IRON MAN 3: Could Extremis be setting up Ultron for the ANT-MAN movie?

As Iron Man 3's May theatrical release nears, rumors have been making the rounds across the Internet about the threequel. This year's 2013 Toy Fair in NYC might have helped with some more speculation about the potential blockbuster movie.

Hasbro has revealed its waves of Iron Man 3 Legends 6-inch figures. (Click right here to see a photo gallery of these new figures.) The first wave will consist of comic book versions of Iron Man and Iron Patriot. While the second wave consists of movie versions of Iron Man's new and mainly golden armor along with a movie version of the Iron Patriot armor War Machine will be wearing. But the other figure, in the second wave, seems to have nothing to do with the movie. Or does it?

The other figure is the villain Ultron. Fans of Marvel comics know Ultron is the creation of Dr. Hank Pym, who is also known as Ant-Man. Even though Ant-Man is set to have his own solo movie in November 2015, Marvel has been very good at setting up future movies with teasers in their other films.

So could Ultron be teased in Iron Man 3, in some capacity? Let's speculate and look at some things that are known in the new Iron Man flick.

Potential SPOILER ALERTS coming up, if you haven't been following Iron Man 3 news closely.

First off, some of Iron Man 3's story is taken from the Extremis comic book story arc. As first introduced, Extremis is nanotechnology that Tony Stark uses to better control his armor and could be part of the reason Stark is seen with pieces of his armor flying onto his arm in the first trailer. The ability to better control his suit, appears to be a big part of the third movie. Side note, in the new flick Extremis is being said to be a nanotech virus but nothing more is known beyond this right now.

Ultron is an artificial intelligence robot created by Pym and bent on cleansing the Earth of the human race. The Extremis virus might become uncontrollable and the start of how Ultron's unstable and evil AI is created. Of course, no one will see Ultron until perhaps the Ant-Man movie, but it's a starting point as to how Marvel may explain Pym creating the eventual villain.

Another possibility that Extremis could be the starting point of Ultron is the fact that in the first Iron Man 3 trailer, fans are shown Stark's suit seemingly having a mind of it's own while waking up Pepper Potts—with Stark still sleeping next to her. If this does happen, Stark's suits might develop "a mind of their own." It could be caused by the nanotech virus and this could be the beginning of robotic intelligence developing itself.

How about the fact that in The Ultron Initiative comic book story line, Ultron uses Extremis as a catalyst to build himself a new body? So many potential ideas to base this concept off of.

Maybe it's all nothing and just a coincidence that Ultron is in that second wave of toys. It could be a way to connect an Ultron action figure to the comic book event The Age of Ultron, which starts in March and wraps in May. It's all theories and guesses right now but having Ultron in an Iron Man 3 toy line just seems weird. Doesn't it?

In conclusion, it is well known that comic story lines are not 100 percent adapted for the big screen and this post is really about figuring out the puzzles pieces Marvel Studios is laying in front of us. And whether or not Ultron's origin could be set up in Iron Man 3. But it all remains to be seen until May.

UPDATE: Obviously this was an opinion column based on things unknown prior to the release of Iron Man 3. Now that the threequel is out, it is quite obvious that Extremis was different than expected and will not set up Ultron's A.I.


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Iron Man 3 Opinion: Has Tony Stark lost control of his suits or does Extremis create Artificial Intelligence?

Iron Man 3 is looking like it has a ton of influence on setting up Marvel Studios' Ant-Man movie

(Images are property of Disney and Marvel.)