Age Rating: M
Cast:
Kathryn Hahn as Agatha Harkness
Joe Locke as Teen
Aubrey Plaza as Rio Vidal
Sasheer Zamata as Jennifer “Jen” Kale
Ali Ahn as Alice Wu-Gulliver
Okwui Okpokwasili as Vertigo
Patti LuPone as Lilia Calderu
Evan Peters as Ralph Bohner
Maria Dizzia as Rebecca Kaplan
Paul Adelstein as Jeff Kaplan
Miles Gutierrez-Riley as Eddie
Creator: Jac Schaeffer

Following WandaVision, its main villain Agatha Harkness is receiving her own spin off show, with Kathryn Hahn reprising her role. I really didn’t know what to think of the idea. Hahn was good in the part, but I didn’t think she or the character were great enough to warrant a whole mini series. Still, I gave it a chance and in all fairness, Agatha All Along is one of the better shows in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

One of the show’s biggest strengths is in how self-contained it is. There are enough references that firmly place it in the MCU, but it is primarily a follow up to WandaVision and doesn’t just shove in random cameos from other characters in the MCU. As a continuation to that story, it’s pretty good. The witch characters and focus are refreshing to see within the MCU and are fun to watch. Across its 9 episodes, it has some good twists, turns and revelations, and is pretty enjoyable and generally funny. That said, it is tonally all over the place, some of the campiness can clash with the more serious story aspects at points. I will give credit that it joins WandaVision and She-Hulk in being the only MCU shows to actually utilise its tv show platform, instead of just being yet another MCU movie squeezed into or padded out to 6 episodes. That said, I’m not sure how to feel about Agatha All Along’s conclusion in its two episode finale. While it makes some bold choices and avoids devolving into a typical action finale like other projects in the MCU, it doesn’t have much proper closure and almost felt like a setup for another show. This is particularly disappointing, with Agatha All Along being a limited series, I assumed that it would mainly work as its own self contained story.

The cast are solid, and the main group of characters share good chemistry between each other. Kathryn Hahn is again great as Agatha Harkness, as she takes centre stage here. She balances the humour and deeper emotional aspects of the character very well. I also appreciate that while she is a likable enough lead, the show largely keeps her an actual villain and doesn’t try to shoe-horn her into an anti-hero sort of role or anything. There’s also a good supporting cast including Patti PaPone and Aubrey Plaza, even if the show needed a lot more of the latter.

The show is directed quite well. The visuals are pretty good, definitely a cut above a lot of the other recent Marvel projects, with solid cinematography and I appreciated the use of practical effects at points.

Agatha All Along is a decent and creative enough show, with a good cast and some fun moments. It does just enough to differentiate itself from many of the other MCU projects, and I’d say that it’s worth a watch if you enjoyed WandaVision.