Agatha All Along episode 3: Mephisto named, Teen clues explained

Agatha All Along episode 3, Through Many Miles of Tricks and Trials, is the first and perhaps only time our dark lord was named in the MCU, and hearing it sent me into a state of euphoria. On a closer look, the episode is also packed with details, references and clues, especially about Teen and about what Agatha gave up for the Darkhold.

The 2024 Disney+ series stars Kathryn Hahn, Joe Locke and Aubrey Plaza. This is the episode where we get a sense of the show's structure, with each trial on the Witches' Road working like its own escape room built on a pop culture reference to sisterhood and witchcraft. Showrunner Jac Schaeffer said the idea came from the original trials witches would have to go through, including a fire trial and a water trial.

The Witches' Road set was built practically to evoke The Wizard of Oz

When Teen says the road is exactly how he pictured it, Agatha tells him it suits him. I think she's talking not just about his goth vibe but about the DIY nature of his approach to witchcraft. The road itself was done practically. Behind the scenes featurettes show trees bent to look like hooded ghosts, and miniatures were used for background locations seen from a distance, all to evoke the practical techniques of Victor Fleming's 1939 The Wizard of Oz.

When the witches note that the Salem Seven chased Agatha down here, Kathryn Hahn does an arm flap gesture that looks like she's calling them chickens. Jennifer Kale says she'll call Teen's parents, and he says he's certain they're asleep. Could that mean they're dead? He keeps talking about his parents, but we don't know what's going on with them.

Westview's historical society and a possible Hellmouth beneath the town

Sharon reveals she's a member of the Westview Historical Society, and I'll go out on a limb to say Sarah Proctor might be another member. My theory is that when Agatha visited the librarian while under her spell, it might have been Sarah's house, and Sarah, whose name dates back to the real Salem witch trials, could have kept the Darkhold in her personal book collection. Actress Emma Caulfield Ford was in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Sharon's talk of a failed transit system under a small town reminds me of my old theory that there might be a Hellmouth under Westview, like the one beneath Sunnydale High.

Sharon is describing something like the tunnels in Jordan Peele's Us, and I want to know what that beekeeper from WandaVision episode 2 was crawling through. I also wonder why Vision chose this town. Lilia Calderu, Jennifer Kale and Lorna Wu's daughter Alice are high profile witches to all be within a few miles of the Scarlet Witch's hex, and I think it's possible Vision's Mind Stone sensed a wellspring of magic there. Separately, Scarlet Witch Updates on Twitter pointed out a promo shot of Agatha kicking Teen out of a chair in the real world, which tells us a future episode will revisit episode 1 from the neighbors' point of view.

Teen's sigil: clumsy, amateur and possibly self-inflicted

When Agatha spots the sigil on Teen's mouth, Joe Locke's mouth moves for one, but definitely not more than two syllables, which could fit Billy. I think he's probably Billy Kaplan, but there's probably more to the story. Jac Schaeffer told TheWrap that "the original idea was that it was a redaction bar because that is what the spell is," adding that it's a clumsy spell that shows its amateurishness. Describing the spell as clumsy and amateur suggests Teen might have placed it on himself. She also described the sigil as sans serif, in contrast to the serif witchcraft of more experienced witches.

When Teen asks why anyone would hide him, Agatha pushes him behind her body, hiding him from the camera angle. She claims sigil magic is beneath her, but I think she knows, or at least suspects, more about why Teen has it than she's letting on.

Wants, the path and the full moon water trial

Agatha goes down the line reminding each witch of her want: for Jen to unbind, for Lilia to reverse her fortunes, for Alice to learn what happened to her mom. It's very Wizard of Oz. Sharon nearly gets swallowed by mud just off the path, and Agatha explains that the lyric means to never step off the road. That makes me think the fallen leaves covering the path might have floor is lava logic, protecting the witches from the forest's muck.

At the beach house, someone wonders if this is the end, and it will be for Sharon. Agatha side eyes Teen, who seems to be enjoying this more than the rest. The door carving shows phases of the moon, marking this house as the full moon and the water phase. I'd speculated the trials might correspond to moon phases, so that's one theory I got right out of probably a hundred wrong. Online correlations vary, but the full moon makes sense, since that's when tides are higher than normal.

Big Little Lies references inside the beach house

Inside, the six of them shift into preppy country club attire straight out of Big Little Lies, and the HBO series gets referenced in the background as Huge Tiny Lies. I don't think there's any witchcraft in that show, unless you count Meryl Streep's acting, which is that enchanting. But it is a show with a group of women and a dead body at the end of season 1, and I think of Debra Jo Rupp here as the season 2 Meryl Streep scene stealer. The aspect ratio also shifts from cinematic widescreen on the road to a more TV ratio inside, something WandaVision did often.

The amulets are worth a look. Jen's looks like a potion bottle. The jewelry artist who designed Lilia's called it the sun tarot card, representing love, joy and success, correcting my earlier guess of the queen of cups. Alice's looks like a heart to me, which might connect to the three of swords. Rio's is her curved dagger, the kind carried by Death in the death tarot card.

Sharon's foreshadowing and Agatha's baby shower line

Sharon says "bury me in that kitchen," and that kitchen will be where she expires. The invitation to the first trial sits beneath a painting of two women floating in a pool, or perhaps one woman mirrored in the water. Agatha asks if this is a wedding and pleads, not a baby shower. If she sacrificed her baby boy for the Darkhold, it makes sense she wouldn't want to be around babies, and the episode ends with her crawling toward a crib.

The riddle points to wine, and they find a 2016 Spanish Rioja. A wine bottle in WandaVision's first episode had us all expecting a House of M story. This is just a red wine, but if you changed the spelling to Reina, you might get some version of Red Queen.

Jen confirms Agatha traded her son for the Darkhold

Jen warns Teen: "Did you know she traded her own child for the book of the damned?" This confirms that the corpse, whose library card belonged to a book spelling out Darkhold, was a projection of Agatha's sacrifice of her son, Nicholas Scratch. This could have been what angered the Salem witches so much. It also gives context to an odd moment in WandaVision episode 5, where Agatha was cradling a corpse, which makes me think she might have been dwelling on Nicholas. Maybe her previous trip down the Witches' Road was an attempt to get her son back.

Jen seems to hint that some trace of Nicholas is possessing Teen. For now, I'm sticking with my theory that he's Billy Kaplan, future Wiccan, who might have been in the car accident from the near death in Westview headline seen under Joe Locke's name in every episode's credits, an article dated December 14, 2023, and that he was saved by a spirit possessing his nearly dead body. That could have been Nicholas Scratch.

Mephisto is named in the MCU

Then Jen says the words that might have been written for us: "They say he might be dead. Others say he might be a demon or an agent of Mephisto." They actually said it, and it doesn't feel real. I don't care if it's a one time pity gesture to fans like us; we'll take it. Still, I'd be surprised if the show links Nicholas Scratch to Mephisto this openly in episode 3. If they were going there, I think the writing would hint more cautiously, unless they plan a big surprise, like revealing that's who Rio Vidal is.

There's also room in the cast billing for another big name like Sacha Baron Cohen, who has been rumored to be playing Mephisto in Ironheart. The closing credits show the main cast, then two open slots before Debra Jo Rupp, Patti LuPone and Aubrey Plaza, and Plaza's tarantula shot has been empty in the last two episodes. The biggest names after the lead tend to come at the end, preceded by the word with. Then again, Jen could just be referring to the name's historical associations with the devil. In 2006's Marvel Knights 4 issues 26 and 27, Nicholas Scratch poses as Doctor Strange, gets banished to hell by Franklin and Valeria Richards, and agrees to become an agent of Mephisto in a coming war. We never really hear from him after that.

Teen's reaction to the Mephisto line

Rewatching this scene a dozen times, I'm increasingly interested in Teen's reactions. He starts off in denial, gets tense as Jen speculates, and when Mephisto comes up there's something downright hostile in his eyes. As Jen walks away, his hand claws angrily or anxiously. It could just be him grappling with uncomfortable truths about his idol, but I think part of him feels threatened about being exposed. After this he gets more urgent and more forward.

When Teen asks for wine, the others say no, but Agatha says yes. If she is projecting Nicholas Scratch onto him, she's okay with him endangering himself. Sharon downs her pour, then the second pour that was meant for Teen, making her his sin eater in a way. Alice finishes next, Jen and Lilia only sip, and Agatha pours hers into a plant. That's the order the effects take hold. Alice also reveals a tattoo from Red Rocks, a venue rumored to be haunted, which Teen recognizes as a ward against spells; I think it might be a rune like the one Agatha and Wanda used to draw the line for dark magic. When Alice says her trauma happened at 13, Teen says his did too. Since he's 16 and the show is set three years after WandaVision, he might mean that December 2023 headline.

Alewife's Revenge and Sharon's prayer to Wanda

Agatha's glass refills automatically, like the mug spell Doctor Strange places on Thor, and here it's a practical effect with what must be a concealed hose up Hahn's arm. Having to drink it all reminds me of the potion guarding the fake locket Horcrux in Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. The witches' faces swell, and Jen names the poison as Alewife's Revenge. An alewife is a herring, which reminds me of a red herring, a distraction from the real threat. Agatha also cracks the window, and I wonder if the flood would have been as much of a threat without that weak point.

Sharon begs, "Let him breathe, please," returning to Mr. Hart choking in WandaVision episode 1, but with different words. This could be what she was saying in her heart, or a prayer she made when her husband died, asking the Scarlet Witch to help her. That would be sad, and Agatha might feel a twinge of jealousy that someone sought Wanda's help, perhaps learning there's another way for a witch to be.

Alice, Jen and Lilia relive their greatest fears

The antidote needs frankincense, a gift given to baby Jesus, which is interesting since Agatha finds her baby in a kind of manger; honey from a eusocial insect; and petroleum, found in Jen's products. Lilia's outbursts seem to be part of her divination, and I wonder if her line was something Agatha's mother Evanora said. Alice's mirrors create an infinity effect like Steven Grant's bathroom in Moon Knight, before she sees her mother Lorna drink poison. Lorna's belief in a blood curse reminded me of It Follows and Final Destination.

Jen's vision comes in one unbroken shot: the camera pans away and back, and the kitchen is lit blue and aquatic with a doctor standing there. Domestic horror does this a lot, from Poltergeist's stacked chairs to the open cupboards in The Sixth Sense. The doctor calls her an inconvenient woman and drowns her. I feel like he might have done something unethical and Jen threatened to expose him. I'd love this to be a backstory for Michael Stuhlbarg's Dr. Nicodemus West. Lilia follows her younger self into an overgrown house and finds her maestra, or teacher, with death's shadow creeping behind. Between fire, water and this earthly house, we're seeing three ways witches were persecuted: burned, drowned, buried alive. An Italian plague from 1629 to 1631 is something a 450 year old Sicilian witch would have lived through.

Agatha finds the Darkhold in a baby basket

Teen boils the antidote with a sous vide his dad loves, another of the recurring parent mentions. Agatha, last to drink, follows a baby's cry to a basket and finds the Darkhold. I wonder whether this is a metaphorical nightmare or literally how it happened, with Agatha making a deal with Chthon or maybe Mephisto, then waking to find the book instead of her baby. A practical transition lets the other actors quietly clear and return to the set without a cut. The moment comes straight from Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby, whose wailing vocals inspired the Lopezes' closing credits music.

The first person to talk to Agatha afterward is Teen, asking what she saw, and I think he knows. Without hesitation, Agatha slices Teen's palm for blood from the unpoisoned.

Flooding the set and The Goonies water slide

The oven pops open in a nod to Hansel and Gretel. Behind the scenes footage shows they flooded this set, and actors get paid more if they're visibly dripping. According to my colleague Joanna Robinson, the Lost cast and crew called this a wet bump, which is why the water only reaches the actors' knees. I suspect Agatha doesn't want to save Sharon, but she reluctantly doubles back and cackles like a pirate going into the oven.

The slide that follows seems like a direct homage to The Goonies, whose winding water slide was built on Warner Bros. Stage 16 in Burbank. When the camera angles up, the actors are damp and muddy but not dripping: no wet bump. Teen reveals Sharon's dead, and Agatha asks, "Who's Sharon?" It's a solid callback.