WandaVision was Marvel Studios’ first foray into television, and it was mostly very good. One of the standouts of WandaVision was the antagonist, Agnes aka Agatha Harkness, played with boundless bitchy glee by Kathryn Hahn.
Now, Hahn returns as Agatha in her own miniseries, Agatha All Along, and carrying over the “every episode is a different sitcom era” gimmick from WandaVision, Agatha opens with a killer parody of dark dramas like Mare of Easttown and every “adapted from the Danish series” murder mystery ever translated into English. The details are spot-on, from the gray light, to how everyone looks f-cking exhausted, to Agatha’s ratty ponytail. But Kathryn Hahn is irrepressible, and she plays Agatha in the early going with an increasingly exaggerated affectation, like she’s steadily ramping up an impression of Detective Olivia Benson. It’s VERY fun, but wisely, Agatha All Along, created by Jac Schaeffer, who also serves a showrunner, does not overplay its hand, and the murder mystery gimmick is released before it hits overkill.
Three years on from Wanda Maximoff sucking Agatha Harkness dry of her power during their witch battle in Westview, Wanda has become a Voldemortian figure, and Agatha is still stuck, dealing with the aftereffects of Wanda’s attack. When a mysterious figure from her past arrives in town, she is suddenly very motivated to very quickly venture onto the Witches’ Road in hopes of getting “what she most desires”, aka her power back (or so she says). To do so, though, she needs a coven, so Agatha sets out to recruit a group of covenless witches, all of whom have some sort of black mark against them.
There’s Lilia Calderu (Patti LuPone), a centuries-old seer on an epic run of bad luck; Jennifer Kale (Sasheer Zamata), a wellness guru and witch whose power has been bound, rendering her powerless; Alice Wu-Gulliver (Ali Ahn), a “protector” witch whose life is in a continual downward spiral; and Rio Vidal (Aubrey Plaza), THE green witch who has a complicated history with Agatha. When I tell you that Hahn and Plaza have electric chemistry and that Agatha and Rio read so Sapphic on screen that Sappho herself is writing odes in their honor, this is, somehow, STILL an understatement. It’s not explicit that Agatha and Rio are exes, but at the same time, they’re definitely exes. (Somebody probably thought this would be a complicated sister relationship, but it really feels like Hahn and Plaza agreed to play it as exes and leaned all the way the f-ck in.)
Agatha’s misfit coven is also joined by Sharon (Debra Jo Rupp), one of the Westview residents previously trapped in Wanda’s hex, and Teen (Joe Locke), a kid obsessed with witches and witchcraft, who longs to join Agatha’s coven. He is called “Teen” because he’s been enchanted so that he can’t reveal his name or any personal info, but Joe Locke is definitely playing Billy Kaplan. I mean, c’mon. That’s Billy Kaplan, we’re not idiots. Locke is delightful, though, he’s a perfect, optimistic but not foolish foil for Hahn’s acerbic performance as Agatha. Their rapport provides the emotional core of the series.
The adventure part of the series is super fun, as these witches who can barely stand each other are forced to band together to survive the trials of the Witches’ Road, each one of which involves a unique set piece with spectacular production and costume design (from John Collins and Daniel Selon, respectively). But where Agatha really excels is in digging into Agatha Harkness, who has betrayed everyone who ever mattered to her, maybe even including her son—the series throws out a couple Easter eggs hinting at mystical characters long anticipated by fans—only now to find herself powerless and alone. She’s having a witch-life crisis, and as much as she bitches and moans about her new coven, being powerless exposes how much she really needs help, and how her bitterness and sharp tongue are pretty thin camouflage for actual centuries of hurt. It’s very clear very early that at least some of Agatha’s bad reputation is bullsh-t, but the fun is in not knowing which parts of Agatha might not be as bad as first thought, and which parts might be worse.
Kathryn Hahn is having an amazing amount of fun playing Agatha—with lots of A+ hand acting—reveling in her bitchiness and sarcasm, but also hitting the deeper, darker beats just hard enough to show us there is a lot more going on inside Agatha than she will willingly show anyone. Teen is the only person who cracks Agatha’s façade, but even him she keeps at a distance. She also gets to sing a lot, as everyone is determined to run the original song “The Witches’ Road” straight into the ground. It’s a good song, but we don’t need another “Let It Go” in our lives (they’re written by the same people).
Agatha All Along is a very witchy good time. It’s fun and cool and surprisingly complex, with a “who researched this and which grimoire did they read” level of understanding of witchcraft, and besides some callouts to Wanda, it doesn’t even feel like this world exists in the MCU. Which is good! The MCU needs more stuff that works independently of 19 other chess pieces. Agatha All Along works beautifully as a standalone story about women who run afoul of larger power structures and find themselves outcasts because of it.
For those intending to watch with kids, there are bare butts and some frightening elements that probably won’t be suitable for younger children, but there is a genre of kid that is really going to respond to Agatha All Along. And for those of us who grew up with Hocus Pocus and The Craft, Agatha splits the difference, a colorful witch adventure nevertheless rooted in darker themes of misogyny and how the past is inescapable, no matter how much time has lapsed. The devil always wants his due.
Agatha All Along premiered exclusively on Disney+ on September 18, with new episodes debuting every Wednesday.