Joss Whedon & company dropped this awesome new featurette profiling two of the prominent new characters being introduced in Avengers: Age of Ultron: Wanda and Pietro Maximoff, a.k.a. Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver.
The Twins were officially introduced to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the end-credits bumper of Captain America: Winter Soldier, and they are more than taking center stage in the upcoming Avengers film. Scanning the few scenes from trailers that have featured the twins leads one to surmise that, as they have been under the controlling and deviously experimental claws of HYDRA, they will likely begin the film as unwitting antagonists. This vaguely mirrors their comic book history; in the comics, Magneto conscripted the two — who are actually his children — to his menacing Brotherhood of Mutants. In their MCU canon, however, Marvel is replacing the Brotherhood/Magneto connection with (most likely) HYDRA/Ultron, and then as they do in the comic universe will join the side of the righteous and seek revenge for their past mistreatment.
Scarlet Witch seems to display slightly altered powers for the film, but are still relatively close in execution. We see her manipulating the minds of the Avengers — not so much in a telekinesis sort of way, but more like an Inhuman-powered version of, say, DC’s Scarecrow-fear-toxin . It’s all about localized “reality/perception manipulation” with that Witch.
Speaking of Inhumans, the twins will–per speculation–likely be the first two in the MCU to be described as Inhumans, foreshadowing a much bigger play on the horizon wherein Marvel introduces plenty of humans with powers who are not mutants. Mutants, a la the X-Men, fall under the cinematic purview of Fox and I don’t figure Fox has any interest in striking up a character-loaning deal like Sony did with Spider-Man. We also see Wanda using what I assume will be her equivalents of Hex Bolts, which will be some sort of psionic force blasts that tie-in to her distortion powers.
Pietro/Quicksilver seems truer to his comic book self. Super-speed is a pretty straightforward power that is easy to grasp. It doesn’t have the Chaos Magic element to it that makes it harder to explain. I have to say, seeing him take down Hawkeye is far more satisfying to me personally than most others might find it to be. From his accent, it’s assumed that the twins will have the Eastern Bloc backstory that is both true to their comic origins, and fits nicely with HYDRA’s European bases of operation.
Big thanks to the appropriately-named Tumblr user Vision for the GIFs.
