WH: Jarrod, in your live-posts about the show, you noted the occasional Too Many Cooks vibes as Ultron hijacked the “UltraVision” segments for his own nihilistic ends. Given that I think “Forever’s” most interesting move is to put itself in direct conversation with WandaVision—rejecting its formulation of grief, and its love of the comforting power of the sitcom, with one fell swoop—I found myself wishing it would push even deeper into that more subversive territory.
DC: I had kind of hoped they’d end up in a Frasier parody—with Ultron as Frasier and Vision as Niles—but given that they were trying to break down Ultron’s “walls” to get him to break down, I see why a broader TGIF sitcom made more sense.
JJ: The family element kept most of the show from working. It’s basically the origin story for Marvel’s artificial intelligence and the intrigues that go with it, but since this is a WandaVision sequel, I feel there was a creative desire to echo that show’s sitcom-riffing to bring it all full circle, which kept the sharper, more sinister elements of Ultron from peeking through. There are whiffs of it in “Forever” — the way Ultron speed-runs Vision and EDITH through hundreds of episodes out of spite, for example, felt Mephistophelean in a way WandaVision did in its eerier moments. But never once did I feel dread or fear for any of these characters, because, to me, the idea of Ultron taking over humanity was actually kind of fun! Who are we worried about here, anyway? A Russian nesting doll of emerging personalities that explain why certain AIs behave the way they do, like Ultron, Jocasta, FRIDAY, EDITH, and JARVIS, assembled like squabbling family members? Feh!
WH: Don’t forget D.U.M.-E. Thank god we get a full narrative arc for D.U.M.-E.
JJ: Yes, at last. It’s all we’ve ever wanted!
SG: As much as I adore James Spader’s sassy, suave performance and how he rocks that hat, the show and its finale just raised the question of why, on the brink of introducing its latest Big Bad, the MCU wants to dig into an antagonist whose movie came out a whole 11 years ago. I know, I know, that’s just how the timing worked out, and that the purpose of these Disney+ TV shows, to some small extent, is to breathe new life into familiar characters. But at this point in its lengthy existence, the franchise is overwrought and hoping for a change. VisionQuest just feels trapped between the desire to be its own thing, yet wrap up a trilogy, and still set up Doomsday, which it did with that post-credits scene. Speaking of, the scene with Wanda wasn’t included in our screeners, so finding out it existed pissed me off because OF COURSE that’s how you’re going to end this. To me, it cheapened whatever emotional heavy lifting VQ tried to pull off in “Forever.” I’m not surprised, just annoyed.
DC: With Tommy managing to make an appearance here, I guess I wasn’t too surprised to learn Wanda also showed up in a post-credits scene. But it’s diabolical of Disney/Marvel not to at least mention to critics that an additional post-credits sequence was being withheld for spoiler purposes.
JJ: My girlfriend, a huge Marvel Comics fan, sat next to me as I live-posted about the finale for TV Club, and that Wanda twist pissed her off. I think VisionQuest, sitting on the precipice of Doomsday, creates a need to close a circle — which is good in a way — but its gentle, humane finale for Ultron, Vision, Billy, and Tommy scraped too abrasively against that post-credit sequence. They can’t stand apart either, because the boys’ mother looms so large in the narrative.
WH: Having only just learned about this post-credit sequence now, I’m going to get back up on an old soapbox and state how idiotic it is to try to tell these genuine, occasionally thoughtful stories about grief—which is what this whole trilogy is, when you give it the most “Here’s what they were trying to do” benefit of the doubt—and then end it on a note of franchise-obliged character resurrection. Bettany and Spader are doing real work here (as Elizabeth Olsen and Kathryn Hahn did before them) trying to dive into the absolute destruction grief can inflict on a person and their personality. But no, Doomsday’s coming in a month. Pull another corpse off the pile.
JJ: I’m sorry we’re the ones to break that news, William.
SG: Tommy asking Vision whether there’s a chance they’ll see Wanda again should’ve clued us in, but I assumed this feeling of “I wish Wanda was with us” would linger for Tommy, Billy, Vision, in Doomsday or whatever project they pop up in next. I also assumed it was enough of a mention for the audience to wonder when and how Wanda will show up. But why bother letting any of that breathe?
JJ: There was no way Wanda Maximoff was going to be allowed to die without a redemption arc. This is Marvel, after all.
DC: I mean, Ultron just got one! (edited)
WH: Call me when they line one up for Virgil Horton. Say what you like about his dance moves, the man could throw one hell of a creepy dinner party.
DC: Can we move on to lingering questions? Because I have a few. What happened to F.R.I.D.A.Y.? And PhilomenAI Cunk?
JJ: I don’t know about Cunk, but I’m glad Diane Morgan got a nice Marvel check. As for F.R.I.D.A.Y., she ran off for a bit and came back to bolster the emotional finale! One big happy AI family! (edited)
DC: But she didn’t go work for Paladin, and she’s no longer living rent-free in a mind palace, so is she just…out there?
JJ: Wandering the internet, helping some nice people get their calendars sorted, no doubt.
WH: F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s ambiguous ultimate fate highlights to me just how little this show actually cared about any of its AI characters; they’re almost literally accessories for Vision from start to finish, in a show that has no actual interest in ideas about virtual consciousness.
SG: I will be honest, happy for Diane Morgan, but I didn’t even think of where The Handler ended up because of how little she mattered. A comic relief, to be sure, but also a subplot that I don’t think VQ’s team wanted to explore much at all. And I agree with William about F.R.I.D.A.Y’s ending as well.
JJ: That ambiguity, for me, cheapens the “death” of J.A.R.V.I.S. earlier on. Just an easy sacrifice beat to pull out early on to heighten the dramatic stakes.
DC: If any story was going to treat AIs as something more real, it should have been this one. But I guess Virgil did spell out the preference for the organic when he said: “We used our own minds to make the artificial real.” These AIs wouldn’t exist without their human inspirations, so, uh, I guess since F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s human is long dead, she can now solve mysteries in a van.
WH: It’s a consequence of how invested (arguably, overly invested) the show is in its central metaphors, I think. Vision isn’t written as an automaton trying to rebuild himself from his own memories, a heady sci-fi concept that the show pays lip service to with things like E.D.I.T.H. fixating on her original “self.” He’s just a very sad man learning to be less sad, and everything else is CGI trappings.
JJ: “Do Androids Dream Of Their Magic Sons?”
DC: Vision playing “dad” to his AIs in his head was presumably his how-to for how to be a dad to his real/brought-back-from-the-dead sons. Then, after Tommy literally works his magic, they all go their separate ways at the end. It’s funny how you can belabor a metaphor and also abandon it.
JJ: I’m with you, William. But then, I’m not surprised a Marvel series is only tipping its Journey Hat towards its stronger sci-fi elements while focusing entirely on the emotionality of its characters — even if the characters, in this regard, are mostly code. Can I say how much VisionQuest kept on reminding me of DC’s Legends Of Tomorrow? Because the way everyone stood around the Mindspace talking sci-fi/tech gibberish while being squishy and cute felt very much like Legends Of Tomorrow.
SG: The bigger picture lingering question I have is after the ending—Tommy heading to New Jersey to meet Billy (Will Vision join them?), Lisa/Paladin/E.D.I.T.H. teaming up, Ultron holding onto that Jocasta drive—do we think this is really the end of the trilogy, even though it certainly wasn’t planned as one? Disney+ seems to be slowing down live-action shows, but do you think they’ll try to wring something else out of this experiment with these characters?
JJ: I think Billy and Tommy could still appear in some capacity in Marvel animation — that’s where most of its Young Avengers characters have wound up lately, in shows like Marvel Zombies and What If…?. As for Vision, there’s no way he’s not in Doomsday if Wanda’s going to be, too. Lisa and Paladin’s team-up gave me strong Team Flash vibes.
WH: “Tommy’s Girlfriend And Her Magic Robot Backpack Will Return…”
JJ: I think the big question is: Was VisionQuest successful in what it wanted to accomplish? Did it close the WandaVision circle successfully with Billy and Tommy’s reunion and Vision’s growing dad-hood? Is this the most satisfying way to handle these characters — to further mire them in grief and doubt until they assemble into a super-unit and save the world? I didn’t feel very satisfied by this approach, even if I did enjoy Spader and Bettany muchly. (edited)
DC: I know we’re winding down, but I did want to mention that I appreciated the Easter egg—I’m assuming it was meant to be a hat tip—of having The Client’s silhouette resemble James Spader’s character in The Blacklist.
JJ: That couldn’t have been an accident.
DC: Jarrod, to your question, I don’t think this was a satisfying way to wrap things up—either for Ultron or the magical/synthezoid family. Its most successful elements were things we’d seen before (in WandaVision, as William pointed out), and then it used what little runway it was given to go somewhere original to just circle back to the broader MCU.
SG: We’ve agreed that what VisionQuest accomplished most was reminding us that James Spader rules lol. I’m not satisfied narratively by much else, including the Ultron-Vision-Tommy connections.
WH: I think all you can get from shows like this is to eke out a few moments of beauty along the way. Miller and Spader dancing around each other—both figuratively and literally. Bettany getting to dig deep into his feelings as J.I.M. Spader and Bettany share a quiet, human moment on a darkened soundstage. Everything else is franchise manipulation or executive-mandated notes or CGI sparklers going off, but VisionQuest at least managed to smuggle in a few human moments, for me.
JJ: It is nice to visit some of these characters. I could spend all afternoon with Ultron. What does that say about me?
SG: I want to end by pointing to Sam’s finale recap, which he ends by asking, “Are we so jaded or are our standards so high that we can’t be a little excited about that?” referring to Wanda’s scene and what it means for Doomsday, even at the cost of what it takes away from VisionQuest. So, are we jaded or are standards too high for the MCU at this point?
JJ: I’m not excited about Wanda being resurrected by Doctor Doom even a little bit, even if that development is about as “comic book” as it gets. Call me jaded!
WH: Wanda Maximoff was an underwritten character played by a talented performer who became popular after a whole other writing team found something in her that was worth exploring, and then got killed off when another writer needed a sufficiently cosmic villain for a different movie. Her story’s over, and the sooner Marvel can accept that stories end, the better. (edited)
SG: I lean on jaded as well, mostly because of things like the Wonder Man cancelation, and Marvel’s inability to let go of characters whose stories have been told and actors who already left their mark (but keep circling back).
DC: My standards were never especially high for the MCU, so I guess I’m also Team Jaded.
JJ: What was one non-Spader thing about VisionQuest that we enjoyed, just to end on a less bummer note? I started calling Paladin’s drones “Pali-drones” last night, which was fun. Wish I’d landed on that one earlier.
WH: I hope Diane Morgan bought herself something nice off of what I assume was a very easy afternoon of work.
SG: While I would like to permanently erase that shot of Jocasta and Ultron making out in their robot forms from my brain, I can’t deny that watching T’Nia Miller is always a treat. I’m a fan of the production and set design. I just wish the show’s intriguing aspects came together entertainingly and cohesively.
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