out of town said like, Merevistown, that's it, right? This is something that like,

Agatha has sort of concocted for herself. We hear Rio comment on it when she arrives and she's like, is this really how you see yourself? Yes. But in this episode, we hear Billy say to her in the flip of the interrogation scene where we see what really happened. He says, detective, that's not what I was expecting, but I can totally see that for you. So this idea of like creating the narrative to fit the person and also that idea of Agatha as the constantly curious, constantly asking questions, constantly following clues, constantly

I'll just follow you down this road, whatever this is that you've manifested. Cause I want to know how does it work and how did you do it? Right. We get the weird moment in episode three, right before they get to the beach house that we commented on. And we couldn't really suss out when Billy says it would be a bummer if this was the end of the road and everyone gives him a look, but Agatha gives him like a long look in that moment. Yep.

And then this is a moment that people were sort of like kicking around in theory corner before this episode. Someone on TikTok, I know, like picked up this moment in episode four when Agatha is again in detective mode, sort of hunched over the body, the dead body of Mrs. Hart. And this is how episode four opens. Steve Lee played this clip. I didn't think you had it in you. I didn't think you would want him though. And then she winks at him.

So the implication here to me, I don't think that Billy, the theory going around is that Billy is like the villain and that he killed Mrs. Hart. I do not think that Billy killed Mrs. Hart or certainly did not intend to. But this question of did he accidentally, did he create a world so real that

that it's potentially lethal for the people navigating it. The wink she gives him is just sort of like, you. I'm talking about, didn't think you had it in you. You. That's what I'm talking about. How would you interpret that otherwise? Yeah. That sounds right to me. And I think one of my favorite moments in this episode was like, you know, life goes on. Yours anyway. Yeah.

To remind him of all the peril that has befallen all of their traveling mates. You know, Rio notably absent from the road and from the glimpses of the sequences and the past where she was. So that's interesting to kind of think about. But, um,

He was horrified. He was horrified by this, like, not just the fact that she's laughing as she's failing to count how many people she's killed over the years, but that's like the, like, whoa, we're not, I don't, I don't laugh about killing people. I wouldn't do that. And of course, like this was, I also do not think that Billy is going to be the villain of the story. I don't think that that's how Wiccan is going to be introduced into the MCU. That just doesn't feel likely. Yeah.

I don't think there's going to be a villain of this story. That's what I think. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's just going to come down to hard choices, but I don't think it's going to be like... Conflict in the human heart. Yeah. I don't think it's... It's the only thing. Here's Mephisto out from the shadows. I don't think that's... Yeah, I don't think we're going to see Mephisto. I do think we'll see Tommy, but I don't think we're going to see Mephisto. I hope so. Yeah. Yeah. Toby.

No one has necessarily all the time in the world to go back and rewatch the scenes. But if you want to go back and rewatch Rio as she's first regarding the road when she gets there, you could read it as, you know, her sort of manic, here's the road, that's cool. I read it as, she's like, oh, we're calling this the witch's road? Okay, I guess. Cool production design. Steve, will you play this clip?

Oh, which is well, no. No, this is cool. That like, okay. Sort of like, sure. If you say so, this is the witch's road, I guess. Yeah, you're right. That's real. Like gold star on your school project. Yeah. This is like not the real thing. Energy. I like that read. Yeah. She's all side theory about Rio. To your point. She's, she's not in the episode. Um,

if we are convinced that Rio is death, her curiosity about Billy, why did you bring that boy? She asks Agatha in episode four, that boy isn't yours. So our interpretation was like, that's not Nicholas scratch. But I think if she and Agatha both know that that's probably Billy, this idea of like, and, and, you know, a point you brought up a couple of times is this idea that Billy and Agatha had a connection in Wanda vision when he was a child. Yeah.

And so she's like, you can't replace Nicholas Scratch with Billy. You can't have this kid. I think we're all a little concerned about the fact that Billy broke the rules in order to stuff his soul inside the dead body of William Kaplan. He's not yours because he's literally mine. Yeah. Rio's entry into the show in the Mare of Easttown thing is, what are you doing here? My job. Yeah.

I am concerned. I have concerns. I am concerned. So to quote the legend Charlie Pace from the television series Lost, guys, where are we? If we're not on the witch's road, where the hell are we? And that's when we have to thank Sharon, a legend in her own right, rest in peace, who gave us that answer, I think, in episode three when she said, and we noted it at the time,

She said, quote, okay, I'm a member of the Westview Historical Society. All I would have expected to see down here were remnants of our failed public transit system. I think we're in the Westview tunnels and Rio is just in the neighborhood. Pop down to the tunnels below Westview that Billy has transformed into this fantastical road adventure. What do you think about that? I,

Again, that line is just like, what else could it be there for? No wasted lines. Yeah. And also Billy, you know, the fact that he was an admirer of Jen's work, that Lilia was at his bar mitzvah, that Alice was at the car crash, like all of these things from his life. Well, he's an obsessive researcher, right? He's like looking up everything about people and places. And also like, you know, the line about like, it's just like, oh, it's about the place. It's like about the place.

It's like the idea that he would have... This specific place. This specific place that he would have come across something about. And then just incorporate that. Use it for this fiction that he is spinning to make his way to Tommy and to the thing that he needs. Feels right. Feels right. Feels right. Yeah. This is the last thing we're going to do and then we are retiring Theory Corner for a second. Which is to say...

We already kind of answered this, but if this is a Hex-like spell, why would Agatha follow another Maximoff into another Hex, having just done it with Wanda? And I think part of it is that insatiable curiosity, that sort of just thirst for knowledge. Why was she strung up by her coven in the first place? Because she stole knowledge that didn't belong to her, right? She's constantly curious, as is Billy, you know? She's assembling dossiers, he's assembling dossiers. But I

But I think also there is this like idea of,

her not being like her mom and her sort of nurturing. I fell into this trap with WandaVision though, because I definitely thought Agatha was there to help Wanda and I was wrong. But like this idea that she is like nurturing Billy's power rather than reviling or shunning or shaming him the way that her mother did to her. Let's, let's hear this exchange between Agatha and Billy.

I'm not like you. Where have I heard that before? I just gotta know. Where did you come by this fresh body? Okay, you don't want to tell me. That's fine. Don't you dare feel guilty about your talent. You survived like witches have been doing for centuries. You saw an opportunity, an empty vessel, and you moved in. So you broke the rules. Big deal. That's what kept you alive. That's what makes you special.

It's what makes you a witch. Mallory, thoughts and feelings? Questions, comments, concerns? Yeah. So, okay. I loved this for a number of different reasons. I think that back at the beginning of the season, actually, as they're trying to summon the road, right? We had that lovely, like, oh, this was just a power grab. She wants us to attack her, right? Lilia realization. And I got this long time for this. Just blast me, you bitches. And...

We... That's iconic. And, you know, we carry not only the events of WandaVision, but a moment like that with us. We carry what we saw last episode with Alice with us. How could we not? How could Agatha not? How could Billy not? And that was so...

for us because as we talked about at length last week, I felt like an almost equal measure how true both of those pulls were, right? The desire for power, like the way that she just actually starts grasping at it was real. Yes. That look on her face was real. But when she said, I can't control it, that was real too. And her shame and her guilt felt real too. And her desire was,

to try to be better. Like, even if that's a difficult thing for her and has been a difficult thing, I can be good. I can be good. And if other people have made her believe she can't, that felt real too. So we bring all of that with us in a way where like, there was a little part of me watching this episode where I was like, oh, we're back to like, kind of like

Agatha is the villain. Like, Agatha is evil. Agatha is cackling. Agatha can't remember how many people she's killed. Does that feel right? But I think it does because this oscillation is inherent to who she is. It's like that is the thing she has to work towards.

through. And so the fact that there is like a part of us that actually wonders if at the end, the reason she followed Billy in or what, what she might want at the end is his power. Correct. I think that that's there. I think also I'm with you completely that the test and the trial will be her making a different choice, whether it's to spare him, to save him, to help him. And I think that what we just heard in that clip is just as real and ultimately hopefully dominant, but,

something shared between them, the thing that she didn't get from her mother and wasn't able to give to her own son, right? And so if that can be

the thing that he reminds her of, her shame, her failing, the way other people let her down can be the thing that leads to her finally making a different choice. Like that will be a beautiful journey to have been a part of. And that's what I mean when I think like, I don't think at the end of the road, it's like, again, to your point about the critique of WandaVision, like I don't think we're leading to some sort of big CGI battle in the sky again. I don't think they're going to do that. I think it's going to come down to like, okay,

emotional decisions needing to be made. Which WandaVision did do. Like, I will say, I hate the battle in the sky, but Wanda undoing the hex in her family is devastating. The conversation with Vision is like...

You are my sadness. Yeah. Gut-wrenching. I think, like, so on that front, the other line that really stood out to me re-watching some of the Agatha Wanda scenes, this is from episode eight as well. I tried to be gentle. This is Wanda saying, excuse me, this is Agatha saying this to Wanda. I tried to be gentle to nudge you awake from this ridiculous fantasy, but you'd rather fall apart than face your truth. Why follow him in? Why play along? Why play along?

Why finally get to the point where she tickles his chin and says you're just like your mother? Maybe it's that. I love that. Which brings us back to the Evanescence poster, which I didn't talk about. But like, why is the Evanescence? Oh, it's like, I think it's an Evanescence vinyl. Why is that there? I jokingly put in the notes that...

When I did the Lost podcast with our pals, Neil Miller and Dave Gonzalez, when we got into the final season, which involved people in this sort of like parallel universe that they had to wake up from, every time we talked about it, Dave just needle dropped Wake Me Up by Evanescence over us talking. He would just like, like Steve on the soundboard, just like hit it. And it's, I can't think of that song without laughing, but I kind of, I think Evanescence Wake Me Up is sort of, because something to be, something that I would say about

the pop culture references that are in Billy's room. Yes. They're of the wrong time period. And like, maybe I shouldn't be so particular about that. Um, with a three-year-old invention that is inside the body of another 13-year-old. What is time? Um, how influential is, uh, is Rebecca's taste, um, or, or Jeff's taste on Billy and that sort of stuff. But like, um,

This is a slight pet peeve of mine that I have where, like, oftentimes...

you know, these pop culture obsessed writers in the writer's room will put their pop culture touchstones on, you get this a lot in euphoria, like the euphoria Halloween episodes where they're dressing up in like nineties references. And I'm like, I don't know that that's what they would do. And so these, these feel like the references of people who are around my age, which is how old, like, you know, at least Jack is and a couple other people are in the writer's room. So yeah,

Let's rewind. Speaking of youth, shall we? Just a round of applause for you. That was great. I mean, hold it loosely if it's not true. But okay, so at the end of the day, if we find out, oh, we just watched WandaVision again, but this time blue...

Yeah. How will you... I mean, as far as I'm concerned, it all has to do with execution. That's how I feel about it, too. If it's poorly executed and it's the same kind of concept a second time and not...

then I will think it was a mistake. But if they nail it, which feels like what we're heading toward, then I think it's not only acceptable, but actually fairly compelling because a lot of this is about what you inherit and what you share. And I'm into it. I'm so curious to see where we go in the final few episodes. Man, and now again, trailer nugget here, if you don't want to hear this, I'll fast forward once. But

That shot in the trailer of Agatha, like, putting her hands on Billy's head in, like, the hospital kind of setting. It just feels like going back through Wanda's memories. If we just did a Billy flashback episode, so I don't know if we're going to get exactly that. But, like, I do think that a lot of those beats might still happen in some capacity. Or maybe that'll be when we get Agatha's memories. I don't know. Oh, yeah. I have a really fun theory about that.

we'll talk, we'll talk about that a little later on. Okay. So let's, let's go to the magical bits of William Kaplan. I'm obsessed. I would be delighted. This is wonderful. So we open on, uh, well, and, and we should say that they made the choice in the writer's room to call Billy Kaplan, William Kaplan. So we could better distinguish between the two. And I think that was a brilliant move. So this is Billy Kaplan in the comics, William Kaplan here. Um,

And opening on William fussing with his curls is so Charlie Spring in Heartstopper, which is Joe Locke's Heartstopper character. I cannot...

Charlie is forever like messing with his curls on the way out the door. Were you thinking of your recent sojourn through Heartstopper when he was constantly as anybody who did not listen to the Penguin episode may not know. I but a week ago, I'd not seen a second of Heartstopper and now have only two episodes left of three seasons and have absolutely adored it and have adored my time with with Charlie and Nick and the whole gang. Hell, towel, everyone. Just love them

I love them all. It's a wonderful show if you haven't seen it. I just love them all. On Netflix. And it was, yeah, like Charlie and Charlie and Nick were so top of mind for me watching this in a wonderful way that I, I mean, I don't think you obviously need to have seen Heart of Soccer to enjoy this episode of television, certainly, but I, I,

I found it enriching and wonderful. I think also I, I just, when the latest season of heart supper came out, I rewatched it and, and watching those boys, uh, or all those kids who were like a good deal younger when the show started versus now. Um,

those mannerisms, I think Joe Locke in, in hat Joe Locke, who was roughly 20 years old when he shot this season of television, maybe 19, but more likely 20 is 21 now, uh, playing a 13 year old. Mm.

but I would say rather convincingly, like I, he's got, you know, a slender frame. Like there are things about him that, that are convincing in one way or another, but there's just something about the way that he was carrying his body differently. That just really, and then I was like looking closely. I'm like, they didn't, you can't really digitally de-age a 20 year old's face. It's already. No, it's like slightly different hairstyle. But it all, it's convincing to me. It all works. So very much so. Yeah. And there, I also just loved the, um,

I know you're gonna, you're gonna talk about the Torah portion in a moment, but I loved the cut from the Torah portion to the swaying and the dance floor to the party, because it was so, it was so, you are so not invited to my bat mitzvah. To me, the recent Adam Sandler and Netflix movie, which I loved and actually thought, I thought was great. Yeah. This idea that like,

these middle schoolers spend all of this time thinking about like how this party is going to be this defining thing. I loved it. And like, you know, that is worth saying for a minute, right? Because we had that Alice and teen conversation about like, yeah, like a lot happened to me at 13 too. And now we understand many things about that newly, right? That's when the car crash happened. That's when William died. That's when Billy Maximoff's.

You said there, they're not going to say Solshard. I'll say it. Solshard made its way into this empty vessel in the backseat of the Kaplan car, et cetera. But also, like, this is when Billy had his... We open here for a reason, I think, not just to root us in a friend group, a family, a community, but very specifically a time in a young Jewish boy's life. Like when you're 13 and you have your bar mitzvah and it's a rite of passage, that moment. And so, like, seeing William...

smiling and dancing with his friends. It doesn't just cement the like, a lot happened to me at 13 timeframe part of it, though I think it does. It shows us also obviously like what his life was like before he became Billy. Like those kids on the dance floor are his friends and then he doesn't remember them. And that is just fucking devastating. There's some stuff with his parents that is so sad I could barely bring myself to talk about, but this part is like, he doesn't remember anything. We also, in this portion, the...

the Torah reading into the party, we get... We see Rebecca and Jeff Kaplan and how they are just bursting with pride and love for this kid. And then we get...

The smallest of scenes of like, eat this food. I love you more than human words can express all this sort of stuff like that. Gross. You're gross. Like, like they're cute little family dynamic. And that's all we see of the Kaplan family. You know, before like we're rushing and we're in the car and all that sort of stuff like that. But like, that's what we see of like,

what was lost. Right. And it's enough. So effective. Yeah. Uh, it's so effective. Okay. So to go back to the Torah, um, portion, he opens up the cabinet, which is called, uh, the Torah arc, uh, to pull out, uh, the scrolls here. And, uh, those cabinets can be carved with any number of things, but they went with a tree. So, uh,

you know, we'll come back to the trees in a second. And then our listener, Rachel wrote in, her email was titled, finally, my bat mitzvah comes in handy. So she wrote in to let us know what the reading was that, that,

William does here. And she said it's Leviticus chapter 10, verse 1. Basically, it's the story of the high priest Aaron's two oldest sons. They improperly perform a sacrifice and are burned to death as a consequence. It's normally read around early April. Don't know if that's relevant. Quote, Aaron's sons, Nadav and Avihu, each took a fire pan, put coals that were on fire in it, placed incense upon the fire, and thus brought before God a fire that was foreign inasmuch as he had not commanded them to offer it up. So...

Two sons, a ritual gone awry. That seems pretty straightforward, right? Okay. Yep.

I love the idea. I love the magical theme. Cause you know, we can't all be visionaries and have Jell-O as our theme at our mitzvah. And so, um, honestly, if I, if I did it today, I probably would pick magic. So, but would you put pick magic or magic? Because this is a thing. Uh, yeah. Great question. Probably magic. William Kaplan loves magic. He's got Houdini posters. He loves sort of like sword and sandal stuff. There's Narnia stuff around, blah, blah, blah. Um,

William loves Majik with a CK. That's the difference between these two boys. We get more tree imagery, though, on the tables. There's moons all over the place and there's trees as centerpieces on all the table, once again giving us that road imagery image.

inside of uh billy's life i wish we had gotten to see more interactions with the the theme you know it was it's obviously very important to go to to lilia's um tent wonderful but like you could glimpse when everyone's rushing out like you can glimpse a little sign for tea leaf reading like a tea leaf station wonderful do you think anyone saw the grim at the bottom of the tea cup

Oh my God, we can only hope. Take us into Lilia's tent. How did you react to seeing Lilia here and this reveal? So this was wild, all of this. Like, first of all, I love the welcome to the curious. Are we looking behind us or ahead? Yeah.

I don't want to know too much reply from Billy. Like, I mean, well, before we get to the, I found a theory guy on Reddit stuff. Like this is just all very audience avatar. Right. Very meta in a way that I really loved. And also of course, like this episode is very much, you have to understand the past so that we can move into the future together. So, and then with Lily as a character, like we've talked about this kind of like,

She is out of time. Her psyche, all of that just felt like, okay, this is a meaningful moment that we are about to watch. She asks for his right palm, and she says that it's clear that a long journey lies ahead of him. This journey will be one of great transformation. Certainly, I would say so. In every sense. Because there's a soul shard of another child. Oh, no. You're going to say shard as many times as you can. I am. Well, I just also like...

Of course, I can't help but think like a shard of Voldemort's soul latching on to, you know, it's like impossible not to think about that. So soul shards very much on the mind. Um,

The line. Your lifeline is broken in two. We get a long lingering look at this. Later during the car crash scene, when we look at the hex from the outside, I was like, the rune looked like the V in the lifeline to me. But what do they both look like ultimately? Obviously we understand what this is now literally about, right? We've got the William and the Billy. But it's a fork in the road, right? So all of this is connecting to the road.

And then Billy reasonably is like, I mean, I just like, it just simply can't be good. I called him Billy. William simply can't be good. And, you know, I love that like before Lillian makes the choice that she makes, but, you know, where we build toward this like great moment at the end where she basically is just like, you know, live in the now kind of gives him this advice. Enjoy the now, baby. It's the only thing that's certain, which is,

you know, especially with a character like Lillia or a character like Agatha, they're hundreds of years old. They've gone through all of this history and all of this trauma, that idea of Lillia's receiving intel from her future self. We think like living the now is such an interesting thing to hear given what is about to happen for William, but also given like who Lillia is. So I will, sorry, just to yes and that, I will say that like,

That hit me so hard. I think that's why it was seeing him in the Havana Gila like moment. Cause that happens like right after that. Right. Is like, um, she says that as if she knows he's about to die. This kid is about to die in a car. And, um,

And I had the car crash theory rolling around in my head. So I was like, Oh my God, he's about to die. And so then to see him lofted up on the chair and everyone just so much joy around him and he looks so young and you're just like, and that's, I mean, we'll get to this idea of like, is William Kaplan gone forever? That's the kind of question that I have. Yeah. I'm, I'm of two minds about it. I don't, I don't need it to be one way or another, but if he's, if he, if he's dead and he's gone forever, um,

I like that kind of stakes on a show. Like that's just the tragedy baked in with the boner ring that happens in this episode to make the brew that we all enjoy. The brew. Yeah, all the brew. So we're going to get to a Tarot Corner TM with Joanna Robinson TM in just a second here. But here's what Lily actually sees because when she's saying this journey will be one of great transformation and she halts the light

Yeah. The energy in the room crackles and then we see upside down in the crystal ball... Billy. Billy. Yeah. Our Billy. He's in his torn sweater, his eyeliner. Like, this is the teen that we have been spending time with. And so...

What we don't know is exactly what Lillia understands from this. Does she know that this is Wanda Maximoff's kid? Does she know that this is Wiccan? Does she know exactly what Billy is going to do on the road, what's about to happen? Or...

Does she know less of the specifics, but that this kid's life, because of the broken lifeline, is about to change? This is the end for him and the beginning for someone else. Whatever extent of knowledge she is able to glean in that moment, and I think it's particularly interesting to think about that with Lillia, because it's like, what is she consciously aware of in a moment like that? Interesting.

In any of these.

And then he kind of knows who he is. I think that's sort of the, there is some like gray area in this of like, what did Billy know? And when did he know it? But this idea of like, certainly piecing it together. Yeah. Is she binding him? Is she protecting him? Is she hiding him from whom, from death, from like, whatever. My favorite thing to come out of this episode are all the people who are like,

Is Lillia's sigil the reason Multiverse of Madness happened? Because she hid Billy and Wanda couldn't find him, question mark Tommy, but like Wanda couldn't find him. And that's why we got Multiverse of Madness is that

I'm not going to blame Lillia for that, but it's just fun to think about. Tough one. Tough one for Lillia. Tough one to carry, Lillia. I look forward to Lillia seeing Billy, presuming they are reunited. Yeah. And...

what she will, what her reaction will be now that the sigil is lifted. Same. I like, the way it was cool that it would, I mean, we understood this to be true. It works on the way she cast it, but to see how it instantly, she puts it in the pocket of the jacket and she's like, there's some kid left this year. I don't know. Great stuff. So Joe, tell us about the tower reverse. When she goes into her, her mini trance dispatch, she says the tower reversed.

William says, I thought you were reading my poem. Oh, I'm sorry. I just remembered something. I just remembered. I think. Oh, so good. I just remembered something. I think questions about, about how Lillia's powers work, but the tower, something I really wanted to say is that, um, uh, I said last week that there wasn't a card for Alice. That's not true. Um, they did release a card for her, um, the night of wands or whatever, but, um, uh,

it's just for some reason it hasn't been traveling around in the graphics with these other ones that they put out. I don't know why. Maybe because nine conveniently fit, but 10 don't or something like that. I don't know. But the tower, the tower card. Yeah. Two people falling from a tower struck by lightning, the crown on top of it. That is all actual tower card iconography. The crown doesn't usually look like a blue Wiccan crown. It's usually like a gold crown, but like,

That's all there. And something that our listener Helen pointed out and a number of other people is that the sign of the sigil is in the corner of all the promotional tarot cards that they put out for the show. So if we wanted a clue about who put the sigil on teen, we maybe should have looked at the cards even closer. That would have maybe been helpful. This to me was very...

Rings of Power season one, like, oh, right, that's Mordor on the map. Yeah. That it feels in hindsight like, oh, yeah, of course, that's what this shape, this symbol was and how all these things were going to connect. It was like sideways. Yeah, exactly. It's sideways. How could we know? How could we possibly know? The tower reversed suggests that you were undergoing a significant personal transformation and upheaval.

This differs from the tower upright where the change is often because of external circumstances and may even feel forced upon you. The tower reverse can be a sign that you are resisting change and delaying the necessary destruction of people. You may be in denial that change is occurring or you may be clinging to an old belief system even though you know they're no longer relevant or healthy for you. So this idea that like this transformation for Billy is something that this sort of feeds into my theory of this idea of like

Does he need to become both Billy and William in order to get to stay in that body? That's a question I have, right? And does he need to be forced? Do we need to wake William up somehow? All this sort of stuff. What is the transformation that he is resisting? He's created this hex, so in a way he's sleeping to a certain degree inside of this fantasy. But that's just a question I have. I don't know.

Yeah. Interesting. It's like he can't leave the body. Yeah. Because Joe Locke has to be wicked. But can he have the memories of William Caplan? Yeah. Have also the new memories of Billy sort of mooshed together. Interesting. Again, I don't mind a show where a teen dies. I'm sad that he died, but I don't think it's like it's a Disney show he has to live.

It would be nice for Jeff and Rebecca Kaplan to have their kid, you know? Yeah, I'm torn on this too because like part of me feels like then he would almost be like a passenger in his own life. Like kind of like almost like a prisoner in his own life if he's like... But I do... The thing that... The single saddest thing in this entire episode to me, now I'm jumping ahead a little bit, is... Greg the dog. Animals always know. Actually, that same scene though, like when...

When Rebecca and Jeff bring him home. Yeah. And everything is right. There's the stress, the anxiety. Like, you're confronting the fact, you as the viewer, that the Kaplans never got to mourn their son. Like, they don't know their child died. And also... They did not get to grieve him. That is... You could say it's a great gift that Billy, in a different way, is in their life. Yeah. But it is, I think, like...

deeply upsetting that they don't know what happened to their son. That's horrible. I agree with that. And I also think it's devastating to watch Billy in real time play Kate. Like he just doesn't want them to be upset. Yes. And so I think that he will tell them the truth at the end of the season. That feels like something we're going to see them get that closure. I think. Um,

Before we leave Lillia's tent, Billy calls it early Argento, which I'm just like, I'm just like considering this native advertising for the podcast trial by content, which is currently doing which movies. So if you've never listened to trial by content, but you want more, which stuff we're doing a witch trial rail, which is a lot of which movies. And we watched Suspiria directed by Dario Argento. So here we go. The hex collapses and the hex collapse collapsing sort of

Kind of causing the Kaplan crash. Reminds me so much of what we were just talking about earlier this week with Spoilers for the Penguin. The flood from the Batman being the devastation on Victor's family. Just this like nice connective tissue of the huge set piece of this other thing. And how did it impact an entirely new set of characters who are living their life just one town over? I really loved that.

Yeah. This was like my stomach just, I don't know the second, cause they have to rush out. And the second we see them in a car, just like my stomach started to twist because you just know that this crash that Agatha mentioned in the first episode is coming into play. And we know that she said the two airbags in the front of

and there was a bloodstain in the back and you're just like, oh my God, this is like about to be horrible. And then it is. This was so gruesome. Audio. And upsetting. Of his heartbeat slowing and then stopping entirely. Yeah. Yes. And like the, just the, the,

thump of his seat. His specific door. Oh my God. Colliding with the tree. The panic of Jeff and Rebecca waking up and seeing the blood in the back and that he wasn't moving. This was like... And Rebecca's like, I can't get to him. All this sort of stuff like that. I just thought it was really incredible. And then Billy's soul moved. Soul shark. Yeah.

Moving through, you know, again, we were mentioning this beautiful scene from the WandaVision finale earlier, but I found it very, very, very emotionally rewarding to connect those two families in that way. And again, like you said earlier, I...

This is such a comic book, in a way that we as comic book fans love, idea, and it's rooted and drenched here in human emotion. And like, that's why these genre stories can be so wonderful and so meaningful and can like unlock something true about everyday existence through this particular method. And like, you know,

You think about like the saying goodbye, tucking in Billy and Tommy, right? Like a family is forever. I just weep through that whole- A family is forever. We can never truly leave each other, even if we tried. You know that, right? And it's like, they couldn't leave each other. Like Billy couldn't leave.

That's the last thing you heard from his parents and he couldn't leave. I love that just last week we got people being like, well, where's Tommy? And it's like, guess what? We haven't forgotten about Toby. Toby. Toby. Tommy. Toby. That killed me. That killed me.

So he screams Tommy as he comes as, as basically Billy Kaplan comes to life. You were the one calling out reflective surfaces in an earlier episode in, in like the first two episodes, it was like puddle watch. We get a lot of reflective surface shots of Joe Locke as Billy, like the most sort of glaring point yet being the two mirrors that

Why does 13-year-old Billy have two mirrors in his room? I don't need to ask. But, you know, he's got two mirrors set up. One is for the close-up on the hair and the other is to check the fit, I guess. Of course. It actually made me think a little bit of Moon Knight. Like the multiple mirrors and just like the different aspects of yourself. I was watching so closely. I was like, is the other reflection going to do something different from the main reflection or something? Yeah, you're right. I was...

Moon Knight Pilled. Yeah, there's also reflective surfaces of him like regarding himself in the window of the hospital room. And his terror. He does not recognize himself. Also to remind, I mean like the concept of the shard of the soul again is complicated and somewhat ageless.

But we get like a little bit of like a big moment because like 13 is not that old, but it's older than Billy was when he went to bed in Westview. So, you know. But for Billy, that's old hat, right? Billy and Tommy are just like aging themselves up on a whim to get what they want. Greg knows, as we mentioned, Greg the dog knows. Sparky knew also, we should say. Sparky. Yeah.

back in our hearts and minds after this episode. Ralph wanted to make sure we remembered Sparky. Haunted by what he did as he fucking should be. It reminded me of both Parent Trap versions where the dog knows that it's a different twin. And as you say, the dog always knows. Oh, it's anything? Oh,

I want to ask the bad babies for a favor. Okay. Because I, whatever I use to watch things, I am not great at being able to like enhance, enhance, enhance. There's a box set of books on the top of Billy Williams dresser in his room. And my first thought that it was, it was the Chronicles of pretty in which the black cauldron is one of the books in the Chronicles of pretty. And, but that is only five book series. This was seven books.

chunky enough to be Harry Potter so definitely not Harry Potter but it was like a beautiful box set so I was thinking it might be Narnia because Narnia is seven books but I could not find that box set anywhere so it's possible that production designers like made a bespoke box set and put it on the table but if you guys recognize that box set I would be so curious because it looked beautiful to me and I love a beautiful hardcover box set situation um

Three years later. Three years later. Three years later. All right. Queer icon Orville Peck is on the car radio, Dead of Night. Love that song. So happy to have it here. Then we get this Billy and Eddie scene. And I just found it so wonderful. Eddie, again...

As with Rebecca and Jeff, we get very little time to know him and I am immediately just so endeared to him. He's very sweet. And in the midst of his anxious teenage do I tell my boyfriend I love him moment, we get some lore and download on how Billy's

mind reading works, right? So he tells Eddie, so this thing happens when I'm with someone I care a lot about and they're having intense feelings. So, you know, we hear the Kaplan's

We'll talk about maybe why he could hear good old Ralph Boner a little bit later on. But from WandaVision, there's this interaction, we referenced it last week, between young Billy and Agatha. Yes. Where young Billy says to Agatha, I like it here. And she says, oh, good. Is it because Senior Scratchy is such a good listener? He goes, no.

It's because it's quiet. And then he turns to her like a child in a horror movie. And he goes, you're quiet, Agnes, on the inside. Oh, man. Normal. So, I mean, what does this mean? Does this mean that...

Billy doesn't care about Agnes, Agatha. Does it mean that she's a legitimate, like has like her legitimacy up and like cannot be read? What do you, how do you, how do you read that? Whether she is a Snape level practitioner of occlumency, I cannot say, but I like the idea that

A couple things could be happening. Because, like, Billy, when he's a kid, doesn't understand his power. Thank you for gently correcting my occluding versus other terminology. I appreciate you. We'll come back to Snape later on as a gift to you for your service. Thank you. Whether that is because... Because, like, initially in the town, it seems like he's hearing...

all sorts of people who wouldn't know or consider close. And eventually it's like allows us to get and, and Wanda to find out what's happening to vision, right. At the edge of town. But it's almost like he can't control the inputs. So is, is,

Is this like an evolution maybe in how they're presenting the power? That's one thing. That's one possibility. Is it that there's the initial kind of just influx and then there's a calibration. He doesn't hear Agatha because she's shielding herself seems entirely possible. She has repressed her emotion entirely possible. Maybe he's not close to her there. And then when he, maybe he will work toward a point in this series where he can hear her and that will show the closeness. That would be incredible. Um,

And on the central front too, like the, it was, it was interesting to hear just the puzzle. Well, if you solved it, no, it's impossible part. Because like you said earlier, like,

It's not that he doesn't know he's Billy. It was really fun to get the other part of the, you know, when we first realized something was going on with the sigil in the first place. And he says, William Kaplan. And then he says, Billy Maximoff. Like he, he knows he's working, but he's got to solve the puzzle. He's got to play detective. He's got to get to that point. So this was just all like very, very interesting on the, what is actually happening with the mythology front. I liked that a lot. I also loved how he said something else, something more. This is like his Oliver Queen moment, you know? Yeah.

Fantastic. I love it. Um, when Billy says he's not William Kaplan and he says, quote, not entirely. That was the moment where I was like, yeah, is there some William Kaplan still inside of him there? Yeah. Um, our listener, Phil wrote in a lovely long email where he's talking about how for Phil, um,

And Billy's Jewish identity in the comics was like quite important to him and he doesn't want like to erase that. So of course we're celebrating it here with Bar Mitzvah, but like, unlike Billy in the comics who was raised as Billy Kaplan, this is like a Billy who was just sort of like inserted into Billy Kaplan's life. And so what Phil wrote is he says, for me, it's important that the characters, both Billy Kaplan, son of Jeff and Rebecca Kaplan,

as well as the reincarnation of Wanda's magically created kid. It's also important to remember that the Kaplans are one of the vanishingly rare examples of loving, unproblematic parents in the Marvel universe, something that has been faithfully depicted in this show. So this idea of erasing these parts of the Billy Kaplan comic book character for the simplicity of the version of the story that they're telling here is...

Something just to think about, I think. You know, on that front, like, that's really interesting. So I'm now thinking again about that farewell between Wanda and Vision and the boys. And one of the things that Wanda said that was just so gut-wrenching was, thanks for choosing me to be your mom. And I like the idea that

Billy can still choose them. You know, he can still choose Rebecca and Jeff at the end of this. Like, that would be beautiful. There's no indication that,

In another version of the story, Jeff and Rebecca would know something was wrong, would feel distant from him. There's no indication of that, right? Jeff's making pot roasts for Eddie. Rebecca's like, should we have one of our regular movie nights? You know what I mean? Like, it's just sort of like, we're still a happy family unit. For Billy, it's torturous to a certain degree, right? He says to Eddie, nothing in my life has felt normal until I met you.

And he believing in him, like, like right away, like has questions, but is sort of on board for this is extremely charming. And with all the love and respect in the world to Billy's canonical comic book boyfriend, um,

Who we will probably get at some point. I am personally right now very much Team Eddie. Team Eddie. I reject anyone other than Eddie in Billy's life right now. Eddie sounds so much like Teddy. It's like, again, it's just very purposeful. Yeah. The comic book character is Teddy. So it's Eddie, Teddy. They're pretty close. But I don't think...

Spoilers to the comics if you care. Teddy is Hulkling. I don't think that Eddie is Hulkling. That's what I would say. Like, he's just a guy, I think. Right? So...

Just a guy. Just a guy with good arms. So, you know. You've got to put those arms away. Put those arms away, Eddie, because Billy has compiled a dossier. We get the Jen cameo and the Redditors and conspiracy theorizers get a shout out. And I love that from Jack and Co. We'll come back to the online conspiracy theory havers. And then we head into...

What I already wrote in the doc before Mallory said this in her introduction, the most important, one of the most important scenes in all of television history. This is just sensational. I gasped aloud when he turned around and I realized what was happening. But even before that, just like on the loving Eddie, instantly loving Eddie front. Yeah.

We couldn't have met him somewhere with lights. More coffee? Or people. Or more coffee. Oh, yeah. It's delightful. Eddie is quite Mallory-coded. Not the more people part. Not the more people part. But the more coffee part. More coffee. Yeah, it's like a no, a no, and a yes for me. Dark, isolated, caffeinated. The Mallory Rubin story. Okay. Yes. Calling this when CraftCrazy17 met Bonerific69.

We're very all the... It must be BonerFX69. I can't believe this was a real thing that happened. I just can't believe this was a real thing that happened. The fact that they got away with the Boner Family Reunion pitch tent shirt. Incredible. Also, I mean, who better to play the role of Deep Throat than Ralph Boner? So yeah, we're doing all the presents then in the parking garage. Um...

The cop that I was thinking of, we're definitely doing all the presence men. But in terms of the bucket hat with the bone cross on it and all the various things and the rambling, this is a horror movie archetype of the old coot who knows the lore of whatever horror movie you're in. There is literally a character in Friday the 13th called Crazy Ralph who has...

a bucket hat. Like it's, it's, I think, I think that's the exact sort of analog we're going for here, but it's an archetype that you see in a bunch of different horror movies. You didn't think, oh, he's wearing Damien Darkblood's outfit from Invincible. Oh, that makes me think of demons. Oh, that makes me think of Mephisto. Is that where you went? No.

A friend was texting me. He figured it out as soon as Billy said someone survived the hex. My brain started going like, okay, which town person are we going to go see? I was like, is it her? Yeah, is it her? Who are we going to talk to? And then it was just like, right when they got into the garage, I was like, what if it's Ralph Boner? And it was. But it took me a little bit to get there, but I was so excited. Yeah.

Fantastic stuff. Fantastic stuff. I have, in our notes, we usually pull out choice quotes. I simply put the entire scene in the notes there. And then I did highlight and underline some moments. Call me Randall. Great stuff from Randy Boner. Randy Boner. I was going to say I won't be calling him Randall, but Randy Boner works. Randy Boner, right? Yeah, Randy Boner.

Boy, Randy Boner works. It does. Oh, man. He says, you want to hear this or not, bub? And if you say bub, I have to think about Wolverine. And, you know, that's just another fun Evan Peters moment for us. Amazing stuff. Also, just this initial part here, because a lot of this is going to be about him talking about Agatha. Yes. But this initial stretch here of talking about Wanda and what Wanda did to Westview, it was interesting to think about, like, as Billy is moving toward

This is who I am. I'm Billy Maximoff. Playing this all back and having to confront what his mom did to this town. Which has to make us think of that scene with Jen when she was talking about who would want to be the kid of Agatha Harkness. And we were thinking about, is Billy thinking about Wanda in that moment? I know what they say about her, right? Yes. Is what he said to Jen in The Big Little Lies house. Yeah, when...

Randy Boner, when Ralph Boner says, you mean like wake up every hour in the middle of the night screaming. Oh my God. It was really funny, but it's horrible. M. Peters is phenomenal in this scene. He's so good. Give him another Emmy. Please. So we heard the clip at the beginning, which includes... Does this count as a Mare of Easttown reunion given that we are, Agnes is back in Mare mode for part of this episode? Yeah.

If you need it to be, it can. I wanted to make sure the clip we hear at the beginning included the phrase, wait, Mr. Bonerific, because I don't know how Jill Locke said that with a straight face. Astonishing. She stole my house, completely ruined the market value. This is my favorite line of the episode. This was Pantheon stuff. We get a mention of...

completely ruined the market value. We get a sword used vision for parts reference and we'll get another one. So I would just like to thank them for reminding us that a vision series will be upcoming on Disney plus things for those reminders. Whereas vision, um, that by the way, that also like, you know, I was her puppet, just like what I was just saying about Wanda. It's like a lot of this series has really warmed us toward Agatha. And this also is a reminder of what she did. Um,

Left my entire Blu-ray collection behind. Not the physical media. Oh my goodness. I guess I can keep my Bowflex. I, when I was rewatching

the episodes, I noticed that, well, it's in this episode too, when Billy goes into the closet, when he's duct taped and put in the closet in Ralph's house, the Blu-rays are stacked in the chair behind him. And it's just like, I, again, did not have the ability to enhance, enhance, enhance to find out what Ralph Boner's Letterboxd top four was. But, you know. Let's put fantasy on it. I want to know. Yeah. Okay. And,

Or you'll end up buried in that yard with that dog or worse. It's very much like I'll get you and your little dog too, which is an illusion we had in WandaVision as well. Eddie flashing his abs on the wire question. Nice. Great job, Eddie. Good work on your arms. Good work on your abs. Good job. Okay. Give you half off tickets to my one minute show in Paramus. I really need to fill seats. Unbelievable.

Unbelievable. Disney, give us the Ralph Boner or Randy Boner, if you prefer, one-man show. I demand it immediately. I need to see it. I mean, also, Paramus, you know, this is one of the fake, I'm from here, Steve Rogers, filling out my enlistment form locations, right? So that's delightful. I love it. The way that William's face changed, like, talking about the kids, right?

The little speedster? We, Wanda and Vision, have kids. Past tense. Twins. What were their names? Billy and Tommy. Tommy, the little speedster. And his mind-reading brother. Obviously, he's like, Tommy, it's pinging something. He's probably remembering shouting Tommy. We hear later him say that he can sense Tommy. But just also, this made me think so much of The Stranger and Nori. And I'll, you know, I won't say too much, obviously, about where this ends up. But, like, in the beginning of season two, that conversation...

Don't you see? No one can give you a name. It's yours already. It is who you are. And when you hear it spoken, you feel your heart glow. Like that, it felt like this was Billy's moment. You know, he hears his name and he knows and something just clicks. I love that. It's funny. Anytime I don't know that I, um,

mention this when we were covering rings of power but i just need you to know that anytime someone like says something about their name or whatever in my head i hear daniel day lewis in the crucible saying because it is my name because i cannot have another in my life um and uh wonderful crucible of course a very famous witch trial uh thing but yeah because it is my name um

Dan DeLuis. What a legend. Okay. Good actor. My favorite. That's a stance I'm willing to take here on this podcast. Dan DeLuis, talented. Okay.

So you're talented. Just want to shout out the fact that Agatha, yes, has been living in Ralph's house, Bowflex and Blu-ray and all. But also, and I didn't fully like notice this, wearing his clothing. She's been styling out these like oversized men's clothing this whole time and looked, I mean, same, presumably not the coat. Presumably that was not Ralph's coat, but like,

Once you see her without the coat covered in mud in just like a large button down tucked into two large pants, you realize that she is wearing Ralph's clothing still. Great observation. I mean, the Boner Family Reunion, obviously. Here's my question. When will this be available for us to purchase and why is the answer not yesterday? I agree. And my question is, is Disney going to be brave or are they going to be cowards and not give us a Boner Family Reunion shirt?

Failing to make this shirt would be an all-time miss. There's already knockoffs online and some people have sent me links, but I'm like, I want...

I want the real, the real deal. Yeah. Well, we made this mistake when we waited for the TV. I'm having terrible memories. As I mentioned, the costume designer for Agatha all along is on Instagram, putting up like notes and he put up immediately the boner family reunion, t-shirt pitch intent, a thing. And he said, basically it was, it was Catherine Han's,

like question what clothing would she be wearing? And we decided she'd be wearing Ralph's clothing. And then we decided to do like a boner family reunion shirt. And then the writers pitched us a bunch of jokes and we were very surprised that this one made it, but, uh, it did. So there you go. Oh my God. I love it so much. Um,

So we, we already talked about what this means in terms of Jack Schaefer beating the boner allegations. So good. Um, but, um, yep. Jeff Kaplan loving Eddie so much that he made him his favorite pot roast and crispy potatoes in the air fryer. My question to you is which appliance do you think Jeff Kaplan loves more his sous vide or his air fryer?

Ooh, I mean, why not both? I do, like, I, as you know, am very inclined toward a Postmates or DoorDash order and not really much of a home chef. However, even I know that it's hard to get by these days without an air fryer. So I feel like that's probably got to edge out the sous vide. It's got more practical applications. It does, I think, certainly. This sounds delicious by the way, like a pot roast and then crispy potatoes in the air fryer with a movie night after.

Freaky but grounded? My God. Are the Kaplans inviting people over? You wouldn't watch psychological horror. Freaky but grounded. You wouldn't do that. You would eat the pot roast and you would leave. You would be like, thanks for your midge mazel level of pot roast.

pot roast uh i loved it i gotta go man um i just loved it i love them i love i love again with very little screen time well cast yeah it's just right because something like that like the disappointment that eddie's not there because they were excited to see him they love and support their son and they love and support the way that he lives his life like this is beautiful this is great yeah max them off come on house of our

Please. Yeah. We go to Billy's room, which is just covered. Again, we still have posters up. The Wizard of Oz has survived the transformation. We have Easter eggs everywhere of things that show up on the road. But we have like a sigil poster.

murder wall, essentially, where he has just assembled everything he could ever get his little hands on about sigils on the wall. And we get two notes. There's one called permanent sigils and there's one called destructible sigils. So under permanent sigils, it says active for long periods of time, sigils can be made into art pieces or hidden in other objects, can be recharged to strengthen, revitalize the active energy.

And they have destructible sigils activated by being destroyed, creates a burst of energy that gives the sigil power, right? Carve or singe sigil into paper, wood, food or object and destroy by fire or force food. Anything you want to say about permanent sigils versus destructible sigils here?

I just, I loved seeing Billy put in the work. And the production design team put in the work. Yeah. I mean, you said he's invited on House of Arts. Real Elrond according to lore. Totally.

Turn the scrolls. Okay. I absolutely loved this. This was wonderful. I mean, this is a treasure trove. Oh, so good. Parsing the room. And it feels like the kind of thing too, we'll be able to like go back to these scenes after the season is complete and find little new treasures to uncover, which I always love. Delightful. I was reminded of in Doctor Who. Yes. If you...

the watch with us that we did last year or if you've enjoyed time with Christopher Eccleston's Night Doctor you'll remember that when Rose Tyler just a common shop girl meets a Time Lord an Angel's Time Lord and

She Googles him. There's some Googling that happens and we get some of this like very similar thing of like through time, these people in these online conspiracy boards tracking this Time Lord and how he's shown up again and again and again in moments of crisis. What I like about this is like in moments of crisis, the Doctor shows up on Doctor Who to save the day. Right. In moments of crisis, I don't know that Agatha shows up to save the day. No, you're like, Agatha's responsible for the Titanic and the Hindenburg. Or...

follow-up theory yeah she just hang around where a lot of people died because she's dating death oh wow she's romantic take your girlfriend to work day something more romantic than the trip to the titanic i mean you know there are jewels floating around actually found it quite romantic yeah they did my goodness i wonder if like yeah they've ever sketched each other in the nude i'm into this i do have i thought this was a great scene i have one note yeah

It's not for the people who make the show. It is for young Billy Maximoff.

We need to work on your internet security practices. Tell me. Just way too haphazard with the clicking of the links. What sort of malware is on young teens' computer? Is this where I tell you that I fail most of the tests that we get from Spotify cybersecurity? I honestly had heart palpitations watching this. I'm like, don't click that link. You don't know where that's taking you. Yeah.

Yeah, stay vigilant, kids. And also me. Okay. Um, B of the East, Bitch of the East is my favorite scream name of all the scream names that we see here. Finding out that Agatha is the real Jolene. Last seen in Nashville, Tennessee, 1973. Incredible. And then we go to bruchapedia.com, which is just absolutely fantastic. And I regret to inform you.

That I was not able to crack every code that I wanted to. And so once again, I asked for help for the bad babies because in the list of A's before we get to Agatha Harkness, we get a number of names. We get Abigail Adams, famous first lady. Love to imagine that she's a witch. That sounds great. We get Agatha Harkness, but we get these other names that I could not find, though it's possible that AJ Kerner is a baseball player, but like I could not find analogs for.

And I wonder if they're anagrams. But they weren't anagrams of like people. I was like, oh, is it Jack Schaefer scrambled around or something like that? I couldn't like, you know, or like Kevin Feige or something like that. Or any of them Mephisto? No, but these have to be. These are such anagram names. Ariel Franks, Addie Denson and AJ Carter. Addie Denson is... Daddy Ensign? I don't know. So...

If you have a better anagram brain than I do, hobbitsanddragons.gmail.com. And let us all aspire to the fun fact section that is on Agatha's page here. Murdered her entire coven. Possesses succubus powers. Nickname is Witch Killer. It's tough. Only known survivor of the Witch's Room. Sick flex. Great stuff. Anything else you want to say about this, Agatha?

Research section. So I guess the only other thing would be when Billy is writing in his notebook, Wanda Maximoff, dead. Vision, dismantled. Sorry, I shouldn't laugh. Dismantled. Tommy Maximoff, missing. Billy Maximoff, dash. Okay. The lyric from the ballad of the Wanda Maximoff, dismantled. Stuff. As we like hover over Billy Maximoff, dash. Okay.

Because he's listening to Lorna Wu's version of The Battle of the Witches Road. The lyric we get paired with that is, the spell is cast, how long it lasts, I cannot divine. So I like that pairing of his name with the idea of this is the time in the series where the sigil is, yeah, the hex and the sigil and all of it. Done. On the Witches Road, allegedly you can find what's missing and then we get Tommy Maximoff missing. Yeah.

Okay. So like, what is your, what is your new theory? I mean, I guess we can save this actually for the ensuing conversation about sweet Toby. Um, but do you think Tommy is like stinger of the show? More young Avengers set up? Do you think he's coming in sooner? Do you think we're not going to get him in the series? Cause there's no empty spaces in the credits or for any other reason. Like what, what do you think? There's the possibility we don't see him until we get the vision show. And that's when we get the whole family back together. You know what I mean?

Or we get him in the finale. But if they've cast him, they've done a tremendous job keeping that fully under wraps because we have no clue at all. Though we also did not expect a midweek bonering. So here we are. You never expect a midweek bonering when you get one of the sub-dolls. Okay.

Let's go back to Westview. And the second most delightful sequence in this episode after post bonering, which is we get a lot of the Mare of Easttown stuff from Billy's point of view. And it is genuinely like so funny. We get remember during I hate to kick a show while it's not been renewed for years.

season two but like this i was i was thinking about acolyte watching this because we were so like oh if you're gonna go back to the same events like you gotta you gotta nail it and like this is an example of how it can really be satisfying and good um i quite enjoyed this the new perspective what it tells us about each of them what it tells us about agatha right what's missing here that was part of her illusion um

What obviously there's a little bit of an homage, I think, to the affair in terms of different perspective. You know, same moment. You're like Rashomon the affair to say what we're going for here. Equally important in the canon. OK, we get a bit more inside of teens, heavily annotated spell book, which is called I could only get part of the title, which is the witch's pocketbook.

TK, TK. I don't know. I don't know. It cuts off on my frame, so I could not get the full title of it. As he reviews the release spell, it mentions that you need a personal item from the Bound. And it appears per an Instagram post from the costume designer on the show that, you know, encircling where the various amulets showed up on the costumes inside of the 80s horror episode.

He circled Billy's fanny pack, which was like the holster that the book was in, has now become a fanny pack. And that's his amulet. So my question is, is it the holster itself? Is it the book inside the holster? And if the book is his like amulet personal item,

What does it mean that it's missing? Who has it and who can use it? And will they use it to unbind him from his own spell one way or another? Hmm. Question mark. I mean, well, my worry, this is an interesting question.

prompt that you've tossed out, my worry would be like, well, it fell off when he was on the broom. The Salem Seven. Who was pursuing him. The Salem Seven. That feels not great. Much like a split lifeline. It's like, that feels not great. I need them to like, accio the book. Did I use that correctly? They need to summon the book. Yeah. Because you can't really backtrack on the witch's row, but I need them to

you know, get some of that blue juice flowing and some of the book off the road. So it's not vulnerable to other people. Oh man. Now we get this big moment, this text message from Eddie and a new black heart emoji clue, right? Again, everything's, everything's on purpose. It's all coming together.

Is Billy, in fact, the Blackheart? Yes. Billy is the Blackheart that Lillia scrawled down when writing out the coven, right? He is the last member of the coven. And I like this idea that she had to do a Blackheart, well, your pen is black, that she had to do a heart because he was sigiled. Couldn't say his name. Couldn't say his name. Yeah. That I love. It does make me, again, worried about the Rio reaping part, though, because we also have the Blackheart association with Rio. Yes.

I'm it's black and it beats for you. I'm endlessly worried about the Rio reaping part. There is a terrible theory going around that Eddie is actually Rio in disguise. I hate it. Reject it. Do not like it. Let's move on. Okay. But speaking of Rio, we do not see her. As you mentioned, we don't see her in what I am calling the rolling rock scene, even though they weren't drinking rolling rock, but they should have been. Yeah. There's some mugs here. Yeah. There are two mugs.

But in the Mare of Easttown version of this scene, they're drinking beers and they're having this conversation. Is Agatha talking to herself? Or what would death look like outside of the spell? I mean, we see... We know that Teen saw her when she broke into the house because later on the road, he's like, the scary charismatic lady is back. Right? Exactly. So we know he saw her in her black hood ensemble. But why is she missing from...

the shot in this point of view. Yeah. I guess, I don't know. Would it be something about, yeah, I don't know how, how she appears to each of them. Yeah. You know? Yeah. Fascinating. And then we get the interrogation scene from his point of view. And this is just genuinely so funny. And Joe Locke did such a good job as like, his being like amused and playing along. The pen bit absolutely killed me. Loved. The kick. Yeah.

Incredible. The accents are swirling in and out. Yeah. Poke the bear also very charming and good. I don't want to poke. I don't want to poke the bear, but the pen bit was amazing. You got it. There you go. Now you got it. It's not going to work. Not going to work. He says, no, I don't want to go back in the closet. This is apparently a Joe Locke improvised line. And yeah,

That's it. Now we go back to the road. Anything else you want to say before we go back to the road? I think just, especially because of where we end the episode. Yeah.

I'm not that nice of a person. I don't need you for the rest of this journey. Like all of this, what we heard, we talked about a lot at the end of last week, like the question of who deserves what and the real like venom that he directed toward Agatha after what happened with Alice. Venom three coming to theaters. Venom, Colin, The Last Dance. Tune in for like eight hours of podcasts on this important film. It felt important to see Agatha

that he was sincere in his intentions here and in his initial like, let's team up, right? Even just the way he's like,

When he falls during the chase. That was also really funny. Like, the pursuit the first time around. It's like, he's like, oh, so... No, it's just like, they both kind of just, like, flat fall their way down. He ran into Sharon's door. Yeah, it was great. And he's like, I can't have a criminal record. But the way that he's like, I'm here to... I want to fully explain myself to you. And, you know, I want to work with you, Detective Agatha. And...

It felt just, you know, again, this is right on the precipice of this real rupture that we're going to assess between them. And so it felt like remembering that the belief that Agatha could be a partner was actually there. I love it. Agatha drags herself out of

Unbelievable. The fire swamp, the richest road, goop, the swamp of sadness, whatever your pop cultural reference you want. It made me think of Wesley and Buttercup dragging themselves out of the lightning stand in The Princess Bride, but also the way she's just like smeared in mud did make me think of a Trejo, that ever ending story. So there's all kinds of, uh, absolutely. Pop culture references for people who grew up in the eighties, uh, here. Um,

But Billy crushes the sigil, this idea that like sigil no longer necessary. No longer needed. No longer necessary. He says that he's not interested in power and she does not believe him. And as we've mentioned a couple of times in this episode, it really feels like these two, Covenant of Two, which Agatha sort of previewed for us, this Covenant of Two are headed towards a showdown with,

where they have to trust each other. He says, I will never trust you. And she's obviously like, I think you're just here for power. And he's like, I think you're just here for my power probably, you know, or, or like all the other witches who are here. Watch you drain Alice. Like, I don't trust you. I never will. Yeah. We only have three episodes left, but it really feels like that's where this is headed, that this is their trial. Can they trust each other? Do you think that it's just going to be the two of them or the two of them in Rio for how long? Yeah.

No, I mean, we... Neither of them seems to think that Lillia or Jen is going to return the way that Agatha just did. I don't know how to answer this without trailer spoilers. So, yeah. Though I will say something that Jax Schaefer said that troubled me slightly. She was talking about Aubrey Plaza and how Aubrey Plaza is so incredible, but it is such an incredible, like, jolt in the arm that has to be used sparingly. And I was like, no. Does it? No.

Does it? What if we drenched and soaked ourselves in it like that mud? Just coated ourselves in it. Get it in your pores. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, we're definitely going to see Rio again, but it could just be in the finale. Like, I don't know. They conveniently, they kind of forgot about Rio. Conveniently, right? We think we know what she's doing, but like, they think Jen and Lilia have...

either drown in the mud or not. They think Alice is dead. We don't think she's dead. I don't think she's dead. And they just don't bother about Rio, I guess. But I mean, my question... Okay, so like, as you mentioned last week, um...

Agatha's face when no one is looking is the most important thing to track. And so she's doing a lot of posturing. We're going to hear a classic bravado Agatha filled with little digs and jokes sort of speech from her in a second. But when he turns his back on her and she says, nice to see you again, she is genuinely like,

gutted and emotional and and vulnerable and open and she tears when she says billy right like so for whatever else we're gonna see her perform in a second yeah there is a genuine emotional connection between her and that child who she knew for i don't remember was it like

48 hours in the hex i don't remember how long they were in there um and um and also thinking about surely thinking about her own son but like you know all of that's in the first mix yeah yeah yeah we won't forget about rio or nikki they're coming back into play definitely every witch with a beating heart can hear you now scary scary i'm scared for billy in terms of and like i

I think this is part of it too. Like is death coming for Billy or are other witches coming for Billy and his power? And how much of this is Agatha trying to shield him from death? Okay. So let me ask you a question that will sound sort of stupid. Never. I don't know if you remember, but I just made a huge Harry Potter blender and you were so nice about it. Thanks. Literally writing a book about it, but it's fine. Okay. Go ahead. Yeah.

How much does the fact that we're in the MCU impact how you feel about these things?

When you say you're so worried for Billy, it's like, oh, there's not an outcome of the show. Okay, right. I don't know. Where Billy as Wiccan is not like a... I'm not worried about him surviving, but I'm worried that he is going to be under threat. You're right that I'm not worried about Wiccan making it out of the show alive or not. Right. So we're like, it's just like we... And they know... But I think they know that, right? But I think they have to be sacrificed to protect him. Yes.

Yeah. So like, does that ever feel like a, an inhibition or something that like can cap our ability to like fully lose ourselves in the stories that we're watching? I say this is absolutely Marvel obsessive, obviously, but like, you know, there's so many people who don't know that.

Right. I would say the majority... Not everyone's building the Young Avengers roster in their minds for the last half a decade. Not everyone's listening to three hours of House of O'Reilly. Yeah. So I would say majority of people don't know that. Right. I think what it's doing for me...

If anything, it's actually heightening my fear for Agatha. Yes. Because, right, it's like, I'm like, well, Billy's gonna, I feel like Billy's gotta make it out, but, like, Agatha doesn't. If Agatha... And that would be very upsetting, but Agatha does not have to make it out of this show. We need Katherine Hahn in our lives, but, like, hold this as loosely as you like. Mm-hmm.

if Agatha sacrifices herself for Billy, which would heal perhaps the Nikki wound would heal the coven wound would heal all these various things would heal the Wanda, all of that. Um, but is there a way in which being reaped by the love of your life, who is a hot lady named death is not actually that bad at the end of the day. So the well-organized mind, I already made this joke. Um,

All right, let's listen to your point of we need Catherine Han in our lives. Let's listen to this absolutely phenomenal bit from Catherine Han. What does Billy Maximoff want at the end of the road? Big magic is already in the bag. Huh. Is it find mama? No. She chose a town full of strangers over her own flesh and wires. What about Robo Papa?

Lord knows where he is or in how many pieces. So who is left? Oh, right. There's two of you. You're after Toby. Tommy. Red. He's out there somewhere. I can sense him. I just can't find him.

stunning work. Toby absolutely fucking killed me. Stunning work from the writer's room. Flesh and wires really killed me. Who knows where he is or how many pieces really killed me. But also his delivery is just extraordinary. Exquisite. Exquisite stuff. So we're left with Coven 2. Not Coven True, but Coven 2. And here's the last exchange which you already teased, which is last one there is a nice person and Billy says, I'm not that nice.

Yep. Yeah. Boy, this is a rich stretch here of setting up the final few episodes. I'm so excited. I think they're going to do it. I really think they're going to do it. Yeah, I'm quite confident that they're going to.

they're going to finish strong. Uh, there's actually no reason to doubt that based on, on what we've seen so far. Do you think in terms of like embracing things that maybe like didn't work or whatever, do you remember at the end of how like the end of WandaVision was supposed to end with like a giant version of Senor Scratchy, a big, like giant demonic rabbit? Do you think they're going to be like, do you think Jack's like, I want my giant demonic rabbit? I mean, I hope so. That would be wonderful. Um,

This was great. Yeah. This was just great. Where have I heard that before? That Wanda tie, like the, you broke the rules. What rules, what does it mean? Where's it going? Very, very worrying. All of it. And, you know, we played that clip earlier. The, that beautiful, like that's what kept you alive. Yeah.

That's what makes you special moment. Yeah. To me, this is like the magic of the show in a, in a, in a little snippet there, because I found it as you did incredibly moving and like a thing that just pulled me into this

bond that has built between them, even if they're in a place of, like, rejecting it a little bit right here, or Billy is. But it's also still, like, that's the logic that Agatha uses to justify the horrible things that she's done to herself and the world. True. So true. And also just, like, thinking of her as someone who, like, you know, her mom and her coven tried to kill her, and this is what she felt she had to do to survive. So survival at all costs, which is why we think maybe...

Not survival at the end of the show. Maybe. I hope we have Catherine on as Agatha in our lives forever, but I'm bracing for a different outcome. I love too just this idea of they're setting off...

Everyone's in a funk and, you know, heading down the road, pouting is like such an interesting mind state to be in. And like, I love the idea of Agatha's reluctant teacher and Billy now is the shift from super eager, precocious pursuer to reluctant student. Like he doesn't want her there. And so they each have to work back toward this thing and this fellowship. And I mean, you know, Toby at the end. Um, I,

I want to end with a listener email that takes us back into musical corner, but there's a little nugget here for you. So the Steven Saldana musical into the woods, which I have cited a couple of times, the ending line ping for me and it pinged for our listener, Leah as well. She says, last one, there's a nice person. And he says, I'm not that nice. Right.

that idea of nice versus good is this constant, uh, thread throughout into the woods. Um, I, I referenced this song that the witch has in into the woods right before a spoiler. She dies, uh, called the last midnight where, um, uh,

she's, she's like, she, you're so, she says to other people in the story, you're so nice. You're not good. You're not bad. You're just nice. I'm not good. I'm not bad. I'm just right. I'm the witch. You're the world. That's like, that's this idea of nice versus good. And then in little red riding hood, who is a character in this, in this musical as well, she has a lyric in, um, in the song. I ill advisedly saying at a talent show, uh,

nice is different than good. The big bad wolf that she meets is nice to her.

but he's not good. And so this is what Leah writes. The idea there is that the wolf was nice, but ultimately bad, and it works in reverse as well. Agatha and Billy might not be nice, but that doesn't mean they can't be good. Mean, rude, unlikable people can still be good, and that's more important. Is this where you said we were coming back to Snape? We who love a problematic fave and a character on an arc know that better than most.

That lyric was, if I can lure Mallory back in, my number one defense of Snape back in the pre-Deathly Hallows days when is Snape good was the debate. And what do you know? I was right. Also, is Agatha and Billy's confrontation about moral superiority the closest we're going to get to referencing my favorite dialogue exchange in Into the Woods between the witch and Little Red? When the witch says to Little Red, since when are you so squeamish? How many wolves have you carved up?

And Little Red says, a wolf's not the same. And the witch says, ask a wolf's mother. I cannot wait to get to the Lillia witch stereotype trial next week as the concept of goodness and niceness is clearly so top of mind for the show and so many witch stories. The musical Wicked touches on niceness a little bit, but has so much fun exhausting the every possible use of the word good and goodness.

Good news. Good will conquer evil. Goodness knows making good out of the goodness of my heart. I'll be back for good. Blah, blah, blah. I've been changed for good is my favorite song from Wicked. I've been changed for good. So this idea of nice versus good. Agatha's saying I can be good.

but she's never going to be nice. Right. And that this idea, I don't want to pick on Jen because I think Jen has like reasons for definitely has reasons for distressing Agatha, but in the context of just, let's say last week alone, I would say Jen is nice, but not good. And Agatha is good, but not nice in that isolated incident. Again, Jen has a lot of history and I, I don't begrudge her her,

skittishness around Agatha. Anything you want to say about this, about Snape, about anything else when it comes to this? I want to go read The Princess Tale right now. My goodness. No, I think that's...

that's a, that's a beautiful email. I think a great framing. And I think one of the show was clearly interested in because so, especially because so much of this is about what other people think of you and like how that then causes you to either recede or like lean into some aspect of the perception of who you are. And then like that thing that you project out to other people, like that doesn't necessarily reflect your nature. Maybe it's actually like an active response to what other people think your nature is. Right. And like,

you know at the end of the day the the truth of who you are doesn't isn't necessarily what you show other people or what you feel like you can show other people so um i really like that and i think that idea of like another through line the thing that these characters share um is really really interesting and i i don't think that it would feel like believable or authentic to the show or the character if like the the place we worked toward at the end of the road was like

What a gemstone. What a gem. Yeah, exactly. Like that just, that wouldn't feel true. But is Agatha capable of a sacrificial good act? Then that would be very rewarding and satisfying to watch. But never nice. But maybe sometimes good. Always funny though. Always funny. And well dressed. Well, and that's the best thing is like leaning into that role. If you, if you have cast me as a wicked witch. Yeah.

I'll play the shit out of that role and I'll be so good at it. And especially coming off of something like WandaVision, where we're talking about like the roles that we play and the stereotypes that we lean into. The nosy neighbor, whatever. The nosy neighbor, which is a detective archetype in and of itself. Okay. That does it for episode six of Agatha All Along, an episode of television we absolutely loved. Loved.

Really excited for 789. Really sad that we only have two more weeks. We get to do the episode 7 one together in person though. I know. That's a treat. See you in LA. Reminder, we only have one episode next week because of Ringer Core Week. What is Core Week? Don't worry about it. And

we'll be back with our coverage of venom as well. The midnight boys. Thank you as always to Steve Allman for his, uh, work on the soundboard, keeping the cause coming. Thank you, Steve. Thank you to our junior Ringo Powell for his production work and booking a studio space next week and all the other things that are Juna does that is so, that is so helpful to us. Thank you to Jomie and dinner on for his work on the social. Good luck clipping out your recorder this week. It was a long one. Um,

And thank you to Stefana Sanchez for the work on the video and also to T-Cruise and to John Victor for all of their work on the video production. We appreciate you all so much and we will see you next week.