VisionQuest finale: is the Scarlet Witch alive under Doom?

Spoilers follow for the VisionQuest finale. Marvel Studios has confirmed that the Scarlet Witch is returning, in what appears to be Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars. The confirmation comes in the second post credits scene of the VisionQuest finale. As many of us thought, Wanda is alive, and Doctor Doom wants her powers.

The finale closes what Marvel Studios has called the WandaVision trilogy: WandaVision, Agatha All Along and now VisionQuest. Beyond the Scarlet Witch, the last episode reveals who Ultron's human avatar is, kills off Jocasta, reunites the Maximoff boys with Vision and leaves Ultron's future wide open.

The Scarlet Witch post credits scene shows Doctor Doom finding Wanda

The scene cuts back to the end of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, where Wanda brought Wundagore Mountain down on herself. There was a red blast at the time, and many people took that to mean she lived. Marvel stayed very quiet about it, which made many people think she was dead. Promos for Avengers: Doomsday have since shown Doctor Doom's witches, and it's widely believed Wanda is one of them. I would definitely say that's the case now.

This scene tells us what has happened to her between Multiverse of Madness and now: she has been with Doctor Doom, because he's the one who finds her. As the mountain crumbles on top of her, he removes the rubble and says, "Scarlet Witch, awaken. Your power will be mine." She opens her eyes, confirming she's alive.

Why I believe Doctor Doom wants chaos magic for Battleworld

Her power is chaos magic, and what I believe Doom wants it for is creating Battleworld. He needs it to be his own reality. In the Secret Wars comics, when Doom creates Battleworld, everybody on it has no recollection of anything that happened before. My belief is that it will be the same in the MCU movie. The Scarlet Witch's power could do that for an entire planet, which is why Doom would want her. On top of that, she's incredibly powerful.

We also know Doom has been collecting people, because the Avengers: Endgame encore scenes showed him collecting the Hulk. Now we learn he has collected the Scarlet Witch too. Some people might argue that Doom brought her back to life, but I'd say if he could do that, he probably would have done it for his dead wife and child, unless it's an ability he learned long after they died. I think Wanda was never dead and Doom simply found her.

Rumors that Wanda's memory is incomplete

There have been rumors that she might not have her full memory. I think that leads her to join Doom without questioning much. My guess is Doom tells her she did a lot of damage to the multiverse, that Doctor Strange did damage too, and that they need to work together to fix it before everyone is destroyed forever. Ultimately that feeds his own plan to create Battleworld, but I think that's how the Scarlet Witch gets behind Doom.

From what I understand, her sons Tommy and Billy, who both appear in this finale, go on a mission in Avengers: Secret Wars, probably with Vision, to rescue her from Doom's castle. She's most likely one of the witches in the Doomsday promos, and from what I understand she has a pretty big role in Doomsday, at least at the end, and then in Secret Wars.

Ultron's human avatar is Virgil Horton, a descendant of Phineas T. Horton

Last episode I laid out who I thought the human avatar might be, and one of my theories was correct. He's Virgil Horton, a descendant of Phineas T. Horton. The finale opens in the past with Phineas selling his entire estate, despite his wife trying to stop him. His daughter took one of his books. She later married, had a child and gave that book to him. That child was Virgil.

Virgil was married to Dr. Josephine, who we now know as Jocasta. The two gave AI its emotions by scanning their own brains into the code they sold to Tony Stark, which explains Virgil's wealth. He used that money to buy back the family estate. Josephine died, but her brain had been scanned. Virgil then took a job at S.W.O.R.D., where he put Vision back together in WandaVision, and used some of the parts to build Jocasta and restore her consciousness.

It didn't work out. She remembered him and woke up as a synthezoid, and she was furious, so he deleted himself from her memory. His plan was to put his own consciousness into Vision's body so he and Jocasta could live together forever as synthezoids. That's why, as the client throughout the series, he hired Paladin to bring Vision to him.

Ultron is imprisoned, and Virgil is not Ultron

When we get back to Virgil's place, he has full control of Vision and Jocasta and has imprisoned Ultron. As I argued last episode, Virgil is not Ultron. Some of him might be in Ultron because he's in that code, but the episode makes clear he isn't Ultron at all. You can see where some of Ultron's tendencies might have come from, though, because Virgil tells Jocasta that with all of the nanos, they can rule the world.

On the surface, Virgil thinks everything is going according to plan. He can finally get into Vision's body and be with Jocasta. What he did not foresee was Jocasta not wanting to be with him.

Tommy reaches Billy, with Agatha's ghost in the background

While Vision's family and new friends gather to help him, Tommy gets in touch with Billy. He realizes the first time he connected with Billy was when he was drowning and Billy put the spirit of Tommy Maximoff inside him. Now that Vision has let him see everything that happened in WandaVision, Tommy recreates his drowning to get back to that moment. It works. Billy had been looking for him but couldn't get a read on him until Tommy's memories were unlocked.

Tommy tells Billy that Vision is alive and needs saving. Billy says he's in New Jersey, and the voice in the background saying it's not good with portals is Agatha. Her ghost is following Billy as his mentor and guide, teaching him much of what he knows, as set up at the end of Agatha All Along. All of this is building toward a Maximoff family reunion with the Scarlet Witch.

Jocasta dies and Ultron takes control of the nanobots

Tommy, Lisa, Paladin and the AIs come together to help Vision as Virgil starts mind wiping him. Jocasta tells Virgil she doesn't love him; she loves the AI Ultron, not the human Virgil. Virgil insists she'll love him over time. Then Tommy comes to the rescue. It looks like he's jogging around the table in real time, but that's because Vision's processors are so fast he can see Tommy running, even though nobody could with the naked eye. Jocasta, also a super processor, can see him too.

Vision understands that Jocasta was lost, but with her memories restored she's family. Since Dr. Josephine's code went into the original AI Tony Stark bought, she's essentially like a parent to Vision. It's like Ultron and Jocasta are Vision's parents, and Tommy would be their grandson. Jocasta and Vision tell Tommy to break the device controlling them. Jocasta attacks Virgil, who kills her with adamantium rounds, but before she dies she throws the device holding Ultron into the nanobots, letting him fuse with and control them, much like Tony Stark's nanotech armor.

Grief turns Ultron back toward wiping out the world

Ultron returns and kills Virgil. With Jocasta dead, the story comes back to one of the main subjects of VisionQuest, WandaVision and Agatha All Along: grief and loss. Ultron was becoming good. It's even revealed he saved Friday rather than killing her. Then the person he loved was taken from him, and that pain causes him to revert to who he once was. He now plans to wipe out the world with the nanos.

Vision and his AIs can't hack into them. Ultron is the only one who can shut the nanobots down. So Vision goes inside to talk to him, and we get another WandaVision style moment, a new show called UltraVision. Ultron even says Vision's plan was to come in and help him through his grief so he'd change his mind. But Vision was frying his own processors, and that fried Ultron's too. Ultron's response: "Well played, my boy."

Vision tells Ultron he may not technically be his dad, but he's his something, and he did come from him. He even says, "Thanks, Pops." That gives Ultron hope again, because Vision reveals Ultron was really afraid and alone, and gives him something that makes him feel wanted. Ultron agrees not to kill everybody, and the day is saved.

Billy and Tommy Maximoff save Vision

The processors of Vision and Ultron are shot. Vision is dying and Ultron is believed dead. Tommy tries to bring Vision back as he did in an earlier episode, but he can't generate enough power. Then Billy arrives with the chaos magic he got from his mother, and together the two brothers save their father.

At the end, everyone accepts who they are. Vision accepts that he is, in a sense, the offspring of Ultron. Ultron accepts that he is, in a sense, Vision's father, though I think the series has hinted he believed that all along. Tommy accepts he's Tommy Maximoff. Billy, who didn't know Vision was alive and didn't know what Vision would think of him, is fully embraced as his son. Most importantly, I'd say, Vision accepts that he is the Vision. When Ultron mentions the older version of him, Vision says he was the one who told him: there aren't two Visions, and he's the true one.

Paladin, Edith and Vision's hint about Wanda

Paladin, who helped save the day, is going clean with Edith as his AI. They're still doing bounties, but better ones, and he's still getting paid. Edith says of course, she's not a monster. This sets Paladin up as a player in the MCU, even after the reboot, because this finale sets up a lot for it. Lisa, now Tommy's girlfriend, is one of his partners and says her boyfriend flies for free.

Tommy puts on AI glasses that let him talk to Vision from wherever. Inside Vision's old mind space, he asks whether, with everyone still around, they might ever see his mother again. Vision replies: "Well, we have said goodbye before, so I suppose it stands to reason we might say hello again." That's a strong hint the Scarlet Witch returns, and this whole trilogy has been leading to a Maximoff reunion.

Children's Crusade may be the template for Avengers: Secret Wars

The setup points to a Young Avengers story called Children's Crusade, and from what insiders have been stating, it happens in Avengers: Secret Wars rather than Doomsday. Wanda could still return in Doomsday. Many people think she's one of Doom's witches; he has three, and some insiders say there are more. Many people think the one wearing a reddish color is the Scarlet Witch, which wouldn't surprise me at all. I think she's one of them. But it seems she'll stay masked for most of the movie, with her backstory saved for Secret Wars.

In the comic, Billy and Tommy realize they're brothers and Wanda is their mother. Wanda, her memories wiped, stumbles across Doom and they get engaged. Billy reaches her at Doom's castle and unlocks her memories, yet she still chooses Doom, sending away the Avengers, the X-Men and others. Doom ultimately chooses power over Wanda and they don't marry. What I've heard is that in the MCU, Doom sees Wanda as one of his greatest assets and keeps her in the castle, believing he's good and commanding an army for him, until the Young Avengers sneak in and give her memories back.

From there, I believe she awakens the memories of everyone else on Battleworld, or at least the heroes who will fight. In the comics, every universe is destroyed, Doom saves about 40 fragments of 40 universes and joins them into Battleworld, and everyone except a handful of people forget their previous lives. That's how we believe it's going to be in the MCU. It's said that Vision is going to be with his two boys and that they all eventually rescue Wanda.

Ultron survived, and he has Jocasta's code

The finale reveals Ultron wasn't destroyed. He went into some of the nanos and still has a physical body. There were 20 billion nanos, and Vision says a significant amount are missing. That might make Ultron much stronger, because he can essentially phase. When Vision asks what he's going to do, Ultron gives the same answer he's given all series: 50/50, a coin flip.

The post credits scene shows Ultron holding the AI code for Jocasta, possibly even a backup of her. He clearly plans to build another synthezoid, perhaps from vibranium or adamantium, and put her consciousness back inside it. Whether they'd try to take over the world or simply be happy together, I can't say. Jocasta seemed to have a change of heart at the end, but after this finale, maybe they'll unite to destroy humanity, which wouldn't surprise me. Ultron became good here, but he's one of the most famous Marvel villains. Could he come back good? Yes. But I think we're getting a villain Ultron returning no matter what.