WARNING: The following contains spoilers for What If...? Season 1, Episode 4, “What If… Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands?” streaming now on Disney+.
Cautionary examples make excellent material for a series like What If…?, not only because the show has free reign to explore some of the darkest possibilities of a choice gone wrong, but because it helps highlight and accentuate the heroics of the “prime” Marvel Cinematic Universe. Last-second rescues and victory against long odds are part and parcel for comic book stories. What If…? and stories like it help prevent such moments from becoming too routine by highlighting how easily and catastrophically things could have gone. Season 1, Episode 4, “What If… Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands?” provides an overtly unsettling example of how heroic the Prime MCU’s figures really are.
WandaVision is, in this case, the perfect counterexample, not only because it deals with similarly reality-affecting powers as “Lost His Heart,” but because the central character is grieving a loved one. Wanda Maximoff is no stranger to the dark side -- just as Doctor Strange in "Lost His Heart -- and as she’s all but confirmed to play an antagonistic role in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, she may yet fall to it. For now, however, she's far ahead of this variant Doctor Strange.
The What If…? version of the character lost the love of his life, Christine Palmer, who was with him on the night of the accident that sent him on the path to mastering the mystic arts. The car crash claims her life, driving him to find some way to bring her back. When the power of the Time Stone isn’t enough to save her – her death is an “absolute point” in time and cannot be changed – he delves into more forbidden magic. He ultimately succeeds in resurrecting her, but destroys his reality in the process, realizing too late that his selfishness has doomed trillions to nonexistence.
The prime MCU's Wanda walks a very similar line for very similar reasons. Though she doesn’t possess an Infinity Stone, her powers stem from a combination of exposure to the Mind Stone, and her latent magic powers, which tap into “chaos magic.” That allows her to reshape reality itself, which is likely why her magical effects are red, to match the red Reality Infinity Stone. She’s manipulating power on the same level as Doctor Strange, and with the same devastating effects. In addition, like the variant Strange, she’s motivated by grief the change reality and bring a loved one back. Both figures succeed at great cost, only to be undone by the fundamental schisms that their efforts create, and in both cases, it’s the innocent who suffer the most. For What If…?’s “Strange Supreme,” it’s everyone in his reality. For Wanda, it’s the citizens of Westview, who serve as living props for the sitcom world she tries to live in.
The similarities are striking, and yet Wanda ultimately understands what Strange refuses to. Her magic is hurting others, and the longer she clings to her departed lover, the longer that harm goes on. She releases them at no small risk to herself during WandaVision, Season 1, Episode 9, “The Series Finale,” then retreats into hiding. Their pain is enough to get her to change course and step away from the abyss, at least for the time being.
“Lost His Heart” puts that in stark perspective with a hero in a similar state of mind possessing powers that can literally rewrite reality. Like Wanda, he’s overcome with grief and can’t let his lover go. Only in this case, he’s too selfish to notice the damage he’s causing until its too late, so focused on keeping Christine alive that he can’t see all of the others paying the cost. Even worse, he refuses to listen despite being told directly by the Ancient One, the Watcher and even another version of himself. Wanda, in contrast, ultimately put the needs of those she’s hurting over her own.
Whether or not that continues has yet to be seen, but her act stands out all the more thanks to the long gaze into the abyss of the last episode of What If...?. It’s even more important considering how close Wanda came to following the same path, which might have had equally devastating effects on the prime MCU reality. Indeed, it might have ended everything much the same way, and if What If…?’s core premise holds true, there is a universe out there where it did. That deepens the implications of Wanda’s final moral choice without even having to mention her. As good as it is in and of itself, What If...? is doing wonders for its fellow MCU properties.
What If ...? is available to stream on Disney+, with new episodes streaming every Wednesday.
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