On October 30th, Marvel premiered the two-episode finale of their original show, ‘Agatha All Along.’ The show started as a spin-off to hit series ‘WandaVision’ but has truly made a name for itself. The show stars Kathryn Hahn, reprising her role as Agatha Harkness from ‘WandaVision’ as well as well-known ‘Heartstopper’ actor, Joe Locke. Locke starts playing the role of Teen who is unknown to the Marvel universe, but he is later revealed to be Wanda Maximoff’s son Billy, otherwise known as Wiccan. A new character was written especially for ‘Agatha All Along’ as Agatha’s past love affair. Her name is Rio Vidal, The Green Witch, played by Aubrey Plaza.
The 2021 Marvel movie ‘Eternals’ showed the very first gay kiss scene in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It took an extra three years to release a sapphic kiss. Junior Audrey Butts said, “It has been shown many times that gay relationships in media bring in more money/engagement than sapphic ones, so I’m not surprised it took them longer to produce a show with a sapphic relationship. Having sapphic characters will entice different groups of people to watch the show. If people feel represented in the media they are consuming, they will want to continue consuming it.”
At the beginning of the show, Agatha and Billy are looking for witches to join their coven so they can embark on The Witches Road. The two scrounge up Lillia Calderu played by Patti Lupone, Jennifer Kale played by Sasheer Zamata, Alice Wu-Guliver played by Ali Ahn and Sharon Davis played by Debra Jo Rupp. Alice is the daughter of Lorna Wu, who is the singer of the most famous version of ‘The Ballad of The Witches Road.’ The ballad is said to conjure the road. Sharon was featured in ‘WandaVision’ as one of the civilians under Wanda’s hex.
The witches begin their walk on The Witches Road and Rio is not included in their coven. When Sharon passes away on a trial they need a new green witch. In Marvel fashion they summon the one green witch that will actually cause them problems, Agatha’s ex. When Rio appears, Agatha is so upset that she tries to attack Rio. The coven holds her back and assumes it’s just Agatha being Agatha, when there is much more to Agatha and Rio’s story than they are letting on.
When another hectic trial is done, the witches are bonding over the scars they have. When Rio claims to have a scar Agatha immediately shrugs it off and tells her she doesn’t. That’s when Rio delivers one of the most talked about lines in the show. “A long time ago, I loved someone. And I had to do something I did not want to do, even though it was my job. And it hurt them. She is my scar.” This line is what lit the fire to the Agatha and Rio romance.
As the story goes on the viewers watch their angsty love story unfold. When it is revealed to the coven that Rio is Death herself, Agatha must decide between saving Wiccan or herself. Just when viewers think she is going to sacrifice Wiccan, she runs up to Rio and delivers Marvel’s first true sapphic kiss in the most poetic way, The Kiss of Death.
In the ‘Agatha All Along’ finale, viewers got to see Agatha and Rio’s backstory. It is interpreted that Agatha and Rio were in love and Agatha became pregnant with Rio’s child. This is possible because death is just presenting itself as female. The child was destined to die in childbirth but Rio gave Agatha some time with him. When Agatha couldn’t keep Rio busy with other dead witches, Rio had to take away their son. This interpretation relates perfectly back to Rio’s original quote about her “scar.” Junior Asher Freedman said, “I don’t know how to explain the impact this show had on me, especially their relationship. Lesbians don’t have a lot of representation in the media, and I hope this show might be a push for other shows to follow suit and consider supplying to the demand for sapphic representation.”
Back in 2015, there was a sapphic Marvel kiss though. It was one of deceit rather than passion. It happened in ‘Agent Carter’ between Peggy Carter and Dottie Underwood. Many fans refuse to consider this the real first sapphic Marvel kiss because Dottie was only kissing Peggy to poison her.
Marvel fans all across the world are happy that the MCU finally has a Sapphic kiss, and many viewers have started watching Marvel just for the Sapphic love story between Agatha and Rio.
