Agatha All Along

It’s all cleverly done and very funny but also suspenseful and a little scary, with a winning combination of the supernatural and the banal (the witches arguing about who was pitchy and who was flat when they sing a magic song). .... Hahn is hilarious, which makes her likable good company, whatever her shenanigans or cutting remarks.

In "Circle Sewn With Fate, Unlock Thy Hidden Gate," the pace is downright brisk. In just 40 minutes, we've gotten a whole coven together and motivated them to perform a complex spell that requires everyone to work together. With only four episodes remaining and several trials on the road to get through, Agatha All Along seems like the rare MCU show that won't outstay its welcome.

Agatha feels accessible and unique, offering a spooky, fun Halloween-season romp sure to keep you on the edge of your seat week after week. Just four episodes in, this series has a clearer identity than almost all of its predecessors, and fantastically utilizes the medium and its talented players to craft an engaging, funny, smart, sexy, singular show.

The mood is zippy; the aesthetic swings between repressed domestic formality and trippy supernatural neon.

Even when the mechanics of its story aren’t entirely clear to the audience, “Agatha All Along” is never less than thoroughly enjoyable. There’s a sense of fun, not to mention consistent episodic structure, in the coven’s journey down the Road, punctuated by Agatha’s tantrums and waystations set-designed to the gills.

Agatha is no WandaVision retread, and its detour into detective-drama hackery is just the first of its many delightful, hyper-culturally-literate surprises.

For now, Marvel fans can rest assured that Agatha All Along gets off to a solid start, maintaining a similar tone and quality level to WandaVision, while not relying on nostalgia from that years-old hit.

Agatha All Along may take its title from a flashback, but everything else about the show (so far) suggests that there’s more than enough to mine when all you’ve got is all Agatha, all the time.

A charming concoction of snappy humour, strong performances and enchanting nostalgia that makes for perfect pre-Halloween viewing. Kathryn Hahn’s sheer magnetism alone will have you spellbound.

Despite the story feeling a tad rushed at times, the two-part premiere does a superb job of teeing up the dire circumstances that takes Agatha and her new coven down the Witches’ Road.

Fans who have been anxiously awaiting Agatha All Along since WandaVision ended are sure to be satisfied with where things go. Not only that, but the show serves as a compelling entry point for new fans, too, feeling like the beginning of a new, magic-heavy side of the MCU with the kind of characters who haven’t been given the spotlight before.

It’s definitely a much better use of Hahn as Agatha than just continuing the WandaVision format. .... We’re excited to see Hahn, Plaza and the rest of the cast of Agatha All Along take Agatha’s story in whatever direction it goes.

The first four episodes of "Agatha All Along" have done a great job at finding the balance between turning Marvel lore into a spooky fun time (not unlike "Werewolf By Night") and laying the groundwork for what has the potential to be one of the best Marvel TV shows on the roster by being unapologetically its own thing.

There's fun to be had with a premise like this. Unfortunately it takes a while to get there. Agatha All Along's debut pair of episodes are not terribly representative of the show. .... In fact, the show doesn't feel like it truly begins until the other witches are present. It's here where a loose structure begins to settle in. .... Here's hoping it's finally learned how to build a proper show around her.

Flimsy but enjoyable is the overarching tone here. .... The cast also seems to realize that they’re just onscreen to have fun and go big with their performances, which in turn leads to wildly divergent levels of commitment from all involved.

The show’s execution could be stronger. But there’s a lot of power — and even joy — to be found in watching Agatha tear into the world, like the witch she is.

Written by Jac Schaeffer, who was the showrunner on “WandaVision,” “Agatha All Along” lacks the creative spark that made “WandaVision” worth watching.

Satisfaction is much less forgiving, and a smarter show, or even just one more concerned with not setting its audience up for a fall, wouldn’t let quite so much hinge on the result of filling in a few blanks. .... That’s not to say Agatha All Along isn’t enjoyable, even if most of the joy is to be found around the edges. .... But I could feel myself bracing for the part when it gets less fun, when the self-contained storytelling gives way to larger imperatives and the fun turns into homework.

As anyone might expect of such a stacked cast, it’s a pleasure simply to hang out in their midst. That they all high-key hate Agatha, for apparently good reason, just adds to the fun. .... It’s the actual storytelling that tends to be hit or miss.

The possibility remains that these disparate elements will come together in a satisfying way when the whole arc of the show is clear. For now, Agatha All Along makes a fun enough Halloween season watch for those who love witchy classics like Practical Magic and The Craft, but won’t strike most Marvel fans as essential viewing.

The stake-less drama I already went over, but the jokes are sparse, the effects are too slapped-together, and the scares are polite. The consistent creative spark needed to boost a serviceable series into something more just isn’t there. As with many Marvel series, there’s plenty of potential in “Agatha All Along,” but past precedent is working against the final five episodes.

As trifling as “Agatha All Along” feels, at least it’s watchable, marginally humorous, and not at all like Marvel homework despite its connection to past Marvel shows. Furthermore, and maybe this is faint praise, at least it’s a big step up from the dire “Secret Wars” and “Echo” nadir.

Creator Jac Schaeffer, a “WandaVision” veteran, conjures up a decent amount of lore and incident, clever ideas and solid performances, but fails to work much out with any real pizzazz. Plotlines feel arbitrary and old hat, while characters struggle to be more than wisecrack machines.

A pleasant trifle that’s nothing more than a franchise footnote.

I didn't hate "Agatha All Along," but I didn't love it either. Overall, the story is thin and seems too manufactured to capture audiences' imaginations. But I enjoyed the show well enough to keep watching.

Now that she is at the center of “Agatha All Along,” she is still selfish, vain, manipulative and condescending, but her flaws have not gained much interest or emotional resonance, and Hahn’s performance is uncharacteristically flat.

One of the most versatile and transformative actors of her generation, she [Kathryn Hahn] is just so good at playing bad (or really, playing anything a Hollywood script can throw at her). You wonder, given she's the real draw of the show, why she's hidden beneath excess characters and themed costumes.

It deserves credit for pushing against Hollywood ageism by casting largely middle-aged female leads. But good intentions go only so far, and not even a performer operating at Hahn’s levels of twinkling charm can bring this moribund affair to life.

When this show embraces its gothic side, whether it is creepy ballads to open a portal, haunting spectres in a peculiar house or hooded figures, it could be an early Halloween treat, particularly for adolescents. A Hocus Pocus for Gen Z. Yet the jokes and set pieces often miss the mark. .... The main problem is, like the recent Star Wars series Ahsoka and The Acolyte, we’re now watching spin-offs of spin-offs, supporting characters of supporting characters.

“Agatha All Along” is sometimes held together by the ensemble’s natural skill set and camaraderie. .... The four episodes available to press go through the derivative Point-A-to-B structure, featuring one-note characters traveling to a CGI world. And because the episode count is so minimal, the story’s flow is frantic, leaving pieces of potential regarding character scattered in its path.