Starring: Michelle Yeoh, Stephanie Hsu, Ke Huy Quan, Jamie Lee Curtis, James Hong, Jenny Slate, Harry Shum Jr., and Randy Newman
Grade: A
Eat your heart out Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
Summary
After a quick look into a mirror of the Wang Family having fun together, we move to the present day in the current timeline. This is where middle-aged mother Evelyn Quan Wang (Yeoh) works on the taxes for the family and the business, and she wants to get it done before her father (Hong) wakes up. He is referred to as Gong Gong, as this means grandfather in Cantonese. Evelyn’s husband Waymond (Quan) interrupts to talk, but she’s too busy and sees him as a distraction, though he’s finished some of the chores she was worried about. As she frantically makes food and cleans things up, Waymond says he talked to Byron about tonight, and the men’s choir have a fun surprise for Gong Gong. She doesn’t acknowledge him or his question about wanting to talk to her after their appointment. Instead, she asks for him to cook the rice in the pot. Evelyn orders more instructions to Waymond because she wants their Chinese New Year’s Party to be absolutely perfect for her demanding father, prompting Waymond to console her and remind her that he will be proud of the woman she has become regardless. Even so, she’s not at ease. Just then, Gong Gong is awake and immediately calls for Evelyn, so she knows he’s probably hungry. At the same time, their daughter Joy (Hsu) is at the door, so she goes and answers it. Once again, Waymond asks if they can talk later, but she ignores him. A saddened Waymond glances at the form in his hand, and it’s actually divorce papers he’s already signed.
Evelyn opens the door of their home, which is in the back of the laundromat they own, and she sees Joy and her girlfriend Becky (Tallie Medel). Instead of greeting the two, Evelyn goes back inside because she now realizes she has to cook for more people. An annoyed Evelyn tells Waymond the news, but Waymond reminds her that Joy was to come along with them for their appointment with IRS inspector Deirdre (Curtis), so there weren’t any more miscommunications. Becky was going to watch Gong Gong while they were gone. Privately in the kitchen, Evelyn tells Joy they don’t need her as a translator at the IRS meeting, and she should stay with Gong Gong instead of Becky. At the same time, some of her comments seem to be a dig at her daughter’s relationship with Becky. Even so, Joy insists Becky just wants to help. They join Becky and Waymond, and Evelyn tells Joy and Becky to stay back and decorate. Then, her and Waymond will take Gong Gong to the meeting, prompting Waymond to ask Evelyn in Chinese if her father knows they’re being audited. She doesn’t respond. Next, they get an alert about more customers entering the laundromat, so Evelyn and Joy head downstairs and enter the store while Becky and Waymond stay back and eat. Joy tries to talk to Evelyn, but she’s in a hurry and doesn’t want to hear it. It also doesn’t help that the one spot on the ceiling Waymond said he painted for her was the wrong shade of white, and it’s noticeable. As she insists to a bothered Joy that she’s open to her daughter dating a white woman, with Joy correcting her by saying she’s half-Mexican, Evelyn goes over to one of the washers and takes off a set of googly eyes that someone pasted above the “Out of Order” sign.
Evelyn takes shoes out of another washer, tells a customer it isn’t allowed, and if it breaks, he pays for it. Getting back on topic, Evelyn says to Joy that Gong Gong is the one who won’t be as accepting to Joy dating a woman. He just flew in from China. His heart won’t be able to take such news. A rude laundromat customer named Debbie (Slate) shows up to pick up some clothes while talking on the phone. Evelyn grabs her ticket to search for it as Joy continues, saying that she and Becky have been together for three years and Gong Gong may want to know. They are interrupted by flirty regular Rick (Biff Wiff) who says one of the machines ate his change again, prompting Evelyn to call down Waymond. Rick does say he’s coming to the party that night though. Upon his entering, Evelyn asks Waymond if he moved any of the customers’ clothes because she can’t find Debbie’s. Sadly, Waymond did in fact move some upstairs without telling anyone because it was too crowded in the regular spot. He insists they’re “happier” up there, showing us that he’s the one who’s been placing the googly eyes everywhere, even on the packages of clothes. A pissed off Evelyn demands there to be no more googly eyes, as she brings the clothes down from the upper shelf in their house. While this is going on, Joy tries to bring up Becky again. Sadly, Evelyn gets off track and starts talking about how the auditor is a terrible person who seems to be targeting Chinese members of the community. After two years of meetings, Dierdre put a lien on the laundromat. All Waymond could think to do to ease the situation was to bring Dierdre cookies, and it annoys the shit out of Evelyn. As she complains to Joy about this, the security camera footage flickers in and out, and they don’t notice because Evelyn is still ranting. Inexplicably, Waymond starts doing crazy acrobatics like a kung fu master inside of the store and starts to look for something.
As Evelyn talks about how Waymond doesn’t take anything seriously and she wonders how he would have done without her, she turns to the security camera to see Waymond back to doing his usual goofy antics with customers, vindicating her for the moment because she didn’t see what happened seconds before it.
Evelyn walks back into the store, and Waymond excitedly tells her about Rick knowing the dance to some movie, prompting them to dance together. He talks about Rick working as an actor in a community theater, reminding Evelyn about her old ambition of wanting to be a famous actress and how she could possibly audition too. As Waymond and Rick dance, and Joy sadly talks to Becky in private, Evelyn stares at the television inside of the laundromat playing the movie of the song and dance sequence. She’s transfixed for a moment but comes out of it to give Waymond the clothes to give to Debbie. As Joy complains to Becky about her mother aloud, Evelyn overhears it and they’re on the verge of an argument. Before it can get more heated, as Evelyn argues with a customer at the same time, Gong Gong enters and starts complaining about food. Evelyn, Joy, and Becky greet him. When Joy tries to speak the little bit of Chinese she knows, Gong Gong notes that she’s getting worse at it every time he sees her. Joy tries to introduce Becky as her girlfriend but can’t remember the word for it, so Evelyn interrupts and tells Gong Gong that Becky is Joy’s “very good friend”. It breaks Joy’s heart. As Waymond gives Gong Gong a bowl of noodles, Evelyn follows Debbie out to her car and invites her to the laundromat’s Chinese New Year’s Party that night, but she’s not interested. Joy and Becky go to their car, and Evelyn stops them before they leave. She looks as if she wants to say something important but hesitates. Instead, she tells Joy she needs to eat healthier because she’s getting fat. Joy drives off sobbing, and Evelyn goes back to all the stresses she has to attend to inside like helping Gong Gong up the stairs and organizing the paperwork for the audit.
As Evelyn looks at the paperwork while Gong Gong eats noodles next to her, she starts to stare off into the distance. Waymond asks her what she’s thinking about.
Part I: EVERYTHING
Soon after, Evelyn, Waymond, and Gong Gong show up to the IRS building for their appointment. Gong Gong asks where they are, and Evelyn lies and says their business is so busy that they are applying for a new business license so they can expand. Waymond doubles down on the lie to Gong Gong for her benefit, but he becomes saddened once he sees an older couple kiss passionately in the building as it reminds him of his own failing marriage. Once they get into the elevator, Waymond suggests they go on a trip after all this is over, but Evelyn says she doesn’t want to think about one more thing today. Otherwise, her head will explode. Suddenly, as the elevator goes up, Waymond turns into an entirely different person again. He takes off his glasses, pulls out an umbrella to cover the security camera, and tells a confused Evelyn that she maybe in grave danger. He puts two earpieces on Evelyn and gives her an ultimatum. When they exit the elevator, she can either (1) turn left towards her scheduled audit appointment, or she can (2) turn right and go into the janitor’s closet. He gives her a phone where there’s a loading screen, as the earpieces are helping scan her brain for an “alternate life path”. As Waymond writes something on a folder, he tells Evelyn to breathe in because she’s going to feel a slight pressure in her head. Once she does and the scan is complete, the elevator doors open to show her being born in a hospital from her perspective. Right before her very eyes, she sees a quick montage of her entire life up until that point. It goes from grade school to when she met Waymond to when Gong Gong told her that if she abandoned their family in China because of him, they would do the same to her. We even hear the audio of Gong Gong tell her, “You’re not my daughter anymore” once she leaves.
The montage continues and it includes them buying the laundromat, having Joy, getting the news Gong Gong is sick, and their current situation. Finally, Waymond interrupts to stop the montage. He gives Evelyn the folder and tells her to follow the instructions written once she gets situated in her meeting. Lastly, he tells her to not tell anyone including himself because he won’t remember. Confused and silent, Evelyn can hear the earpiece say, “Mental scan complete”. Then, Waymond puts the umbrella back, puts his glasses back on, and turns back into regular old Waymond with no recollection of what just happened previously. Evelyn is in pure shock. Once they exit the elevator, Waymond happily drives Gong Gong in his wheelchair towards Deirdre for their meeting. Evelyn looks over at the janitor’s closet but ultimately decides to go to the meeting. While sitting there, she looks at the directions written on the paper that “Alpha-Waymond” wrote down. It has three steps:
- Switch shoes to the wrong feet
- Close eyes, imagine you are in the janitor’s closet
- Hold that thought and press the green button
The final written line is, “P.S. Don’t forget to breath”.
Reading this, she’s interrupted by Deirdre who pulls out a receipt of a karaoke machine, asking how this could constitute as a business expense for a laundromat owner. Evelyn says she’s a singer, so Deirdre tells them they’ll need a separate “Schedule C” filled out for all of their “businesses” because what they’re trying to deduct would imply that she’s a novelist, a chef, and whatever else. Evelyn tries to remind Deirdre what she said last time, but she doesn’t want to hear it. As Waymond and Deirdre continue to discuss problems with the deductions, Evelyn mentally dejects herself from the conversation and pulls out the list written by Alpha-Waymond. She follows each step. First, she switches her shoes to the opposite feet. Second, she imagines herself in the janitor’s closet. When she does this, the earpieces turn green. So, she holds the thought, presses the button on the earpiece, and breathes. This sends her and her seat flying into the janitor’s closet at a rocket’s pace. At one point, Evelyn is split into two versions of herself. One is in a different universe and in an alternative to the current reality while in the janitor’s closet. The other is her regular self still in the meeting. In the janitor’s closet, Alpha-Waymond appears and tells her to relax her body in the other universe and to go into autopilot. This allows for things to be at ease in the other universe they are in. Alpha-Waymond explains that “they” don’t know that him and Evelyn are in this universe yet, so he uses this time to explain. Alpha-Waymond is not her husband, at least not the one she knows. He’s another version of him from another life path, another universe. He’s here because they need Evelyn’s help. There’s a great evil afoot that has taken over his world, and it’s spreading its chaos throughout all the universes.
He has spent years searching for the one who might be able to match this evil with an even greater good and bring back balance. All of his searching has brought him here to this universe, to her.
Just then, Evelyn is brought back to the regular universe and to the audit meeting by an interrupting Deirdre, who is annoyed at Evelyn going in and out of a daydreaming state. Deirdre reminds her how serious their meeting is, how there is already a lien on their property, and repossession is in their rights. Evelyn insists she’s paying attention after touching the regular Waymond to make sure he’s real. Not buying it, Deirdre gestures towards her three “Auditor of the Month” awards on her desk that look like butt plugs. She sees a lot of bullshit in their forms and looks like she’s about to get them in a lot of trouble. Realizing what’s going on, Waymond explains that Evelyn confuses her hobbies with businesses, and it was an honest mistake. Getting practically giddy over getting someone in trouble, Deirdre says that even if they don’t charge them with fraud, they will most certainly fine them for gross negligence. A teary-eyed Evelyn interrupts and talks about how Deirdre uses big words to confuse them, and Deirdre reminds her in a slow and insulting manner that she was supposed to bring her daughter to help translate. Just then, Evelyn is brought back into the other universe by Alpha-Waymond, who reminds her how important their conversation is as it effects every single world in their infinite multiverse. Softly pressing his hand on her face, he acknowledges Evelyn’s thoughts on how every passing moment, she fears she may have missed her chance in life. However, every rejection and disappointment has led her here to this moment and to not let anything distract her from it. She laughs and awakens in the meeting. As Deirdre asks if things are funny, she responds by saying she’s thinking. She goes back to the other universe once there are knocks on the janitor’s closet door, but she switches back and forth as the tension rises.
In the regular universe, Waymond asks Deirdre for more time to fix things and to potentially re-submit their papers while Alpha-Waymond in the other universe explains that “they” are going to kill them but to not worry because this universe they are in is only a “burner universe” they use for communication. Just then, the other universe’s version of Deirdre breaks into the janitor’s closet after snapping Alpha-Waymond’s neck, killing him. She grabs a pipe off the wall and smacks Evelyn with it, prompting her to wake up back in the regular reality where she screams aloud and alerts the entire floor of the IRS building. Once she sits down, Deirdre decides to give them until 6PM to give her everything. It’s their last chance. She thanks Waymond for the cookies while they head out. As Waymond collects all of the papers, he sees the divorce papers on the ground, so he assumes Evelyn has been acting weird because of it. Unbeknownst to him, she’s been acting weird because on the back of the form are the directions Alpha-Waymond wrote to her. When he confronts her about it, he shows the paper to her. He thinks she knows about the divorce he’s been asking for, but she only sees the other side of the paper with the directions because of the way he’s holding it. Because of this, she thinks he knows about the multiverse. Both of their statements confuse the other, as they talk before getting into the elevator. Evelyn makes eye contact with Deirdre who starts walking towards them, and she starts to get anxious. As Gong Gong makes side comments about how Evelyn is never able to finish what she started, Evelyn turns and punches the approaching Deirdre right in the face, knocking her to the ground. Waymond freaks out as Evelyn insists that he told her to do it because she assumes he is Alpha-Waymond still. As Deirdre threatens hell upon them once she’s helped away, Waymond clears the confusion by showing her the divorce papers.
Getting emotional, she accuses him of being influenced by his brother who got divorced and how he now thinks it’s okay, but as Waymond explains himself, he switches into Alpha-Waymond while reminding her that he said to lay low. Now, Evelyn can tell the difference between the two versions of Waymond. The cops show up and tell them to get down, but Alpha-Waymond doesn’t listen. Instead, he takes off Evelyn’s earpieces, pulls out ChapStick, and eats it. Next, he hits the green button as if to activate himself into fight mode. Using his fanny pack as nunchucks, he beats the hell out of every member of security. Then, he offers Evelyn a chance to come with him to live up to her ultimate potential or to lie there and live with the consequences. She chooses the latter, but he picks her up on her shoulders anyway. In the other universe, we see that this version of Evelyn has been knocked out by Deirdre and is still lying in the doorway of the janitor’s closet. Deirdre talks to the other people she has in captivity on the floor, addressing them as the “citizens of the 4,655th Thetaverse” and how they are going to be lucky enough to be graced by the presence of their sovereign leader, Jobu Tupaki. It’s the evil version of Joy. Jobu walks onto the floor and by the other people held captive and heads straight to the slowly waking Evelyn. She presses her finger on the middle of Evelyn’s forehead, and it forces another quick montage through her life. Jobu claims it’s not “her” and walks away. Then, she switches universes to encompass regular Joy, who is sitting with Becky at a bar, as they both see that the building Joy’s parents are in is on the news for an undisclosed attack. Joy exits the bar without saying a word before both Evelyn and Waymond’s faces are emblazed on the television screen as suspects.
Evelyn questions how Alpha-Waymond can still be her husband when regular Waymond can’t even kill a spider, but Alpha-Waymond explains that any small decision made can create another branch in the universe, though he stops when he sees she isn’t listening. She insists he’s bad at explaining things, but he stops her and takes her into a room to hide from more security guards. Evelyn finally remembers Gong Gong, but Waymond says they’re monitoring him and he’s safe. In fact, he’s in the kitchen of the building eating pudding. Pulling out his special phone, he gets into the nitty gritty details. Showing her a picture, he details how her universe is one bubble floating in a cosmic foam of existence. Every surrounding bubble has slight variations, but the further away you get from your universe, the bigger the differences. Alpha-Waymond is from the Alphaverse, the first universe to make contact with the others. In this world, Evelyn was a brilliant woman. In her search to prove the existence of other universes, she discovered a way to temporarily link your consciousness to another version of yourself, accessing all of their memories, their skills, and even their emotions. Alpha-Waymond fighting everyone with a fanny pack is an example of this. It’s called “Verse Jumping”. Stressing that this is their only chance of getting out of there alive, he tells Evelyn she has to learn how to Verse Jump right now. He takes gum off the desk they are hiding under, chews it, presses the green button on his earpiece, spits it out, and prepares them to go back onto the main floor and out of hiding. Evelyn asks why he can’t get his Evelyn to do this, but his Evelyn is dead.
Once they exit the room, they act like frantic citizens, and it allows for them to bypass security on the floor because everyone is freaking out and running around in a panic. Once they get into the stairwell, Alpha-Waymond says he’s seen Evelyn die a thousand times in a thousand different worlds when she asks how she died. Every single time she was murdered. Moving down the stairs, Alpha-Waymond talks about Jobu Tupaki and how she’s an omniversal being who runs the multiverse with an unimaginable power, an agent of pure chaos. She has no motives or desires. They are interrupted by security coming up the steps, so they enter a random floor. As Alpha-Waymond calls in on his earpiece for another exit, Evelyn wonders why they can’t just let Jobu blow up some of the universes since there are so many, mostly because she doesn’t want any part of this mission. However, it’s not that simple. Jobu has been building something. They thought it was a black hole, but it’s something else entirely. It appears to consume more than just light and matter. They don’t know what it is, or what it’s for, but they can feel it. She realizes she feels it too once Alpha-Waymond notes how she probably feels that her clothes never wear as well the next day, how her hair never falls in quite the same way, and how her coffee even tastes wrong. He continues on explaining how our institutions are crumbling, nobody trusts their neighbor anymore, and how she stays up at night wondering to herself, “How can we get back?”, which is a line she finishes for him.
This is the Alphaverse’s mission, to bring us back to how it’s supposed to be.
However, it begins with finding the one who can stand up to Jobu’s perverse shroud of chaos. This person is Evelyn, which is why Alpha-Waymond has risked everything to get her out of there.
Quickly after, the two see Deirdre and she tries to apologize for punching her, but Deirdre staples a paper onto her head with a circle drawn on it as she “Verse Jumps”. The two run around the office setting as the powerful Deirdre destroys the place. Just then, Alpha-Waymond jumps back into the Alphaverse with his two cohorts who are directing him. They tell him that Deirdre has jumped somewhere with brute force, so Alpha-Waymond asked for a jump to someone agile. They give him the skills of a gymnast, and he jumps back into the consciousness of the body in the office building with Evelyn. Through the earpiece, they tell him he has to give himself four papercuts, one between each finger. He struggles with it but gets it just in time as Deirdre grabs him. She tries to hit him with a backbreaker, but Alpha-Waymond is able to grab the “Exit” sign while he’s in the air and puts it under his back when he’s pulled down. This saves him and temporarily hurts Deirdre. As this happens, his earpieces are knocked off and he’s locked into a room by Deirdre, who’s now hunting Evelyn. In the Alphaverse, they panic a strategy for Evelyn, but Alpha-Waymond is insistent that she can find a way to Verse Jump and fight, despite a jump having the ability to “fry” most inexperienced people. Back in Evelyn’s universe, Alpha-Waymond calls her from his locked room and tells her she has to Verse Jump. She runs over and grabs the earpieces from the ground incognito. Next, Alpha-Waymond tells her to concentrate on a universe where she studied martial arts. In the Alphaverse, they find it on the computer. However, to activate it, she has to profess her love for Deirdre. It’s like eating the ChapStick or switching shoes.
They developed an algorithm that “calculates which statistically improbable action will place you in a universe on the edge of your local cluster, which then sling shots you to the desired universe”. Basically, it’s the only way that you can receive such a power in the moment and in an instant. It’s called the Stochastic Path Algorithm and it’s fueled by random actions.
She has to tell Deirdre she loves her, and she has to mean it.
The only other options are for her to break her own arm or take a nap, and she’s not sleepy. Finally, Diedre finds her hiding and is about to attack. Evelyn shyly says, “I love you”, but her earpiece only turns yellow. As Alpha-Waymond shouts “No!” to try and get her to not press the button, she does anyway. Evelyn wakes up in a parked van next to a calm Waymond in a local divergent universe. Alpha-Waymond assumes she’s back home to finish her taxes. We then see Evelyn still in the cubicle about to fight Deirdre at the same time. Mentally, she switches back and forth between getting her ass kicked in one universe by Deirdre and talking to Waymond about their potential divorce in the van in the regular universe. Waymond says that when Byron from church brought up divorce with his wife when they were miserable, they talked things out and it made everything better. As Waymond talks about how anytime he tries to bring things up to her, she always seems to get pulled away by something, we see her get thrown back into her battle with Deirdre in the other universe. She’s getting her ass kicked now. Alpha-Waymond decides to leave her, realizing she’s not the one. He switches back into regular Waymond, and Evelyn enters the room in which he was trapped. Switching back to the version of her in the van talking with Waymond, he sadly agrees with her that maybe they would have been better off had they have not gotten married. Evelyn says she never said that, but Waymond says she didn’t have to. The way she looks at him tells the story for her. Switching back to the other universe, Deirdre chases the both of them and Waymond is confused as all hell, especially after Evelyn frantically tells Deirdre she loves her to try and activate her martial arts skills. Finally, she slows down on the stair steps and says it with her whole heart, and it works.
She presses the green button, but it sends her back to another universe where she decided to leave Waymond and instead stay home in China. In this universe, and through a rapid montage, she learned kung fu and parlayed it into a highly successful career as a superstar actress. She comes back to this universe and takes out Deirdre in seconds in front of a shocked Waymond.
She turns to him saying, “I saw my life…without you. I wish you could have seen it. It was beautiful. I should have listened to my father and not gone with you all of those years ago”. As Waymond starts to get teary-eyed and she tries to explain herself to him, Alpha-Waymond comes back into Waymond’s consciousness and says they have to keep moving because they definitely have Jobu’s attention now.
This is just the beginning, as Evelyn continues to explore the multiverse to defeat Jobu. On the way there though, she will realize that the meaning of this ultimate fight is much more nuanced than initially expected.
My Thoughts:
The buzz surrounding Everything Everywhere All at Once reached a fever pitch during awards season a couple of years ago and for good reason. There were so many elements that came together that could not simply be ignored. It came out the same year as a Marvel movie with a similar premise, but with a quarter of the budget, it starred an Asian cast and accompanying story directed by the guys who brought us eclectic and unforgettable productions like Swiss Army Man and hilariously enough, the music video for “Turn Down for What”, and it was released by A24, the highly acclaimed production studio that has staked its claim as the voice of a new wave of storytelling, fitting the tastes of a new generation of filmmakers and fans alike. Even with certain flaws and questions in nitpicked details that we may have regarding the film, Everything Everywhere All at Once may go down as one of the premier examples of how filmmaking, storytelling, and pure imagination shifted the focus of mainstream moviemaking into the next generation. Much like its title, the film does everything conceivable to touch on every single aspect of the story and production to capture interest from any age group, ethnic background, gender, or whatever else. In summation, there is something for everyone. What was accomplished here by the Daniels was nothing short of remarkable. To grab mainstream fans, the marketing focuses heavily on the science fiction premise and the ever-popular multiverse concept that has found itself into many major features and television shows over the years. Along with this, the fighting and martial arts aspects of the movie were shown in big spurts while being accompanied by key comedic scenes to keep things light-hearted in what turns into a surprisingly deep and involving story.
Though the marketing did a good job in bringing the audiences in, all of this is very secondary to what’s important in Everything Everywhere All at Once, so action movie fans be warned. What you expect based off what you read versus what the film is actually about is something entirely different. Really, the stuff that piqued our interest into turning the movie on in general is quite unimportant to the overall story. Sure, it enhances the screenplay, but it’s not what EEAO is about. In fact, it becomes more obvious with every rewatch to the point where you want to move past it to get back to the heart of what’s important. There’s a lot of flash, crazy action, and cosmic chaos, but the focus of the story is what rocks you to your very core. As bizarre and chaotic as this screenplay is, there is a heart to it that stays with you. The Daniels rip open the special effects and imagery by its seams to reveal a hardened skeleton of themes consisting of depression, intergenerational trauma, existentialism, nihilism, determinism, the difficulty of accepting things you may or may not understand, the struggle of being an Asian American family with a background heavily molded by tradition, and the influence and development these traditions may have on children growing up in America. Once you get to this core of the movie, everything else in the film starts to unravel and you start to realize how it’s all just shlock used to muddy the bare bones of the real story. Don’t you see? Nothing matters, at least most of it doesn’t matter. This is why when you come to the realization of this fact by the time the credits roll, your heart feels warm, there may be a tear in your eye, you pull your loved ones closer, and the goosebumps on your arms rise as the final title card shows up on the screen.
With so much going on, the focus of this review should start with the ironically named Joy, the daughter of Evelyn who has gotten the least amount of publicity, despite being the most crucial character to the story. No matter what universe they are in, everything can be rooted back to her struggle to connect with Evelyn and Evelyn’s lack of understanding of her daughter and who she has become. Right in the opening minutes, Evelyn tries to explain how she’s open-minded enough to not be bothered by Joy dating a woman, though she does refer to Becky as a “white” woman specifically when she is in fact half-Mexican. Evelyn is trying but seeing herself as the only one who takes the family’s responsibilities seriously as the main provider, she doesn’t have time to play the other side of being a parent. Unfortunately, this is the side that can affect any child for the rest of their lives, as it’s the actual parenting aspect of being a parent. This is the side where you help mold your child into becoming a capable and goodhearted adult. The intention isn’t to influence them or explain what they can or cannot be. A parent’s job is to simply put their child on the right path in the best way they possibly can and guide them along the way if they need the assistance with love, support, and advice. Sadly, Evelyn’s responsibilities have exceeded her ability to balance each aspect of her life, especially her interpersonal relationships. Basically, everything seems to be happening all at once, and Evelyn’s universe is caving in on her, which is also why the title of this film and each section it’s broken down into is so pristine and perfectly in-tune to the screenplay written. With these thoughts in mind, doubt creeps in. As it does with all of us, Evelyn’s conscious starts to remind her of potential missed opportunities any time she has a second to think to herself or when she tries to calm down. She starts to wonder what could have been had she done this instead or made a different series of decisions than the ones she did to lead her here. The existential dread starts to set in, and she’s starting to feel hopeless. Unbeknownst to her, she’s carrying this weight into her family life to make everyone else miserable too.
It’s as if she’s trapped in a hole, and the water is slowly rising and encompassing her whole body. No matter how far she gets in an attempt to escape the flooding, the water is only rising, and the room to live comfortably and breathe is getting smaller and smaller.
If you don’t have a good support system, misery can follow, such is the case with EEAO. Here, both Evelyn and Joy are at this breaking point mentally and emotionally. Joy hears all the words Evelyn tries to throw at her to make it seem like things are cool, but she knows Evelyn thinks differently since she’s so adamant on not telling Gong Gong. Joy has been with Becky for a couple of years now, so it’s a serious relationship. Because of this, she wants to be proud of it, as Becky is here to stay. Since Evelyn is still trying to still hide their relationship with the initial mask of it being too much for Gong Gong to comprehend because he is very traditional, Joy can never feel the acceptance she desires as an adult woman. This is familial trauma that can only be healed in three ways, honesty, understanding, and kindness. Otherwise, the resent Joy has for Evelyn and her being stuck in her ways will never leave and the black hole of nothingness will always be there. To feel complete and to be able to move on, she needs Evelyn to make that step whether she believes it or not. This is something carried into every universe too, as it is explained with Jobu Tupaki that no one knows her goals. All they know is that she is looking for Evelyn. Even though when she comes face to face with Jobu and she blames her for her daughter “thinking” she is gay, Evelyn is not some mean-spirited bigot. A majority of this multiversal mess is explained through her story, what she has been through, how she has gotten to this point, and why she needed to go through this to reach her daughter. When we get our first taste of the multiverse and a montage is presented to explain Evelyn’s life story up until this point, we get years of generational trauma that she has internalized from the very beginning and never talked about openly with Joy or Waymond.
Even when Evelyn was born, the doctor had to apologize because she was a girl. It’s an internalized hurting she has experienced from literally her first day on the planet!
Not only does it explain how she is as a parent and wife now, but it also strengthens her in the eyes of the audience because it’s reintroducing how difficult it was for a Chinese immigrant to start a new life with a husband who was looked at as a mistake of mythic proportions by her father. As said in the summary, when she leaves China to marry Waymond, Gong Gong straight up says that Evelyn is not his daughter anymore. Even so, she leaves anyway. I shouldn’t have to tell you how much strength one has to have to do this. This moment alone is enough to justify her reasoning to Joy about not wanting to tell Gong Gong the truth. He has mellowed in his old age and Joy only knows the nicer version of him. However, we see firsthand that when he was still parenting Evelyn and controlling her life, something like this would set him off to the point where he may swear off ever seeing them again. Knowing this, Evelyn doesn’t want to take that chance for Joy’s sake, but Joy doesn’t know anything about this. As a result, a protective and loving thought is misunderstood as a cruel action simply because it’s too hard for Evelyn to communicate and speak openly about the generational trauma she suffered and doesn’t want her daughter to go through. She holds it within, making the moment of when Evelyn demands to know why it was so easy for her father to give up on her in the third act so agonizing. Of course, Evelyn’s decision to keep this inside continues the trend of trauma into Joy but for completely different reasons. Sure, all is technically fine now because Gong Gong is visiting and they bend over backwards for him to make sure things are as good as they can be, but these words spoken by him to Evelyn at such a young age are words that can’t be taken back. These are words you can’t forget, and it will be forever rooted deep into her subconscious to the point where it’s affecting her own parenting.
Those who deal with family drama of any kind can relate to this relatively short montage sequence in the elevator because many people know someone in their family that they too look at differently because of a certain moment frozen in time where they did or said the wrong thing. It stays with you for an eternity.
Besides the colorful imagery in the moment, the biggest takeaway from the sequence are these words spoken from Gong Gong, so it makes sense as to why Evelyn is so worried about her father and the potential deterioration of his relationship with his granddaughter. As outwardly cold as Evelyn may seem because she’s spreading herself too thin with work, parenting, and the evil of filing taxes, her intentions with Joy become much clearer and heartfelt as a result. Yes, she should have been proud of Joy through and through and not be afraid of telling Gong Gong about Joy’s relationship with Becky, but she’s just not wired that way. She already went through this defining moment in her life where she almost completely severed ties with her father, and it took a lot out of her. She doesn’t want Joy to go through that with him and put the final nail in the coffin. Additionally, she may also not want to be looked at as a further failure in her father’s eyes, proving him right. As we can see, she can’t even tell him the truth about being audited when Evelyn and Waymond wheel him through the IRS building, saying instead that they’re actually very successful and they may expand, which couldn’t be further from the truth.
We’re all scared of the realities of this world and have moments where we dip into existential dread when all of our everyday responsibilities seem to be caving in on us. Going along with this, we all have feelings of resentment because every single one of us do feel like we are destined for more. It’s not that we are incapable of being happy, we as human beings just tend to be unsatisfied. When someone accomplishes a goal, they create another. Being content is a myth. On the surface, human beings can be cool with how life eventually turned out for them, but there will always be the “What if?” scenario that is buried deep within oneself because they wonder if they could have been more successful had they been dealt better cards in life or decided to take a different path. It’s not regret per say, it’s just a longing for more. Even if we have family and we love our kids, parents, and whoever else, there will always be that small part of you that wishes there could be more, whether it be more money, notoriety, a bigger house, or a less stressful and more fun job. Evelyn is very much this type of person. Yes, she’s rigid as a parent and is work-focused to the point where she doesn’t see her own marriage crumbling or her relationship with her only child deteriorating. However, never do we question her love for her family and those around her. It’s just mishandled, and her focus is misdirected. As the matriarch of the household, she is just too concentrated on what’s at stake. If she didn’t do all of these chores and responsibilities like figuring out how to organize their tax related information, who would? It certainly wouldn’t be Waymond or Joy. Going above and beyond in everything else has allowed the Wang family to stay afloat, but the foundation of every family in love, kindness, and understanding has taken a backseat. Because of this, the “What if?” scenario starts to boil to the surface in the head of Evelyn. Again, she still loves her family, but the multiverse allows for her to see what could of have been of her life.
She was never proud of her accomplishments because she always thought of what could have been, and it stemmed from such a bad ending with her father and wanting to prove him wrong. When she gets a glance of everything she could have accomplished, she sees how close she was.
Call her selfish all you want, but anyone who would be lucky enough to have that moment to peer into the most successful version of themselves would be just as enthralled as she was. She stood there in shock, seeing that one version of her accomplishing her dreams of being a movie star actress being rich, successful, and known and loved by all. Despite the chaos around her and Alpha-Waymond explaining how she’s the key to saving the multiverse, she can’t help but selfishly think of how amazing it would be to just be that version of herself. Like many of us, she’s clouded by what could be and can’t see how crucial her role is to the present. In fact, she tries to back out of the mission a few times before she realizes her true purpose. When she’s given the ultimatum by Alpha-Waymond after the initial fight in the IRS building, she chooses to stay until Alpha-Waymond calls an audible and grabs her anyway. When Evelyn is very obviously considering Verse Jumping into the “movie star” universe, he is only able to stop her byy talking about how it’s a contradiction that leads to her inviting chaos, which could lead to death (“or worse!”). She doesn’t want this fight and is more worried about her taxes rather than saving the universe. It’s not until she’s attacked or has her back against the wall facing Jobu or Deirdre that she is forced to buy in. When she comes face to face with the master of the multiverse in Jobu Tupaki, a version of Joy, her true feelings come to the surface. Though afraid of the powers Jobu has as explained by Alpha-Waymond (an overloaded mind usually dies, but hers fractured and continuously explores every world and every possibility at the same time to command the multiverse as an emperor of sorts), especially because Evelyn directly caused it when Alpha-Evelyn pushed Joy to her very limit when she found out how to Verse Jump and wanted her to learn it, she blames Jobu for the reason Joy doesn’t call home anymore, why she dropped out of college, got tattoos, and “thinks” she is gay.
At this moment in time, Evelyn doesn’t understand that she played a part in what she doesn’t like about Joy, as she saw her potential and pushed her to the point of exhaustion. In fact, in every universe, this has happened and has resulted in many other versions of Evelyn being killed. The multiverse is centered around a determinist story being told within the relationship between Evelyn and Joy, and this version of Evelyn (“The One”) being the only way to stop it from happening again. Though there are certain details changed here and there depending on what universe they step into, Evelyn pushing Joy to the brink with her domineering ways has led to the same result every time. Because of this, Jobu became stronger and fueled by nothingness and nihilism, as the lack of love, understanding, and kindness has molded her into a multiversal cosmic supervillain who has all-encompassing powers, killing at will and changing things as she sees fit. It’s like how Alpha-Waymond explains, she’s seen too much now with her powers and has lost her sense of morality or belief in objective truth. It all means nothing, so she can do anything at any time, which is why the scene in which Jobu finally shows up to meet Evelyn in the hallway of the IRS building is such a great why to explain the anarchy of Jobu as a villain and subsequently EEAO as a whole. As the always blunt Evelyn asked in the most “Ethnic parent” style possible, “Why do you look so stupid?”, Jobu gets off the elevator dressed like Elvis and walks a pig alongside of her before decimating the security guards in the most creative ways possible. One has confetti coming out of him as his head explodes, she turns two others into salsa dancers and bludgeons the last cop with two dildos. In terms of a villain who is a complete nihilist with the infinite powers of the multiverse at her disposal to the point of boredom, there is no scene done better to explain her situation and characterization.
“If I can become like her, maybe I’ll be strong enough to save my Joy”.
Evelyn comes to this conclusion as the only way to save someone so powerful. Like any strong-willed mother, she knows that this is still her daughter for better or worse. With this, the magic of the multiverse is fully delved into with our protagonist exploring all of these other versions of herself where she has been more successful. Once she reaches near her max capacity, she gets eerily close to the nothingness consuming her. As scary as it is, and how Evelyn has that emotional moment where she destroys her laundromat at the party and signs the divorce papers in front of her loving husband’s face, it’s the moment of release she needs to get through to Jobu and subsequently Joy. When faced with the everything bagel Jobu created to put “everything” on it, she talks about how it became the truth, which is that nothing matters. If nothing matters, “then all the pain and guilt you feel for making nothing of your life, it goes away”. With this moment of truth explained to Evelyn, she almost gets sucked into the bagel until Alpha Gong Gong saves her, with Alpha-Waymond explaining the other, more positive side to this devasting truth. Because Evelyn has continued to fail in life and has never followed up on anything, it led to success for other versions of herself in other universes adding, “You’re capable of anything because you’re so bad at everything”, creating the most backward mythos for “The One” archetype that we may have ever seen. Waymond’s ability to see positivity in the worst things imaginable is what makes him who he is, and it’s what saves Evelyn from tipping over the edge into the bagel for selfish reasonings when she was tiptoeing the line at one point. For a majority of the movie, Waymond’s enthusiasm was balked at, and he was seen as foolish until she realized there was a reason for it all. Splitting between her “movie star” universe where she runs into a smooth and independently successful Waymond at a movie premiere, the other in which she’s fighting the forces of another universe, and the regular universe in which she is sitting in the laundromat, Waymond confidently explains in an emotional, heartstrings-pulling scene that he adjusted to life in a completely different way than her.
He isn’t weak. He’s not ignorant to the cold world. Waymond just tries to see the good side of things and tries being kindhearted because it’s strategic and necessary adding, “It’s how I’ve learned to survive through everything”. On top of this, he talks about the importance of being kind, “especially when we don’t know what’s going on”. He’s been on Earth just as many days as her. He just chooses to respond in a different way, evoking an epiphany in Evelyn as she now sees why he’s always been the man she loved, the one she was destined to be with. She just didn’t realize why until this ever-important, life-changing reminder that redirects the trajectory of her life and the movie in general. Can you imagine that? A simple point of being kind when faced with the dangers of the unknown of everyday life and an earnestness when saying it breaks through Evelyn’s hardened core, which was on the brink of giving up in every universe, and gives her a newfound hope and love for what has become of her life and the people in it. Waymond is a character with an ethos that means the world of a difference in a movie whose characters desperately needed. He is the balance to her that Becky is to Joy, leading Evelyn to realize that Joy has become her. With this in mind, she learns to “fight” like her husband, something she never considered before, as it is the only way to succeed in life. It’s the best of both worlds, and the embracing of the “goofiness” (complete with the googly-eye she places on her forehead) of Waymond allows her to let go and become one as a result. With kindness fueling her defensive fighting within the multiverse, she becomes the hero, and her righting the wrongs of the negative aspects of every universe is a heart-warming sight to see unfold. You’re not alone. Sometimes, you just need some help whether you’re an adult or a child. Admitting this isn’t a weakness. It all leads to a newfound strength and figuring out how to reach your own potential. That is powerful stuff.
The aforementioned, beautiful monologue sequence that leads to this realization is magnified by deserving Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan, and the final line of “In another life, I would have really liked doing laundry and taxes with you” is one of those lines that stays with you, reminding any viewer of the joys that can be found in everyday life if you look hard enough. Not only does Quan show a secret, unlimited range that Hollywood didn’t care to find out he always had, but there is a genuine warmth to his presence and energy that I’d dare argue hasn’t been felt or seen, before or since. Furthermore, Stephanie Hsu should have won Best Supporting Actress. Though it felt good in the moment because she’s a veteran of the game and has never really won anything of note, Jamie Lee Curtis’s Academy Award win felt like a “Thank you” rather than a deserved trophy. She was memorable but wasn’t in the same stratosphere of Hsu in terms of range, emotional depth, or ability, especially considering how nearly impossible a character like hers was to play. Hsu should have had a bigger campaign behind her because she was the vital third piece in holding this picture together. Also, thank God Awkwafina didn’t get this role too, as she was the original choice but had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts. It’s not that she couldn’t have pulled it off, it’s more that this allowed for Hsu to get a major opportunity to become a star itself. I live for stuff like this. The fact that Hsu knocked it out of the park on top of that and arguably should have won the most highly coveted prize in Hollywood only proves it.
At the very least, rewatch that parking lot scene between Hsu and Yeoh. You’d be hard-pressed not to feel moved during this conversation (“I don’t wanna hurt anymore.”).
Along with the exploration of so many deep themes and topics, EEAO is consistently amusing, and it keeps you from being totally lost in the somewhat confusing details of the world-building and intricacies of certain plot developments. Despite the hilarity surrounding the mispronunciation of Ratatouille (“Raccaccoonie”) leading to a puppet raccoon taking over the role in a certain universe and wanting to kill Evelyn (with every callback to it being just as hilarious), the moment when she tries to Verse Jump to fight but instead goes into a universe where they have hot dogs for fingers and she’s in a relationship with Deirdre was outrageously funny, especially when it was accompanied by the 2001: A Space Odyssey parody. Then, there’s the power up of the guy jumping ass-first on a butt plug-looking statue to fight Evelyn and the entire fight sequence Evelyn has in front of a confused Waymond and Joy. There’s so much fun to be had throughout.
With the glory being more in the dynamic between Evelyn and her family, there is still a lot of entertainment in the convoluted science fiction details that shape the action. The Verse Jumping is a cool concept and makes sense within the story, and the amusing ways in how they have to complete a task on the stop to pull it off are always funny, with Alpha-Waymond’s quip about how impossible it is to pull off three paper cuts purposely being one of the more underrated jokes of the film. Another fine moment of engaging writing and action mixing in with questions of morality was when Alpha Gong Gong opting to kill Joy to try and stop Jobu. His reasoning makes sense within the story, but in the heat of the moment, Evelyn is at more of a crossroads than she’s ever been. In the sequence, she is basically faced with killing her daughter, the version she knows as a normal person, for the sake of the universe. Since she’s not a nihilist, she can’t do it, despite it potentially saving every other universe or at least taking the chance that it might. It’s a such a tough question because Gong Gong’s reasoning is logical, but it would be hard for literally anyone to go through with it, especially since it doesn’t necessarily equate to them winning the war. It only makes one less Jobu Tupaki. Moments that make you question everything are what makes a good sci-fi movie great, and this is what EEAO does in more ways than one. Then, there’s all the montages through the multiverse to show the infinite possibilities of the world created for us, something that EEAO blows Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness completely out of the water with. It’s done so well that one of the most compelling scenes of the entire film is one as simple as the serene desert location where our two main characters are silent rocks, with only captions to explain the conversation between the two inanimate objects.
As they oversee a cliff and only silence is heard throughout the sequence, you feel at peace for this singular moment in time. In a film filled with such anarchy, fighting, and bizarre happenings, there is something enlightening about this one moment of clarity to get our bearings as the two share a laugh for the first time in a while. In recent memory, the only other time I’ve seen something similar to this was when Trinity saw the blue sky for the first time during the chase sequence in The Matrix Revolutions. Both times, it felt like pure serenity. Lastly, EEAO also strives in seeing the Waymond-like positivity in nihilism. One of the most significant lines of the film is during the reconciliation sequence in which Evelyn states, “We can do whatever we want. Nothing matters”. In a way, it’s true, but it’s more the idea of seeing meaning in nothing. This is what gets me with this line. It is true that there is so much that we hold near and dear or care way too much about it when it really doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, but within this statement is pure unbridled love. It strengthens Evelyn’s words to Jobu previously about how she doesn’t have to go through anything alone. That in itself defeats this point of view because you are finding purpose when faced with adversity. With every new discovery, we are reminded “We’re all small and stupid”. Though it’s a reason to not care about life on a large scale, I feel like this quote is almost a proponent of making sure you live your life to find out your purpose, meaning, goals, motivations, or simply what matters to you. They aren’t telling us to give up and smile about it because life doesn’t matter. It’s essentially telling us to stop stressing the elements of life that don’t directly affect you.
Just focus on you and the people you affect to help make Earth a better place to live. When you do this, you will be at peace and joy will come along with it.
Everything Everywhere All at Once is a lot to take in, and there are times you will be a bit overwhelmed with the presentation. Truthfully, not all of it works as well as you may assume when looking at my review. Nevertheless, when you start to analyze it and loosen up on any preconceived notions on its approach to certain genres or themes, you will begin to see the film for what it is and that’s a remarkable work of art that will age even better with time. Succeeding as a wildly creative science fiction extravaganza, a strangely funny comedy, and as an Academy-Award winning emotionally resonating journey, EEAO is an example of a team working together in full commitment to the filmmakers’ vision to create a feature that borders on the “generational” label. I can’t say that you’ll comprehend or appreciate every nuanced detail the first time, but let it grow. Think about it, read about it, and revisit it. By then, you may start to see what the Academy saw, and that is a movie worthy of winning Best Picture.
…or don’t watch it. You can do whatever you want. Nothing matters, right?
Fun Fact: The original idea was for the film to star Jackie Chan, but the concept was changed for a female lead after the Daniels decided the husband/wife dynamic would be more relatable if the protagonist was a woman. Awkwafina was originally cast as Joy but had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts.
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