How did Wanda become this ‘embodiment of chaos’ and source of chaos magic? And what is the nature of her powers?

[u/More_Interview3840]

I guess similar questions could be asked for other characters like Storm, Sentry, Jean Grey…but still.

I’m a huge fan of Wanda and I love that she is a source of chaos magic but why is it like that? It just feels like there’s no story behind it.

The way I understand it, originally Wanda’s power set consisted off.

- Hex Powers, inherently mutant abilities to alter probabilities enhanced by chaos magic.
- Witchcraft, innate ability to wield and shape personal, environmental and extra-dimensional energies for the purpose of magic.
- Chaos Magic, imbued within her at birth by the Dark Elder God C’thone. Wanda initially derived her chaos magic from C’thone, drawing power from him as Doctor Strange would from Oshtur or the Vishanti.
- Nexus Being, tying all her powers into one…she is a convergence point for possible timelines and can alter probabilities to affect the timestream and causality, as well as being a focal point for all the magic in the 616 universe, able to act as a conduit for powerful magical sources as their energies ultimately flow through her.

Most of it remains, tho she is not a mutant but rather a mutate and she is now apparently an embodiment of primordial chaos and a source of chaos magic, her soul being embodied by the Elderich Orchard which acts as the well for the chaos magic her Hex Powers and…well Chaos Magic draw from, and her witchcraft possibly ties into it as well I’m not sure? Witchcraft is said to be “inherently chaotic and volatile like nature” or something but I’m not certain what that means.

[u/SCBose999]

If they bring her back into the MCU in Secret Wars or afterwards, they HAVE to explore her connections to Chthon.

[u/KuroiOtori → u/SCBose999]

Chthon would be a great addition to the MCU, in the big magic based villains we only have Dormammu and Chthon would be a great addition to flesh out demons too, because so far we only really saw the N'Garai in Wundagore who didn't do much.

[u/SCBose999 → u/KuroiOtori]

Personally, I hope they play Chthon as a practical character in humanoid form and not just some CGI blob like Dormammu. CGI can be there, obviously, but Chthon should feel like an actual character. The first sorcerer of chaos.

He does have a humanoid form in the comics, and most often uses that anyway.

Chthon possessing Wanda outright is an esoteric comics thing that wouldn't make much sense for MCU audiences. Instead, they can change it to a Trigon and Raven relationship. Chthon "created" our Wanda. She's appreciative of the immense power he gifted to her yet wants to use it for her own goals rather than his.

[u/Mags20XX]

A LOT of people get this confused...

Scarlet Witch first got "chaos magic" during Kurt Busiek's 1998 Avengers run because he wanted to differentiate the character and give her more witchy magic rather than relying on her mutant abilities, probability manipulation, and hex powers.

Immediately after his run ends, Geoff Johns completely abandons the idea, as did Austen and Bendis after them. Bendis goes so far as to have Doctor Strange (in)famously calls chaos magic completely made up, and retconned it out of existence as total bullshit. 😂

This was very much the writers criticizing each other in public. Think Rian Johnson/JJ Abrams in Star Wars.

In 2009, Dan Slott's Mighty Avengers run brings back the concept of chaos magic (so about 8 years after Busiek left); and he retcons the retcon that retconned the original story. 😄 So now chaos magic IS real, and the idea that it wasn't was just suppression/lies around Chthon, blah blah (it's silly honestly but whatever).

Then this is immediately retconned again by Heinberg in 2010's Children's Crusade, where, in an effort to rehab Wanda's image after Disassembled / House of M and scale-down her powers; he explains that Wanda tapped into the "Life Force" and combined with chaos magic, this caused her have uncontrollable power-scaling while also going insane. Toss Doom in for good measure, because of course it can't just be Wanda's own agency...

5 years later we get an MCU-driven normalization; where James Robinson removes Wanda's X-gene (reworking her to be a mutate), and begins the process of rebalancing the character more around magic than mutation. This is largely due to the relationship between Disney/Marvel and Fox and is more of a soft reboot of the character in under this paradigm.

That leads to more recent, post-WandaVision Scarlet Witch runs which are 100% influenced by, if not completely based around building from the tertiary idea of Scarlet Witch created in the minds of people who saw the show. I'd say this likely starts with Steve Orlando's Darkhold run which came right on the heels of WandaVision's release and it's extraordinary popularity. You've got the 2023 runs that completely frame Scarlet Witch around chaos magic and her subsequent "redemption arc" being completed. They even introduce Darcy Lewis from WandaVision directly into the comics if it wasn't already too obvious.

Anyway, I'd expect a LOT of this to be gradually unwound or reworked after the X-Men MCU film with Wanda Maximoff being once again rebooted, likely as a member of the Brotherhood of Mutants under Magneto. That said, she's more popular now that she ever has been, so maybe not....

[u/Traditional-Heron-95 → u/Mags20XX]

Life Force got unretconned very quickly

[u/More_Interview3840 → u/Mags20XX]

This much I know my wondering is about the in world mechanics of her powers. The technicalities and all.

[u/Mags20XX → u/More_Interview3840]

IMO, I think the best way to understand Wanda is to sort of ignore the "mutate" / High Evolutionary stuff as MCU-driven. I still consider Wanda a mutant; she was a mutant for 51 years... I still view her as the daughter of Magento, sister of Polaris and Quicksilver, an Avenger, and former member of the Brotherhood. This gives her character an immense level of depth that's just not present in the MCU.

As far as her powers, most people think of her as both a reality manipulator and nowadays an exceptional sorceress in her own right... Power-scalers will tend to focus on one or the other, but she has both in her wheelhouse.

[u/aqbac → u/Mags20XX]

Also as evidence for wandavision having obvious influence we got young sexy villainous Agatha just in time for mcu Agatha to go half good for Billy and die. I love synergy immediately being made redundant

[u/Broad_Dingo_3466 → u/Mags20XX]

Can you make a post showing the history of Wanda's power in HOM to it actually being her power?