Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Mike Redmond | TV | October 28, 2026
For this latest batch of VisionQuest episodes I hope nobody made the mistake I did and watched them back-to-back. The past two weeks the double-episode release strategy has felt breezy. Not so much this time around, and that’s because this show couldn’t escape the MCU of it all, which added some drag in the back half.
When we last left our artificial heroes, Ultron (James Spader) had full control of Vision (Paul Bettany) after promising to quickly shut down a nasty situation with Jocasta (T’Nia Miller). — Vision was getting his clock cleaned and not exactly firing on all cylinders. — In fairness, Ultron did make good on his promise, but not without an immediate casualty and just as quick betrayal as he had no intentions of going back to his “cell” in the attic of Vision’s mind. Nope, our murderous robot has other ideas, starting with a grandfatherly chat with Tommy (Ruaridh Mollica).
“Pop pop,” as he menacingly asks to be called, notably doesn’t kidnap the boy. Instead, he takes him for a pint where we get a peek at Ultron’s true motivation: connection. The killer robot has become more curious in his old age, but he’s not getting what he wants from the boy. While Ultron clocks Tommy’s hope to no longer be an unwanted orphan, a front that Vision is currently failing on, Tommy also clocks that his grandfather is also alone. He twists a knife by saying Ultron will never escape that fate before accepting his offer that Tommy can leave whenever he wants.
While this family squabble is happening, Vision and the other AIs are desperately trying to figure out what Ultron is doing and wrest back control. They’re only able to piece together where he’s been after the fact thanks to him walling off Vision’s real-time data. However, a solution is discovered, but it’s a dicey one. If Vision shuts down his firewall, he can regain control from Ultron. The only catch is that’s because Ultron will be free to escape into the internet, which is where things went very south in Age of Ultron. When Ultron got loose the first time, he tried to create a massive extinction event via homemade meteor, killing hundreds of people despite being stopped by The Avengers. Kinda want to avoid that.
Knowing dear old dad pretty well, Vision deduces that he can catch up with Ultron if he figures out where he’d go first should he be freed. That destination soon becomes crystal clear: Jocasta. That’s right, Pappy is in love, and he’s got it bad. If your main hook for VisionQuest has been snarky James Spader, these two episodes let him completely off the chain, and he’s great. The chemistry with T’Nia Miller is off the charts. Unfortunately, it also barrels the show into Jocasta’s evil plot, which is to shove an AI nanomachine into the brain of every human on the planet. (How topical!) I know what every nerd like me is thinking: Wait, wasn’t that the villain’s plan in The Amazing Spider-Man except turning everyone into lizards? Yes. Yes, it was.
Before we learn all of this, Vision makes a fateful decision. Turns out Ultron and Paladin (Todd Stashwick) stayed in touch after the events of the first episode, so guess who just got his hands on Tommy again. Ultron even tells Vision where he is, but there’s the pesky problem of that whole firewall. Ultron wants out, and he played this hand perfectly. Vision drops the firewall, but makes a surprising move: He gives Ultron a kindly send-off. Our boy decides to “lead with hope” by giving dear old dad a chance while also making it clear that he’ll be coming for him. F.R.I.D.A.Y. (Orla Brady) does not love this and bounces into the internet. She was with Tony Stark when Ultron got loose before, she’s not doing that again.
With Vision back in control of his body, he wakes up on a plane to Madripoor. If that sounds familiar, congratulations, you remembered something from The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Lisa (Lauren Morais) is also on the plane thanks to following the Ultron-controlled Vision around, which was understandably weird as hell for her. All of this leads to a standoff with Paladin, who holds all the cards by planting a bomb in Tommy’s arm. Vision also came prepared though and in shockingly dark fashion. Turns out Paladin has a daughter whose life Vision could easily snuff out by taking control of traffic cameras or even the smart home devices in her house.
At this point, the two adversaries are at each other’s throats, so cue a third party to shake things up. With the bounty on Vision still in play, the Ten Rings pins down our boy and Paladin under the command of Raza al-Wazar (Faran Tahir) a.k.a. the dude who captured Tony in the first Iron Man. This leads to an uneasy alliance thanks to E.D.I.T.H. (Emily Hampshire) setting loose Paladin’s AI (Diane Morgan), so kudos to everyone who guessed Philomena Cunk wasn’t human. A mindless action scene ensues — Can you tell I didn’t love this part of the episode? — and eventually Paladin and Vision fight off the interlopers.
There is a wrinkle though. During the fracas, The Client makes their presence known and makes Vision an offer: They can give him what he really wants: a heart and a soul. All he has to do is power down and let himself be taken peacefully. Vision does not do that and gets busy mopping the floor with whoever’s shooting at him now.
But before we get a happy ending complete with Vision and Tommy attempting to bond like father and son, Jocasta and Ultron unknowingly arrive on the scene and unleash one of the nanomachines. At first, the target is Tommy, but Ultron steers Jocasta away, who immediately questions this odd show of concern. Ultron explains that it will send Vision crashing down on them like a white-hot missile. (Ultron already knows that’s coming anyway, but Jocasta doesn’t.) So Lisa becomes the target. She’s infected, and only by Tommy using his powers to overload her head do they shut her down. Jocasta’s plot has now been revealed, and Vision knows she has the means to execute it thanks to the final key Ultron is hiding in his brain…
Random Data
— So, obviously, the mystery of who is The Client and where the heck Jocasta got her body is starting to converge. That piece of the puzzle is stopping me from fully guessing The Client is Wanda because they really tried to make it seem like Wanda, no?
— Once again, James Spader is great, and who doesn’t love a show that’s being driven by Ultron’s boner? That said, VisionQuest is not quite hitting the same as WandaVision and Agatha All Along. Jac Schaeffer’s absence is palpable, but as a trilogy capper, it’s been way more Return of the Jedi than The Rise of Skywalker. Things could be worse, but Episode 6 really starts to creak under the weight of the MCU. It was the most Marvel-y of the whole series so far, and I’m hoping the show course corrects in the home stretch.
