Transcript

Taylor: Welcome back, listeners. We are changing things up today in this episode of Sisters Assembled. If you’ve been following our recent coverage, you know, we’ve been fully focused on all things The Marvels and breaking down quite a few different important elements of the film that we really didn’t get to dive into in our initial reactions. But now we feel like we’re pretty well sated on The Marvels and we have to return to another property that came out on the same evening, which is of course, Loki and the season finale. Now, coming out of that, there is an interesting theory that’s kind of been floating around on the Internet and we’re going to break it down for you today. Talk about our perspective on it and just give a little bit of background on this kind of pretty prominent, I would say, theory. I’ve seen a lot of articles about it and it’s been popping up everywhere. So to start it off and change things up, I’m going to lead it off today. Starting out, I want to just give a little bit of credit to Den of Nerds whose tweet is really the one that I keep seeing popping up as kind of the impetus for this theory. If it’s someone else, I apologize but this is the one that I saw on the TikToks, so Den of Nerds, this one goes out to you. Basically, the theory posited, hey, what if you know, we have the Avengers turning into the Infinity Stones and basically embodying them and they are doing that to fight Beyonder Kang. So there are a couple of interesting elements that I think we need to dive into as they relate to that theory, really two parts. One is Avengers as Infinity Stones, which is going to be the second half of this episode, and the first half being Beyonder Kang. So what’s interesting about this is there are actually a few different theories, even around this part of the theory so there are many, many layers. To start off, the Beyonder is a really important figure as it relates to, you know, Secret Wars in the comics. The 1980s version, which we talked about in our Secret Wars episode, gosh, what, like a year and a half ago now? That is kind of the original Secret Wars and in that version of the comics, Beyonder is the one who brings all the heroes and the villains together into Battleworld to literally battle it out. Now, in the 2015 version, the Beyonders are more of a group of people who Dr. Doom takes away their powers. The Beyonders are actually a group of people, just more generally so you have an idea of who they are and the Beyonder himself is then an individual who is a member of that group. Very, very confusing, and clearly Marvel was running out of names but that’s kind of a very top-level look at who the Beyonder is. Now, I’m going to give you three interesting theories about it really quickly. One, as I mentioned Beyonder Kang. This theory specifically says that Kang is going to be the Beyonder in Secret Wars. Two other names have kind of risen to the top, come up as potential characters to evolve into the Beyonder. One is Loki, of course, because of his new role as God of Stories and the other is O.B., which I think is actually really funny and interesting. But they are kind of talking about his knowledge about the TVA and time travel and how he seems like he’s a really important character who shouldn’t just stay within the Loki franchise. So there is kind of a few reasons why he could become the Beyonder. But those are the three beings kind of in the running for the Beyonder right now that I’ve seen. This particular theory, again, is really looking at Kang becoming the Beyonder. Now I spewed a lot of facts to you. Katie, react to them, build upon them, give us your thoughts. 

Katie: Okay, partially because of recency bias, but partially because I think the biggest part is the three theories you kind of threw out at the end of who might be the Beyonder or part of the Beyonders, depending on which direction they go with what version of Secret Wars we could get. I’m going to say I don’t actually advocate for any of them currently, and this is going to be why, I have a very nice way of spelling them each out. So the first is Kang and I get why this would be an obvious choice. However, as our recent blog post just went through, we did a theory smash, which we do on some of the big theories that come through every once in a while about Kang Dynasty and the future of Kang Dynasty because quite honestly, it’s kind of up in the air. If you haven’t been paying attention, it’s been rumored Marvel’s trying to move away from Kang for a lot of different reasons. Obviously, the off-screen stuff going on with the main actor is not helping the situation, I am sure, but that has been kind of the gist and so we did recently do a blog post relating to this. Because that is currently in my brain, I’m not sure we’re going to go the Kang route. I don’t know. I kind of think if they’re trying to do away with that direction, I don’t see them putting him as such a big storyline or big part of the storyline still. I do think if we did go the King route and we continued and kept Kang Dynasty, I could see it, so I’ll put that in that way. The second one O.B. or I’m sorry, you said Loki next.

Taylor: I think. I don’t actually remember which order they were in, but I think Loki was next. 

Katie: So I’ll go with Loki next to try and keep us in the same order. The thing is, is not that the Beyonder is, I mean, the Beyonders aren’t inherently good guys, let’s say that. I don’t necessarily think they’re going to have Loki do the character development he did to kind of take the step back again into I don’t want to say villain territory because I feel like that’s not fully fair to say, but sort of take that step back from super good guy giving life to the whole Multiverse now and making a horrible decision to help everybody else to suddenly like we’re going back a step in that character development. You bring a different Loki in, okay, maybe. Do I mentally think I can handle that? No, not at all so let’s not. Then you said O.B. last and I just every fiber of my being can’t handle O.B. being some sort of not-good squishy human being because I love him and I just don’t I think it could be a very interesting turn of character if they do go that way. I just don’t know. It’d be a very weird direction to take the O.B. that we currently know. 

Taylor: Yeah, I think I mostly agree with you. I don’t think it’s going to be Loki because of the second part of this theory. I mean, it can be in two places at once, but I think it would be weird and probably not the best execution to do it that way and we’ll get to that in a second. O.B., I agree. I do want to see the character again, so I like that we’re getting creative about why and how that can happen, but this doesn’t feel right to me, I don’t agree with it. I do want to revisit Kang because I think I see what you’re saying about, you know, everything that’s happening, the off-screen stuff, all of that, and some of the possibility that he’s not going to be the guy that we thought he was going to be. But at the same time, a few things are rattling around in my head. One of them is the idea of Ramatut, which we’ve talked about actually on other shows, and his relationship with the Fantastic Four, which we know is coming. And we’ve talked a lot about Kang Dynasty sticking out like a sore thumb. What I like about this theory is the idea that we can go from Kang Dynasty into Secret Wars in a seamless way, like we went from Infinity War to Endgame and it bridges that gap and suddenly Kang Dynasty is now falling back into line in a way that we would more expect it to. It also ties then because we’re not getting rid of Kang, it also ties into the Fantastic Four, who we know are super, super important in Secret Wars, so that just brings in another tie there. If I had to choose between the three, I think Kang is my best choice and I don’t dislike it. I actually kind of like it a lot because I think it solves quite a few of our problems. There are, of course, again, the off-screen issues that are the world’s biggest variable. I mean, you know, recasting is possible, we’ve talked about it a few times. We’ve done it before, Rhodey being a huge one, and we were for the better. Don Cheadle has been amazing for us for over ten years now. What a great choice that was. So I’m going to go with Kang because I think the other two just don’t make sense to me and I think we can solve problems by going with Kang but it’s not a for sure because of so much of the other stuff, unfortunately, right now.

Katie: I would be inclined to agree because I think he is the more obvious choice. I like what you were saying with the idea that it would finally piece some of those things together. I know even doing the theory smash, that was one of the points where it was like it sticks out like a sore thumb and we’ve all said it. We continue to say it. And when you have the Fantastic Four supposedly coming pretty close to Kang Dynasty, if you, I mean, granted that part of the slate’s very hazy. I think those are the only three movies that are released for Phase Six. That was weird to say, Phase six.

Taylor: I can’t even emotionally go there right now. 

Katie: I was like, are you sure you’re not trying to say Phase Four, then I was like, no, like, I am trying to say Phase Six, but those are the only three. So as of right now, Kang Dynasty’s pretty much sandwiched between two Fantastic Four storylines. I know that was something even like I was saying in the theory smash, I brought up to say how strange, because even if Dr. Doom’s not sitting pretty in that Fantastic Four movie, you best bet that’s what everybody’s waiting for because we don’t know what that movie’s going to hold. We don’t think it’s going to be an origin. So he might not even appear directly in that movie. He could be an end credit, who knows? Or he could be towards the end of the movie, whatever. But then, you know, it’s like what happened with Captain Marvel in my brain. It’s like, okay, here’s Infinity War, here’s Captain Marvel, then there’s Endgame. No one cared about the middle of the sandwich because the bread was too tasty so it’s like that was where my concern was. If we go this route, I have to agree. I think I’m starting to care about the turkey, like I’m enjoying the middle of the sandwich finally. But there is a lot more layers then unfortunately, the legal case. I mean, the director has stepped down now, which is the director of Shang-Chi. That could be because he’s starting on Shang-Chi 2 but there’s that. We lost the writer who was pro-Kang’s storyline, he’s no longer on the project. You know, there’s a lot of extra aspects that I think if we lose Kang Dynasty, do I think Kang is going to be the Beyonder? I don’t know anymore. I think our future looks very, I should say, we have two paths we can go down and it all depends on whether Kang Dynasty stays in the slate or not. 

Taylor: Yeah, I agree. I do like the idea of it coming kind of falling back into line. That was one of the things that I was reading about when I was doing my research for this episode was here’s a reason why it could work, because it actually creates this throughline. But I think there is another alternative here beyond the through line with Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars. You mentioned, of course, the idea of just simply removing it. It’s directorless, it’s writerless and it’s not really a highly anticipated film. To your point, it’s smack dab right now based on a loose idea, it’s smack dab in the middle between Fantastic Four, which if any of the rumor mill that we’ve been on for the past, I don’t know a year, about casting for this is any indication, people are so hyped for this film. I mean every time there’s a new quote-unquote secret cast revealed or official leak, everybody loses their minds, right? I mean, I don’t think I talked about it on our show, but I’ve definitely talked about other shows, the idea that Pedro Pascal might be attached to this. I mean, my level of excitement is through the roof.

Katie: Well, and I just want to interrupt you really quick to say, you said about slate-wise, yeah, it’s loose, but it might be movie-wise back to back to back. We might have shows in the middle but if you’re thinking about what releases and how many movies release in a year, they very well could be the three movies that go in a row.

Taylor: For sure and I also mean, it’s not set in stone, so we could move around, you know, we could get a Kang Dynasty, then a Fantastic Four, then a Secret Wars, which, you know, not maybe how I would do it personally, but whatever. It’s just not set in stone. But the other end of that, then, between Fantastic Four, I’m sorry, you have the Fantastic Four on one side, then you have Secret Wars on the other side. I mean, everybody’s losing their mind, right? It’s our next Endgame. To me, Secret Wars, as someone who actually read the comic this time, because you all know, we don’t always read them, But I made it a point to read this one, and I loved it. I sat down and I think I read it in one or two sittings. It is incredible. The storytelling is amazing. It was like a page-turner. That coming to life on film, not even getting into the whole fact that Miles Morales is in it and y’all know how I feel about a live-action Miles Morales, is something that I know I’m super excited about. A lot of people are really excited about it, it’s a very popular comic. So long spiel aside, what I’m trying to say is you have two incredibly anticipated films and you have Kang Dynasty in the middle and nobody is like, yes, Kang Dynasty oh my God, I can’t wait. That’s not really the vibe. So no writer, no director, less fan excitement.

Katie: Maybe not even the main actor, like we’re not doing well over here. 

Taylor: Also that, also that. The legs are literally falling out from underneath this film and we’re watching it in real time. So let’s take it out, let’s say it’s gone. The Beyonder theory stands on its own. It doesn’t have to be Kang, it doesn’t have to be O.B., it doesn’t have to be Loki. We could just get the original Beyonder, have them introduced. 

Katie: Oh yeah. I just think as far as the three that are rumored, I don’t advocate for any of them unless we keep Kang Dynasty. That’s like my caveat, if Kang Dynasty stays and we stay with the Kang storyline, they don’t pivot away from it. I’m cool with it being Kang. I think it actually makes so much more sense to me and it’s like I can finally understand the direction that they’re going. If we lose Kang Dynasty and we move away from Kang, just give me a brand new character.

Taylor: Agreed, agreed. And I think there’s something interesting about that too. The Beyonders a very I mean, look, I tried to do some research on the guy. Super complicated, like we’re talking not quite Kang-level complicated because he doesn’t have a quadrillion variants, but I mean, I don’t understand this dude at all. I tried, I really did. So it’ll be interesting to see if they can pull that off but I would also, like I said, be interested in it. It would be cool. It’s an interesting character. So even beyond this kind of trio of characters that are potentially vying to become, well not vying with each other, but you know, in the running, potentially to become the Beyonder based on the theories online, we could also just fourth option go ahead with the straight up go with the Beyonder from the comics and so that’s kind of why I like the theory as a whole the idea of, you know, the Avengers fighting the Beyonder or in whatever form he takes because it could be any number of characters and it would still be interesting, some more so than others but it would still have legs and that’s what I think is the most important thing here. 

Katie: Yeah, I think I’m seeing it more as its own character and that’s where we go from here. But now we’re going to get to the interesting part, which is like the part of the theory that I think initially started growing some hair.

Taylor: What an interesting metaphor. 

Katie: Yeah, yeah, I was going to say grow legs, but I wanted to grow hair. It’s like that mold like on that food you left it out, that’s where I feel like this started. 

Taylor: You couldn’t just go with a Chia Pet? Why couldn’t you go with a Chia pet? Why did you have to go with moldy food? 

Katie: Because I didn’t think of a Chia pet bro. I was thinking like, okay, listen, sometimes things in my fridge go bad, right? And so I was thinking like, gross, like the ecosystem. Anyway, not the important part of this anyway, anyway, to get back on to the main point, I think that part of the theory that initially kind of started it all before we got into the Beyonder, before we kind of put all the puzzle pieces together and I say we I just mean the fan base in general, not us. It was not a a brainchild of us, by any means. But it’s the part where certain characters are starting to look like they might represent Infinity Stones. Now, there are two that are like, yes, people like them, people want to run with them. There are two that are kind of like we have one or two options and then we have two that are like, we’re kind of just trying to figure out which ones these work with.

Taylor: It’s a little bit of a reach for the last two. 

Katie: Yeah, well, exactly. So I’m going to kick us off with the first two because they are also two of my favorite characters. So we shouldn’t be shocked with Wanda. I’m kicking her of first because she’s the first one that I think came to mind with all of this as the Reality Stone, as a representation of the Reality Stone. No one should be shocked here, she literally bends reality. That is her power. Anybody who’s like, she’s dead, get out, you’re wrong. 

Taylor: Go away. No body, no death. What is the golden rule? No body, no death. 

Katie: And she’ll be back. You don’t kill the Scarlet Witch because she dropped a building on herself.  Like, are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? So that’s our first one. That’s a pretty solid one. And honestly, ever since WandaVision, you could have run with that. Then we have Loki representing the Time Stone. That, again, shouldn’t be shocking to anybody after the end of Loki Season Two. He literally surpassed Kang in his ability to control time, and he now sits pretty in the middle of the Multiverse. So I think those first two shouldn’t shock anybody out there.

Taylor: Yeah, I think you hit the nail on the head by saying that really, Loki and Wanda are kind of the backbone of the credibility of this theory. They’re the two most obvious. Everybody else is kind of a meh, at best. But there’s one element that I do want to emphasize from what you were saying, and that is the color portion of it as well. As we know, each Infinity Stone has a very distinctive color. Reality was red, or you could even say perhaps scarlet, which goes pretty nicely with our good friend Wanda and her color palette. Then, of course, Loki, whose iconically green, matches very well with the green Time Stone, so those two, for so many reasons, not just their powers, but also their color scheme and you’ll see that that’s kind of how some of these other characters are matched online as well. But those two fit so naturally and they’re not shoehorned in at all. It’s a very, for lack of a better term, very natural fit. It makes so much sense. And again, those are really the two that are driving the credibility within the theory, because otherwise, it is a little mushy. So to get into the next two, which are mushy but maybe not as mushy as the last two, so I’m going to make those last two. But the next two have just really like two people each but neither of them, in my opinion, are dead ringers like Loki and Wanda. So the first one is the Mind Stone. And I was reading a couple of different articles, some of which are from more reputable places than others but hey, if the theory is out there, we’re going to report it. The two people who came up for me in the articles that I was reading were Captain Marvel and Vision. Vision, I think, makes a ton of sense. As we know, he held the Mind Stone so that again, a more natural fit just based on where the character’s been. Now, of course, White Vision, he doesn’t have a Mind Stone, so that’s a little bit more of a tenuous connection versus, you know if the original Vision was still alive, of course. The other one you might be thinking, Captain Marvel, which I also thought this one was a stretch, but there are some legs to it. Their initial thought process was her powers are yellow, like the Mind Stone. All right, I’ll give you the color, great, checkmark. The other thing that I thought was actually interesting and I never really thought about it this way, but the article mentioned that she is trying to get her memories back through Skrull technology. So the idea that she is playing with the mind, the article posited, okay, maybe she’s playing with the mind in the same way that Loki was playing with time, and through Loki playing with time, he got to be a master of it. Well, what if Captain Marvel becomes a master of the mind by trying to rediscover her own? And I thought that was actually really fascinating. It kind of made me almost put her above Vision in my ranking of the two of them, because I thought it was such a fascinating way to look at it and not something that I think people are really talking about with Captain Marvel right now. I mean, we did four episodes on The Marvels, and I don’t think once did we touch on the fact that Carol doesn’t have her memories, still, from her time with the Kree or before the Kree, sorry. So there’s so much there, and I think that’s actually fascinating. And then the second stone that I’m going to talk about at least, is the Space Stone, which the two people who were put forth for this one were Monica Rambeau and America Chavez. So, Monica, again, the color, her color is sort of a bluish white and then she also, as we know, spends a lot of time in space. She’s an astrophysicist, I want to say the article said, I think that’s what I remember. I know she does things with the science and the space. 

Katie: She’s an astronaut.

Taylor: Sure, she’s that, too. 

Katie: Well, she is. 

Taylor: Yeah. I mean, she might also be an astrophysicist, like, you know, there’s also that. 

Katie: I mean, she’s really smart beyond that but I know she’s an astronaut. 

Taylor: Yes, but anyway, Monica and space make a lot of sense together. They go together, hence the Space Stone. The other person who, of course, makes a lot of sense with this is America Chavez. We know blue power, Space Stone, great. And of course, her ability to move between the universes is very much in parallel with the Space Stone and the ability to move in space. So I think both of those not totally out of left field, there’s a little bit of evidence for both I don’t feel strongly about or more strongly about one over the other at this point. Maybe America is slightly over, Monica, but that’s pretty much kind of a quick rundown on what Mind and Space look like. But as you can see, there’s a serious decline in real good evidence between the first two and our middle two. 

Katie: Well before I get into answering those and giving my $0.02, I just want to put out too, Loki had to go through a huge transition to get where he got, and so did Wanda. I mean, obviously we knew Wanda’s was coming forever, especially once Disney got Fox. Like we knew that was finally going to happen, but both had to step into a bigger role. So again, this is a theory, this isn’t going to be a for sure until we’re told it’s a for sure. But I mean, we still have plenty of time for any of these characters to step into a bigger role or to have, I mean, okay, I’m just going to get into let me just get into picking these and I’ll kind of go further off that thought. So for the Mind Stone I would rather see Captain Marvel over Vision because I feel like Vision is so obvious and I also am like, it doesn’t make sense for Vision anymore. If you gave me Vision in Phase Three before he got the stone plucked out of his head and killed, sorry. 

Taylor: So graceful.

Katie: There’s no grateful way to say that. He’s a robot so I’m kind of like, what level-.

Taylor: He’s a robot with feelings. Give the guy some credit.

Katie: Okay, it’s still one of the more questionable things Wanda has ever done. 

Taylor: I don’t disagree. 

Katie: Yeah, we just like microwave. 

Taylor: Oh my gosh. Well, now that your true feelings about Vision have been revealed all these years after his death.

Katie: No, I love Vision as his own thing. I just and I understand Vision and Wanda are the thing in the comics. I’m all cool with, like, going to comic book precedent, but it’s just like, who thought that up? They were, like, ah robot and super powerful, witch, yes,. I just don’t know why that was a thing but I digress. I don’t like Vision as an option just because, again, too obvious. Because we are talking about a replacement for the Mind Stone, I mean, no offense, but if you take the Mind Stone away from Vision, I don’t see the connection anymore and he doesn’t have the Mind Stone. Vision Quest is going to be all about him finding himself.

Taylor: I forgot that was the thing. 

Katie: Yeah and you know what? I will get points here. Maybe that’s the movie where he steps into that next tier and he is the representation of the Mind Stone. Maybe. So I’m not going to take it away, but I don’t, I think it’s too obvious. 

Taylor: Is it a movie or a show? 

Katie: I believe it’s a show.

Taylor: Okay, I forgot that was on the slate.

Katie: Because I think that’s like the third spin off from Wandavision. 

Taylor: Okay, wait, Agatha.

Katie: Or second.

Taylor: I was going to say, what’s the third? 

Katie: I think I’m thinking of like Monica, because technically The Marvels was a second for her.

Taylor: And MoM. 

Katie: Oh yeah. But like, TV spinoff wise, it’s the second.

Taylor: Right.

Katie: Yeah, at least confirmed, but yeah, so I mean, like, maybe that’s the show where that happens for him. Who knows? But I do prefer Captain Marvel for the Mind Stone. I think it could be interesting. Besides the color matching, I just think your whole thing with the mind and her trying to get her memories back. That could be a really interesting plot, and I think I would like to see that come true. 

Taylor: I agree. 

Katie: As for space, the reason I was pausing myself earlier was because the whole thing where so far the two characters who clearly represent a stone have had to go through a huge character development. We have not had Monica named yet.

Taylor: That’s true. 

Katie: And I think that’s very important to note. I think it’s also very important to note that we only just saw her learning to use her powers and in the meantime, she closed a hole in the Multiverse. Granted, she had help, but she literally, like closed a hole in the Multiverse. So I do advocate for Monica just because of the idea of the space a little bit more. Versus America, to me, goes a lot more into the Multiverse direction and I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but I just don’t see it for the Space Stone directly, which was not opening doors to a Multiverse to our knowledge. So I’m going to advocate for Monica, just my $0.02. 

Taylor: That’s fair. I do want to clarify one thing, and I don’t know if this is in the comics because I am not really familiar with America in the comics. But the article I was reading did mention that she is capable of like straight up in universe teleportation, much more aligned with the Space Stone. So I just want to point that out. I’m not trying to advocate, you know, because I think it’s still very murky between the two of them but there’s that. And again, I don’t know if we obviously didn’t see it in the MCU, so I don’t know if that’s from the comics or what that is but I did read that somewhere so just keep it in the back of your mind. Take it with a grain of salt, but like, keep it there as a something to chew on. 

Katie: Yeah, I’ll take that with a grain of salt just for now, because we haven’t seen that in the MCU yet. As much as the comics obviously guide things, we all know, Marvel with the MCU can take like the smallest thing possible and turn a whole thing out of it. So I don’t want to, I don’t want to give her anything she doesn’t quite have and have that be the backbone to anything but good thing to know for sure. And then let’s just move into where like this theory falls apart. That’s really, like if we started at a really nice like, here is a tree. Sorry, I just thought of Loki and his tree.

Taylor: Yggdrasil.

Katie: Yeah, I really like a nice tree stump and it was like all together at one point and then you kind of start going to the dirt, and you’re like, oh some big roots. And then you end up at the very end where like all the little roots are coming out. This is those last two. All the little roots are coming out like we’re, we’re all over the place. So starting with the Soul Stone, there are four options that are being thrown out there, and I’m just going to list them from the jump and we can go into them as needed. So the first is the people of Karma Taj, then we have Wong, Adam Warlock and Shang-Chi. I’m going to say from the jump, my favorite two options are Adam Warlock and Shang-Chi

Taylor: Agreed 100%. 

Katie: I just think and not to be like the colors but part of it being the colors but also Adam Warlock has something in his forehead, right? Like, what is that?

Taylor: Well, in the comics, it’s the Soul Stone. 

Katie: I know. 

Taylor: So when I was reading up on it, they were like, well, I think at one point they were like, he is the Soul Stone’s favorite carrier. 

Katie: I think he is. 

Taylor: If it has to pick anybody to be its personal avatar in the world, I guess it would be its favorite carrier now, wouldn’t it be? But, you know, that’s why that’s my favorite as well. I think even more so than Shang-Chi. I do love him, but I think Adam, to me is a clear frontrunner. 

Katie: I agree. I think Adam’s definitely a frontrunner for me. I do like Shang-Chi as the runner up right now, based off what we know, the rings have the abilities to do and what we know the Soul Stone to be like. I feel as if that’s a kind of pretty good trade off, so I will put him solidly in my runner up place. I do like Adam as I mean, I remember even reading up on him about the Guardians and the whole thing with how he gets the Soul Stone and everything of that nature. I think he’s definitely a solid option. It’s weird right now because we saw essentially a five year old Adam Warlock, and I know we all had very strange feelings about that. So I think when we see him, but maybe that’s the change. He matures into the role of Adam Warlock, who is a very, very powerful being. So I could see it, I could see it pretty well with them. And then we move on to the last one, which is our Power Stone. We have three options for this one, which is Agatha, Kamala, and kind of like you could say, Wakanda as a whole, but I would say most likely more the Black Panther.

Taylor: Yeah. I mean, this one is interesting because I think there are actually strong reasons for each. I think color obviously for all of them. I mean, I think that just goes to that being said, that’s why each of these characters were in in my mind, at least when I was reading. That was the first thing for each of them, right, that these articles were talking about. They picked characters specifically who have powers of this color. Obviously, we know purple is such an important color in Wakanda, Kamala’s powers are purple, Agatha’s colors are purple. That’s almost like a pre requisite to get into the club for consideration so I’m going to toss it aside. We don’t need to talk about anymore. But one of the interesting things, and I’ll go character by character for why I think each one of them has their own particular reason for it making sense. For Agatha. all of the articles were talking about, well, she’s power hungry. We saw that in her history, and they kept emphasizing that so I think that makes a lot of sense. Think about the history of the Power Stone in the MCU and who does it tie back to? Ronan the Accuser trying to use it to improve his power, the power of the Kree empire and wipe out their enemies. So it clearly is attracting people who are attracted to power and I think Agatha really fits that exceptionally well. 

Katie: And something really important to me and actually why I prefer her, I think, as the top runner here, which is hard because I feel like Kamala has some really redeeming reasons as well. But why I put Agatha up at the top is she and for those of you who have watched The Vampire Diaries will understand what I’m saying here, she’s a siphon. She sucks the power from other powerful individuals. We see that in her origin or I don’t know if we can call it her origin, but that scene we get WandaVision when they were trying to pretty much cast her out and instead she kills all the other witches because she sucks their power away. We see her do it to Wanda, and so I think she could be a very interesting representation for the Power Stone when she literally can suck the power away from others to use it for herself. And we have her show coming up, which again, could be a great moment to have some character development. We know that it’s not a past show. It is going to be in the present because of the rumors that Wiccan will be in it, one of Wanda’s sons. By the way Wanda’s son that has abilities like his mother, not the one that’s super speedy, the one who is a warlock, essentially. So I mean, I think with that you have the ability to have the character development. She’s a siphon, it’s a very interesting way to put her forward as a Power Stone. 

Taylor: Yeah, no, I’m actually so glad you brought up the idea of her being a siphon, because if you think about the Power Stone and how it was introduced to us, that one touch could disintegrate a regular human. The only reason Peter Quill could hold it that long is because his dad is a Celestial and the other Guardians were helping him out. That power that the Power Stone inherently has is not for the faint of heart. But then you look at a siphon who could actually use that to her advantage and might be the only person of human DNA that could actually hold the Infinity Stone. Obviously it doesn’t exist anymore, but she could probably hold it. It would make her stronger and then it would make sense for her to be kind of its living embodiment because she can hold so much power and in fact, it makes her stronger. I mean, power makes everybody stronger up to a certain point but I think we’ve seen that she has levels to that. I mean, she was siphoning off the Scarlet Witch and she was feeling fine. So there’s a lot of power not only within her, but power that she’s capable of absorbing. And I think it’s almost the exact opposite of what the Power Stone does, but makes her the perfect representation in living being form.

Katie: Exactly. Well, that’s kind of my thought process went so I’m glad you went there and kind of took it further because I was kind of what was in my brain. And then, as I was mentioning, I was talking about Kamala. Other than the purple, Taylor said, already we’re throwing out the colors. Other than that, we saw that Kamala has very strong abilities. She wore both bangles, which we saw Dar-Benn get torn apart while wearing and was able to use that power. Now, the only thing I want to say is, are we going off of abilities? Because like I think the bangles themselves are like an addition. This could also work against Shang-Chi in this form of the theory in saying if we’re going off of things like the bangles, the Ten Rings not counting because they aren’t inherently the power source of these individuals, then I would say Kamala gets moved out of the running for this one because while she’s powerful and she clearly can handle both of them well, one, they’re separated, we know that. But two, I’m kind of like, okay, does that count? If we’re counting that I don’t care, then we’re good. Then as far as I’m concerned, we’re good. 

Taylor: I want to counter you, and I want to say that my girl Kamala fits this theory with or without the bangles for two reasons. One, as we saw in The Marvels, her powers are inherent to her. We found that out. She’s a mutant at the end of her show but it wasn’t until this movie that we saw her use her powers without the bangle, confirming that the bangle woke up her powers. It may help her channel them, but the powers that she uses, her light based powers live within her. That’s why she body switched because if we’re going against our going towards our Dar-Benn, Maria Rambuea theory about using the bangles from different universes, she would have had a different reaction if it was about the bangles and not her inherent light based powers. Point two, if we’re looking at the bangles as a metaphor for the Power Stone in this example, again, because it gives power, it is an inherently powerful object, she was able to hold two together. They are kind of one pair. She was able to hold the pair and use them and channel them and not get blown to bits like Dar-Benn and remember, we said, what does Dar-Benn flaking apart in space look like? Everybody flaking apart while trying to hold the Power Stone. So that’s why I feel like the bangles and her ability to hold them are almost a point in her direction because it shows us she can handle incredibly powerful objects like a Power Stone that other people are just not built to manage because Kamala Khan is a queen and a boss. 

Katie: I don’t disagree, but I think you’re like coasting past the point. I think your explanations, yes, but I think like the points right here and you’re sliding right past it because what I’m saying is, yes, she’s powerful. But if we want to look at it in the living embodiment, because that’s what the point of this is, right? That is what Wanda is, she can physically rewrite the reality. If you remove the bangles from the equation, Kamala is no different than my opinion then like Peter Quill when he was able to hold the Power Stone, but he was holding the stone. The stone itself was showing he was powerful, but it wasn’t that he was the power, you know what I mean? Versus I think you’re making the face because you’re getting the point. You’re seeing what I’m saying. 

Taylor: I just think you’re also negating the fact that she does have inherent powers like Peter Quill when he’s not on Ego, doesn’t have inherent powers. 

Katie: No, I’m not negating that she has inherent powers. I’m just saying I don’t think she is anywhere in the realm of representing a Power Stone where she’s at right now without the bangles. I think with the bangles and that’s why I said, if you take the bangles, if you leave the bangles into this conversation and you leave the Ten Rings in with Shang-Chi, they are very capable of making both of these lists and being the embodiment of the Soul and Power Stone respectively. But if you are removing them granted, yes, Shang-Chi does not himself have powers beyond being a child assassin who’s very skilled but beyond that, yeah, Kamala is different cause she has powers, but they are nowhere near the level of embodiment of the Power Stone. Now, if she goes through some sort of, I guess really we could be calling it like a metamorphosis, because that’s essentially what Loki and Wanda both did. If she goes through that, I could I could argue differently if we don’t include the bangles in this conversation. However, when I look at the slate, where does Kamala have the time to do that? I love Kamala, but I have to argue the case. 

Taylor: I agree that Agatha is the better choice in terms of fit. I do think that she’s the more natural fit but I will never not go to bat for Kamala Khan when given the opportunity. 

Katie: I think she’s great. I just think again this is a split in the road where it’s like bangles, okay, no bangles, I don’t see it as much. That’s why to me, she falls to number two for this theory. 

Taylor: I think that’s fair. I also, like I said, I just think that so many signs point to Agatha that it’s like, no contest really.

Katie: It’s like, why are we getting an Agatha show? That’s the question, right? Like, why would we be getting an Agatha show if there wasn’t a reason we needed to see her character development? 

Taylor: Your guess is as good as mine. Kathryn Hahn’s a great actress. I don’t know. 

Katie: I mean, listen, I loved Agatha, and I love Kathryn Hahn. She’s in so much that I have, like, adored over the years, but I genuinely sit there and I’m like, if there is not a bigger reason to have this character continued, you didn’t need to continue her. You could have left her in her little, like, weird mind thing that Wanda put her in pretending to be somebody she’s not essentially and walked away from the character. We didn’t need to worry about her again like they do with a lot of villains, whether they defeat them or whatever they do, they walk away from them. We never see them. There’s a reason Agatha is remaining on the table and getting her own freaking TV show. 

Taylor: Yeah, I mean, to play devil’s advocate, you could also just say she’s a vehicle to bring Wiccan in. 

Katie: Yeah, but come on. There couldn’t have been 9 million other ways to do that. And why just Wican? At that point, you could have just, you could have done, the Multiverse is open. We could have done anything else to get Wiccan in here with his brother.

Taylor: Look, I’m not saying that I subscribe to that particular reason. I’m just playing devil’s advocate, which is fair. 

Katie: I’m just going against the devil’s advocate there and saying there were other ways to do it.

Taylor: That’s fine. 

Katie: But either way, our last one, which I think we can both agree, falls to third place in the running here is Wakanda slash the Black Panther entity. I think again, we have the purple but beyond that, I mean, the suit has a very similar idea of Agatha kind of sucks in people’s blows and their power and then are able to then use it back against them. But also, I mean, the Heart-Shaped herb does inherently give the Black Panther powers in the sense of they’re pretty much like a super soldier. I don’t hate it. I don’t think it’s the best it could be. Not when you have a witch in the running. 

Taylor: Yeah, I agree. It is a little weak. I also think if you look at the idea of wanting power as kind of being a pre requisite Agatha fits that bill, right? Power hungry. The people of Wakanda are not. The Black Panther is not. They are focused on I mean, now they’re doing outreach, but they are focused on the good of others and the good of themselves not becoming some world superpower, dominating other countries and things like that. That’s not their goal. They’re not trying to amass weapons, are not trying to amass an army, none of that. That’s never been who they are as a people, which is inherently contradictory to the idea of gaining power at the heart of the Power Stone. So if you ask me, I think there’s a lot of reasons why it doesn’t work, just simply for the fact that philosophically they don’t align with what the Power Stone stands for. So why would the Black Panther be the embodiment of the Power Stone in this new iteration? I love the people of Wakanda. I love the Black Panther but this this one doesn’t sing for me. 

Katie: My only argument, I guess I could see as part the idea behind the Power Stone is what we’re used to seeing it for, which is the fact that people are power hungry. Agatha is a good example, but when we see the Power Stone, I mean, well, Thanos obviously wants it for other reasons, but it is part of the story. Obviously, we see Ronan, I think that’s the best example of when we see the Power Stone and how he’s power hungry and how he wants to use it. But I guess if you take the step back and you don’t look at the drive for power that comes from wanting that stone so bad and just kind of look at the stone as a whole, it’s just a lot of power. That’s what it is. And I kind of wonder if you look at it from that way, I can see whether, again, it’s the Black Panther themselves or the Wakandans as a group, whatever. I could kind of see that more if you’re looking at the stone being just a representation of having a lot of power. I could kind of see them starting to fit that mold a little bit more, not in the sense that they’re bad people because of it, but they’re a very powerful nation. They are arguably the most powerful nation in the world. And the Black Panther is very powerful individual and mantle because there is nothing stronger than not just being powerful in itself, but having that strong belief system behind it. So I could see if we went in that direction why they make this list. I think that makes a lot more sense to me. But again, they still fall third for me behind Kamala and Agatha.

Taylor: Yeah, I could see that if you’re changing perspectives on the philosophy outside of we’ve always seen it in a negative lens because it’s always been a plot device for a villain. But again, it kind of goes back to what we are talking about in one of our recent episodes. The idea of what would happen if we stopped viewing powerful objects as potential weapons and started viewing them as potential opportunities to do good. Kind of the same thing here. We always view the Power Stone as something that could enhance a villain and something they’re going for in order to enhance or move along their villainous agenda but in the right hands, a.k.a the people of Wakanda,i t could do a lot of good and it could also mean I already have power and I’m not bad because of it. I just have it, I earned it and I’m doing my thing and I have a righteous belief system behind it. So I like that kind of change of perspective I think is interesting. 

Katie: Yeah, I think that is to me what makes them make sense on the list rather than the greed of the power or the want of the power. It’s just the fact that they already have it and they’ve naturally already had it, that’s what the entirety of the first movie is about. And they have not used it for bad and they are just a great representation and so I think at the end of the day, they’re not the strongest on the list, but I could keep them there happily.

Taylor: I agree. 

Katie: Yeah so in the end, what does this theory as a whole mean? I mean, it’s a theory. It’s a good one as far as I’m concerned and honestly, I have to say, like, if we’re going to wrap this up, put a bow on it because it’s near Christmas, we don’t have Infinity Stones in this timeline. We know they’re very popular as seen in the TVA. They get pulled out all the time. So we are in one of I don’t want to say one of the few because there are infinite universes, but we are in probably the lesser amount of universes that don’t have any Infinity Stones. And I think it could be a very interesting way of saying you can never have a universe without something like this and that is what I think at the core of all of it, that’s what it means is whether or not we have the physical stones or we have heroes who well, or just people in general, but they happen to all be heroes for the most part, heroes that are representing these entities. You have to have them. They have to be there. They have to be in that universe for whatever reason that’s still very much unknown. But I think that’s kind of that bow on top of the present point there is that we’re never going to leave the Infinity Stones alone. 

Taylor: I love that you said that because in my research I came across the idea that we don’t have the physical stones, like you said, but the energy has to go somewhere, right? Energy, what does it matter cannot be created nor destroyed or energy cannot be created or destroyed? I don’t know. 

Katie: I think it’s matter. I don’t know. That’s science. 

Taylor: Whatever. Either way, whatever it is that is the basis of that sentence can’t be created or destroyed. And that’s kind of how I think this article was viewing the Infinity Stones, because it was taking us all the way back to what we learned they were. The singularities that formed during the creation of everything and they crystallized into these six stones. When the stones were destroyed, think about when we saw that in Endgame. We saw Thanos destroy them or they saw I’m sorry, we didn’t actually see Thanos destroy them, but they saw the energy signature, right? Because the energy dispersed. So then having them destroyed, the energy has to go somewhere. If it goes somewhere, why not then go into the person that each stone feels embodies its power, its meaning, and all of that the most. And then we go from physical being in a stone to physical being in a person, because the energy doesn’t go away it just finds a new manifestation. And in this case, going along this theory, it’s our hero slash quasi hero slash antiheroes. 

Katie: Yeah, I mean, I couldn’t agree more. I think that’s the best way to end it, is to say the power had to go somewhere and it just makes the most sense for it to go towards what it is attracted to the most. That is why I think we’re sitting here having this conversation and why we’re trying to figure out who embodies it the best, because I think that’s the best way to look at this theory is who pretty much sucked up a Power Stone, who pretty much sucked up a Soul Stone like that’s the idea here, right?

Taylor: Absolutely. 

Katie: I mean, we’re sucking up stones over here. That sounds like that’s a lot of fun. Did you think that was where this is going to end because I’m not sure?

Taylor: No and we even brought in, like, math and science. It’s like when you brought in the x y axis and you felt really good about yourself.

Katie: I to this day, to this day, feel so good about that. 

Taylor: You know, even though I can’t remember if the actual saying is for energy or matter.

Katie: I do feel like it’s matter. Or is it mass? 

Taylor: I don’t think it’s mass. Anyway before Kate and I rip out the Google to try to figure out what part of science we’re trying to talk about right now, we’re going to end this episode and spare you all the confusion that we are feeling, but this has been fun. It was great to dive into this theory that may or may not guide us into the next series of really exciting movies. If you are excited to follow us as we close out the year with a little bit more content and as we move into next year with all of its fantastic content, you can follow us on your podcast platform of choice. Make sure that you’re checking out our website as well, where we have the calendar and all of the interesting info about our show can be found on there as well as ways to support us, if you would be so inclined.

Katie: Go ahead and give us a follow on Twitter at SisAssembledPod and Instagram and Threads as SistersAssembled. We are wrapping up the year with our last episode of 2023 and it wouldn’t be doing it right if we didn’t do our rankings and our 2024 preview. So that is going to be our final episode of this year. We’re very excited. We’re looking forward to it and we hope you guys are as well. So make sure you guys coming back next week so you can hear that and get ready for what comes in 2024. And with that, as always, keep up with Marvel and keep up with us as Marvel does blew your mind, so let’s talk about it.