Today, see how an Avenger helped break apart the marriage of the Vision and Scarlet Witch and it was never really ever addressed again after it occurred.
In every installment of “If I Pass This Way Again,” we look at comic book plot points that were rarely (sometimes NEVER!) mentioned again after they were first introduced.
There's a popular term used when discussing serialized fiction that is called "Plot-Induced Stupidity," meaning that characters will sometimes do stupid things that they wouldn't normally do when it serves the plot of the story. People sometimes use the phrase "carrying the idiot ball" (based on a comment by Hank Azaria about a show he once worked on, where they would ask, "Who's carrying the idiot ball this week?" In other words, who is going to act uncharacteristically stupid for the plot to work this week?). In the case of VisonQuest, the storyline that broke Vision and the Scarlet Witch apart in the pages of West Coast Avengers, it was more like Plot-Induced Cruelty for Mockingbird, an Avenger who oddly callous in how she treated the Scarlet Witch and the Vision in helping the governments of the world kidnap the Vision and wipe his memory and then be strangely curt to the Scarlet Witch and the other Avengers over her actions.
WHY WAS VISION TAKEN APART?
In Avengers #238 (by Stern, Al Milgrom and Joe Sinnott), the Vision was badly damaged and could not move. At the time, one of the members of the Avengers was Starfox, who was from the planet Titan (Starfox was Thanos' brother), and so Starfox decided to contact ISAAC (Integral Synaptic Anti-Anionic Computer), the sophisticated computer that essentially ran Titan. ISAAC interfaced with Vision and the resulting merger seemingly fixed Vision.
However, what no one realized at the time was that Vision and ISAAC's merger had a negative side effect. With their two robotic minds combined, the two devised a plan to make Earth a better place by, in effect, taking over Earth just like how ISAAC ran Titan! Starfox had the ability to manipulate the pleasure centers in people's minds, making them feel so good that they were susceptible for suggestions. Vision and ISAAC artificially simulated that effect to get the Wasp to cede the leadership of the Avengers to Vision and then for the Avengers government liaison to approve Vision's plan to expand the Avengers into an East Coast and a West Coast branch.
This was all part of Vision's bold plan to protect the world by expanding the superhero prescience over it. It all culminated when Vision took control of the world's computer systems in 1985's Avengers #254 (by Stern, Bob Hall, Joe Delbeato and Josef Rubinstein), thus giving him control over the nuclear weapons of every country, as well. At this point, his fellow Avengers discovered his plans and they resolved to try to stop him. As it turned out, there was a "Control Crystal" in Vision's brain that had previously been used by Ultron to force Vision to betray the Avengers. The crystal had malfunctioned when ISAAC merged with Vision and it was the crystal that led to the Vision coming up with his plan to save the world by ruling over it. The Vision seemingly resolved the situation by pulling the crystal from his own head, once and for all. Now cured, the Vision and Scarlet Witch resigned from the Avengers and the U.S. Government allowed them to do so.
John Byrne did not like that the Vision had no real consequence for trying to take over the world. Similarly, he did not like the Vision/Scarlet Witch relationship period, telling Dwight Jon Zimmerman in Comics Interview #71 (published by the late, great David A. Kraft), " I've always been bothered, first of all, by the idea of the Vision marrying the Scarlet Witch. In the issue that just came out I have one of the characters saying that her brother-in-law was very offended when he founds out, he said it was like somebody marrying a toaster or a blender or something. Actually I was the brother-in-law, that was my first reaction. That was a signal issue of THE AVENGERS, you know - the Scarlet Witch marries a toaster and Mantis marries a tree. I don't know what we're saying in that issue, so I wanted to get rid of that, that had always sort of bothered me."
How Byrne did it, though, involved making Mockingbird oddly callous.
MOCKINGBIRD BREAKS BAD?
So the Vision is kidnapped in West Coast Avengers #42 (by John Byrne and Mike Machlan) and the Avengers learn at the end how someone was able to bypass their security codes to kidnap him. It has to be an Avenger who betrayed them and suddenly Mockingbird shows up, basically bragging that it was her!
In the next issue, when everyone is freaking out, Mockingbird explains that yes, she helped, but she had been tricked!
However, what she means is that some SHIELD agents (well, they told her they were SHIELD agents) came to her and asked her to help them come up with a plan to break into the Avengers West Coast compound to kidnap Vision if Vision went bad again. The issue there, of course, is that if you tell someone a way to break into your teammates' home, that's still a betrayal, even if it is just a "contingency."
Also, when you have to have a bit in #43 where the others are all, like, "But why were you such a dick about it?" and you have to have her explain her reasoning, you know it's out of character (and her explanation doesn't work at all).
Later in the issue, Mockingbird helps the Avengers break into the warehouse where the Vision is being held and Mockingbird realizes that the Vision was already taken apart and yet look at what she does to Scarlet Witch here...
WHY IS SHE BEING SO CALLOUS?
So, look back to the page where Mockingbird apologized and Scarlet Witch was, like, "I don't know if I can ever forgive you," but everyone forgives Mockingbird RIGHT AWAY. The "I was tricked" excuse was totally accepted and that was it for any repercussions for Mockingbird. It's so odd. Obviously, a lot of that had to do with Byrne leaving the book, but still.
If you have a suggestion for a future edition of I Pass This Way Again, be sure to drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!