Review: Agatha All Along, “Seekest Thou the Road” and “Circle Sewn with Fate Unlock Thy Hidden Gate” | Season 1, Episodes 1 & 2
Agatha Harkness is back with an HBO parody and another musical number
Welcome to Episodic Medium’s weekly coverage of Agatha All Along, which debuted tonight on Disney+. As always, the first review is available to all, but subsequent reviews will only be available to paid subscribers. You can check out our full Fall schedule here (along with information about our yearly subscription deal going until the end of September), and learn more about the site and its mission on our About page.
Of all the ways I thought Agatha All Along might start, a 25-minute homage to Mare of Easttown certainly wasn’t one of them. But what a delight it is for “Agnes of Westview” (based on the Danish series “WandaVisdyen”) to usher us back into the wild, wacky, TV-loving world of WandaVision. In fact, I was having so much fun watching Kathryn Hahn go full prestige Kate Winslet, that I would’ve happily watched this series just cycle through various eras of TV dramas the way WandaVision did for sitcoms. But, alas, there’s witchy plot to get to and Agatha All Along doesn’t waste too much time getting us there.
Instead, the Mare of Easttown riff is mostly just a clever way to ease us into all the exposition we need to remember since we last visited this mystical corner of the MCU. The last time we saw Hahn’s villainous Agatha Harkness was in the 2021 WandaVision series finale, where she was cursed to live in the persona of Westview’s nosey neighbor Agnes until Wanda needed her again. Only Wanda went and got herself killed in 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, destroying all copies of the evil magic book the Darkhold in the process.
As far as I can understand it, Agatha spent about three years living in her Agnes persona until Wanda’s death triggered a sort of multi-day psychic break, which she processed as a gritty detective story. And while I’m not sure the timeline totally adds up there (was there a three-year gap between WandaVision and Multiverse of Madness?) I’m also not sure it matters. By the end of the premiere, Agatha is back, she’s on the hunt for her missing powers, and she’s got “the Salem Seven”—plus Aubrey Plaza’s sultry Rio Vidal—seeking revenge. What more do you need for a spooky season treat?
Indeed, after the Mare of Easttown segment seemed to promise a show every bit as twisty and mind-bending as WandaVision, it’s a little surprising how straightforward Agatha All Along becomes. After Agatha pulls herself back to reality in a fun sequence that highlights all of her great WandaVision looks, the sense of mystery largely evaporates. Instead, the show seems to be leaning into the comedic, holiday-themed tone of Hawkeye rather than the embracing the ambitious genre storytelling of Loki and WandaVision.
Thankfully, if you’re going to make a comedic superhero series, it’s hard to ask for a better cast than this one. Hahn is an early champ for the way she believably embodies a grizzled small-town detective while also making you feel the fact that she’s playing a character; winking at the material without ever fully breaking. As with WandaVision, the “Agnes of Westview” segment is less of a parody than a loving homage, which really only works because of how seriously Hahn invests in it. Once Agatha claws her way back to reality, meanwhile, Hahn gets to shift back into the same sort of vampy performance that made the character such a breakout star to begin with. (The quick bit where she sits in her delusional living room car is a masterclass in how to underplay an over-the-top joke.)
The big difference, however, it’s that she’s no longer alone in her larger-than-life witchy style. While the last two WandaVision episodes contrasted Agatha’s campy persona with more grounded performances from Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany, this time around everyone exists within the witchy world—from Joe Locke’s aspiring magic-user (and mysteriously nameless) “Teen” to Patti LuPone’s strip mall psychic, Lilia Calderu, and Sasheer Zamata’s magic-restricted potions expert, Jennifer Kale.
There’s an Avengers-meets-Ocean’s-Eleven quality to the second episode, in which Agatha seeks out a makeshift coven in order to “walk the Witches’ Road” and get her powers back. In addition to Lilia and Jen, she also ropes in former cop Alice Wu-Gulliver (Ali Ahn), whose mom was a witch, and green thumb Sharon Davis (the great Debra Jo Rupp), who may or may not have any powers at all. Really, though, Agatha All Along ultimately belongs less to the live action superhero canon than it does to the witch one—a proud tradition that includes everything from The Wizard of Oz to The Witches of Eastwick.
The trouble is, it’s such a well-trod genre that these first two episodes sometimes struggle to feel totally fresh. I’ve seen this sort of comedic take on modern day witches before and while Agatha All Along fits well within that genre, it doesn’t immediately elevate itself above the pack. I found Plaza way more compelling as a wry FBI agent than as the more over-the-top warrior witch Agatha does battle with (even if the sexual tension between Plaza and Hahn is absolutely insane). And the jokes about Jennifer’s new age wellness shop felt particularly stale. Then again, I’m also someone who grew up on Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Hocus Pocus, Charmed, Kiki’s Delivery Service, Practical Magic, Harry Potter, and Bewitched, so maybe I’m just too overexposed to appreciate this in a way someone newer to the witch genre might.
Where Agatha All Along most springs to life is in its moments of genuine originality, like the closing musical number that sees Agatha’s newfound Coven of Misfits sing open the Witches’ Road. Coupled with the horror movie imagery of seven hooded witches coming to get Agatha, it’s an evocative sequence that’s only slightly hampered by the show’s penchant for corny dialogue.
Though not everything about these first two episodes work, I appreciate how swiftly they get us from Agatha’s cursed mind palace to a new reality where she’s leading a coven down the Demented Yellow Brick Road to who knows where. The pieces of Agatha All Along may feel familiar, but I genuinely have no idea what the show is going to do with them. And I’ve got enough faith in WandaVision showrunner Jac Schaeffer not to let this slightly rocky start worry me too much. Given that stories of witches have long served as metaphors for stories of women (something Agatha leans into when Lilia frames Agatha’s experience in terms of agency and female betrayal), I’m curious to see where this road ends up.
Stray observations
Welcome to weekly coverage of Agatha All Along! I’ll be here recapping the show through its double-header finale—which debuts the night before Halloween. I fall into the Hermione Granger–Piper Halliwell side of the witch spectrum, and I’m very excited to walk this Witches’ Road with you all.
So what’s up with Teen?? He doesn’t seem to notice that Agatha can’t understand his name or backstory, which makes me think he’s protected by magic he doesn’t know about. Or then again maybe that’s just what he wants us to think… Either way, it sort of feels like Agatha should be questioning his motives more than she does, but maybe that’s just not her style when she meets a fan.
It’s fun to rewatch the “Agnes of Westview” sequence and try to piece together what’s actually happening in the real world. When “Agnes” first walks up to the crime scene, she and Herb chat across the police tape exactly how they wind up talking across his fence when she wakes up naked.
I can’t get over how much Agatha’s outfit makes her look like Missy from Doctor Who. I would absolutely love for Disney+ to make that crossover happen.
Lots of witch rules to follow: Agatha and Rio aren’t allowed to kill each other, but they can torture each other—something Rio agrees to hold off on until Agatha gets her powers back. The Covenstead Rule states that within any three-mile radius, there will be a collection of “witchy-enough people” to form a coven. And the Witches’ Road “will give you the thing you want the most” and “promises that what’s missing awaits you at its end.”
I didn’t notice this on a first viewing, but before Rio leaves she mentions that she has a “black heart” that beats for Agatha. Was she destined to be the fifth witch in Agatha’s coven before Agatha subbed in Sharon “Mrs. Hart” Davis instead?
I appreciate Schaeffer’s loyalty in bringing back all the supporting actors from WandaVision. I wonder if we’ll be returning to Westview this season or if the rest of the show will take place in the Witches’ Road realm.
Loved both the dramatic “Agnes of Westview” credits sequence (complete with characters credited by their fictional names) and the show’s actual closing credits montage set to “Season of the Witch.”
ICYMI: The cast performed “The Ballad of the Witches’ Road” live at D23 and it was pretty damn fun:
At the 2021 Emmys, WandaVision went head to head against… Mare of Easttown. Neither show won the Limited Series category, but Kate Winslet beat Elizabeth Olsen. And Evan Peters won for Mare. So I enjoyed what I imagined to be Jac Schaeffer making a play for the last laugh.
And speaking of Evan Peters, didn’t Agatha take up residence in poor old Ralph Bohner’s house? I guess he never came back after Monica helped him escape Agatha. I hope the little creep is okay.
> I found Plaza way more compelling as a wry FBI agent
Finally, Janet Snakehole-Macklin spinoff America has been waiting for!