VisionQuest Episodes 3 and 4: Tommy's Trauma, Paladin's Creed and a Mystery Synth

VisionQuest Episodes 3 and 4 give Vision a brush with death, a reboot in a pool, a closer look at the bounty hunter Paladin and a new synthetic who hacks straight into his mind.

Tommy's Fear of the Pool Ties Back to Agatha All Along

Tommy got over his fear of the water quickly, and the answer in our discussion was simple: he had to. There was some back and forth over whether the word itself was the trigger, along with a joke that "pull" and "pool" all sound the same to an American ear.

The fuller explanation offered was the trauma itself. Kids held Tommy under the water, and it was at that precise moment that Tommy Maximoff's consciousness came into his body, because the original occupant had vacated it. The other reading had been that some kind of power simply woke up at that moment.

The parallel drawn was Billy. The recollection, offered with an "if I remember correctly", was that Billy had maybe a car accident and died, and that it happened at the same moment Wanda shut down Westview. Their consciousnesses then conveniently found bodies with identical names. There was also the memory that at the end of Agatha All Along, Billy said he could feel Tommy, and that Tommy was drowning in a pool or something. The verdict: "it's all coming together."

Vision's Failed Simulations Gave the Reboot Its Heart

Vision tells Tommy he has run thousands of simulations of this conversation, but none of them work because he does not know Tommy well enough. That moment was called fascinating, with a question over whether it was meant at face value for the emotion of the scene or carried some deeper message for the audience.

The answer offered was that AI is programmed to problem solve, and perhaps some of the time people are not a problem for it to solve. Sometimes you have to admit you don't know someone, so you can't tell them.

That moment was also called "really beautiful", because Tommy is finally getting the father figure he wanted. The hug when Vision came back to life was described as "so sweet", even though Tommy barely knows him. The reply was that he obviously has a deeper connection from the childhood memories he inherited.

We never expected Vision to die, though we agreed it would be wild if Tommy couldn't wake him. A joke about retitling the show "Tommy Quest" got shut down fast: "No. Absolutely not."

Paladin's Bounty Hunter Creed Won Interest, but Not Total Conviction

The Paladin lore drew real interest, even if there was only a little of it: a family of bounty hunters that passes down by blood, with this Paladin different because he was basically adopted. That prompted a comparison to Stick taking Daredevil under his wing, which led to a dispute over whether Stick killed Daredevil's dad. The counter was that he "for sure did not", and that Stick never said, "You can call me dad now." The overlap was called minute, the costume included.

Showing his trauma in this episode was said to humanize him, after two episodes where he was just a bounty hunter chasing them. There was something called noble about his creed, "my contract is my oath", even though he'll kill good guys and bad guys alike as long as there's a contract. On the performance, the response was: "At first, I wasn't sure, but I like it now." One view held that his oath feels samurai, while he behaves more like "a dangerous dude". The answer was that you can hold a creed without acting like a samurai.

The other side was blunt: "I don't know how I feel about him. That's the honest truth." The prediction, as of now, was that a year from now he might not be remembered. The comparison was with fragments that stay, like getting emotional over WandaVision, or Andor, where the details have faded but the memory of loving it remains. Paladin was not found "supremely compelling".

Would a cold, calculated approach have worked better? He was called flippant rather than cold, possibly a case of Marvel undercutting with comedy. The Terminator came up, with its poster recalled as "no pity, no pain, no fear, unstoppable". The pushback was that Paladin is a person, while the synths and AI in this show are layered with personality. One part did land: the whistle with the glasses, a callback that explained why he's still alive. His beatings also drew a comparison to Batman in the Dark Knight trilogy.

A Mystery Synth Breaks Into Vision's Mind

There was no fear for Vision, but there was concern about how they'd fix him. He's still not 100 percent, and now he has "malware or something" from another entity in his head, compared to someone breaking into your house uninvited. The questions piled up: was she also created by SWORD, and why is she killing these people? The vibranium bullets hurt her, but she's still alive.

Her voice drew comparisons to Cate Blanchett, the guest star at the end of the last season of Squid Game, and Tilda Swinton, with the caveat: "I don't think it's either of them." Olivia Colman came up later. Neither of us knows the comic book counterparts. A red sky briefly raised the thought of Wanda, despite her being crushed by a mountain, which got the reply, "Who really dies?"

Then came the mind battle, an exorcism built on code with lines like "The power of code compels you" and "Control alt delete thee from this place." Ultron then joins the hunt for the killer. On the synth herself, the reaction was: "I need to know. I mean, at this point, I think we all need to know."

The Fab Four Slip Puts Tommy on Vision's Trail

Tommy finally asks who Vision keeps talking to when he goes spacey. Vision admits he hosts several AIs: Friday, Edith, DUM-E and U. Jarvis, sadly, was deleted. Tommy calls them his fab four. There is one more, though: another AI called Ultron, the one Tommy hates because of Sokovia. One reaction was that this is the truth, only kind of adjacent.

The omission comes back at the gala. Vision mentions five AIs, and Tommy remembers that back at the motel it was four. A Freudian slip comes up, along with the line "how human of you." Tommy tells him, "You can't con a con man." There was a debate over whether anyone would really push for that detail in the middle of a James Bond level espionage job. The answer was probably not, but Tommy simply sensed he wasn't being told the truth. That is probably the most human thing Vision did. Our parents lie to us and mislead us because they think they're protecting us.

The Butcher Bird Case Points to Josephine Carrington

Edith and Ultron get past Interpol's security, which is personified as bots. A captcha asks them to prove they're not robots and count the fire hydrants. They argue over three versus five, and that reminded one of us of our own password skit. Later they get three attempts at a code with 8,493,611 possible combinations. They guess October 3rd, 1980 and Astros 1980 before landing on the dog's name.

The files show a five person team that created the first stable synthetic consciousness, and a killer synth picking them off one by one. The exception is Dr. Josephine Carrington, the project co lead, who died of natural causes in 2008. The files describe exactly one liter of blood taken by needle, fingerprints laser surgically removed and an eye pecked out. All of them are bio keys to something the Butcher Bird is still searching for. That points to Katarina Wells, who is sponsoring a gala on AI and transhumanism.

At the gala, Edith learns the Stark AIs were modeled on real people, and that her template was Edith Marx, described as exceptionally brave. That led to a point in the discussion: the old you doesn't matter anymore, you're the next version, and you could do the same in real life. The other half of that point was that Ultron could change too. There was also a moment about Phineas Horton's synthetic man, whose imagery drew a comparison to V for Vendetta. When the killer turns out to be Josephine, the reaction was: "How come I figured this out from the beginning and it took the AI so long?"

Ultron Takes the Wheel Too Fast

When Vision can't win the fight, he gives Ultron control, and Ultron sends Josephine away and locks everyone out. The trajectory made sense, because what we wanted to see was what happens if Ultron takes over. Ultron plays by his own code, compared in the discussion to the difference between Daredevil and Punisher. The process didn't land as well: "Come on, man. Put up a fight."

The fight felt short. It looked pretty cool the moment it started and was over before it really began. The counterpoint was that Vision doesn't have his full functions while she has a fully working body. Still, there was a wish that his direction had been less human, since he looked like a winded person rather than a robot struggling like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Terminator 2. Maybe that's the point.

The simulation ability also came up. It was compared to Hermione's time turner: if Vision ran even a rough simulation of the gala, the Ultron conversation would surely have come up. The show hasn't established a cost to running them. The pushback was that he isn't at full power, and that with Tommy as his son he may be reacting more like a human and making mistakes. That point was conceded, with a maybe.

Ultron May Not End Up the Villain

We don't know for sure that Ultron is duping anyone. His touching moment with Edith suggested he might realize he doesn't have to be the destructive version of himself. He even offers Vision sound parenting advice, though it comes from watching a lot of TV. It's hard to know if that is imitation for manipulation or real empathy. Then again, he has had a long time locked away to plan for exactly this, and he played the long game until he got control. His closing line, "You can call me pop," drew the reaction that it was sinister. Even so, there was a hunch it will turn around: "I don't think that Ultron is going to ultimately be the villain of this. He's too fun."

Paul Bettany's Shift From Vision to Ultron Drew Praise

It's rare that a TV show built on film IP keeps the film actors, unlike Limitless, Rush Hour, Lethal Weapon or Buffy. That trend was credited to Marvel and to TV now being seen as prestige. The visual effects were praised too, though you could see some desyncing between Paul Bettany saying Ultron's lines and James Spader's voice. Overall it was done really well, and Bettany captured something of Ultron's essence.

Since episode run times vary, there was frustration that the show doesn't linger on the best moments, like Vision turning into Ultron. It was the eyes, and the way he moved more fluidly, slower and deliberate. When his voice shifted from Vision's to Ultron's, the reaction was: "Oh my gosh, this is so cool." The hope is that we get him for a little while longer.