Spoilers below for those who aren’t caught up with Agatha All Along, so walk the Witches Road with caution.
We’re not even halfway through Agatha All Along’s season, and I’m already thinking it’s impossible for any upcoming Marvel TV shows to inspire the same kind of rabid theory-chasing that this horror dramedy has already provoked. (At least until Paul Bettany’s Vision series brings Ultron back.) From guessing who Aubrey Plaza’s Rio Vidal is to pondering the ramifications of Mrs. Hart’s death, it makes for fun Halloween season speculation.
One long-running magnet for such theories is Buffy the Vampire Slayer vet Emma Caulfield, who reprises her WandaVision role(s) of Dottie Jones / Sarah Proctor for the Disney+ spinoff series. She was previously presumed to be playing a character of great importance, due to reports around the time saying that Kevin Feige had to personally approve her casting. The actress says she was an intentional red herring, but I suspect deeper narrative ideas existed that were cut for time.
So seeing her pop up again in Agatha’s prestige crime drama mindscape in the first episode was a hoot, and though we’re technically no closer to figuring anything wildly revealing about ol’ Dottie, the door is wide open for a return to Emma Caulfiend-centered theories like the one below.
Could Dottie Be A Specific Variant Of Marvel's Arcanna?
For background, Dottie's minimal appearances in WandaVision drew comparisons to the witchy Marvel character Arcanna, due in large part to the Westview resident boasting a garden of bright yellow flowers. (They were white at some point, but yellow was the more predominant pick.) That prediction never played out with any kind of confirmation, but the events that have transpired in Agatha All Along sent me back to the Arcanna well.
To be sure, the mainstream Earth-712 version of Arcanna Jones could potentially fit the mold for what's gone down on the Witches Road so far, but it's specifically the Earth-31916 variant created by writer J. Michael Straczynski and artist Gary Frank that now piques my interest. While the idea is possibly far-fetched, let's look at some of the reasons why it seems more plausible than not.
Comparisons Between Dottie Jones And Earth-31916's Arcanna
First appearing as in 2005 in the pages of Supreme Power #18, this alt-Arcanna is both a scientist and the author of at least one book about quantum physics. She's also noted as being a keen observer of humanity.
- Emma Caulfield's first appearance as Dottie in Agatha All Along, which technically part of a spell-oriented fantasy and not reality, features her as a librarian, easily connecting her to books and authorship, as it were.
- When Agatha asks about the Darkhold (in no certain terms), Dottie advises her to go to Natural Sciences. That doesn't exactly make sense for a place to find copies of a book of the dead, but considering quantum physics is indeed a natural science, it feels like a potential clue about Dottie's true identity.
Earth-31916's Arcanna wasn't just interested in such science studies for the hell of it. Rather, her powers include the ability to see and affect quantum dimensions, as well as being able to see all possible outcomes of a specific event. But for the sake of this argument, it's far more interesting to note that she has the ability to not only create extremely realistic illusions and fully manipulate matter, but she can also zip characters back and forth between various dimensions and universes.
- The Witches Road is a construct that supposedly changes for every coven who starts the walk, so it's theoretically possible that everything we've seen so far, including the poison-addled Trial #1, isn't the "real" Road, but rather an illusion that Arcanna set up for Agatha's half-baked coven to travel. And without anyone being able to tell the difference.
- Agatha was as surprised as anyone to see the door portal open up on her basement floor, and also seemed concerned that the door closed behind them. Could it be because this isn't how the Road normally shows itself, and is actually just the way that Arcanna chose to transport the six characters from one realm to the next?
- If Wanda is truly dead and without a clear hold on Agatha's spell anymore, maybe it's been Dottie who's kept her confused as Agnes for the past three years in inspired-by-true-crime TV mode, and not Rio as many have suspected.
While also boasting the power of flight, Arcanna can also control massive amounts of water at once, and also has the power to make it appears as if she's walking on that water.
- As viewers are well aware, Episode 3's biggest threat beyond the poison and the hallucinations is the house they're in being completely submerged underwater over time, despite a total lack of rain or any noteworthy water sources outside the home.
Sure, the Witches Road realm itself could be capable of all the manipulation noted above, and we don't really have any way of proving otherwise, since the setting hasn't been explored repeatedly like other familiar comic book locations. Maybe someone else like a certain demon named Mephisto is responsible, or maybe it's Alice's mom pulling the strings so that Alice is able to find her.
But at this point, the details are stacking up almost too convincingly in a way that points to Emma Caulfield's Dottie being potentially responsible. Unless this show really pulls the rug out from ender everyone and reveals one of the other characters is Arcanna, which would be a real bummer without the WandaVision connections. Unless it's Dottie's husband Phil, who can't seem to keep his clothes blood-free.
Maybe Dottie Is Keeping A More Hellacious Secret
Given the attention paid to seemingly ever detail in this series, I questions how much of a coincidence it is that Dottie's faux credit in the series premiere appears over a high school football scoreboard for what's assumedly the Westview Blue Devils. (Since home teams are usually noted on the lefthand side.) Sure, yellow is the witchcraft color most suitably applied to Caulfield's character, but what if that was all just another blue herring...er...red herring.
Now that Mephisto has been namechecked in a direct way, along with the notion that he has minions doing his bidding, it's inherently feasible that Dottie could be a soldier in the demonic character's army. Though I guess I can't quite explain where the Blue comes from there, beyond it being a common spots team mascot. Yellow Devils, not so much. (Unless we're talking about Matt Murdock's yellow Daredevil suit.)
Whetever the answers end up being — I'm fully anticipating being wrong on all counts — Agatha All Along is letting me flex my speculation muscles in ways that have been creaky AF since WandaVision ended, so keep checking back each week to see what detail sends me up the theory flagpole next.
