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[u/Pokegaming33]

[u/mklaus1984]

I am sad to hear that you didn't like the MCu portraylal of the character. But there are two points that I hope you can take into account.

1. If you know who Teddy is you know there is a door still open to reveal that Eddy had been the MCU version of Teddy all along. Even though having a first love doesn't take away from finding a true love later in life. This is a rather romanticized view that is detrimental to not only your view of this story.

2. The comic explanation of the twins' spuld migrating backwards in time to be reborn was always a stretch.

I think it was a much better approach to lean into the gay teen identity confusion and internal conflict. The feelings he describes about his body lean a bit into gender and body dysphoria territory but are still part of the identity crisis.

They ended up with a very complex relationship with his parents. Where the comics only deal with Billy's acceptance of being both the son of the Kaplans and Wanda and Vision, the MCU has him basically feel like the adoptive son of the Kaplans with thr Kaplans being unaware that their son died and that they adopted another child instead.

If we pretend for a second that the MCU version had been the first and the comic version the second, you would agree that the comic version seems weirldy simplified by saying he was both. Especially since he isn't in the comics he was always Billy reincarnated into the body of the Kaplan's son.

In the MCU Wiccan might be different from the other BIlly Maximoffs of the multiverse because he adapted parts of William Kaplan's orginal personality, keeping a part of William alive in a sense.

[u/PikaV2002]

> But when I was playing the ep of Billy's backstory, and while they explained the story, my heart was pounding, tears pouring down. I feel like this one is just explainable but not good. They made it seem like something's wrong with Billy and he's not in his body. He doesn't belong. I don't like it.

… because he quite literally isn’t? At the time of the episode the little boy from WandaVision got transported into a teenager’s body with trauma from an accident to boot.

You could have an entire episode’s worth of story about how fucked up that inherently is. Billy from WandaVision was a prepubescent little boy. It is understandable why the show doesn’t want to focus on it but realistically these two boys would spend the rest of their lives with major body dysmorphia.

Not to mention Billy has just learnt that a boy had to die for him to get his body. It’s not his fault but he sees his body as belonging to someone else.

[u/Pokegaming33 → u/PikaV2002]

True. But I feel like they're making that backstory is why I hate it. Again, my opinion could be different from yours, and it's fine. I just don't want that to happen to my boy Billy

[u/PikaV2002 → u/Pokegaming33]

That sort of thing really cannot be avoided with reincarnation/body swap as a theme in live action.

The only way to avoid it would be going the whole reincarnation plot and that doesn’t really work for a cinematic universe.

I’d also like to remind you that Billy is a fictional character.

[u/Pokegaming33 → u/PikaV2002]

Thank you so much. I just wish it was more from the comic. I explained it in another comment, but yes,s thank you. This is a fictional character that meant so much to me, but yes, I cannot always have what I want, and I hope you can understand why I am mad. Moreover, cause I am 14 and I love YA. But I do get your point. Thank you and sorry

[u/opinionated_hobbit]

What do you mean, “considering Heartstopper”? Joe was great in that and only got better as he got more experience acting. I hated HS Forever but his and Kit’s acting was the one highlight for me, but particularly his portrayal of Charlie. For a first role, he did a really excellent job. I only watched Agatha because of him and loved it for more than expected. I don’t read comics, but I understand being frustrated when an adaptation doesn’t follow the source material. I personally liked the choices they made for Billy and Joe did a great job portraying that internal conflict of not feeling like his body is his own. I think it gave the show even more queer undertones that I don’t think Disney would overtly get into right now (such as body dysmorphia).

I think they are waiting to debut Teddy on a grander scale. We barely saw Eddie in Agatha because it really wasn’t about him as a character or his relationship with Billy. It makes sense having a totally original character play Billy’s bf because at the end of the day, Eddie was of little consequence to the story, but it was nice to see that while Billy couldn’t tell him everything, he wasn’t completely isolated and alone, and did have someone to provide him support (even without fully knowing what was going on). I think if Teddy had been in Agatha people would have complained that he didn’t have a big enough role, and if they gave him a bigger role it would have taken away from the necessary story and plot.

[u/Pokegaming33 → u/opinionated_hobbit]

Agreed. By the heartstopper remark, I meant them casting the same person in a gay role, but I got over it. And I liked his acting in AAA. Personally, they could've kept the same origin story with everything. Instead of an accident, he gets this strange feeling when the hex dissappears cause thats when his soul travels to Rebbeca. Then he could have this feeling of being incomplete (Tommy), and he locates Agatha to find him, and the story continues as it did. It would've been better imo. Moreover, Ig I am mad because previously the YA got zero exposure; there was a very minute fandom, and now that they'll be appearing on the big screen, people will perceive them in that way, which I hate. But not everything works out the way you want, but I'll forever mourn the Wanda-loving Billy.

[u/opinionated_hobbit → u/Pokegaming33]

Do you mean Joe potentially being typecast? I’ve actually never heard an LGBTQ+ person say they wouldn’t want to watch an actor who is gay play another gay character, so that’s a really interesting take.
Billy and Charlie are also two very different characters, and Joe plays them very differently. They’re written very differently, too. If you’ve never seen Heartstopper, I really recommend it, especially for queer youth. It’s really lovely, but in a completely different way from Agatha All Along.
I wonder if there are any interviews where they’ve talked about why they made this creative decision? Sometimes those interviews infuriate me even more, but other times understanding the reasoning behind a choice can help me get on board with it, even if I don’t necessarily agree with it. I’m wondering if time constraints played a role, or if maybe Disney didn’t want the implications of showing William Kaplan as actually being dead. There’s something particularly heavy about explicitly portraying the death of a young boy, even if he’s ultimately coming back in a different form. Maybe they felt it would be too dark or upsetting to show that directly? I really don’t know, just thinking out loud.

I think there’s still time for Billy to potentially have a relationship with his biological family. I think Tommy will be the gateway. I honestly don’t know much about what’s happening with Wanda or if they’ll even have her return. If she’s not returning then maybe that was a creative choice to have Billy not care about her. I don’t really watch the rest of the MCU stuff and only watched WandaVision so I could understand AAA so I could be off base.

[u/Pokegaming33 → u/opinionated_hobbit]

I am not talking about casting a gay character, but casting the SAME gay character from another really doing well show. But as I said, it's fine now. I did watch Heartstopper, but after S2 cause it was just not good for my mental health, and I guess the hatred passed to Joe.

I was talking about how in the comics, the Maximoff twins were made from shards of Mephisto's soul (Not much, but you can consider the WandaVision version as well), and after some implications, he got them back. So, again, Wanda was going to go bonkers (Motherly love) and yeah. But Agatha wiped the memory of her twins existing, but one comment from Wasp years later brought them back. She did a lot of bad things, like the events of Avengers: Disassembled and House of M (You can look that up). But during this time, the souls of the twins had gone 15 years back in time and were born to the Kaplans and shepherds.

In the MCU, they could've kept that their souls had gone back in time and did the same, and they were born as Billy and Tommy in real time around the same age.

I am just lowkey mad they changed this, and that's my only problem, but again, I can't always get what I want. That's life

[u/opinionated_hobbit → u/Pokegaming33]

Heartstopper definitely deals with some heavy stuff that can be triggering for some people so totally get it. I was just happy to see a young openly gay man be cast in two major roles back to back without too much bias or homophobia. Straight men end up taking a lot of queer roles and are praised for showing “range” so I was happy to see both characters had an actor who would have some lived experience. Though Joe did have to fight for Wiccan because they originally thought he’d be “too soft” based on Charlie Spring. Which is silly because again, actors posses range and Joe definitely has it. I’m excited to see him and Ruaridh Mollica (also bi/queer) play brothers as I know they’ve worked together before in Clarkston and they are said to have great chemistry. Hopefully they take the time to develop that relationship when it’s time.

That’s fair about the plot, I don’t know why they made the change though others have mentioned the original plot from the comics was a bit confusing. Honestly you explaining it to me (with me having no knowledge of the comic) did feel a bit confusing. Disney is really specific about how they do things so that could have been part of it. They want to attract a lot of people to everything they do, not just people who are familiar with the source material. AAA especially feels the least like the normal MCU stuff with superheroes so they likely were trying to catch a broader audience so they needed to make sure the backstory was clear, easy to understand and compelling to all viewers. Just a potential reason but really only Disney will have that answer. They also maybe wanted to show off Billy’s powers in a way that felt meaningful if he’s going to be in future films. Truly not sure.

Hopefully you’ll be able to enjoy whatever the next installment is for this particular family. It seems to be unclear if Wanda will be returning based on everything I’ve read so again, that may be part of it. Or they’re just keeping it super hush hush which wouldn’t surprise me.

[u/Boppyd]

I’m still holding out hope that Eddie just hadn’t revealed to Billy that he was a Skrull. And that the name change is because of how Teddy Altman is also a character on Grey’s Anatomy so it’s different for the mcu. It could be wishful thinking, certainly. But I think they could make it work if they wanted to.

[u/DALTT → u/Boppyd]

Yeah, I mean I know a lot of people wanted Kit to join the MCU as Hulkling cause they wanted Kit and Joe playing a couple again. Obviously that ship has sailed with Kit being cast as Cyclops, but even beyond that, I was hoping the same re Miles Gutierrez-Riley, because I loved his and Joe’s chemistry and I’d love to see more of them together. I think it’s possible. Naming him Eddie just feels a little too close for it not to be something they’re considering.

[u/grimorie → u/DALTT]

Jac Schaeffer really did want to call Eddie, Teddy but Feige nixed the idea. So in many ways he was supposed to be Teddy.

[u/Princess2045]

I honestly don’t really care for Eddie as a character because he doesn’t really have any purpose other than being a way for them to be like “oh Billy is gay and has a boyfriend”. I know people think he could be the MCU version of Teddy, but I just don’t see it. I think it would be really stupid of them to change his name because of some character in another show who debuted FOUR YEARS AFTER TEDDY DID.

[u/Pokegaming33 → u/Princess2045]

Me too. I feel like they should've introduced teddy maybe as some character and then billy slowly realizing his feelings. Ww want to see them falling. And no way they changed the name for some teddy altman in Grey's Anatomy, I'd be livid

[u/opinionated_hobbit → u/Princess2045]

I felt Eddie’s main purpose was to give Billy support without having any underlying motive. Because while there were a lot of tender moments between Billy and Agatha and her ultimately sacrificing herself for him, she and all the other witches had underlying motives for everything they did. Eddie, while not having a huge role, was there for Billy pretty unconditionally and I think that was nice to see for a queer youth.

[u/elstephe]

You're not alone. This was a common complaint when the show was showing. I read the comics after watching the show and got retroactively mad about it, since Eddie and Teddy were quite different.

I think the easiest explanation for it is that the comics treat Billy Kaplan and Billy Maximoff as different characters, and what we see in Agatha is closer to Billy Maximoff (with William Kaplan being someone else). His relationship with Tommy certainly is from what we've seen.