The Disney+ hit series WandaVision followed a grieving Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) as she harnessed her unworldly powers to resurrect her dead android husband Vision (Paul Bettany) in a fantasy version of old school sitcoms.
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she → follow → sitcoms
Agatha All Along then explained how Wanda’s magic found a new body for witchy son Billy (Joe Locke) in the real world.
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magic → explain → world
Now, VisionQuest wraps up the saga, with the “Ship of Theseus” version of Vision — built by S.W.O.R.D., burdened by the real Vision’s memories — struggling to figure out his whole deal.
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version → wrap → deal
The usual comic book fanfare of the Marvel Studios intro has been replaced with digital flickers, lines of code, and a shot of the all white Vision booting up.
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fanfare → replace → Vision
His disembodied voice says: “Who am I?
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I → say → ?
In case you forgot, part of the subplot of WandaVision was that S.W.O.R.D. rebuilt the Vision to be their own personal weapon, but the spirit of Vision created by Wanda’s memories intervened, gave him the old Vision’s memories (though not emotions), and new Vision fled.
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Vision → forgot → memories
Now we’re catching up with this android as he’s living on the run in Edinburgh, working in the same pub where the original Vision and Wanda stoked their romance.
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Vision → catch → romance
At night, he retreats into his internal systems, which he’s imagined as a grand house populated by human avatars of all of Vision’s AI predecessors — including J.A.R.V.I.S. (James D’Arcy), F.R.I.D.A.Y. (Orla Brady), and even Ultron (James Spader).
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he → retreat → J.A.R.V.I.S.
Things get complicated when a vicious mercenary known as Paladin (Todd Stashwick) begins hunting Vision in the real world with real life consequences.
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mercenary → get → consequences
Paladin becomes the first person to figure out that Billy Maximoff managed to put his twin brother Tommy’s consciousness in the body of Scottish teen Thomas Shepherd (Ruaridh Mollica) and uses this intel to ensnare Vision.
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Maximoff → become → Vision
What Shows Will It Remind You Of?
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It → remind → You
It’s high concept storytelling with great acting, big ideas, and kooky humor.
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It → ’ → acting
Our Take: If WandaVision and Agatha All Along are about the lengths people will go to in order to outrun or bargain with grief, VisionQuest seems to be about what comes next: how do you move forward after loss?
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you → go → loss
Both Vision and Thomas have been given memories of lives they know they didn’t physically live, leaving them both confused about how to fill that void.
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they → give → void
We literally have scenes of Vision opining about how he is, but isn’t, the superhero android he used to be along side Thomas running confidence games with his friend Lisa Molinari (Lauren Morais), prompting the wayward teens to describe how they get to pick who they want to be on any given day.
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they → have → day
Vision even keeps his supervillain “dad” Ultron in some sort of sentimental hope that the old man will see the error of his ways.
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man → keep → ways
Another big streaming show, Netflix’s East of Eden, is also dealing with a lot of these big, heavy themes — generational trauma, free will, etc. — but VisionQuest is doing it with a multicolored android who can phase through matter and fly.
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who → stream → matter
VisionQuest is, however, hampered by the very dense lore that came before it.
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that → hamper → it
It’s not that you have to have seen all of the MCU titles referenced in the show, but you do have to sit through it being regurgitated again and again, so that the showrunners know you know what’s going on.
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what → ’ → show
WandaVision, on the other hand, just threw viewers in the deep end to much more charming affect.
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WandaVision → throw → affect
James Spader gets to really ham it up as the human avatar of Ultron, his doomed Avengers supervillain.
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Spader → get → Ultron
As Vision wrestles with footage of Thomas Shepherd describing his memories of life as a child in Wanda’s sitcom fantasy paradise — and Paladin confirms he’s kidnapped Thomas — Ultron claps him on the shoulder and says, “Mazel tov! It’s a boy!”
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It → wrestle → shoulder
While VisionQuest starts off clunky, there’s enough charm in its ensemble cast to make it fun.
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it → start → cast
(Plus, how else are we going to find out how the WandaVision saga ends at last?!)
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saga → go → ?
The Aporia
