Marvel 'Agatha All Along' with Kathryn Hahn, Joe Locke is a 'throwback to the golden age of filmmaking'
"I'm greedy and I want all the things, I want all the tones and all the genres," showrunner Jac Schaeffer said about the Agatha Harkness spinoff
After the immense success of WandaVision, Kathryn Hahn's Agatha Harkness finally has her own spinoff Marvel Television series, Agatha All Along, premiering on Disney+ Sept. 18 at 9:00 p.m. ET. A continuation of the WandaVision story, the show starts off with Agatha living an absolute "nightmare."
"It was a nightmare for her," Hahn told Yahoo Canada in Toronto. "Her biggest nightmare is to be in a sitcom and be without her powers. That's a great place to start, for sure."
Watch Agatha All Along on Disney+ at a discounted price of $1.99/month for three months
When Agatha All Along begins, the title character at this point is named Agnes and she's working as a detective in Westview. She's called to help investigate a Jane Doe case that apparently only she can solve. We don't see the woman's face, but as we saw teased in the trailer, Jane Doe's body is Wanda. After a visit from her colleague in the morgue, who turns out to be Rio Vidal (Aubrey Plaza), Agatha escapes Wanda's spell from WandaVision.
Agatha is then tracked down by a fan, a character just called Teen, played by Joe Locke. He wants Agatha to take him along the Witches' Road with the hope of accessing powers. According to the lore, witches who make it to the end of The Road will get whatever it is they're seeking. While initially resistant, Agatha realizes this may be the only viable way to get her own powers back.
"She's the best scene partner," Locke said about working with Hahn. "She's someone who is so on the top of their game and she's the most talented person I've ever met."
"Even watching her face, everything she can do without saying anything is so amazing. So to get to work on such a complicated relationship, the dynamic changes every five minutes in every episode, you never really know quite where it's going, which was so much fun to be able to map out throughout the arc of the season."
In order to effectively travel Witches' Road, Agatha has to assemble a coven, another nightmare task for the character, but she has to work in a team in order to complete a series of trials along the journey. That brings Agatha and Teen to characters played by Patti Lupone, Sasheer Zamata, Ali Ahn and Debra Jo Rupp.
Watch: 'Agatha All Along' Kathryn Hahn and Jac Schaeffer: Women of all ages were a 'priority' for witchcraft story
'Women are my priority and it's women of all ages'
There is something particularly magical about the cast of Agatha All Along. The energy of Heartstopper star Locke, mixed with women of different ages, different generations. It makes the world of this show feel particularly lived in, dynamic energies that create a character-driven story.
"It was a real priority to have characters of different ages. First, it felt correct for the world of witchcraft, the idea of Maiden, Mother, Crone," showrunner Jac Schaeffer said. "As a creator, it is always very important to me. Women are my priority and it's women of all ages."
"That was something that we wanted to bring into this circle. It was really fun and really rewarding, but it also just felt absolutely necessary to the story."
"All of these women from all these different walks of life, and this gorgeous witch Joe, are able to be still looking for their power and their authenticity," Hahn said in a separate interview. "And I learned so much from all of them, I think we all really learned a lot together and this show is about that. ... Striving for one's authentic voice with each other."
"A coven really is building each other up and that was, I think, a real huge takeaway for sure. We kept talking about Hecate, which includes Maiden, Mother and Crone in one, in each of us, like every woman. And that felt very alive during this, that we were carrying all three at all times."
'Throwback to the golden age of filmmaking'
Agatha All Along, in a similar way to WandaVision, the first four episodes we've seen of the show have a really appealing blend of fun comedy, addictive music, thrilling action, alluring witchcraft lore, and maybe in a surprising twist, the series actually goes to places that are quite dark and emotional. Schaeffer attributed her ability to go to all these different places in this show to Hahn's talent.
"I think the tone of this is tricky, much like how the WandaVision tone is tricky, and as an artist that's what I love," Schaeffer said. "That challenge is most interesting to me because I'm greedy and I want all the things, I want all the tones and all the genres."
"So with this one I knew Kathryn would be willing to really go there and we do, the show gets very, very dramatic in certain aspects, because Kathryn so fully embodies the character. ... She's so charismatic and she is so theatrical as a character, and witches, by their nature, are very theatrical. So I knew we were always going to, even when things go dark, or even when things go dramatic, you always sort of have to come out of that kind of nosedive, because that's the home base of the show, is the fun."
A particular highlight for both Locke and Hahn is that this Agatha All Along world is really crafted with practical effects, providing a really rich, and sort of old school visual appeal and wonder to the series.
"I thought, like most people think when they think of a Marvel project, a lot of like blue screen and acting to tennis balls, but we pretty much had basically none of that, which is amazing," Locke said. "I think it's a throwback to the golden age of filmmaking and practical effects, and real, built sets, which, as an actor, it's the dream be able to act in the front of the thing you're actually supposed to be acting in front of."
'Delicious' relationship between Kathryn Hahn and Aubrey Plaza's characters
But one of the most appealing parts of Agatha All Along is watching Hahn's Agatha and Aubrey Plaza's Rio together. Even in the first episode alone, it's a steamy, infectious and powerful dynamic to love.
"We had been in Parks and Rec together, but we really hadn't had any screen time together," Hahn said about working with Plaza. "This was our first like chunky, meaty thing that we'd had a chance to dive into."
"It's interesting, we really didn't even talk about it that often, like we would send songs to each other or pieces of writing, or movie recommendations, but we really didn't talk about the characters that much, and we kind of saved it for the set. So we really kept to our corners almost and then it kind of exploded. ... I can't speak for her, but not what I expected in that relationship and really delicious. ... I feel like there's a lot of history there on the page and I feel like we found that really easily, very early on."
'Agatha All Along' could be the 'spicy little stepsister' of Marvel
It's no secret that the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and Marvel Television has increasingly faced criticism as more and more movies and shows are released. An interesting evaluation that's come up for some fans (even journalists covering the Agatha All Along release) is that some things "don't feel like Marvel," which was the case of WandaVision and could be the same trajectory for Agatha All Along.
We would argue that this is actually the type of exciting, unique and risky storytelling that Marvel needs, with a range of actors bringing their own energies to a production. And that was also the goal for Schaeffer, who was compelled to work with what's "unexpected."
"My time at Marvel has been so fruitful and so much fun, and so rewarding to me personally and professionally," Schaeffer said. "For me, it's about that they are actually always interested in doing the unexpected thing."
"I know there's been criticism of late and that is sort of the nature of being in a space for a given time. But what I have observed of [Marvel] and their mission is to strive for the unusual thing. They hear what fans are clamouring for and then they try to deliver that in the most surprising way. So I really, in WandaVision, WandaVision and Agatha, really took that to heart, and was like, 'How do we satisfy, but still surprise?' It's my hope that Agatha checks that box."
"This is the only MCU that I know, is from WandaVision to this, so I've always felt like Marvel's been really interesting and new storytelling and practical magic and about the characters," Hahn said in a separate interview. "It's been very character-driven, like I haven't really done that much in front of a green screen or a blue screen, and so much of the drama is between the humans."
"But I will also say, you know Deadpool & Wolverine is fabulous. And so I feel like I'm in the middle of a really exciting period and that this show is really a part of that. Also that there's something different and also recognizable in it. It does feel like it could be this spicy little stepsister off to the side, but I still think it's rooted in something big and magical, and just bigger than we are. There's something exciting about that."
Watch Agatha All Along on Disney+ at a discounted price of $1.99/month for three months
For Locke, while he's had his fair share of fame with the Netflix hit Heartstopper, he's about to unlock a whole other world of fandom with Marvel. But the beloved star is prepared.
"I think Heartstopper has been a great opening into that world," Locke said. "And the difference is that everyone who watches Heartstopper generally has positive opinions, whereas I think Marvel fans are more honest about their actual opinions."
"I'm ready for lots of different opinions, but at the end of the day, people's opinions are theirs, not mine."
