Wizards Beyond Waverly Place Season 1, Episode 1 Review: ‘Everything Is Not What It Seems’

“I’ve missed this,” Alex Russo says opening the door to the wizarding world.

Truth be told, I have missed this too. There was nothing better on The Disney Channel for the longest time than Wizards of Waverly Place, so a return to the iconic show was exactly what I needed. Was it perfect? No. Was it nostalgic? Absolutely.

And maybe that’s what will help this show – its nostalgia.

But what will keep it is its own individuality. Before you ask – it does have a mix of both. While I would love to say that the first episode hooked me on the show, it didn’t. The last five minutes of it were the best parts of it. For the first 20 or so… I wondered how much money Disney was refusing to invest in good VFX and what the h-e-l-l was that monster. It was those two things that stopped me from loving the show.

But we’ll get there.

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Justin Russo is the same old, same old. He’s uptight, high-strung, and everything has to be his way. He wants people to see how great he is and wants to hear it. It’s as if he’s looking for validation everywhere and when he can’t find it, he reminds people that he needs it. Even though he’s a little annoying it is in the most loveable way.

I love that he’s a father of two, and married, and I’ve missed him so much that I will overlook the fact that Justin Russo lives on Staten Island (IYKYK).

He’s got a loving wife named Giada, and two sons – Milo and Roman. Roman is a miniature Justin Russo and Milo is a lot like Alex. I wasn’t sure what I thought Justin would grow up to be, but seeing him here, with his family, it’s perfect.

Roman doesn’t want to room with his brother anymore, because he believes in monsters. Milo is old enough to know that there aren’t monsters in the closet, but firmly believes they are there. And then it gets worse when Billie, a young wizard comes through the mirror in the room.

You can’t help but love Milo. His innocence and matter-of-factness are what makes him just an easy character to love. Roman being a miniature Justin Russo is what the show needed in order to bring in the nostalgia and the sense of new.

It’s Justin’s 34th birthday and Giada says that she has a surprise for him. Justin hates surprises, but when Alex shows up at the front door with Billie, he thinks Alex showing up is his surprise. It’s nice to see Selena Gomez walk through the door and that Alex Russo hasn’t changed at all. She’s grown, but she’s also remained the rebel that she was.

She’s brought Billie there because she was kicked out of Wiztech. Billie needs a teacher and Justin is the best that Alex knows. There is the whole thing that Justin hasn’t told his family that he is a wizard and that magic and monsters exist.

While I can get with this entire storyline, what gets to me is the whole Floogie monster. It’s just sooo badly done – I was like WTF. What is that? I couldn’t wrap my head around it at all. It pulled me out of the story, seeing some weird monster run around. It wasn’t the monster being a part of the storyline, it was just how poorly that it looked.

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Wizards Beyond Waverly Place has to have a budget and they should have invested something into that monster. VFX isn’t cheap, I do get that. However, things like this can make a person pull away from watching.

And I do get that with this show there will be a mixture of ages watching. There will be people who watched the original and people who didn’t. There will be the young and the older. I get that there has to be a balance between the two. But that whole thing wasn’t good.

What I did love was that the monster would freeze people and the only thing that would unfreeze the people is if the monster was banished. I loved that Alex got herself frozen and Justin had to help Billie and teach her to banish the Floogie back to wherever they were from.

Ultimately, seeing David Henrie and Selena Gomez share a screen again was something that I never thought would happen, but it was something that I needed. In a world where everything seems chaotic, remembering simpler times that gave me so much was exactly what I needed.

It was the last few minutes, after Justin had agreed to teach Billie that got me. He says that he can’t teach her at the house, because his family doesn’t know he’s a wizard. So, Alex, Billie, and Just step through the mirror into the Russo’s old lair.

And yes, I may have cried my heart out at this moment. It was exactly what I needed. It was as if I was going home.

If you thought it was as simple as Justin teaching Billie, you (like me) would be wrong. Alex tells Justin that there is a prophecy, that the fate of the world is in Billie’s hands.

Alex tells Justin to make sure that Billie is ready and and she’ll make sure to figure out what Billie will be up against.

Overall, the first episode of the series was a little slow, but it was enjoyable to watch. Will I continue to watch? Yes. A little piece of my youth was brought to life watching this and I don’t take it for granted.

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