VisionQuest is already halfway over, and boy, if it keeps up the momentum it has going in its third and fourth episodes, I’m sure gonna miss it in a couple of weeks when it wraps up. I’m such a sucker for its dysfunctional family of robots and its sulking speedster con man. With every episode I can feel myself getting closer to finally seeing Vision’s sons Tommy and Billy reuniting and reader, I’m gonna be a wreck. Thankfully, in last night’s two episodes, the show already managed to fix my biggest issue with its premiere last week, in that it sidelined an underwhelming villain for a much more interesting one. Well, two, perhaps.
Todd Stashwick’s Paladin, a gun for hire sent to retrieve Vision by an unknown client, will no doubt return in future episodes of VisionQuest. In “Reboot,” the third episode of the series, Paladin is revealed to essentially be a fraud, which probably explains why he seems incompetent. It’s nice that the show gave him some depth, but as a driving force, he’s not quite as compelling as Vision, Tommy, or any of the AI running around in Vision’s head. VisionQuest’s exploration of the fallout of artificial intelligence in the MCU feels a lot more central to what’s going on than “guy with gun and a traumatic childhood” who is on the trail of the father and son for money and an ego boost. Thankfully, now we have a new villain nudging things along in Jocasta, another Synthezoid who sure looks a lot like Ultron when her true form is unveiled.
Jocasta starts out as a mysterious, synthetic serial killer, leaving her victims’ bodies lying dramatically over wings etched into the ground, earning her the name “the Butcherbird Killer” on the local news. As Vision and co. investigate these murders after the Killer hacks into their systems, it’s revealed that Jocasta is a robot based on scientist Josephine Carrington, played by Fall of the House of Usher’s T’Nia Miller, who is hunting down her ex-colleagues in AI advancement after her originator’s death in 2008.
We only see Jocasta uncloaked in the final minutes of episode four, “Malware,” but she sure makes an incredible first impression. VisionQuest has spent a fair bit of its runtime exploring whether an AI based on someone else, such as Vision himself, who only has the memories of the original Vision but doesn’t feel any emotional attachment to those recollections, is a “true” recreation of the same person, or just a copy-and-pasted imposter. While our hero may be struggling with that internally, Jocasta is straight-up convinced she is Josephine and says as much, claiming she is “not based on” her creator, but is her. Despite this, Vision calling her by that human name seems to distress her for some reason. Is this delusion, or a stage of certainty that Vision has not reached yet? In the grand scheme of what VisionQuest is exploring, it certainly makes for a more compelling question than whatever Paladin’s got going on.
Who is Jocasta in Marvel comics?
Jocasta, like most characters in the MCU, originates from the comics, and her connection to other synthetics in the source material could lead to some complications throughout the rest of the show. When the character debuted in 1977, she was originally created by Ultron and Hank Pym with the intent of her being a lover for Ultron. Her mind was meant to be modeled after that of the Wasp, specifically Janet Van Dyne, but the Avengers managed to stop the process. Still, Ultron was able to salvage what he started and Jocasta was “born” as a servant to Ultron, which she was until she eventually broke free and became part of the Avengers.
So it seems like VisionQuest has remixed her origin story a bit, but Ultron, who primarily exists in Vision’s head right now, is still drawn to her in this iteration. At the end of “Malware,” Vision, who is compromised by the fear he feels over Tommy’s life being in danger, gives up control of his body to Ultron so he can face Jocasta, and while Ultron succeeds in a roundabout way by tricking Jocasta into disintegrating her target rather than leaving their body intact to obtain some kind of biomarker, he also ends the episode by locking down Vision’s systems and holding onto the wheel.
Now, Ultron and Jocasta are the real threats of VisionQuest, and while Paladin will probably show up again sooner or later, it’s good to have villains that feel like they’re actually central to what’s going on rather than bolted onto the side of more interesting conflicts.
New episodes of VisionQuest premiere Tuesdays at 9 p.m. Eastern on Disney+.