WandaVision Episode 8 Easter Eggs EXPLAINED - What's The Real Meaning Behind MCU Scarlet Witch?

6. The Salem Witch Trials

The first and most immediate reference to be found in this week's episode is the location of Salem and of course the infamous Witch Trials that took place there in the late 17th century.

The MCU opts to put its own spin on the event here though, showing a coven of witches as they attempt to execute Agatha for practicing dark magic.

In real life, the Salem Witch Trials were enacted by a Puritan colony in Massachusetts and were emblematic of the wider European craze that reached its peak in the early 1600s and led to the deaths of tens of thousands of women.

In the comics, Agatha was actually involved in the Witch Trials, although not in the way WandaVision depicts them here.

As was revealed in the second volume of Nova, of all places, Agatha's coven is persecuted by the Puritans but, in one of her darker moments, she actually willingly sacrificed members of her own coven.

She later settled in New Salem, a secret magical community founded in Colorado, and would indeed later face execution from a former coven, but not for the reason presented in WandaVision.