In 2015, Earth’s Mightiest Heroes banded back together on the big screen for Avengers: Age of Ultron, which started off with the superhero team fighting one of the remaining HYDRA cells, but then focused on their clash with the megalomaniacal Ultron, played by James Spader. Naturally the robotic menace was defeated by the time the 11th of the Marvel movies in order was over, but word’s come in that Ultron will be return for the upcoming Marvel TV show about Paul Bettany’s Vision. While this is exciting news to hear, I wonder how this is going to be pulled off considering what happened in Age of Ultron.
This update comes to us from THR, which shared that Spader is set to resume voicing Ultron for this Vision series, which has sometimes been referred to as Vision Quest, though that’s not its official title. Spader is the first actor unveiled to be joining Bettany in the project, which is reportedly looking to begin filming in England in early 2025. Star Trek: Picard’s Terry Malalas was tapped to serve as showrunner for this small screen affair in May.
As many of you reading will recall, Ultron was born in Avengers: Age of Ultron when the global defense program that Tony Stark and Bruce Banner were developing became sentient upon being exposed to Loki’s scepter, which contained the Mind Stone. The now self-aware Ultron decided that the only way to protect the world was by wiping out humanity, and in the process of trying to achieve this, he built a new synthetic body for himself with the Mind Stone embedded into the forehead. However, the Avengers managed to steal this body before Ultron could download his mind into it, and with the additions of Iron Man’s J.A.R.V.I.S. AI and Thor’s lightning jumpstarting the body, this being became Vision, who was worthy enough to lift Mjolnir and helped the superheroes battle his “father.”
By the time Avengers: Age of Ultron was over, all but one of the robot bodies that Ultron had replicated for himself was destroyed during the climactic conflict in Sokovia, and Vision tracked down the survivor and destroyed it after one final, poignant conversation. So when it comes to the main MCU reality, there shouldn’t be any copies left of Ultron’s consciousness (though an Ultron variant did nearly conquer the Marvel multiverse back in What If… ? Season 1, which can be streamed with a Disney+ subscription). Meaning, how is Ultron coming back into play for Vision Quest (let’s just assume that what it will be called).
Is this just a case of Ultron’s consciousness having been downloaded into a secret source years ago, and now it’s finally being unleashed? Or will Ultron even be part of the physical world at all? Remember, Vision Quest is following the white-colored Vision from the end of 2021’s WandaVision, who had his memories restored by the Vision created as part of Wanda Maximoff’s Hex. When also taking into account how the original Vision was partially based off Ultron’s personality, perhaps the android protagonist will only hallucinate seeing James Spader’s character.
It’ll be a while until we learn what exactly is going on here, as Vision Quest is expected to be released on Disney+ sometime in 2026. Meanwhile, the next MCU TV show on the docket is Agatha All Along, which premieres its first two episodes on Wednesday, September 18.
