‘WandaVision’ Easter Eggs: 5 Things You May Have Missed in Episode 9

You can’t do a whole show with retro witchy vibes without paying tribute to the original campy witches in The Wizard of Oz. It took all season, but WandaVision finally homaged the 1939 film with this moment. After Wanda slams a car into Agatha and then into a house, all our hero sees left of the witch is her goth footwear. That is, of course, a direct nod to how the Wicked Witch of the East met her demise when Dorothy dropped a house on her in The Wizard of Oz. But unlike Oz’s witch, Agatha survived that calamity.

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After first getting a peek at a mysterious, magical book at the end of Episode 7, Agatha Harkness finally calls it by name: it is the Darkhold, the Book of the Damned. The Darkhold is a Marvel Comics artifact that dates all the way back to Marvel Spotlight #4 in 1972. It is a book of spells written by the Lovecraftian Elder God Chthon, and it is essentially no good. I mean, it’s called The Book of the Damned for a reason. It seems to serve a similar function in WandaVision, acting as a guide for Agatha in dealing with her first ever encounter with a real Scarlet Witch.

Here’s the thing, though: the Darkhold has already popped up in a few TV shows, ones produced by Marvel Television. It appeared through Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 4 on ABC, and then popped over to Marvel’s Runaways Season 3 on Hulu. It also looked completely different on those shows; it had “Darkhold” written on the cover, stylized so that it read “Darkhold” whether you were looking at it right side up or upside-down. It is possible that there are two Darkholds, or that one of these is a second printing. It is, however, maybe a little more likely that this is another indication that Marvel Studios is quietly ignoring some of the things introduced in the old TV shows.

Even though those shows were constantly touted as being part of the MCU, they never really were. They were produced by a different production company (Marvel Television made the shows, Marvel Studios made the movies), and the crossovers only ever went in one direction: down. Movie actors popped up on S.H.I.E.L.D. every once in a while, but no one from the TV shows—nor any events from the shows—ever rippled up to the movies… except for one blink-and-you’ll-miss-it Easter egg in Avengers: Endgame. And even Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. ignored that half the world was snapped out of existence! There’s still some plausible deniability, sure, but this could also mean that all the Marvel Television stuff takes place in a splinter reality.

This is a teeny tiny one, but notable considering where WandaVision started. Right before Wanda uses her magic to poof away in a puff of red magic smoke, she folds one arm and waves the other in a fashion that is really reminiscent of Jeannie’s magic move. This looks like a nod to I Dream of Jeannie, one of the supernatural 1960s sitcoms that WandaVision paid tribute to in Episode 2. In that episode, Wanda’s stand-in for a nose twitch or double blink was a little wave of her finger. And now that she’s a full-blown witch in the series finale, she’s using both arms. Director Matt Shakman and Elizabeth Olsen spoke about Bewitched and Jeannie’s direct influence on the series in our oral history about WandaVision’s origins.

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Vision shedding a tear is A Moment for a number of reasons. One, it’s just heartbreaking. This construct forged out of Wanda’s love for her dead partner is moved to tears by all the love! And he’s about to die! Come on, it’s so tragic! And two, it’s a direct reference to the iconic Avengers #58. The issue, titled “Even Androids Can Cry,” is the one that welcomes Vision into the fold as a full-fledged Avenger. It’s also where we learn more about Vision’s origin, and it comes exactly one issue after his debut as a threat for the superhero team to deal with. Vision’s reason for shedding a tear in this comic from 1968 is different, though: he cries because the Avengers not only accept him as a teammate, but they accept him as a human being that deserves their respect.

In the mid-credits scene, Monica Rambeau is guided into the movie theater for a secret rendezvous with a Skrull agent. But on the marquee of the Westview Coronet is the phrase “Tannhauser Gate,” which is a direct lift from the oft-quoted “tears in rain” monologue from the 1982 sci-fi game-changer Blade Runner.

In the film, the brief monologue is given by actor Rutger Hauer, portraying an artificial life-form named Roy Batty. The entire monologue reads:

I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.

So yeah, Tannhäuser Gate.

The connection between this monologue and Vision’s own goodbye monologue is pretty clear. They are both goodbyes from androids, reflecting on their own existence and humanity in the wake of experiencing their own mortality.

As for “put the fun in dysfunction,” I have no idea. Looks like WandaVision may have left us with one more mystery to untangle. Oh, who’re we kidding? This brilliant, beautiful show left us with dozens!

Stream Blade Runner on HBO Max

Stream WandaVision on Disney+