Elizabeth Olsen Once Felt There Was Something ‘Genuinely Broken’ About the Marvel Universe

Elizabeth Olsen was made a fan of the Marvel Cinematic Universe thanks to the movies’ compelling stories and interesting characters. But there was something she noticed about Marvel in the beginning that might’ve made the series stand out from other superhero properties.

Elizabeth Olsen on what she found ‘broken’ about the Marvel Universe

Olsen admitted that she knew very little about the comic books her Scarlet Witch character originated from. But she became a huge fan of the MCU in the universe’s beginning phases.

“I’m not too much of a comic-book person,” she once told Total Film. “I like comic-book movies, but my brother is the comic-book guy. If I’m having a meeting, I ask my brother to tell me what it’s about. But yeah, of course I’d seen Avengers!”

One of the things that attracted Olsen to Marvel was its handling of its mythology. Olsen felt the studio was able to balance mythical story elements in a real-world setting. This made the film series seem a bit broken in her eyes.

“Marvel keep the fantastical qualities but create something as realistic as they can make it for this world. There’s something genuinely broken. Everyone has their Achilles’ heel,” she said.

Elizabeth Olsen was surprised so many fans liked her Marvel character

Olsen’s Scarlet Witch might’ve possessed all of the attributes she found relatable with other Marvel superheroes. The actor acknowledged the flaws in her character, which was greatly expanded upon in the Disney + series WandaVision. She believed that Scarlet Witch’s own flaws were something other women would be able to sympathize with.

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“Wanda is someone who we allow to make mistakes and go through big struggles, to fail and maybe make the wrong decisions. She isn’t a perfect role model, but I do think she is an example of a woman who has strength and power and is also deeply sad and has a lot of loss. Her vulnerability is her strength. But, you know, she also makes big, big mistakes, but she’s an independent thinker,” she once said in an interview with El Pais.

But perhaps these flaws were why Olsen was so surprised by how well-received her Scarlet Witch turned out to be. Olsen thought Marvel fans gravitated towards the more animated, positive figures who were a part of the franchise. Whereas Scarlet Witch was considerably darker in comparison.

“The biggest surprise has been people caring about this character. I always thought people love the Marvel characters for being so witty and funny and charming, and I was surprised that people even cared about our characters. What Jac Schaeffer wrote for WandaVision is what made that show special,” she said.

Elizabeth Olsen had to explain to ‘Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness’ writers what happened to her in ‘WandaVision’

Olsen’s Scarlet Witch went through a lot of character development in WandaVision. There was speculation that Wanda’s ordeals in the show would help inform her arc in Multiverse of Madness. But the problem was the film’s director, Sam Raimi, didn’t see the series in its entirety. So Olsen had to explain to the filmmaker what exactly happened in WandaVision. But the writers of the film also hadn’t seen the series. This meant that Olsen had to take certain liberties with her character to maintain continuity between WanadaVision and Madness.

“It’s a similar arc that I had to play in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. There could be parallel stories being told there, of dealing with grief and loss,” Olsen once told Collider. “Well, I proposed that to the writers who wrote Multiverse of Madness. I said ‘Do you know what we’re doing in WandaVision? Have you seen it?’ and no, they had not seen it, because it wasn’t finished yet. So I had to try and, I don’t know, play it differently, right? I had to attack the same themes in order for it to be interesting for me, I think, and potentially for the audience. I had to come at it from a different point of view so that it wasn’t repetitive.”