'Agatha All Along' is a Major Moment for Sapphic Fandom
The season of the gay witch
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[Editor’s note: spoilers ahead for Agatha All Along.]
When the cast and crew of Agatha All Along described the show as “the gayest project Marvel has ever done,” reactions ran the gamut. Some responded with excitement, hoping that Marvel would finally do right by its queer fans. Others were more incredulous, tempering their enthusiasm with skepticism due to the many times Marvel (and Disney) have disappointed viewers on the queer representation front. The anti-woke posters said their piece as well, using Agatha as another example of the downfall of the mighty Marvel empire.
In what came as a surprise to many, the prophecy came true: Agatha All Along proved itself to be the gayest project Marvel has ever done. In the very first episode, Aubrey Plaza erotically (is there any other way?) licks Kathryn Hahn’s hand, and the sapphic shenanigans only escalate from there. Lesbian and queer fans rejoiced, laughing at how wrong the haters were. The show’s fandom grew every episode, and it soon became a phenomenon among queer fans online.
How did this happen? I spoke with several fans of Agatha All Along about their love of the show and the fandom that’s coalesced around it. Some viewers came to the show with a good amount of familiarity with the MCU – many were fans of WandaVision, the show where “bad witch” Agatha was first introduced. Still, even those who had previously identified themselves as Marvel fans were hesitant to put all their faith in the studio. Amy told me that she’s experienced “Marvel burnout” in the last few years, though she loved WandaVision.
One fan, an artist who goes by the name @sunken_silk, told me he knew very little about Marvel but was intrigued by the cast, which includes Kathryn Hahn, Aubrey Plaza, and Patti LuPone. In fact, most of the fans who I spoke to pointed to the cast as a huge draw, particularly for lesbian and queer fans. Both Hahn and Plaza have played sapphic characters in the past and already had a strong queer following, which no doubt pulled more eyeballs to Agatha All Along.
When I asked fans what they had hoped from Agatha, many said they wanted it to actually deliver queer stories rather than simply queerbaiting, but they were afraid to really get their hopes up. “i got that super gay vibe from her in wandavision and knew they COULD do something with that but i never dared to dream they actually would because it's marvel after all lmao!” Amy told me.
Fans were delighted when the show did deliver on those hopes, at least in part. When I questioned why the show gained such a devoted fandom, many pointed to the complexity of the characters and the depth of their connection as one of the primary reasons. When Agatha (Hahn) and Rio (Plaza) first meet in Episode 1, it’s clear there’s some history there. We later learn about their tragic backstory, which involves the death of Agatha’s son and the fact that Rio is literally Death herself. Rio’s emotional revelation that Agatha is “her scar” in Episode 4 had fans hooked and dying to know more.
Jazz explained to me that one of the things she loves about the show is how morally complex the characters are. “A lot of queer rep is of one dimensional good guys because they're afraid of either falling into the queer bad guy trope, or just making queer characters even more disliked in the current political climate. So getting to see a queer character like Agatha who is not the good guy, who is so morally grey most of the time, its refreshing,” she told me.
Fans shared that Agatha and Rio’s dramatic, morally grey, enemies to lovers to enemies dynamic felt unique to them within the TV landscape. Two people pointed to SwanQueen from Once Upon a Time as a somewhat similar ship, but that relationship was famously never made canon. Jazz suggested Root and Shaw from Person of Interest as a comparable couple, but still felt like there was not much else like Agatha and Rio that she’s seen on television.
Though viewers were overwhelmingly excited by Agatha and Rio’s relationship, there were still aspects of the show they were disappointed by. Most fans noted that they wished we got to see more of Rio and Agatha’s backstory over the course of the series. A lot of that backstory and those details “relied on subtle hints and context being filled in afterwards by the showrunner in interviews,” Jazz told me. Amy shared that she was let down a bit by the ending but that made her even more desperate for future iterations of these characters.
Above all else, the Agatha All Along fandom is thirsty. Thirsty for Hahn and Plaza, of course, but also thirsty for more media from the duo. This is the perfect environment for an active, passionate fandom. Amy told me that she hasn’t seen anything like it in her “12 years on stan twitter,” and if you’re at all active on queer on sapphic social media, you’ve likely seen Agatha content come across your dashboard.
On X and Tumblr, this content comes in the form of fanart and fan videos, set to songs by artists like Stevie Nicks, Florence and the Machine, and of course, fanvid favorite Taylor Swift. Most noticeable, however, is the amount of fanfiction written about Agatha All Along, particularly Agatha and Rio. As of this writing, there are over 2,000 fics about Agatha/Rio on Archive of Our Own, and that number was already in the hundreds just a few episodes in.
The amount of fanfic indicates love for the couple, yes, but also that sense of disappointment some of the fans felt about the finale. Fanfic gives fans a chance to fill in the gaps that we didn’t get to see on screen, deepening and expanding the relationship between Agatha and Rio. The couple didn’t get their happy ending in the show – as many fans expected – but in fanfiction, writers give them happy endings of all kinds, including in AUs (Alternate Universes) where the situation isn’t quite as dark as it is on the series. Or, writers lean into the angst, luxuriating in the tragedy of their story.
Every fandom can teach us something about the state of media and how viewers interact with popular culture. In the case of Agatha All Along, the fans told me that, despite the areas where it was lacking, the show made them hopeful for the future of queer representation in Marvel and beyond. “hopefully they see they don't have to necessarily cater to the toxic white dudes anymore and we get many more complicated sapphic relationships in the shows and movies from now on!” Amy told me.
“the show itself showed exactly how to make queer rep part of the story without being /the story/ which I loved. Its done so well in all the numbers, even being said so by the big bosses, so I think that's shown there's a huge drive and demand for our stories to be told,” Jazz said. @sunkin_sulk told me he hopes Marvel learns something from this and stops queerbaiting. However, while the show has given her some hope for the future, Zee shared that she thinks Agatha’s success has more to do with showrunner Jac Schaeffer than Marvel.
Though fans of the show hope its success proves to producers that queer media is worth making, fandom is ultimately about the communities that are built around popular culture. Lesbian and queer fans are thrilled to have something to obsess over together, and Agatha has given them the perfect opportunity to do just that. What more could a witch ask for?
mouse house? more like trash house
Greatest soccer moms ever incoming. And what did Disney do this time?
God, I need to find the time to watch this show.
I'm on a break from work, walking down the street, reading this article and literally just cheered out loud and fist pumped in the air when you mentioned SwanQueen. I had no idea it was being compared to Agatha All Along 🤯 but makes complete. I'm a member of that fandom from Season 1! And it's still my #1 whenever I'm reading fanfiction.