And, like, WandaVision is this story about pushing that question to its limit This terrible mathematical equation where her power grows in proportion to her pain, which means it's always growing past her ability to rein in her desires
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Like I think this is a deep dark thing at the heart of how we look at art and creativity I did a thread before on how this is the message of the fucking Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory movie with Gene Wilder
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Charlie wins the game at the end because he understands that as abusive and unfair and tyrannical as Willy Wonka is, the Chocolate Factory is beautiful, it brings countless people joy, it's TOO IMPORTANT to let it be destroyed over his own grievance
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It's a choice people make all the fucking time Probably way more of the Great Artists and Great Works that make up our culture wouldn't exist than we're willing to admit, if everyone stood up for their rights
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It's a stereotypical way creative men leech off of women, but it's by no means a special power only men have And, like WandaVision is about it not being an easy question to answer
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The easy way out is to just say "Well fuck you, your pain isn't real, the very fact that you have power and privilege means this is just narcissistic wank and you can be dismissed" It's a very common response nowadays when a celebrity faces a "reckoning"
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But like WandaVision doesn't let you have that out The pain *is* real, and the suffering *is* real, and the power is *powered by the suffering* The citizens of Westview suffer precisely because her grief is so strong, because its echoing constant reality binds them to her
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And Westview *is* a beautiful thing, something that watchers like Darcy get "invested" in The twin boys and the false Vision are real within the Hex, and alive, and worthy of life in their own terms, and to give up the Hex is to sacrifice them
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The big moral question is whether it's worth it to keep on abusing and using and sucking the life out of the background NPCs to keep Westview going And of course the answer is no Of course it's an atrocity that must stop, no question But *actually doing it is fucking hard*
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They were trying to get at that with the last scene but ultimately I think, especially with the constraints that still being in the MCU put on them, they didn't have the range It's a tough fucking thing to try to confront and stay on that tightrope
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So much easier to fall on one side of the tightrope ("Wanda's a fucking monster and the Hex has no value, bullet through the head now") or the other ("It was a false choice and everyone calling Wanda a monster was a liar, the Hex can and should live on without harming anyone")
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(Lol okay if you want an obscure artsy reference to make you feel better than the MCU plebs -- This is essentially the final choice between the Bachelor's ending of saving the Polyhedron and the Haruspex's ending of saving the town in Pathologic)
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(And the Changeling's magical third option of saving both has a much darker cost in the end than either of the original two terrible choices)
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End of conversation
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