WandaVision

[Tyndmyr]

Finale comments, obviously all spoilerized.

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Overall, it was interesting, but I had a few questions.

First off, the whole "can't change a spell once it's been cast". What? We've literally already seen Wanda change the specific spell they're talking about, the Hex. Leaving aside the size change, we have the addition of runes to it in that very episode. I'm having a bit of trouble trying to figure out what the actual rules are.

I don't really know a ton about the kids. I guess summoned from Wanda's imagination? Eh? I dunno, I just expected a little more here.

What the hell is Monica's power? I don't know her from the comics, but the MCU variant seems...arbitrary. Even her color theme changes, with her using just about every color *but* red. Maybe it's some kind of trumpy power, power copying or something? But it seemed a little unclear.

Agatha also seemed...over the top. I have no specific problems with her motivations or the like. Bad guy doing bad things to get power, check. But why? Why does she need or what that power? What's actually motivating her to get into a deathmatch with the Scarlet Witch? I think this could have been expanded on some.

Likewise, I expected more from Pietro than "yup, he's a fake, but not one that's gonna do much of anything now."

All in all, not wholly bad, but I'd expected a little more from the third act. I feel like a lot of well set up stuff didn't ever get fully paid off.

[QUOTE=Psyren;24957089]

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It took Agnes' memory lane spell to even allow her to recall how it began, much less stop her subconscious from "editing the footage" and reaffirming the status quo every time she came close to learning. She didn't truly know enough to end it until this episode.

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Largely irrelevant. She knew she controlled the spell, she knew that people were being meat puppetted. And, per Monica, she was able to release people from it at any time.
She absolutely could have freed those people earlier had she chose to.

Now, I don't mind Scarlet Witch being the villain at all. Doesn't impact my enjoyment. But she most definitely was one to a fairly large extent. A sympathetic villain, sure, but a villain all the same.

[Rodin]

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She genuinely believed the Scarlet Witch's power was too dangerous to remain in Wanda's untrained and by all accounts very unstable hands. And she might be very right to think that. We see Wanda as a sympathetic figure because of her attempts at heroism and her tragedy at the hands of callous corporations, literal Nazis and alien super-fascists, but if WandaVision proved one thing it's that her magic is capable of real and lasting harm regardless of whether she means it to be. The fact that the series ends with Wanda having indefinitely imprisoned Agatha in her own mind without trial and fled the authorities to go read a forbidden book somewhere is not exactly a refutation of Agatha's thesis either. And Agatha herself didn't appear to have exceptionally nefarious intentions for the power either, she simply and genuinely thought she was the best possible person to safeguard it since she had the training that Wanda clearly lacked.

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I'd call it more Evil vs. Evil myself. Agatha was clearly messing with powers that scared the CRAP out of the other witches in her coven. She broke a taboo and was about to be punished for it. Add her demeanor with Wanda and I'm comfortable filing her under the "villain" category. She saw how powerful Wanda was and coveted her power, but first she wanted to know how Wanda got that power. I don't believe she intended to absorb the power and then safeguard it without using it - she wanted it for her own purposes, whatever they may have been.

All that doesn't excuse Wanda's actions. She acted in grief, but I'm reminded of Inkyrius' words. "Give up this power now, before casting another damned cantrip." Wanda may have gotten a bit of closure, but I don't think she's any more mentally stable now than she was before. She didn't hang around to be held accountable for what she did, and she's off studying a forbidden book of magic.

[Ramza00]

@ Tyndmyr

Concerning Monica in the Comics power set wise and other lore

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Monica in the comics, leader of the avengers ^{(more on this later)} has a comic book story origin similar to the Fantastic Four, except it happen on Earth with a dimensional gateway doing cosmic rays.

And while the fantastic four gain body types that make them more like water (Mr. Fantastic), air (Invisible Women), fire (Human Torch), and earth (The Thing)...

Monica Rambeau is a energy and light bender who can turn herself into a hologram and travel at the speed of light, but also can change one form of energy into another like Bishop from the X-Men. Monica can absorb one type of energy and make it into another.

Segue to describe scale of her energy powers. There is a famous comic scene where Greek God Zeus is being an [censored] and is fighting the Avengers for nonsense reasons for Zeus is an angry abusive duffis. Monica hits him with her energy beems, Zeus then proceeds to hand the Avengers their behinds including Thor and then Monica tells Zeus to back off again. Thor who is on his knees interrupts saying the power of Zeus is beyond your kind, this is no place for Mortals. Monica says the gloves are off and the panel is of a nuclear like explosion.

So in effect Monica is a “ghost” who can fly and move through things, she can also be solid, project a hologram or be invisible. She can also do energy manipulation and energy beams. Oh she also has hyper senses and a photographic memory. And she can be normal speed, faster than sound, or light speed.

She also has some other powers used less often, but that is comics. Pretty much she is the upper tier of Superheroes and can make other super heroes with their insane powers look small in comparison when put side by side with Monica.

What she did in WandaVISION with the bullets was energy manipulation where she sapped them of kinetic energy / momentum while also phasing through them.

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So Monica is a character created in the 80s. By 1987, 5 years after her creation she is team leader of The Avengers. This will not last but the best Monica comics are in the 80s, some of the 90s, and the recent 2010s. The worse stories are in the 00s.

Monica picks the name Captain Marvel independently from Mar-Vell the Kree male soldier who had the name Captain Marvel. In 1982 Marvel famously killed said character in a famous story arc and in the same year Monica picks the same code name independently. In that very issue the Thing mentions Mar-Vell used to have the code name Captain Marvel but he would be honored by said choice. Aka a wink to the readers they are not letting the name go fallow, and this is the new Captain Marvel but also Monica is her own person with an unrelated character story.

In the mid 90s Monica meets a new character, one of Captain Marvel kids who was created via artificial insemination after Mar-Vell’s death. [Mar-Vell had multiple kids but that is not here or there.] Even though Monica picked the code name independently and did not know of the Kree soldier till the Thing mentioned it she lets Genis-Vell have the code name / reclaimed it and mid 90s Monica afterwards goes by Photon. Only for Genis-Vell in the 00s to take that code name Photon and Monica goes by Pulsar. Followed by Genis-Vell now Photon to die only a year later in comics.

And then in the 2010s Ms Marvel aka Carol Danvers decided she wants the name Captain Marvel and now Monica is known as Spectrum. Yes this is frustrating for comic readers, but also some fans are kind of mad how people are always taking Monica’s codenames.

@ Rodin

Spoiler: Where Wanda is now

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but I don't think she's any more mentally stable now than she was before. She didn't hang around to be held accountable for what she did, and she's off studying a forbidden book of magic.

Monica literally has no bonds what so ever in this world right now. No family, no friends, no husband, and she lost her kids.

All she has is herself and her moral compass. She does not want to hurt people that do not deserve it, she does not want to hurt the world. Yet she is fine punishing people who hurt others. She is like Bruce Wayne at 10 still traumatized by the War which destroyed her community and stole her parents.

She is now nesting studying the dark book of the damned, no longer retreating to tv which she did after Age of Ultron (in the episode 8 flashback), and after the endgame return snap in WestView with the hex.

Yes she has a moral compass, but no it does not follow societies rules for she knows society can be broken based off personal experiences where individuals can do what they want and hurt people upturning society.

She is a “witch” and witch morality is a trope for they are the solitary outsiders from which in fairy tales can critique society but also in other stories be the villain of said fairy tale.

[Psyren]

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Largely irrelevant. She knew she controlled the spell, she knew that people were being meat puppetted. And, per Monica, she was able to release people from it at any time.
She absolutely could have freed those people earlier had she chose to.

Now, I don't mind Scarlet Witch being the villain at all. Doesn't impact my enjoyment. But she most definitely was one to a fairly large extent. A sympathetic villain, sure, but a villain all the same.

You still appear to be assuming a level of conscious control that I don't see support for in the text.

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I'd call it more Evil vs. Evil myself. Agatha was clearly messing with powers that scared the CRAP out of the other witches in her coven. She broke a taboo and was about to be punished for it. Add her demeanor with Wanda and I'm comfortable filing her under the "villain" category. She saw how powerful Wanda was and coveted her power, but first she wanted to know how Wanda got that power. I don't believe she intended to absorb the power and then safeguard it without using it - she wanted it for her own purposes, whatever they may have been.

All that doesn't excuse Wanda's actions. She acted in grief, but I'm reminded of Inkyrius' words. "Give up this power now, before casting another damned cantrip." Wanda may have gotten a bit of closure, but I don't think she's any more mentally stable now than she was before. She didn't hang around to be held accountable for what she did, and she's off studying a forbidden book of magic.

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I never once said Agatha wasn't a villain - just that she isn't "cartoonish" because she actually has a decent reason to believe herself to be in the right. She is likely very, very wrong that she could handle the Scarlet Witch's powers any better, because that's how these tropes usually go, but believing that she could do a better job than the untrained novice who unwittingly enslaved an entire town isn't totally out of left field either.

And yes, I fully agree that Wanda studying the Darkhold instead of moving on from her dead(?) children is a Bad Move.

[Tyndmyr]

You still appear to be assuming a level of conscious control that I don't see support for in the text.

Not for the first few episodes, but she most definitely has the awareness by about the midpoint.

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Ejecting Monica was a fairly straightforward decision on her part.

Popping out to confront the military, same same. At this point, it's quite clear that she knows whats going on and can toss people out.

[BRC]

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I could buy that she spends the first few episodes in a sort of fugue state, unaware of what's happening and unable to comprehend the implications of what's going on.

But we later see her acting as if she's aware and in-control, but we don't get any moment where she "Wakes up" and realizes that "Hey, I've turned a town into a stage for my fantasies!"


We know, explicilty, that she wasn't aware that people were suffering. But she was still aware of the general circumstances.

[Psyren]

Not for the first few episodes, but she most definitely has the awareness by about the midpoint.

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Ejecting Monica was a fairly straightforward decision on her part.

Popping out to confront the military, same same. At this point, it's quite clear that she knows whats going on and can toss people out.

Her "footage" was still being edited at and after that point. As we saw with the Mind Stone experiments/surveillance, that can happen without her conscious control, so her power itself was still in the driver's seat.

In addition, we have the Modern Family episode:

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where it's revealed that Agatha herself was conducting all the "cutaway/sidebar interviews" - actively keeping the masquerade going. Her goal was not to end it or help Wanda end it, but rather to discover how she did it. Only when doing that within the confines of the sitcom failed, did she rend the veil.

[Ramza00]

So Matt Shakman, director of the 9 episodes of WandaVISION is now saying in interviews that the finale was meant to be longer but they did not have time to finish all these VFX shots and thus scenes were cut from the final episode.

Including sideplots with Monica and the boys.

*sigh*

[hungrycrow]

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I never once said Agatha wasn't a villain - just that she isn't "cartoonish" because she actually has a decent reason to believe herself to be in the right. She is likely very, very wrong that she could handle the Scarlet Witch's powers any better, because that's how these tropes usually go, but believing that she could do a better job than the untrained novice who unwittingly enslaved an entire town isn't totally out of left field either.

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I mean she was at least partly lying about that; part of her "i'll be more responsible" spiel was the idea that she'd fix Wanda's spell, which she had no intention of doing. Also, she was just as willing to mind control people to get what she wanted. It'd be interesting if the show fleshed out what she wanted with all that power, but I don't think protecting the general public was one of her priorities.

Also, she murdered a dog and then wrote a song bragging about it. That's definitely "cartoonish" evil.

[Psyren]

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I mean she was at least partly lying about that; part of her "i'll be more responsible" spiel was the idea that she'd fix Wanda's spell, which she had no intention of doing. Also, she was just as willing to mind control people to get what she wanted. It'd be interesting if the show fleshed out what she wanted with all that power, but I don't think protecting the general public was one of her priorities.

Also, she murdered a dog and then wrote a song bragging about it. That's definitely "cartoonish" evil.

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Again (and for the third time) I'm not saying Agatha wasn't a villain. But even lying to the nigh-all-powerful nexus being that is holding a town of people hostage might be justifiable if that's the only way to beat it.

As for your last sentence, no - the dog was almost certainly an illusion, the goal of which was getting her "children" emotionally attached to it and trying to prod Wanda towards revealing more of her power on their behalf. Far more depth there than a "cartoon."

[Ramza00]

To judge Agatha as X or Y

Spoiler: Agatha

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Ever since Episode 3 with the fence and a different neighbor Agatha was doing her best to seperate Wanda and Vision. It was Agatha who pointed out the contradictions to Vision and pushed him further with exiting the Hex. Her entire goal was to separate Wanda and Vision to then allow Agatha to be the trust agent between her and Wanda.

Such plot was not to make Vision learn more about the truth for the sake of the 3,000 people. No it was merely to give the robot a mystery box and to keep him busy. Likewise the 6th episode of WandaVision (the halloween episode) where Agatha literally was in the car alone and gave Vision information some lies some misleading to cause him to exit the hex. Agatha was not being mind-controlled by Vision yet she mislead Vision that this was the case.

Hell we have no clue why the people at the edge of town in Episode 6 were acting the way they did. Was this due to Wanda or was this do Agatha, or both?

All we know with Agatha is she is an unreliable narrator and this is confirmed in Episode 7 with the Villain song and the misdirection fight in Episode 9 where she purposefully lied to Wanda after Agatha thought she drained all of Wanda's chaos magic.

[Rodin]

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Hell we have no clue why the people at the edge of town in Episode 6 were acting the way they did. Was this due to Wanda or was this do Agatha, or both?

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That's fairly straightforward I think. Wanda doesn't have the juice to simulate the entire town simultaneously. So, she puts unneeded actors on a freeze until they are required. Like in a sitcom, characters don't really "exist" unless they're on screen.

We now know that "Pietro" was under Agatha's control when he gave the explanation during the episode. With that context it's clear he's throwing what Wanda's doing in her face to try and jolt her out of it. I see no reason for Agatha to lie when the truth is such a powerful barb.

Thematically and practically it makes sense for the frozen townspeople to be exactly what we see. Even the kids only showing up for holiday specials makes sense - Wanda is rationalizing it as "eternal holidays with sleep in between" when in fact the kids are trapped in a nightmare.

I'm happy to believe that 99% of what we see in Westview is exactly as presented. Agatha is trying to fly under the radar for most of the show and only starts acting directly in the later episodes.

[Dienekes]

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On the question of is Wanda at fault here.

Her power may be being weird and partially in control. But she twice pushed people out of her spell: Beekeeper and Monica. And I think before we even get the Wanda backstory reveal episode she is expanding her hex. She may not be 100% in control, but she still has some autonomy and can realize that what she's doing is wrong.

She may be deluding herself that the people there are all at peace. But Vision's experience with the coworker should have dispelled her of that notion, which she ignored because she does not want her dream world to end. It'd be one thing if she was in a plot on the land and no one else was affected. But at several points she demonstrates the ability to free people. Even walks out of her Hex to confront Sword and tells them she's not going to let anyone free (admittedly that goes poorly in part because Sword-guy was a moron).

Which is before we even get into that she at several points chooses to pretend nothing is going wrong while knowing what is happening is taking away people's bodily autonomy. Which is horrifying. And she was just ok with because it gave her what she wanted and she got to lie to herself that the townspeople were fine with her taking control of their lives.

I don't begrudge her that the spell happened. But I do blame her for continuing her dreamland fantasy paradise past the point of realizing she could get people out of her Hex and choosing to keep living her delusions. Yes, what she's going through is sad. But what she's doing is inexcusable.

Anyway.

I liked it. Fun show. I'm certain that a bunch of people got angry with the tease of the X-Men crossover with Quicksilver and only having it be a joke. I love that the ending confrontation with the Visions was a discussion on the nature of being. Though White Vision just flying away was a bit abrupt. Like I get getting him out of the narrative was useful to keep the focus on Wanda and her sacrifice of her husband and children. But I felt there could've been a line of "Wow, I need to process this." Or something. Him just flying up felt kinda awkward to me.

But really the real weak point for me was Sword-villain, who's name I don't remember and is unimportant. I really have no idea what his motivation is or why he's a bad guy. He wanted to stop Wanda? Good. What she's doing is horrific. But his methods were suspect to say the least. Ignoring professionals he called in for support. Lying to them for... no reason as far as I can tell. Really, telling everyone that "We have the remains of the robot Vision back at base that thing isn't him." Is important information for what's going on.

And then he wants to get her Vision for... reasons? He had a working Vision.

What is his goal and end game here? What is he trying to accomplish and how do his actions push his goals forward? I know there were some tacit reasons given. But on the whole he felt like less of a character and more a new obstacle for the human trio to face every episode because otherwise they would need to focus on Wanda being the problem. In a show that actually had some pretty tight writing, he felt the weakest link. Could've used some edits.

But overall, really enjoyed the show. I'm glad at least the towns people didn't go to Wanda's side or say they forgive her or other nonsense at the end. Them all staring at her like she's a monster drives home that Wanda really did mess them up. Felt Monica should've been a bit harsher in her assessment really. Maybe still be kind about it, but "They won't know what you sacrificed for them." I don't think they would care. Because what Wanda did to them was horrifying.

But still excited to see where they go with this. Wanda with the Darkhold, whatever could go wrong?

[Joran]

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On the question of is Wanda at fault here.

Her power may be being weird and partially in control. But she twice pushed people out of her spell: Beekeeper and Monica. And I think before we even get the Wanda backstory reveal episode she is expanding her hex. She may not be 100% in control, but she still has some autonomy and can realize that what she's doing is wrong.

She may be deluding herself that the people there are all at peace. But Vision's experience with the coworker should have dispelled her of that notion, which she ignored because she does not want her dream world to end. It'd be one thing if she was in a plot on the land and no one else was affected. But at several points she demonstrates the ability to free people. Even walks out of her Hex to confront Sword and tells them she's not going to let anyone free (admittedly that goes poorly in part because Sword-guy was a moron).

Which is before we even get into that she at several points chooses to pretend nothing is going wrong while knowing what is happening is taking away people's bodily autonomy. Which is horrifying. And she was just ok with because it gave her what she wanted and she got to lie to herself that the townspeople were fine with her taking control of their lives.

I don't begrudge her that the spell happened. But I do blame her for continuing her dreamland fantasy paradise past the point of realizing she could get people out of her Hex and choosing to keep living her delusions. Yes, what she's going through is sad. But what she's doing is inexcusable.

Anyway.

I liked it. Fun show. I'm certain that a bunch of people got angry with the tease of the X-Men crossover with Quicksilver and only having it be a joke. I love that the ending confrontation with the Visions was a discussion on the nature of being. Though White Vision just flying away was a bit abrupt. Like I get getting him out of the narrative was useful to keep the focus on Wanda and her sacrifice of her husband and children. But I felt there could've been a line of "Wow, I need to process this." Or something. Him just flying up felt kinda awkward to me.

But really the real weak point for me was Sword-villain, who's name I don't remember and is unimportant. I really have no idea what his motivation is or why he's a bad guy. He wanted to stop Wanda? Good. What she's doing is horrific. But his methods were suspect to say the least. Ignoring professionals he called in for support. Lying to them for... no reason as far as I can tell. Really, telling everyone that "We have the remains of the robot Vision back at base that thing isn't him." Is important information for what's going on.

And then he wants to get her Vision for... reasons? He had a working Vision.

What is his goal and end game here? What is he trying to accomplish and how do his actions push his goals forward? I know there were some tacit reasons given. But on the whole he felt like less of a character and more a new obstacle for the human trio to face every episode because otherwise they would need to focus on Wanda being the problem. In a show that actually had some pretty tight writing, he felt the weakest link. Could've used some edits.

But overall, really enjoyed the show. I'm glad at least the towns people didn't go to Wanda's side or say they forgive her or other nonsense at the end. Them all staring at her like she's a monster drives home that Wanda really did mess them up. Felt Monica should've been a bit harsher in her assessment really. Maybe still be kind about it, but "They won't know what you sacrificed for them." I don't think they would care. Because what Wanda did to them was horrifying.

But still excited to see where they go with this. Wanda with the Darkhold, whatever could go wrong?

This was exactly my reaction, well said.

Spoiler: SWORD

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SWORD didn't make a particularly satisfying villain given I didn't understand their motivations either nor their jurisdiction; how did they get a hold of Vision's body and keep it legally? What happened to the Sokovia Accords ban on AI technology, given the last time people mucked around with AI they got Ultron. SHIELD has always felt like it overruled the FBI but SWORD apparently doesn't?

I joked frequently with my friends during WandaVision that they're just going to pretend SHIELD doesn't exist anymore despite Agents of SHIELD reconstituting it a couple times XD

The better antagonist would have been someone like General Ross; someone with a known antagonism to superheroes and someone who has the political power and clout to hold onto Vision's body and to order a strike on Wanda.

Spoiler: GI JOE

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Only other complaint I had was the witch battle between Wanda and Agatha; it's kind of boring that it devolved into firing red/blue bolts at each other, when there's more clever witchy ways they could do it.

Vision on Vision battle was cool though.

[Ramza00]

Diekenes I agree that is one of the weakest parts.

Spoiler: Vision

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So Sword villain Hayward and what his deal is?

Well we now know that the final episode that scenes were cut due to visual special effects crunch. And the director has talked about this on interviews, and the showrunnner and main writer is also doing interviews that will drop next Friday in a few days...

But one of the scenes cut was more information and exchange between Monica and Hayward, and Darcy and Hayward. It is unclear if this extra scene would better explain Hayward’s motivations and why he is going to jail.

Sigh this is frustrating...it is literally a dangling thread.

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Hayward was allowed to dismantle and reassemble Vision per the Sokovia Accords. He was not allowed to turn on Vision for that is the creation of a new superhero and you are not supposed to do that and the Sokovia accords is about the creation of superheroes and the management of them once they are here. One of the facets of the Accords is no new self aware AI after the Ultron incident.

Hayward is a villain who thinks he is in the right and is mad at how the world had his pants down with the snap. He wants to create weapons to defend the world, Hayward is the hero of his own story.

Thus his plan was to create new Vision and then blame Wanda. New Vision will eliminate Wanda and old Vision in episode 9. It is not clear if Hayward in flashback with episode 8 would have tried to eliminate Wanda if she reanimated Vision at the sword base.

Pretty much Hayward is looking for loopholes, a state of exception in political theory / theology, where one was allowed to break the rules for the greater good, and Hayward was wanting to blame Wanda so he did not face accountability. For if a self aware AI like vision was created he is not automatically dismantled, he would operate under the hero rule set of the Sokovia accords.

This is merely my intuition reading between the lines about project Cataract. Yes this is bad writing if the story falls apart for a key scene was not filmed in the final product. The lore dumps about Project Cataract occurred in episode 6 and 7 as mystery box screens that Darcy was hacking. Likewise we got more information in Episode 8 and 9 but it was incomplete.

Likewise we also known some of the reworked physical scenes at the last minute per the director interview, involved episode 5 with Wanda v. Hayward about the Drone and “Do not shoot.” And another scene involving episode 7 with Monica breaking the fourth wall of the Hex when the astronaut rover failed. Well in episode 8 Hayward mentioned they are using the 1990s Stark Drone that was shown in Episode 5, the drone full of Hex magic via crossing the Hex twice to fuel the rebuilt vision.

[Tyndmyr]

One of the facets of the Accords is no new self aware AI after the Ultron incident.

If that's the case, hasn't Stark already broken that like three times post Ultron? Vision stems from Jarvis, and not only has Stark made a replacement Jarvis for himself, he's also set up Spidey with one, and he even made Pepper a suit, and of course there's all the drone killbots he made and gave some kind of swarm intelligence to.

The Accords should be renamed to "Tony, No."

[Ramza00]

If that's the case, hasn't Stark already broken that like three times post Ultron? Vision stems from Jarvis, and not only has Stark made a replacement Jarvis for himself, he's also set up Spidey with one, and he even made Pepper a suit, and of course there's all the drone killbots he made and gave some kind of swarm intelligence to.

The Accords should be renamed to "Tony, No."

I really do not like the Accords, or Tony, or those whole plot points. So I am not defending it...every story about it I find frustrating and not enchanting.

But Age of Ultron Jarvis is not the same type of Self-Aware AI, yet he can punch close [ I literally can not tell the difference with the information presented on screen, once again bad writting ] , and Jarvis was merged with similar type of code as Ultron to create Vision, aka Jarvis code got upgrades and Vision emerged.

The Accords should be renamed to "Tony, No."

Agreed.

[Tyndmyr]

I'm on pretty much the same boat. It's clear that Jarvis changed somehow, but it's hard to actually say how, or how that differs in a law-enforcement provable kind of way from later AIs.

You could maaaybe make a case that the Accords only care about AI bolted to extremely lethal stuff, but he also put an insta kill mode in Spidey's suit that is apparently almost entirely run by the AI.

Dunno, it just feels like Tony's dabbling is way too connected to all the messes for folks to just ignore his later dabbling.

[Draconi Redfir]

Re: EDITH, Friday, and the Drones.

my understanding was that they were simple Virtual Intelligences, made to imitate intelligent life without actually being intelligent, more like Alexa or Cortana in our real world then the fictional Vision or Ultron who were entirely self-aware.


And really, who are we kidding. we know exactly why project Cataract and white vision happened. Because Marvel wanted another Same-on-Same fight.

Two super powered individuals fighting eachother with DIFFERENT superpowers!? Heresy!

[Ramza00]

Re: EDITH, Friday, and the Drones.

my understanding was that they were simple Virtual Intelligences, made to imitate intelligent life without actually being intelligent, more like Alexa or Cortana in our real world then the fictional Vision or Ultron who were entirely self-aware.

Agreed we are "TOLD" that there is a difference between these two things, but we are not "SHOWN" the difference, for if Jarvis is more like better Alexa / Cortana how then did he do feats in Age of Ultron like fleaing Ultron and then hacking / firewalling the nukes so Ultron can not hack and unleash the nukes.

In sum the mix match between show and tell will always be frustrating for me. Best to hope that future Marvel stories focus on other areas of this Mythos. More Magic, More Space Cosmic, less how human capitalists and military industrial people are "literally the worst."

[Draconi Redfir]

Agreed we are "TOLD" that there is a difference between these two things, but we are not "SHOWN" the difference, for if Jarvis is more like better Alexa / Cortana how then did he do feats in Age of Ultron like fleaing Ultron and then hacking / firewalling the nukes so Ultron can not hack and unleash the nukes.

Jarvis was probably a True A.I. then. He was made pre-accords though, so the "A.I." that come after that (EDITH and Friday) most likely would not be able to do this.

[Psyren]

Agreed we are "TOLD" that there is a difference between these two things, but we are not "SHOWN" the difference, for if Jarvis is more like better Alexa / Cortana how then did he do feats in Age of Ultron like fleaing Ultron and then hacking / firewalling the nukes so Ultron can not hack and unleash the nukes.

While we don't have every detail, we have what we need to know - creating a true self-actualized AI, i.e. a new lifeform, so far has needed an infinity stone and the power of a god. None of the other intelligences Tony created had these things, so concluding they are different/lesser takes no massive leap of logic. Even Jarvis himself originally did not have these elements.

If that's the case, hasn't Stark already broken that like three times post Ultron? Vision stems from Jarvis, and not only has Stark made a replacement Jarvis for himself, he's also set up Spidey with one, and he even made Pepper a suit, and of course there's all the drone killbots he made and gave some kind of swarm intelligence to.

Vision is presumably grandfathered in since he was "born" before the Accords were invented. As noted above, the other stuff - EDITH, Jocasta, Friday etc - are VIs, not true AI.

As for SWORD finding a convenient excuse to violate the very Accords they're supposed to be helping enforce - is anyone really surprised by that?

The Accords should be renamed to "Tony, No."

No argument here.

And really, who are we kidding. we know exactly why project Cataract and white vision happened. Because Marvel wanted another Same-on-Same fight.

Two super powered individuals fighting eachother with DIFFERENT superpowers!? Heresy!

White Vision reconstructed to be a more easily controlled weapon is a direct callback to the comics, not merely formula. Or put another way - yes, the MCU does this trope a lot, but that's because the comics do this trope a lot. We've seen it for decades, so it's a bit odd to expect them not to use it.

[Tyndmyr]

And really, who are we kidding. we know exactly why project Cataract and white vision happened. Because Marvel wanted another Same-on-Same fight.

Two super powered individuals fighting eachother with DIFFERENT superpowers!? Heresy!

I couldn't help thinking that, yeah.

And also how futile punching is between two people who can both phase through matter. The phasing itself was cool, and a good energy blast works out, but the fight choreography of the two visions fighting each other while the two witches exchange energy bolts was...unimaginative.

While we don't have every detail, we have what we need to know - creating a true self-actualized AI, i.e. a new lifeform, so far has needed an infinity stone and the power of a god. None of the other intelligences Tony created had these things, so concluding they are different/lesser takes no massive leap of logic. Even Jarvis himself originally did not have these elements.

Jarvis had neither infinity stone nor god, and managed to most definitely meet any reasonable definition of sapience or sentience. He was by any definition a true AI prior to contact with the infinity stone. Thus, these things are definitely not necessary.

A "no screwing around with infinity stones" would be a fair rule, though. For some reason, nobody seems to have pursued this, despite it going terribly on a pretty routine basis.

[Kareeah_Indaga]

If that's the case, hasn't Stark already broken that like three times post Ultron? Vision stems from Jarvis, and not only has Stark made a replacement Jarvis for himself, he's also set up Spidey with one, and he even made Pepper a suit, and of course there's all the drone killbots he made and gave some kind of swarm intelligence to.

Vision and Friday - and for that matter Ultron, I’m iffy about Karen - pre-date the Sokovia Accords, so Tony wasn’t violating the Accords making them. IIRC Pepper’s suit is still synced up with Friday, so no new AIs there.

Edith is a bit sketchier, but I’m inclined to agree Edith is just a fancy audio interface. She doesn’t seem to have the level of intelligence that the previous models did - Karen for example caught on that Peter had no idea what he was doing with all his new features and suggested reviewing them, whereas Edith was perfectly happy to let Peter order a drone strike on a classmate without so much as a side comment.

The Accords should be renamed to "Tony, No."

This I can agree with wholeheartedly though.

A "no screwing around with infinity stones" would be a fair rule, though. For some reason, nobody seems to have pursued this, despite it going terribly on a pretty routine basis.

The big issues I see are:

• The stones spend a large chunk of their screen time disguised as other things (the Tesseract, Loki’s Scepter, the Eye of Agamotto)
• The UN has no authority off of Earth (SFAIK) and a non-zero number of people who messed with them (Loki, Thanos, Malacath, I’ll count Ronan because that still ended badly, just not for Earth) did so off-planet at least part of the time
• By the time it became obvious just how bad news they were, Thanos destroyed the lot of them

Tl:dr - it would be an excellent rule, but a nightmare to enforce.

[Ramza00]

While we don't have every detail, we have what we need to know - creating a true self-actualized AI, i.e. a new lifeform, so far has needed an infinity stone and the power of a god. None of the other intelligences Tony created had these things, so concluding they are different/lesser takes no massive leap of logic. Even Jarvis himself originally did not have these elements.

My read of the scene right before the Ultron Hammer scene is the Infinity Stone is not just a power macguffin but also had lots of information inside of it like an encyclopedia or like the new macguffin the Darkhold "the book of the Damned" and via using that information as a template Vision, Banner, Tony made big jumps in AI research and allowed the creation of Ultron faster than they understood the differences between the two.

Pretty much my read is Ultron is not Mind Stone powered in a magical / tech sense but he is an inspired by data from the Mind Stone.

*sigh* Age of Ultron is so frustrating from the writting perspective. Lots of good ideas but bad with sticking the landing. We have Frankenstein / the urge to be Prometheus creator of mankind in Greek Mythology, we have Pinocchio, we have lovecraftian style images / imperial gothic where reading a book or another alien artifact may unleash nightmares greater than our comprehension. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

[Psyren]

Jarvis had neither infinity stone nor god, and managed to most definitely meet any reasonable definition of sapience or sentience. He was by any definition a true AI prior to contact with the infinity stone. Thus, these things are definitely not necessary.

We can quibble about where that line is drawn to infinity (natch) and back, I'm sure. What I'm more taking issue with is the claim that Tony's other intelligences are on the same level as Vision and thus inherently violative. They are not, and given that he submitted to the Accords before making most of them, someone else apparently agreed.

Or they are and he simply broke the rules where he felt like doing so, receiving no material consequences for doing so. Either way, what the Accords say about AI doesn't matter.

My read of the scene right before the Ultron Hammer scene is the Infinity Stone is not just a power macguffin but also had lots of information inside of it like an encyclopedia or like the new macguffin the Darkhold "the book of the Damned" and via using that information as a template Vision, Banner, Tony made big jumps in AI research and allowed the creation of Ultron faster than they understood the differences between the two.

Pretty much my read is Ultron is not Mind Stone powered in a magical / tech sense but he is an inspired by data from the Mind Stone.

I firmly believe that the stones are more than just data repositories and batteries, that they possess, if not intelligence then at least will. Mind and Soul especially.

*sigh* Age of Ultron is so frustrating from the writting perspective. Lots of good ideas but bad with sticking the landing. We have Frankenstein / the urge to be Prometheus creator of mankind in Greek Mythology, we have Pinocchio, we have lovecraftian style images / imperial gothic where reading a book or another alien artifact may unleash nightmares greater than our comprehension. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

I agree completely, AOU was written with the primary goal of ending Phase 2 in a flashy way, and being a satisfying entry in the canon second to that, which is why it feels so out of place.

I've linked this before, but Nando's Phase 2 reordering makes a lot more sense.

[Clertar]

We need an MCU Her with Peter Parker and Suit Lady.

[Tyndmyr]

We can quibble about where that line is drawn to infinity (natch) and back, I'm sure. What I'm more taking issue with is the claim that Tony's other intelligences are on the same level as Vision and thus inherently violative. They are not, and given that he submitted to the Accords before making most of them, someone else apparently agreed.

Or they are and he simply broke the rules where he felt like doing so, receiving no material consequences for doing so. Either way, what the Accords say about AI doesn't matter.

I do agree that largely the Accords don't seem to have a lot of teeth, at least post-civil war. We don't see a whole lot of effect from having them. For all the talk of say, having to get authorization before going into a country to do heroism, nobody actually does that in movies after that.

I also find the suit destroying at the end of Iron Man 3 to end up being kind of wildly out of place. There's no character development there that doesn't have to be walked back for all the sequels.

[Eldan]

Having the hero fight an evil copy of themselves in the first movie means you also only have to set up one set of super powers in the story and probably also only one origin story. Tony Stark builds a super suit, then fights his business partner who has a bad copy of that super suit. Bam, done, easy, one story. If your first movie is, I don´t know, Tony Stark fights the Skrulls, you need to explain Tony Stark, the suit, what Skrulls are and why they are on Earth.

[Tyndmyr]

Yeah, but for Wandavision we already have quite a few powersets.

Even if we disregard duplicates, we have Wanda, Vision, and at least three other powered individuals who are fairly unique in terms of capability and origins.

Given the existing opposition between a lot of them, it certainly doesn't have to boil down to mirror matches.