#36 WandaVision & The Global Influence of the American Sitcom

A cultural analysis deck about one of my favourite shows from 2021

Hi, I’m Florencia Lujani and this is a new edition of Cultural Patterns, a newsletter on brands, culture and strategy. My posting schedule is a bit random, so if this is the first email you receive from me, welcome! Feel free to reply to this email and get in touch. Florencia x

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This is the first time I release a deck like this, so I’m as terrified as excited! But I had fun doing this so I hope you enjoy it too. I’ve taken an academic essay I wrote on WandaVision earlier in the year and turned it into a Google Slides deck.

WandaVision is one of my favourite shows from this year. I loved the characters and the storyline, the references to other tv shows, and how each episode took place in a different decade. It just felt like a very fresh and innovative concept that I wanted to explore and dissect, and so I ended up choosing it for my module’s final essay.

This deck is a cultural analysis of WandaVision and the influence that American sitcoms have had on people all around the world. It’s a Google Slides deck of 35 slides with gifs, photos and pop culture references, and I’ve also kept some of the academic research to give it a bit more depth. What’s inside the deck:

WandaVision and the global influence of the American sitcom through the decades

1) The global dominance of the American sitcom:

• How the distribution of tv shows since the 1950s made American television a global phenomenon.

• How this global popularity made the idea of WandaVision possible.

• How WandaVision reference other shows to create its concept

2) Creating the idea of America for global audiences

• How sitcoms create a common global language.

• ‘Cultural bilingualism’ or how American pop culture is the world’s second culture.

• How sitcoms help create an idea of the United States linked to progress.

3) The sitcoms referenced in WandaVision

An analysis of six sitcoms referenced in WandaVision: The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961), Bewitched (1964), The Brady Bunch (1970), Family Ties (1982), Malcolm in the Middle (2000), and Modern Family (2009). This analysis looked at:

• The material and aesthetic references to each sitcom to identify where the intertextuality was coming from.

• The plot of the original shows to understand why WandaVision was paying tribute to those specific shows.

• Finally, I dissected how these sitcoms portrayed American families to craft an idea of the United States linked to progress for global audiences. 

Hope you enjoy it, and if you want to connect with me, you can find me on Twitter or Linkedin. See you next time,

Florencia