James Spader Returning As Ultron For Vision Disney+ Series
James Spader Returning As Ultron For Vision Disney+ Series
Red alert! Red alert in spades. The robotic AI that knew what it had to do from a single scroll of the internet will return.
In a way, grandfather, father, and son return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2026. Emmy-winning actor James Spader will reprise his role as Ultron in Marvel Studios’s Disney+ series focused on Vision formerly known as Vision Quest.
It will be Spader’s first television role since ending a ten-season run as Raymond "Red" Reddington on NBC’s The Blacklist in 2023. His previous series regular roles were as Robert California in season 8 of The Office, and Alan Shore on The Practice and Boston Legal. The rogue artificial intelligence is the only other role the Pretty in Pink and Stargate star took on in that span, for Avengers: Age of Ultron in 2015. Multiversal variants that appeared in subsequent (or interim, I guess) Marvel Studios productions, namely the final three episodes of What If…? season one and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness were voiced by Ross Marquand, who had previously taken over the role of Red Skull starting with Avengers: Infinity War.
Ultron, is an artificial intelligence who in this continuity was created by Tony Stark, aka Iron Man, to act as a defense program but following a single scroll through the internet turned against humanity. Ultron then created Vision, but the body was seized by the Avengers before Vision became conscious. Vision ultimately received consciousness by having the remainder of Stark’s AI J.A.R.V.I.S., voiced by Paul Bettany, loaded into him, in tandem with the Mind Stone, thanks to Stark and Bruce Banner and considered themselves a new being, played by Bettany. Freshly born, he’s the one that defeats Ultron. He would develop a romantic relationship with Wanda Maximoff, but with Thanos in pursuit of all Infinity Stones, his retrieval of the Mind Stone served fatal. Wanda grieved with a magical construct in WandaVision, while SWORD went forward with Project Cataract to resurrect the physical body, with zero memories of his past life, though now completely white, ordered to go after Wanda to stop her in all her power, before the construct enlightened him.
With the construct erased, it’s the reactivated Vision the series centers on as he searches for a new purpose. Being bare bones casting news, it’s unclear how Ultron will actually be incorporated into the series. Meant to be the third in a trilogy with WandaVision and the upcoming Agatha All Along, this series is preparing production in England in early 2025, claiming Terry Matalas from Star Trek: Picard as showrunner. The series is expected to premiere in 2026.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter