After CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER, audiences realized that Marvel had no qualms with shaking up the status quo. There's no doubt that audiences will be bracing themselves for a change-up when AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON hits in 3 months' time. We've been told that the Avengers line-up is going to change, and one new addition to the team will be The Vision. Paul Bettany has been voicing Tony Stark's artificially intelligent butler (for lack of a better term), JARVIS, since the first IRON MAN. In AGE OF ULTRON, he'll become a fully-realized android being. Bettany just recently spoke up regarding his prep for the role, as well as the fact that he'll also being returning to the Marvel Universe after AGE OF ULTRON.
Paul Bettany on preparing to be The Vision:
I did a lot of research — and my research was watching all of the films. I realized they are so interlinked and I wanted to understand the universe I was in. So I did and it was a really amazing, fun experience.
Everybody made me feel really at home and I have no bad stories — they are really funny people and really creative. I have never seen sets that big in my whole career. I have never seen set pieces like it — we were in a set that felt like a town.
Regarding his future with Marvel:
That’s the really great thing about the Marvel gig for me,” he says. “I have never known if I have had a job six months out ever in my life. And now I know that they have plans and I can be even more judicious about the stuff that I do outside of that work. I can wait for the right thing and feel really attached to it.
I understand why they went the route they did with JARVIS in IRON MAN, as to avoid comparisons with Batman, but now I feel like Marvel is tapping the full potential of Paul Bettany. The idea of turning JARVIS into The Vision is really cool, and just one of the many examples on how the cinematic Marvel stories can differ from the books. Changing what was done in the source material is not a bad thing, as long as it's compelling and it makes sense. You don't need me to tell you this, but Marvel seems to have a pretty good handle on their characters, and I look forward to seeing what role The Vision will play come CIVIL WAR (if he ends up there).
AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON will be released on May 1, 2015.