WandaVision S1E6 All-New Halloween Spooktacular! picks things up after the last episode’s surprise appearance of Pietro, Wanda’s brother. The big surprise being that this Pietro is the one from the Fox “X-Men Universe”, not the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The series is now fully in the 1990s with a Halloween episode.

The episode is the usual goofy plot you’d expect from this sort of episode at the time with Pietro using his speed powers to cause chaos and Tommy and Billy talking directly to the camera.

But, the episode is about the small moments and the attempt for Wanda to recognize her trauma. She and Pietro discuss their time in Sakovia and their hardship. There are also some digs in the fact that this isn’t the MCU Pietro, “something is different”. That also leads to a great joke about Evan Peters and Aaron Taylor-Johnson both appearing in the comic-based film Kick-Ass. There’s also a comment about Monica Rambeau’s changes going in and out of the “hex” and changes happening to her, hinting at her future.

It’s the breaking of Wanda’s control that’s the real interesting aspect of the show. Pietro is aware of what’s going on and Wanda is “writing” the show. Vision spends his time examining what’s going on and trying to figure out what to do next. We also get to see the extent of Wanda’s powers as things begin to fall apart a bit and glitches in individuals within the town become clearer. Billy and Tommy also break barriers not just by displaying powers but also being aware of Vision’s predicament. It’s all adding up to show that while Wanda controls a lot, it’s clear her grip is slipping and she doesn’t have control over everything.

This is an episode that delivers a lot of “what’s to come”. Wanda shows off the extent of her powers even further and we get to see some more resistance to her control in multiple ways. It sets up characters for their roles much further down the road. It teases a lot of things that might come. It also delivers a lot of winks and nods to things in the past. “All-New Halloween Spooktacular!” is a “bridge” in what’s to come not just for the series but the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole and continues to set up Wanda as a major player on multiple levels.

Overall Rating: 8.0