Elizabeth Olsen’s role as Scarlet Witch was enigmatic to say the least in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Her powers were nebulous, with telekinetics and some level of suggestive mind control and whatever else happened to be necessary at the time. In a new interview with USA Today, Olsen talked about how Wanda Maximoff evolved for her next appearance in Captain America: Civil War, and her connection to the character. Even just the way her hands move is proprietary, she says.
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“I have a movement coach for the way she throws her hexes so I’m very protective over that,” Olsen said. “It’s something that was created out of whatever uniquely that we made up for the first film. Now we have this huge attachment to it and we don’t want to see it messed up.”
In Civil War, Scarlet Witch is “coming into her own and starting to understand and have conflict with how she wants to use her abilities.” The character started as a villain out to get the Avengers before teaming up with them to defeat Ultron, but it’s not all hunky dory. “It’s a dramatic conflict within her and obviously there’s conflict within the (Avengers) as well.”
Meanwhile, despite a promo video that included Wanda on the side of Captain America shown at D23 Expo, she’s glad that her status in the battle is being kept at least somewhat up in the air.
“I like that they didn’t release Scarlet Witch in the promo photos for the teams — it places her as being a wild card, and I like her having that kind of edge that people don’t know what she’s capable of. They can fear her because she is so incredibly powerful in a different way than the rest of the heroes for the most part. I like playing that role within the gang.”
Olsen also revealed that there was an ending shot where her on-screen brother Pietro aka Quicksilver survived, and teased that it could still carry back over into the MCU.
“We did always know how that was going to end. At the same time, they had to shoot two endings because they didn’t want the crew to know or want it to get out. They did an incredible job of keeping that under wraps,” she said. “But it’s also a superhero movie. It’s insane, but they just made a whole television series (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) about a dead guy. So who knows?”
