Marvel Studios has made a casting announcement for upcoming Disney+ series VisionQuest that just might surprise one or two fans.
British actress and comedian Diane Morgan, who is best known for her comedy character Philomena Cunk, will join the Marvel Cinematic Universe as part of VisionQuest, Variety reported. Apparently she’ll play an associate of Todd Stashwick’s character, Paladin. Not Philomena Cunk herself, then — although that would be amazing.
For the uninitiated, Philomena Cunk is a fictional character who presents mockumentary series, most notably Cunk on Earth (Netflix/BBC), Cunk on Britain, and Cunk on Shakespeare. She’s an ill-informed, deadpan, and clueless investigative reporter whose hilarious questions often leave the real-world experts she interviews struggling to come up with appropriate answers.
Meanwhile, newcomer Lauren Morais is also in VisionQuest. Variety said Morais plays Lisa Molinari, a character described as “closely connected” to Scottish actor Ruaridh Mollica’s adult Tommy Maximoff, the son of Vision and Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch.
At at New York Comic Con, Marvel Television showed the first footage from VisionQuest. Here’s how we described it:
[It] follows White Vision as he adjusts to having the memories of the late (Red) Vision but no emotional attachment to them. [Head of Marvel Television and Marvel Animation Brad Winderbaum] called VisionQuest the conclusion of a trilogy that began with WandaVision and continued with Agatha All Along.
The footage shows White Vision, in human guise, entering a mansion where he’s met by servants who turn out to be AI characters previously seen in the MCU in human form. There’s James D’Arcy reprising his role as Jarvis. He’s joined by human incarnations of Friday, who was Jarvis’s replacement, and Edith, the AI program from Tony Stark’s sunglasses in Spider-Man: Far From Home.
But the biggest reveals were saved until the end of the VisionQuest footage: the return of Ultron, but in human form and played once again by James Spader (with a big bushy beard). You’ll recall that (Red) Vision killed Ultron in Avengers: Age of Ultron.
At the end of the footage, Ultron reveals the son this Vision hasn’t known: Tommy Maximoff, played by Ruaridh Mollica. Tommy is known in the Marvel Comics as Speed.
In May, T’Nia Miller was reported to be set to play Jocasta in VisionQuest. Deadline reported that Miller (Hannah Grose in The Haunting of Bly Manor, Victorine LaFourcade in The Fall of the House of Usher, and Zephyr Halima Ifa in Foundation) will play one of the lead roles.
Miller’s Jocasta is described as “cunning and powerful” and “driven by revenge.” In the comics, Jocasta was made by Ultron so that he would have a spouse. He managed to upload Wasp’s consciousness into the robot, but Wasp alerted the other Avengers and they removed it. Jocasta was reactivated by Ultron but betrayed him and joined the Avengers to defeat him.
IGN has reported that VisionQuest is being made by a team of veteran Star Trek writers and production staff. The series, which has quietly been in development now for over a year, was previously announced as having gained Star Trek: Picard writer and later showrunner Terry Matalas. Matalas will act as showrunner for VisionQuest — and reunite with a number of other Star Trek writers in the process.
