The Walt Disney Company/Marvel Comics(NEW YORK) — In an interview with Empire magazine, writer-director Joss Whedon teases some details about Ultron, the titular villain in his upcoming Avengers sequel, who is voiced by James Spader.
“For me what was interesting is that [Ultron] is this angry, and I hired the smoothest talker in Hollywood to play him. I did it on purpose. I needed a guy who can give you the ‘Morpheus’ but then can just LOSE HIS S**T. Spader’s really good at that.”
Whedon confesses he wanted Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk, and the rest of their pals to face off with Ultron on the big screen even before he directed the original Marvel film. Whedon says the mechanical menace did have to undergo some changes from the comics, however.
“With Ultron, we have to make him slightly less omnipotent, because he’d win. Bottom line,” he said. “Also, having weaknesses and needs and foibles and alliances and actually caring what people think of him…are what make him a character and not just a tidal wave. A movie about a tidal wave can be great, but it’s different than a conflict between one side and the other.”
Originally created by Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark and Mark Ruffalo’s Dr. Bruce Banner as a force for good, Ultron becomes self-aware — and soon sees that to achieve peace, mankind must be eradicated.
Incidentally, in the comics, it’s Hank Pym — AKA Ant-Man — who creates the ravaging robot, but Whedon had to change course thanks to then-Ant-Man director Edgar Wright’s take on that Marvel character. Wright eventually dropped out, and the Ant-Man project moved on with Michael Douglas playing an older Pym.
Having Pym in the Avengers sequel felt like “a bridge too far” for Whedon, who admitted, “Of all the heat I’ve ever taken, not having Hank Pym was one of the bigger things.”
However, he makes clear, “Ultron needs to be the brainchild of the Avengers, and in the world of the Avengers and the MCU [Marvel Cinematic Universe] Tony Stark is that guy…It didn’t make sense to introduce a third scientist…to do that.”
Marvel Studio’s Avengers: Age of Ultron, also starring Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Chris Hemsworth, Jeremy Renner, and Samuel L. Jackson opens May 1.
Ant-Man hits theaters July 17.
Both movies will be released by Disney, the parent company of ABC News.
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