Teyonah Parris on Marvel Fan Scrutiny and WandaVision's Aerospace Engineer Reveal

Marvel Cinematic Universe newcomer Teyonah Parris opens up about WandaVision being scrutinized by [...]

By Cameron Bonomolo

Marvel Cinematic Universe newcomer Teyonah Parris opens up about WandaVision being scrutinized by Marvel fans and the reveal of the Aerospace Engineer, an associate of Monica Rambeau's (Parris) speculated to be everyone from Blue Marvel to Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four. While investigating the "Hex" surrounding Westview, New Jersey, with Dr. Darcy Lewis (Kat Dennings) and FBI Agent Jimmy Woo (Randall Park), Rambeau texts a mystery contact: an aerospace engineer up for the challenge of creating an armored vehicle capable of protecting its pilot from the cosmic microwave background radiation emitting from the Westview anomaly broadcast by Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen).

When Monica goes to retrieve the S.W.O.R.D. space rover, it's delivered by Major Goodner (Rachel Thompson), an original character named after series creator Jac Schaeffer's college friend Aly Goodner.

"What I didn't expect was, once I started watching as a fan and as an audience member with the real Marvel fandom, they were showing me things that I didn't know [were] there and that meant something," Parris said during Variety's streamed panel discussion with the cast and creators of WandaVision. "I'm off to the side like, 'Hey, is that what we meant? Does this mean something?'"

"I'll be honest, the whole tech person that I was going to see, the way people were fired up, I actually was like, 'Who am I meeting? Did I forget? Did I not fully understand?'" Parris said of the aerospace engineer. "They were so adamant, and then just being new to the universe, not realizing that everything single thing you say will be scrutinized. And you see like, 'She said Wanda did this…' and I'm like, 'No I didn't, I didn't know that I promise!'"

"So it was just a lot of new things like that, like joining the fandom and watching it as an audience member and seeing the Easter eggs," added Parris, whose superpowered Monica Rambeau returns opposite Brie Larson's Carol Danvers and Iman Vellani's Ms. Marvel in The Marvels. "Yeah, it's a lot. It's a lot, I'm trying to keep up (laughs)."

Director Matt Shakman previously explained there was "never an intention on our side to set up the Fantastic Four."

Fan theories are "charming and wonderful," Shakman said on Fatman Beyond in March, "but we're building to this rover set piece, which I have worked my butt off on for well over a year creating this rover. And all of a sudden, everybody wants to know who's going to meet her there, and I know it's going to be this wonderful actress who's playing Major Goodner, and it's not going to be Reed Richards."

"I want people to be invested in what is the origin story of a different character that Monica Rambeau is becoming, and instead we're being distracted by someone else," Shakman continued. "So yeah, the director-producer in me is like, 'Oh, don't run with that one!' Because I didn't want the focus to shift from what was important, which is the story of Monica traveling through that Hex."

All episodes of Marvel's WandaVision are now streaming on Disney+.

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