A Number of Things..."Everywhere All at Once" Quiz

Answer: Laundromat

There's a fair bit of significance to the laundromat as it's the Wang family's chief source of income and a slight catalyst to their recent economic issues. Even in the first scenes of the movie, as Evelyn takes a chair at her dining room table to continue working at her taxes, the shot frames her at her seat under piles of laundry bags stowed away on the top shelf of a cabinet; she's literally buried in laundry-- some of which isn't even her family's (Waymond moved some upstairs; he thought it'd be happier there).

In their grounded reality, Evelyn and Joy share their key fights and perhaps their most important discussions in and around the laundromat, perhaps indicating that after going through all of their cycles, it all comes out in the wash.

Answer: Internal Revenue Services

The Internal Revenue Services Building is the setting for a significant amount of the action of the film, not only being the location where Evelyn first meets Alpha-Waymond and realizes her circumstances, but acting as the site of the film's climactic moments. Evelyn and Waymond head to the IRS (with her father, Gong Gong) to speak to their inspector, Deirdre Beaubeirdre, in regards to their recent tax audit and what ends up happening is a whole different type of processing as Evelyn comes to reflect not only on her life, but all the possibilities beyond it. It's just fortunate that Deirdre gives the Wangs one more chance to figure it all out.

Deirdre Beaubeirdre, perhaps a bit ironically, tells Evelyn that when she sees all of her paperwork she sees more than documents-- she sees a story. Perhaps it's most fitting that Evelyn's story is best experienced there.

Answer: Divorce papers

Although the Wangs are in the midst of everything else already, Waymond has divorce papers drafted up in advance of the eventful day not necessarily with the intent to go through with it, but to discuss divorce and hope that it gets them past their troubles.

It comes as, perhaps, a coincidence that Alpha-Waymond appears before Evelyn in the elevator of the IRS building, uses the back of the divorce papers, absentmindedly, to scrawl out further instructions, and leaves them with Evelyn before they head into the meeting with Deidre. Evelyn doesn't even know what they are until they move to depart from the building...and it couldn't come at a worse time. It almost appears time to divorce from reality.

As the complexities of the multiverse start to build in Evelyn, she comes to realize what her life could have been without Waymond...but that she also couldn't bear to be without him-- just another bit of processing they have to go through. It might simply be that a jaunt through the multiverse is what their relationship needs.

Answer: Joy

Once Alpha-Waymond elaborates on the truth of their circumstances, he explains to Evelyn that Alpha-Evelyn, his original version of her, died. In fact, he's seen a thousand Evelyns across the multiverse die in a thousand ways, but the link is that they've always been murdered by an omniversal force known only as Jobu Tupaki, an agent of pure chaos with what appear to be no motives or desires.

The problem is that it appears she's been building something. They thought it was a black hole, but it consumes more than just light and matter.

The other problem is that in the Alphaverse, Alpha-Evelyn and Alpha-Waymond used their Joy as a promising test subject, having her explore the multiverse but causing her mind to fracture. Now, experiencing all the universes at once, she's seen and become capable of too much. She's lost her morality and any sense of objective truth. And she's looking for Evelyn.

Answer: Bagel

The everything bagel, as is described by Jobu Tupaki, was just something she made while she was bored and decided to...well...put everything on a bagel. All her hopes, dreams...every dog, every personal ad on Craigslist...poppyseed, sesame...salt. And it collapsed in on itself. When you put everything on a bagel, it becomes the truth: that nothing matters. And if nothing matters, then all the pain and guilt you feel for making nothing of your life goes away. As the adventure develops, Evelyn realizes that if she becomes like Jobu, at least in her sheer strength, then perhaps she can be strong enough to save her Joy from whatever Jobu has created.

In reality, the bagel appears earlier than that when Deirdre Beaubeirdre starts circling items on the financial paperwork that Evelyn brings into the IRS building. Right there, in the middle of everything, is another big problem. The imagery persists in Jobu's cult members-- they produce the image of an everything bagel on their foreheads and it, too, looks like the corona surrounding a black hole.

Even more interesting might be the fact that on Alpha-Waymond's control device, his app depicts Evelyn's universe as a bagel-shaped circle floating amongst, but connected to infinite other bagel-shaped circles-- a multiverse of everythings.

In the end, Jobu nearly persuades Evelyn that the bagel is the end-all. She created it with the aim to commit fully to their shared nihilism, and with that they could simply end it for themselves. At least this way they wouldn't have to do it alone.

Answer: Pig

Jobu Tupaki first reveals herself to Evelyn when she ascends the service elevator in the IRS Building, and when she does she comes in wearing an Elvis suit, her hair dyed pink, holding a leash with a pig on the end. As much as the pig could simply contribute to the 'everything', and at this point it might be just another bit of absurdity to contend with, it's an interesting recurring symbol.

Evelyn reminds Joy, later on in the film, that Joy got a tattoo of a pig which, as Joy claims, was meant to represent their family. It might be an indication of Joy's divergence or lack of regard for her family's heritage as the member of a later generation. Gong Gong mentions, early on, that Joy's Mandarin gets worse every time he sees her. It might come as a surprise that the Mandarin symbol for 'family' is comprised of the symbols for 'home' and 'pig'. When Evelyn comes back around to the tattoo, she says she doesn't care that it's *supposed to* represent their family. Evelyn needs to let Joy make her own choices, of course, but she's still her mother.

Oh yeah, and Waymond keeps a small toy pig on his waist pouch.

Answer: Hot dogs

As Jobu Tupaki closes in, Evelyn makes a feeble attempt (by urinating herself) to slingshot across the multiverse and gain the powers she needs to fight back. What she doesn't understand, however, is that she needs to lock into another universe. When she fires off, she effectively backfires, gaining capabilities from a universe in which everyone's fingers are giant hot dogs. It allows her to break out of a pair of handcuffs, but be functionally useless as a hand-to-hand fighter.

The visit to this universe actually poses more interesting implications since she's not with Waymond in it-- she's in a loving relationship with Dierdre. It's further proof that the choices people make can cascade, rhizomally, into vastly different alternative scenarios. As Alpha-Waymond explains, not locking into another universe slingshots her off the multiverse map entirely.

When Evelyn attains the power she needs to fight Jobu, her fractured self is sent hurtling through the multiverse. This is one of the may such destinations she inhabits and strives to repair.

Answer: Raccoon

As Evelyn comes to understand that she is, perhaps, the worst Evelyn of the multiverse, she's also reassured that she is the version of herself that has the most potential, being in the universe that's the shortest path to so many possible selves. This, alone, makes her the best option for defeating Jobu Tupaki.

When Evelyn tries to explain to her Waymond and Joy that their multiversal selves are controlling them like puppets, she likens the situation to the one in that movie-- you know the one-- "Raccaccoonie". It's that movie with the chef and he makes bad food and a raccoon sits on his head to control him and makes good food.

As it turns out, Raccaccoonie exists in another universe. In this one, Evelyn is a teppanyaki cook and one of her coworkers, Chad, gains his amazing chef capabilities from a raccoon hidden (poorly) under his toque. Just one more of those instances where the lines between the universes always seems to bleed over.

Answer: Waymond

The googly eyes start appearing early in the film when Evelyn starts finding them in the laundromat, having been placed on broken machines and bags of laundry despite Evelyn's disdain for them.

These silly items actually hold more significance as Evelyn's story takes a turn. Experiencing everything alongside Jobu throughout the multiverse, she comes to determine that everything is actually truly meaningless. Jobu brings Evelyn before the bagel and, as they gaze into it together, Jobu says that she never wanted to find her and kill her; she wanted to find someone who could see what she saw and feel what she felt. And that someone is her.

With this, Evelyn gives up. In her original universe, she signs Waymond's divorce papers and forces Dierdre to bring the authorities to seize their assets. In other universes she ruins relationships and lives.

As the mother and daughter prepare to step forth into the end of all things in the center of the bagel...Waymond speaks to Deirdre in the real world and convinces her to give them one more week on their taxes. Everything, he says, will be okay. All he did was talk to Dierdre.

Despite the cruelty of the world, all he wants is for everyone to stop fighting. They're all scared and confused. He chooses to see the good side in things and he knows they all need to be kind-- especially when no one knows what's going on.

The googly eyes may seem like nothing more than a silly kindness, but they're also the diametric opposite of the bagel. While the dark everything creating to the bagel has the empty void inside, the googly eye has a dark center with a white, outer ring. As Waymond's words bring about an epiphany, Evelyn later places a googly eye upon her forehead, almost as though opening her third eye.

Answer: As rocks

After Evelyn sees everything and is everywhere, it all comes down to the obstinance of...well...just rocks. And those rocks, perched on a clifftop looking over everything with a perfect, clear view, is what becomes of Evelyn and Jobu as they reach their nihilistic nadir. Talking telepathically in one of the universes where conditions weren't right for life to form, Evelyn apologizes; her daughter just tells her to be a rock. It's easier.

But things change. As Waymond helps Evelyn understand that through kindness and despite all the bad, she can fix everything for herself and others, Jobu brings the bagel through to the IRS building. It's not too late for Evelyn to stop her though. As Waymond reminds her that they need to stop fighting, Evelyn prevents herself from hurting Jobu's cultists, instead helping them one-by-one. As they fire bullets at her, she transforms them into googly eyes.

On the cliff in another universe, Evelyn's rock turns to face Jobu's, showing that she now bears two googly eyes. There are no rules. The Evelyn rock crawls towards her.

Though Alpha Gong Gong tries to stop Evelyn, she lets him know that she can no longer stand by and do to Joy what he did to her over the years. He let her go and damaged their relationship, but it's Evelyn's turn to do right by her daughter. In her original universe, Evelyn says that it's all okay; just like her with Waymond, Joy has Becky, who loves her and balances her.

On the brink of the bagel and in the parking lot of the laundromat, Evelyn fights to save Joy/Jobu from taking the plunge but realizes that she needs to let he daughter make her own choices. Before Joy leaves the New Year's party, however, Evelyn admits their relationship doesn't make sense; maybe some new discovery will emerge, however, which will explain why Joy came looking for her mother through all of the noise and why, no matter what, Evelyn still wants to be there with her. She could be anything, anywhere, with anyone else, but she will cherish the few specks of time where it all makes sense if that's what it takes.

In the universe devoid of life, Evelyn's rock follows her daughter's off the cliff, and in the IRS building, Jobu reaches out for her mother from the void of the bagel's hole. In their original universe, Joy asks if Evelyn still wants to have her New Year's party. Evelyn responds they can do whatever they want. After all: nothing matters.