In early 2021, the Marvel Cinematic Universe kicked off its post-Endgame era with WandaVision, a series that started out amusing and became less so as it descended into incoherence the way almost every MCU show has since. And now the main baddie from WandaVision, the witch Agatha Harkness (Kathryn Hahn), is back with her own little quest–and so far, through the four episodes that were screened for critics, it’s one of the more entertaining and well-told stories in recent MCU memory.
Agatha All Along begins with Agatha still trapped in some sort of residual illusion in Westview–she’s a police detective who’s been suspended without pay and has been wallowing until she’s brought back in to investigate a murder. The case is full of sign posts intended to lead Agatha back to reality, like her centuries-old witch locket. After intervention by another witch named Rio Vidal (Aubrey Plaza) and a mysterious unnamed teen boy (Joe Locke), Agatha escapes the illusion.
But she’s got no power, and Rio wants to kill her thanks to some old personal grudge. To avoid the wrath of both Rio and a group of witches called the Salem 7, Agatha will need to gather a new coven of witches and walk the fabled Witches’ Road, which she believes will help “get my purple back,” as she says in the premiere episode.