Some Solid 'VisionQuest' Theories Have Emerged

I promised myself I wasn’t going to get mired in VisionQuest theories after learning my lesson from WandaVision, but then a wild thing hit me: We’re already halfway through the show and it just premiered last week. Thanks to the double episode release strategy, there are only four episodes left. (Two more drop next week, followed by a single episode release for the final two.)

I also wasn’t going to get too invested in the show because there’s a huge question mark around how many people are watching it. Marvel’s live-action experiment has notably been struggling, resulting in the cancellations of both Daredevil: Born Again and Wonder Man. But I’m a giant dork and can’t help myself, so let’s dig into the biggest mystery:

Who Is The Client On ‘VisionQuest’?

After Paladin (Todd Stashwick) crossed paths with Jocasta (T’Nia Miller), it became clear that she’s not the mysterious “Client” who hired the bounty hunter to track down Vision. I’ve already seen wild theories that the Client is Doctor Doom, and showrunner Terry Matalas could not be more adamant that people need to stop doing this. He also shot down the theories that Billy (Joe Locke) was hiding in the background of shots.

Via ComicBook:

Speaking to New Rockstars about the theory that Billy is the Client, Matalas said, “It’s not Billy. But also, it’s not, I don’t want everybody to go down to the Mephisto thing. Like who is it, who is it, is it going to be Tony Stark? … It’s not that kind of story.” About fans believing that Billy was following Tommy, Matalas said, “Somebody had taken footage of Tommy and Lisa walking in Borough Market and freeze framed and, like, ‘It’s Billy, look, that’s clearly.’ It’s not. It’s an extra. We had a background actor who had a very similar haircut and hoodie. It’s not. I wish we had seen that on the day. We might’ve flagged that. But Billy is not walking around Borough Market.”

More than likely the Client will be a character introduced in the show, and a solid theory suggests the show has been smacking us in the face with who it is: J.I.M.. Originally dropped in Captain America: The First Avenger as nothing more than an Easter egg to Cap’s early Marvel Comics day, the original Human Torch — not to be confused with Johnny Storm — has permeated VisionQuest as a revered synthezoid, the first of their kind. A robot Adam if you will.

As we learned in Episode 4, J.I.M. was deactivated shortly after his creation because his emotions were so strong that they caused him to burst into flames. How do we know he’s probably still kicking around? My dude is literally in the trailer:

VisionQuest has been big on revealing that all of the Stark AIs were based on real people. Ultron (James Spader) has suspiciously claimed that he just randomly chose his human form because it “suits” him, but there’s a very good chance that isn’t true. His most likely avatar: Phineas Horton, the scientist who created J.I.M. Of course, this raises the question of who is Vision’s avatar? I have a feeling we’re looking at it above. VisionQuest has been big on father/son relationships, and this reveal would go right to the start of the family tree. Not for nothing, Ultron originally created Vision’s body for himself, and I wonder where he got that idea?

Or the Client is Hawkeye. Jeremy Renner posted about the West Coast Avengers, and when you think about it… *gets hooked off stage*