“Agatha All Along” creator on that Mephisto name-drop: 'We're always playing with the audience'

Was that reference an inside joke or an overt wink to the arrival of a powerful Marvel villain? According to Jac Schaeffer, maybe it's both.

Warning: This article contains spoilers from Agatha All Along episode 3, "Through Many Miles of Tricks and Trials."

As far as the Agatha All Along theories go, two characters swiftly rose through the ranks as the big guesses for a surprise reveal down the (witches') road: Wanda Maximoff herself (Elizabeth Olsen) or Mephisto, an all-powerful demon with ties to Agatha Harkness in Marvel comics. Whether either will show up is still anyone's guess, but the clues are there, and episode 3 now gives a much more overt nod to the latter possibility.

The first trial on the Witches' Road presents Agatha Harkness (Kathryn Hahn) and her coven with an oceanside house, which magically gives them wasp-y, east coast fashion ensembles — high pin-striped shirt collars, pearls, and wine to go around. As they survey the scene, potions expert Jennifer Kale (Sasheer Zamata) has a one-on-one moment with the mysterious Teen (Joe Locke). Since he still cannot share any details about himself with the other witches, thanks to a sigil cast upon him by an as-yet unknown entity, Jennifer considers all the possibilities of his true identity — much like what the viewers themselves are doing.

One option she throws out, she says, is that this Teen could be "an agent of Mephisto." In an interview with Entertainment Weekly that took place prior to the show's premiere on Disney+, showrunner Jac Schaeffer addresses that particular name-drop in episode 3, titled "Through Many Miles of Tricks and Trials," which surely raises eye brows among comic enthusiasts.

Related: Agatha All Along star Aubrey Plaza channeled 'chaotic energy' for Rio Vidal: 'There's all kinds of layers'

"With these shows, so often there is something that is at once a joke and a wink and a nod, and actually has something legitimate underneath it," Schaeffer comments. "As we all know, Mephisto is a character who's very wrapped into Agatha's storyline. I mean, people have to watch, but we're always playing with the audience in that way."

Mephisto is a fun one because fans of WandaVision theorized when it was airing that the character was involved somehow. Though, that hypothesis proved to be false. Inspired by the demon Mephistopheles, Mephisto lords over a dimension in the underworld and is determined to acquire as many souls of the living as possible. He often appears in the likeness of the biblical Satan and loves a good mischievous bargain or trick to get what he wants.

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One current fan theory gaining popularity online for Agatha All Along is that Aubrey Plaza's Rio Vidal, the so-called "green witch" who has history with the lead character, could really be an interpretation of Blackheart, a child of Mephisto from the comics. Rio mentions in the first episode that she has a black heart that beats for Agatha, while Patti LuPone's divination witch Lilia Calderu draws a black heart when she foresees another witch joining their coven. Or could Rio be Mephisto himself in disguise?

Related: How Agatha All Along channels the history of iconic pop culture witches

"I can't say everything about my character now, but I'll say that there's all kinds of layers," Plaza previously teased of Rio to EW. "I really wanted to try to bring some kind of chaotic energy and a spontaneity to it that would keep Agatha on her toes, and just have fun playing in that dynamic."

In terms of the other big theory, whether Olsen herself will appear on Agatha All Along, Schaeffer speaks about how much of Wanda's shadow she wanted to include on the series.

"There was a lot of consideration," she says. "That's a great way of articulating it: her shadow. Agatha is not a character who's going to stand in anyone's shadow. So this is emphatically Agatha Harkness' show. However, we are in the WandaVision corner of the universe, so Wanda's legacy has threads in this narrative. But, yeah, it is about Agatha. It's about her journey, it's about the truth of her, and that is very much our focus with the show."

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly.