WARNING: Spoilers for Season 1, Episode 7 of What If?
We got a brief introduction to a powerful version of Ultron at the end of the last episode and this week's episode tells the story of how he came to be.
Every What If? scenario revolves around a brief moment in the MCU that has huge consequences. In this universe things seemed to pretty much follow the MCU we know up until the point in Age of Ultron where Vision is created. In this universe Ultron succeeds in getting hold of the organic body and claims it for his own, becoming pretty much unstoppable when able to harness the power of the Mind Stone. He quickly wipes out the Avengers, with the death of Tony Stark in yet another universe, and nukes the entire Earth.
Thanos pops up this episode through a portal though we never see what his intentions are. In the main MCU we saw Thanos watching the events of Age of Ultron from afar so he certainly seemed to be intrigued by the AI so it's possible he was going to offer Ultron the chance to form some sort of alliance. Ultron never gave him the chance as he immediately sliced Thanos in two with the Mind Stone and then united the Infinity Stones. At this point he became even harder to stop as he rampaged across the universe in a really cool montage with the Guardians of the Galaxy and even Captain Marvel unable to stop him.
Inexplicably though, Black Widow and Hawkeye were somehow still alive on Earth. It wasn't entirely clear how they survived on a planet that was a nuclear wasteland but survive they somehow did. Their plan is to use Armin Zola to take down Ultron's hivemind and they sought out a copy of Zola in Siberia. This was an interesting development as it surely means that there is still a copy of Zola just waiting to be found in the prime universe.
The version of Hawkeye we see here has a lot in common with the Hawkeye we see in Endgame, a broken man who has lost his family. The time heist was a chance to bring them back but in the universe we see here his family are gone forever. It's only Black Widow that keeps him fighting and she tries her best to bring out the fun side of him but it doesn't really happen. In a great parallel with Endgame, here it's Hawkeye who jumps to his death as a sacrifice and Black Widow survives, though ultimately the plan fails as Ultron has left this universe. What If? has been great at giving us alternative versions of some of the most powerful character moments in the MCU.
The Infinity Stone-powered Ultron is so powerful that he can detect the Watcher and after wiping out the universe and facing a brief moment of feeling obsolete he seeks out the Watcher and realises that there is a whole multiverse to cleanse. This leads into an epic battle between two hugely powered beings and for the first time we really get to see the Watcher as a character rather than simply a narrator. Ultron questions the Watcher's policy of never interfering and manages to get the better of him. The episode does a great job of showing us just how powerful this Ultron is- he's killed the Avengers, the Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel, Thanos and defeated the Watcher in battle- he's one tough cookie. It's also interesting to see the Infinity Stones being used in a different way. Thanos generally used the stones for relatively minor purposes and in a humble way but Ultron just goes all out and uses all the power they give him.
The battle between Ultron and the Watcher seeks the pair zoom through the multiverse and enter lots of individual universes. Most are quick peaks that don't really give us much of a clue what is happening there but one gives us a little more. We see Steve Rogers giving a speech having apparently become President of the US. No explanation is given and perhaps we may see this universe in season two of What If?. It's hard to imagine the Rogers we know wanting to become president so there must be an interesting backstory here. I wondered if this could be What If?'s take on the controversial Secret Empire comic book event when a Hydra-aligned Captain America took over the USA. It's not a story I'd like to see in the main MCU but it's perfect fodder for a What If? episode.
The end of the episode returns us to the universe of a previous episode, which consists of only Doctor Strange Supreme in a tiny bubble. This version of Strange had already interacted with the Watcher and he appears quite smug about the fact that the Watcher has now come to him for help. It doesn't look like the Watcher is going to interfere as such but I suspect he's going to act as a multiversal version of Nick Fury as he forms a Multiversal Avengers. Next week will undoubtedly see the return of some of the heroes we've seen over the previous seven episode but I still wonder how they will defeat a seemingly invincible Ultron?
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