National Post (National Edition)
A NEW GENERATION SUFFERS THE JOY OF TV THAT'S NOT IMMEDIATELY AVAILABLE.
In the era of shows on demand, weekly waits are new again
Being a parent of children born in the oughts is to find oneself occasionally chastising them about what television was like in the olden days.
I used to watch The Flintstones at lunchtime, I will explain, because that was the only time it was on. We didn't have DVDs or PVRs, I will prattle on, and binge-watching meant watching back-to-back reruns of Three's Company after school. If you missed an episode of your favourite show, I will say in my most incredulous voice, you could maybe catch it in the summer, if you made a point of searching the weekly(!) printed (!!) TV guide to try to find when it was on.
My teenage children probably think I am making some of this up, which is fair enough. They have only ever lived in a world in which their shows were readily accessible, from the beginning with Thomas the Tank Engine and Dora the Explorer and Caillou (gah) right up through The Clone Wars and The Simpsons. They even watch shows and movies from my childhood in great big dollops, as though to rub it in. I had to wait three years to find out if Han Solo was really going to survive the carbon freezing. “THREE YEARS!,” I will say. “You just, like, watched the next movie right away!”
“Yes,” they will say. Again, fair enough. What are they supposed to do, apologize?
But now, the kids know of my struggles, thanks primarily to the Disney company, which as part of its Disney+ streaming service has launched shows that dribble out one episode at a time, a throwback to the days in which it was impossible to watch a full season in a sitting. Children of this millennium have finally discovered that sometimes you only get a tiny piece of the story per week. Haha, suckers.
The first of the high-profile Disney shows to go this route was The Mandalorian, the very fun Star Wars homage to Westerns that introduced an adorable baby-sized Yoda to its expanded universe. It finished its second season in December, and while it was not without its surprises it tended to avoid cliffhangers.
But January brought the debut of WandaVision, an episodic serial set in the same world as the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and with some of the same characters. It has unfolded as a giant mystery, so much so that in the first couple of episodes it wasn't even clear what the point of the whole enterprise was, other than to spoof some old sitcoms. But once the larger plot was revealed, it has been one teased ending after another, leaving the show's fans, my younger teen in particular, rather aggrieved. It is both unexpected, and funny, that a show developed for a streaming service that can be watched on a phone has introduced a whole new generation of television-watchers to the concept of the weekly mystery.
WandaVision is uniquely well-suited to the slow drip of its plot. I'll avoid spoilers here, but two characters from the Avengers films — no points for guessing which two — are in a small New Jersey town for unclear reasons. What begins with the somewhat goofy premise of placing a couple of superheroes in classic sitcom settings is soon revealed to have something deeper and possibly sinister taking place. And, because these characters have already been through countless story arcs in the world of Marvel comics, there is no end of speculation on what is really happening in idyllic Westview, where it's all going and who might end up dead. The week-long pause between episodes gives plenty of time for analysis and debate, and to research possible connections to old comic-book arcs, if that's your thing. (It is not my thing.)
Where I am quite happy to watch one episode, digest it and then wait for the next episode to further the story, fans like my daughter want to figure out What It All Means before the show spells it out for them. She has a whiteboard in her bedroom that she uses for theories. She gets up early on Friday mornings to watch the new episode before school, lest anyone spoil it for her in person or on social media. Last week she declared that she was getting up even earlier to watch the penultimate episode.
Me: “Isn't 6:45 a little earlier than needed? You could watch it at 7 and still have plenty of time to get ready for school.”
Her: (Sighs, exasperated) “But I'm going to need time to process it.”
Right, of course.
I'm not actually sure what I think of WandaVision as a standalone venture. The sitcom spoofs of the early episodes have fallen away as the larger story has taken over and, with the finale to be released in the wee hours of Friday morning, I have no idea how they will stick the landing. It's been enjoyable enough, but also it's nice to just have a new thing arrive every week in a pandemic. There are only so many Scandinavian detective shows one can watch. The bigger deal is what it means for Disney, which now has a streaming service it can use to colour in the outlines of some of the narratives that are only hinted at in its big theatrical releases.
It started this with The Mandalorian, and has repeated the trick with WandaVision. The creative honchos at Marvel Studios have said its new shows will inform new films, which will tie back to other shows. Fans will have to follow, and pay for it all to keep up. It's genius, really. Not unlike a supervillain's thinking.
But for now there is one finale to go. I know someone who will be setting an alarm.
IT HAS UNFOLDED AS A GIANT MYSTERY