‘Agatha All Along’ Episode 6 Recap: “Familiar By Thy Side”

Well, we’re in it now. Teen’s origin story. Er, wait, William Kaplan’s. Or is it Billy Maximoff’s? It’s all of them! Episode 6 of Agatha All Along begins three years ago in the series timeline, as William Kaplan, in his shimmering blue yarmulke, performs the reading of the Torah at his “Magick Mitzvah” in Eastview, New Jersey. Joe Locke plays this younger version of his character with a wholesome inquisitiveness, the only child and absolute pride of his parents, Rebecca (Maria Dizzia) and Jeff (Paul Adelstein). The magic theme continues at William’s bar mitzvah afterparty, where palm readings by none other than Lilia Calderu are part of the entertainment. But when Lilia takes William’s hand, she’s struck with one of those shock moments we know from earlier episodes of Agatha. “The Tower Reversed!” And in her crystal ball is the image of Teen in all his eyeliner’d and black heart earring’d glory. “Your lifeline is broken in two,” Lilia tells William. He isn’t looking when Lilia draws a filigree sigil on a little domino of wood and drops it in his jacket pocket. “Enjoy the now, baby. It’s the only thing that’s certain.”

Lilia saw what was up. In Agatha All Along, that it is William who becomes a bodily vessel for the hex-jettisoned soul/consciousness of Wanda Maximoff’s son Billy is not random. It’s some kind of fate. As a disturbance in “the anomaly” plaguing neighboring Westview forces the party’s evacuation, a near-collision forces the Kaplan family off the road, leaving William unconscious. He wakes with a start. “Tommy!” And suddenly he’s looking at all of the people around him – Rebecca and Jeff, the paramedics, Alice Wu-Gulliver as an Eastview police officer – like “Who the fuck are all these people?” William Kaplan has been imbued with the spirit (or whatever) of Billy Maximoff. During times of stress, he can hear people’s thoughts. And rather than alarming anyone, he decides to just go with it and do his own research. 

Now it’s three years later, and William Kaplan hears the mind of his boyfriend Eddie (Miles Gutierrez-Riley), who longs to express his love. The feeling’s mutual, so William wants to come clean. The car accident? He died that night. And when he came back, “I was different. Something else. Something more.” In this other half of his lifeline, he doesn’t even remember what came before. Who came before. Only that he must make solid the notion of who he is now. William shows Eddie how there were runes within the hex. It was not an anomaly, not an Avengers training op skidded sideways. It was a spell. Witchcraft. And William’s Reddit contact @bohnerific69 has a line on the truth.

Evan Peters returns! He was Peter “Quicksilver” Maximoff in the X-Men films and the hexed husband of Agnes/Agatha in WandaVision, but now he’s just a haggard standup comic with Westview PTSD. This version of Ralph Bohner, whose thoughts William also reads, is who turns him on to Wanda’s lost twins, Tommy and Billy. (“The little speedster and his mind-reading brother.”) It’s the hinge, the moment episode 6 merges with the events of Agatha All Along  Agatha All Along Episode 1. And William becomes more of the goth Teen we know as he Googles infamous Salem witch Agatha Harkness and her murderous, disruptive exploits throughout the centuries. (Agatha was the homewrecker Dolly Parton wrote “Jolene” about, among other highlights.) The attempted burglary, Agatha’s jaded detective act, and the confrontation in her Westview home. He tells her how he longs to walk the Witches’ Road, just like in the famous song by Lorna Wu & the Coral Shore. It’s where he’ll gain the power he needs. (This is a play, obviously; power is what Agatha craves.) He tells this succubus, this witch killer, that his name is William Kaplan. And finally, with no prohibitive sigil present, he tells Agatha what she will later say she suspected all along. “I’m Billy Maximoff.” 

Back on the Witches’ Road, a mud-caked Agatha crawls to the surface, with Lilia and Jen nowhere to be seen. And she says though she suspected, she wasn’t exactly sure. That is until the emotional stress of seeing Agatha drain Alice to death manifested Billy’s Maximoffian powers. (Episode 5, “Darkest Hour/Wake Thy Power”.) Billy and his mother have the same tell, anyway. Behind the mud her eyes are narrowed. “Where did you come by this fresh body you’re wearing?” 

Kathryn Hahn is just so great, because simultaneously, she can visually and orally express all of the Agathas we know. That Teen/Billy apparently killed Lilia and Jen for them to arrive here is not her concern. She attempts to tick off how many lives she’s taken across nearly 500 years of witchly havoc, but it’s hopeless. And besides. “You survived,” she tells him. “Like witches have been doing for centuries. You saw an empty vessel and moved in. That’s what kept you alive. That’s what makes you special.” She’s not even mad. She’s impressed. 

And so. “What does Billy Maximoff want at the end of the Road? Big Magick is already in the bag.” It’s not Wanda. Not Vision, “Robo-Papa,” who the streets say was sold for scrap. The only name left is the one on William Kaplan’s original list. Billy’s lost twin brother, Tommy Maximoff. Agatha and Billy, formerly known as Teen, will stay on the Witches’ Road together. They both sense that they still need each other, even if those impulses are denied out loud and not exactly emotionally evident. While there is not trust, there is a wary alliance. “Got it,” Agatha says with a mischievous wink and an evil mustache-like twirl of her muddy locks of hair. Hahn! 

“Let’s go find the next trial. Last one there is a nice person.”

Johnny Loftus (@glennganges) is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift.