Does Ultron Know Doctor Doom Is Coming? A Vision Quest Theory About Avengers: Doomsday

I think Ultron knows that Doctor Doom and the coming incursions are on their way in Avengers: Doomsday. If he does, the bigger question is why he isn't telling anyone on Vision Quest. This theory covers the whole season without spoiling anything, and as of writing this, I have not seen the back half of the season.

I put some of this to Vision Quest creator Terry Matalas in an exclusive interview.

Ultron survived Age of Ultron as a backup inside Vision

The biggest revelation from Vision Quest is that Ultron survived the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron. In his final moments with Vision, when the camera cut away, Vision did not only destroy Ultron's physical body. He absorbed and backed up Ultron's AI consciousness in a file in his quantum processors.

I asked Matalas about this, pointing out that it has been a fan theory for years. In Spider-Man: Homecoming, when Peter Parker is in the Damage Control storage unit, there's still a glowing red eyepiece in that Sentry head. Then there was the animated What If. I asked whether this was a secret Vision kept, or whether he ever told Tony, Banner or Wanda.

Matalas said that would feel like a smart call for Vision, but that in the writers room, "just because he backed up his code didn't always mean it was switched on." He added, "You know it's like in cold storage," and then, "Or maybe he was." He also mentioned seeing someone online ask whether that meant Ultron was around for Thanos and had an opinion on him. Matalas said he kind of wants to see what that was like, wondering whether Vision accessed that code for advice or didn't switch it on until after White Vision regained his memories, found it in a backup and was curious.

The conversation also touched on the idea that either way, as of this moment, Vision is definitely relying on Ultron for some kind of advice, whether because Ultron has a better point of view on humanity or because Vision respects him and, twisted as he is, values his opinion.

Matalas leaves the door open on how long Ultron was awake

Looking back, it sounds like Matalas wants to leave the door open on whether Ultron was actively conscious this whole time, the way he is now on Vision Quest, perhaps giving Vision advice on Thanos or even romantic advice about Wanda Maximoff during their time together.

But the second half of his answer sounds like what the writers settled on. I read it as this: the moment Hex Vision unlocked the memories of White Vision in the Ship of Theseus scene in WandaVision, Ultron activated from whatever dormant cold storage file he was in. He then took up a position in the attic of Vision's mind space as someone Vision could talk to.

So far on Vision Quest, Ultron is still the character he was in the 2015 film. He jokes that if he were free, he could just as easily spend his time taking in the human art of great museums as he could hijack the planet's missiles and burn us all to ash. The key difference now is his apparent respect for humanity's contradictions and complications, and specifically his love for television and all things WandaVision. In an earlier theory, I laid out how I think Ultron on this show might be aiming to revive Wanda's hex as Ultron Vision.

The Countdown to Doom game on Ultron's TV wall is a real 1982 title

I asked Matalas about a possible Avengers: Doomsday Easter egg in Vision Quest episode 2. On the TV wall in Ultron's attic, tucked between two of the TVs, there's either a tape or a file that says Countdown to Doom.

Matalas said it's "apparently a real game" and "a real thing." He explained that one of the set decorators put it in there, and that he remembered seeing it and checking whether the production had made it. He was told it was real.

He's referring to a 1982 text adventure game in which you play a space explorer whose ship crashes on a planet called Doom for short. You have to find the necessary spare parts or your ship will corrode away in 400 time units. The game was developed for the BBC Micro and Acorn computers as part of the early 1980s BBC Computer Literacy Project. It's a deep cut that only a UK based set decorator would likely know existed.

So Matalas confirmed he saw this detail on set and asked about it. He wanted to make sure it was not a prop they made, because if it was, it would be deemed an intentional Doomsday Easter egg they would have to explain to the audience and to Marvel Studios. In this case they could say they dressed the set with vintage AV equipment and old media that existed in the real world. But they didn't remove it either.

Vision Quest and Avengers: Doomsday shot side by side at Pinewood

When I asked whether there was pressure in releasing the show as the title right before Avengers: Doomsday, Matalas volunteered that both productions shot at the same time on the same Pinewood Studios lot in the UK. "They were shooting it at the same time," he said. He also said that being part of this conversation is fun, and that even he can't wait to see the movie, joking that he's texting Marvel asking when the premiere is.

The Vision Quest production spanned March 2025 through late summer 2025, which was exactly when principal production on Avengers: Doomsday was taking place, before its several months and phases of reshoots since then.

To be clear, shooting two Marvel productions on the same lot at the same time doesn't make a crossover any more or less likely. It's not like James Spader is going to be ushered from one sound stage to another in his mocap suit to pick up shots with the Russo brothers. But I do think the character of Ultron knows about Doctor Doom and the coming incursions we'll see in Doomsday. Here's why.

Ultron inherited Tony Stark's ability to see the future

First, Ultron inherited Tony Stark's futurism. When Ultron first awakened, before he had a body, he was confused as he rapidly took in all of human history and the history of the Avengers. When the Avengers asked about his mission, he answered, "peace in our time."

Throughout Age of Ultron, we see how much of Tony's personality and humor Ultron inherited, since Stark was the father figure who built him. Ultron is simply faster and more advanced than Tony's brain. Tony also had the ability to see the unknown unknowns of the future, the probabilistic outcome of their actions. His warning in Avengers: Endgame, "you mess with time, it tends to mess back," is a line I expect to come back in some form in Doomsday, when that same actor is playing Victor von Doom.

Ultron also inherited that specific ability to think and see into the future. There's a line in Vision Quest episode 3 that ties into this. I won't spoil it here, but I'll come back to it in the future.

Ultron has the time and the tools to read the probabilities

Few minds in the MCU have this kind of mastery of probabilistic outcomes. Doctor Strange is among them through the Time Stone. The Leader, Samuel Sterns, hinted that he could see Doomsday coming in the post credits scene of Captain America: Brave New World: "It's coming. I've seen it in the probabilities."

But AI like Vision and Ultron are capable of quantum computing that does much the same thing as the Time Stone, slowing down time to run through billions of simulations and test possible outcomes. While Vision is stymied on this show, decrypting the puzzle of his identity and his relationship with his son Thomas, Ultron has nothing but spare time to watch TV and see where things are going.

Ultron also has access to the outside world and the same signs Samuel Sterns could read. He can see everything Vision sees, and even inside the mind space he can watch TV news and read newspaper reports about various headlines. In episode 1, Vision had Ultron's upstairs decor deleted, but the TV wall was left standing. In episode 2, things like the Countdown to Doom game were still tucked in there. If Ultron was supposed to be punished with boredom early in episode 2, why did he get to keep that game? Based on that, I think it's at least fair to interpret it as a sign of some knowledge Ultron has that Vision does not.

Ultron's end of the world line and the memory wipe question

Perhaps the most obvious clue comes in episode 2, when Ultron quotes "It's the end of the world as we know it" and follows it with "And I feel fine." To me, that reads as a declaration that he knows Doomsday is approaching and is very much okay with it.

Perhaps he feels okay because a key part of Doom's plan is memory wipe magic, making the new occupants of Battleworld forget their old worlds so they think the world where Doom is God is the only one they've ever lived in. In a promo for a moment later in the season, EDITH seems to still remember Peter Parker, saying, "My first boss was a junior in high school."

If EDITH can still remember Peter, then Doctor Strange's spell to make the whole world forget him, along with every physical and digital trace of his existence, did not work on the quantum code of Vision powered by Wanda's magic. If it didn't work on EDITH, it didn't work on Vision, and it didn't work on Ultron either. That means any memory wipe spell cast by Doctor Doom probably won't work on them. I think Ultron is going to be fine with the end of the world because he's predicted, in one of his billions of outcomes, that whoever this new ruler is will let him rule part of Battleworld, Perfection, as Baron Ultron.

Ultron told Vision that humanity was doomed

Matalas made it clear to us that one of the two key scenes his idea for Vision Quest was based on was Vision's final conversation with Ultron in Age of Ultron. After Vision tells him there is grace in humanity's failings, Ultron responds: "They're doomed."

It's right there. I don't know if Ultron knew what that meant in that moment, but he was referring to some apocalyptic outcome that would eventually come for humanity. Thanos only threatened half of all life, at least the first version of Thanos. Ultron was aiming for all of it.

When the showrunner speculates that they talked about whether Ultron ever discussed Thanos with Vision, they had to have at least talked about whether Ultron would have thoughts on the Marvel big bad following Thanos, the one shooting right across the lot from them.

Does this mean Vision Quest will show Ultron talking about Doctor Doom this season? I don't think so. But could Ultron return in Avengers: Secret Wars, show off his tech kingdom of Perfection and talk about how he predicted all of this would happen? Yes. He's smug enough to say it.