‘WandaVision’ Easter Eggs: 5 Things You May Have Missed in Episode 8

During the flashback to Sokovia, we see young Wanda Maximoff pick out something for her family to watch on TV night. It is, of course, another sitcom—an episode from her most favorite show of all time: The Dick Van Dyke Show. The episode? Of course, it’s “It May Look Like a Walnut.”

Originally airing in January 1963, “It May Look Like a Walnut” is itself kind of a WandaVision episode. The majority of the Season 2 episode is presented as, essentially, a riff on The Twilight Zone. In it, Rob (Dick Van Dyke) wakes up and is repeatedly taken aback by just how off everything feels around him. Laura (Mary Tyler Moore) only eats walnuts and takes a drink of water in order to catch her breath. His co-workers have lost their sense of humor and, more shockingly, their thumbs. Rob becomes convinced that everyone around him is really a Twiloite from the planet Twilo, ruled over by a Danny Thomas lookalike named Kolak (played by Danny Thomas). The whole episode nails the building tension and surreal vibes of The Twilight Zone, just like how WandaVision’s first episode got The Dick Van Dyke Show right down to the tiniest details. Even though this episode was written by series co-creator Carl Reiner and directed by frequent helmer Jerry Paris, it’s not exactly the best example of what a typical Dick Van Dyke Show episode was like. Still, it’s become the show’s most famous episode, and it’s easy to see why this is the one WandaVision reran.

Another little note: Wanda says that she wants to watch “Season 2, Episode 21.” You may think that WandaVision goofed when you look at Hulu or a list of Dick Van Dyke Show episodes, where “It May Look Like a Walnut” is listed as Season 2, Episode 20. That’s because those episodes are listed by airdate order, while the DVDs were presented in production order. And in that order, on the DVD set, “It May Look Like a Walnut” is Season 2, Episode 21.

Stream The Dick Van Dyke Show, "It May Look Like a Walnut" on Hulu

Maximoff TV night is interrupted in the most tragic way when a Stark Industries missile blows up the apartment, killing Wanda and Pietro’s parents and trapping the twins in rubble. There they are trapped for two days, days spent just staring at an armed missile, hearing it beep and looking at its red, blinking light. If the sound and ominous blinking reminded you of anything, it was that gosh darn toaster from Episode 1.

As with every commercial in WandaVision, this was a stand-in for a moment in Wanda’s life. The toaster, with its stark logo and ticking time bomb sound, symbolized the missile that killed the Maximoffs.

During her subjection to HYDRA’s big experiment with Loki’s scepter, Wanda got a close look at what we’d later discover was the Mind Stone. During the scene, set before the end-credits events of 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Wanda’s presence essentially ignites the big blue rock housed in the tip of the scepter. It floats to her, breaking open to reveal the yellow Mind Stone. Its energies overwhelm Wanda, and in the energy she sees something inexplicable: it’s a silhouette of a figure wearing what is, essentially, Wanda Maximoff’s comic book costume. Or, if you remember just two weeks ago, Wanda’s Halloween costume.

Yeah, it’s like that costume but, like, much more serious and dramatic.

This is what Wanda wears in the comics, and honestly, it kinda looks like Elizabeth Olsen is wearing it in that vision too. Of course we don’t yet know what this means. We know from the end of the episode that Wanda is a Scarlet Witch. We don’t actually know what a Scarlet Witch is; it’s just her code name in the comics because Stan Lee thought it sounded cool, probably. But this could be a sign that Marvel Studios is finally up for giving Wanda something closer to what she wears in the comics.

And just a thought (as suggested by Decider’s Alex Zalben): what if Wanda’s headpiece appears in energy form when Wanda uses her powers, similar to the crown that formed on Agatha’s mother’s head during their fight?

Hey, it could happen!

Lots of big Vision reveals in this episode! First, we now know that the Vision that’s inside the Hex is a complete fabrication created by Wanda using incredibly powerful magic. It’s so powerful that neither “Vision” nor any of S.W.O.R.D.’s technology could tell that he wasn’t the real, artificial deal. Even Wanda acted fooled most of the time, probably because she was fooled by herself. This explains why Vision couldn’t just walk out of the Hex without falling apart. He can’t exist unless he’s powered by that good ol’ Hex magic.

Speaking of hexes… what’s with all the hexagons? We’ve spent a month theorizing that it has to be connected with A.I.M., a cabal of Marvel mad scientists who really love hexagons and beekeeper suits. But it’s most likely that those A.I.M. clues were misdirects! First we found out in Episode 4 that the “beekeeper” was actually just a S.W.O.R.D. agent in a hazmat suit, transformed into a beekeeper by the Hex. And as for that one particular shape? Just look at what’s inside Vision:

His internal structure is made up of a latticework of hexagonal shapes. You can see them towards the right of the break, under Vision’s synthetic skin. It’s entirely possible that there are a bunch of hexagons in Westview because that’s what Vision is made of, and Wanda created the entire town out of her grief over and love for Vision.

And then the episode ends with a shot of what the actual Vision has become. After trying to successfully flip the switch on Vision’s corpse for years, S.W.O.R.D. finally got the energy they needed—from that drone that they sent in to kill Wanda and that she then threw at their feet. Now, without the Mind Stone that made Vision Vision, the ex-Avenger is just a ghost of his former self.

This is a direct pull from the West Coast Avengers comics by John Byrne. In his 1989 run, Byrne had Vision dismantled and essentially rebooted. He lost his memories and, with that, the brain patterns of Simon Williams (a.k.a. Wonder Man) that gave Vision his humanity. When he was reborn, he appeared in a spooky, all white form that the show has adapted.

This is not the Vision that Wanda, or viewers, know and love.

After seeing pretty much all of Wanda’s origin story, Agatha comes to a scary conclusion: Wanda Maximoff is a Scarlet Witch and she is wielding Chaos Magic!

Okay—just know that if that reveal left you assuming that you’ve missed out on something by not knowing the comics, it’s fine. In fact, knowing the comics inside out doesn’t really have an advantage here. For one thing, Scarlet Witch isn’t a title one holds in the comics. It’s just… a name she uses, given to her by one of the villagers who was trying to murder her for being a mutant (she’s not a mutant in the MCU, and she’s not a mutant in the comics anymore—for now, on both accounts). So even lifelong Avengers comics fans are waiting a week to find out WTF being a “Scarlet Witch” means in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

As for Chaos Magic? That is very real in the comics, and it’s what Wanda Maximoff wields in order to rewrite reality and cause all sorts of problems. In the comics, it was Agatha Harkness who trained Wanda in the use of this magic (see, she wasn’t all bad at first!). But later in the Avengers Disassembled event in a story known as “Chaos,” Wanda totally lost it and just absolutely wrecked the Avengers, killing a few and ultimately rewriting all of reality (see: House of M).

The arrival of Chaos Magic in the MCU could spell a lot of trouble for the entire world, unless Wanda can get a hold of it in next week’s finale. Otherwise, uh, maybe Wanda will be the reality-threatening villain of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness?

WandaVision’s finale arrives on Disney+ next Friday, March 5.

Stream WandaVision on Disney+