The “WandaVision” series, carried by Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany, has shaken up the codes of the audiovisual industry.
-
disney
The finale of the
Wandavision
miniseries
was posted online this Friday on Disney +.
WandaVision
is at the same time the adaptation of a
House of M
comic book
, a series of platforms that is part of a series of films, an ode to the history of American sitcoms and one of the most meta works of the world. history of the series.
How has this work changed the
game
of streaming and the audiovisual industry?
WandaVision
will be to streaming history what
Twin Peaks
is to television history!
WandaVision
is both an adaptation of a
House of M
comic book
,
a platform series that is part of a film series, an ode to the history of American sitcoms, and one of the most meta works of the series history.
At a time when Disney + has just unveiled the last chapter of the miniseries, entitled "The grand finale", a look back at how the first Marvel Studios series for Disney + has changed the
game
of streaming and the audiovisual industry?
WandaVision
turns into an unidentified film object
As the Marvel film release schedule has been rocked by the Covid-19 crisis, Phase 4 of the MCU, the highest-grossing movie franchise of all time, began with a pastiche of American TV sitcoms on the platform. Disney + streaming.
The first Marvel project featured since
Spider-Man: Far From Home
in 2019 has confused fans.
WandaVision
begins as a vibrant tribute to the history of the American sitcom with an episode in 4/3 and black and white, far from the traditional codes of Marvel productions.
Over the episodes, this ode to the sitcom unveils its charms turning into a fantastic mystery, a drama on mourning or an origin story on the Scarlet Witch….
All in an unusual half-hour format, with the exception of the final episode which lasts 42 minutes.
WandaVision
revives the good old TV recipes
In 2019, it was thought that
Game of Thrones
on HBO would be the last big serial hit built on an old-fashioned weekly broadcast.
Netflix imposes the model of a full season upload.
With
The Mandalorian
, then with
WandaVision
, Disney + relies on the good recipes of old-fashioned TV: namely the
posting
of one episode per week which ends with a good old
well-mastered
cliffhanger
.
The Mandalorian makes history by becoming the first series not available on Netflix to climb to No. 1 on Nielsen's weekly charts.
According to Parrot Analytics, less than four weeks after its launch,
WandaVision
has risen to number one in the world's most popular series.
This rise in power is the result of this publication strategy.
A publishing strategy that inspires competitors: While the first season of
The Boys
is published in one fell swoop on Amazon Prime Video, the second, which has become the hit that Jeff Bezos' platform has been waiting for, adopts the weekly rollout by episode.
WandaVision
, the most meta series of all time
Never, since
Game of Thrones
, has a series aroused as many theories as
WandaVision
!
The MCU is a giant, interconnected universe, and Jac Schaeffer, the
WandaVision
showrunner
,
understood it.
During its nine episodes,
WandaVision
has never ceased to incite its fans to the discussion, by disseminating countless easter eggs and nods to spectators within the fiction.
“I hope that the spectators will have the impression that the trip was satisfactory.
I know there are a lot of theories about the show;
there will be a lot of people who will undoubtedly be disappointed by our choice ”, confided the director Matt Shakman on the eve of the broadcast of the final to our colleagues at
EW
.
The series leaned on the knowledge of the Marvel fan base for them to theorize every week, sowing true and false clues: the commercials reflected Wanda's subconscious well, the demonic references mistakenly made Mephisto and the appearance of the
X-Men's
Pietro
hinted at a crossover between Fox's X-Men (recently acquired by Disney) and the Avengers, etc.
Fietro was ultimately not the Quicksilver of the
X-Men
, from a parallel dimension, but Ralph Bohmer, an actor manipulated by Agatha Harkness.
Fiction has also multiplied meta allusions to series and television in general, recalling for example the techniques used in soap operas to camouflage the pregnancy of an actress when Wanda hides hers from Geraldine with a coat, a fruit basket or a big vase.
In the final episode, Wanda finally agrees to mourn Vision and face loneliness.
(Even though during this episode the two versions of Vision clashed and each survived in some way. The Vision reprogrammed by SWORD has regained her memory, and the one created by Wanda is throwing at him, "Who knows what I'm going to do. to become ? ").
Wanda abandons the sitcom world she created, at the same time inviting the viewer to mourn the fictional world offered by the series.
A moving metaphor.
WandaVision
blurs the lines between cinema, TV and streaming
Disney was inspired for its audiovisual productions by the newsroom model in the press.
“What we want to do is separate the people who create our wonderful content from the decision-making when it comes to how it's marketed to the market,” Disney CEO Bob Chapek explained in October 2020. , on CNBC.
On the one hand, the producers of content, on the other, those responsible for determining the best to monetize and distribute this content, "as opposed to whether it is predetermined that a film is intended for theaters or that a TV series is intended for ABC ”, specifies the boss of Disney.
This strategic direction, which the pandemic has accelerated, is blurring the traditional boundaries between cinema, television and streaming.
WandaVision
was announced as a miniseries.
"I
've
worked at Marvel long enough not to say a definitive no to a project, not even a
WandaVision
sequel
," Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige told
Deadline
.
Falcon and the Winter Soldier or
Loki
, thought of as one-shots, could also have the right to a series sequel, or to the cinema.
“The fun of the MCU is obviously all the crossover we can do between series, between films.
So it will vary depending on the story.
Sometimes there will be a season 2, sometimes it will continue in a movie and then return to series, ”says Kevin Feige, who has mapped the MCU and the Disney + series.
We already know that Wanda Maximoff appears in the film
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
, which was originally due to be released on March 20, 2020 and should be in theaters in 2022.
This strategy will build loyalty among Disney + subscribers, and make them want to see the films in theaters.
Film buffs will want to see the series, to fully understand the films.
A virtuous circle which aims to make Disney + the world's leading platform against the leader Netflix.
The finale of
WandaVision
thus ends with two post-credits sequences.
In the first, an officer calls out to Monica: "Captain Rambeau, we are asking you at the cinema".
A meta wink, once again.
The agent turns out to be a Skrull… It's likely that this post-credits scene will introduce
Captain Marvel 2
.
Our dossier on Marvel
The second post-credits scene shows Wanda secluded in a haven of peace in the heart of the mountains.
She generates an astral projection of herself as Scarlet Witch who reads the Darkhold, a set of scrolls that lists evil spells gathered by the evil Elder God Chthon, at the origin of the famous "chaos magic" mentioned in
WandaVision
.
At the end of the scene, she hears her children calling.
No doubt this has something to do with the upcoming
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
, and who knows, maybe the possible next season of
WandaVision
?
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