Hot Take: Quicksilver - Aaron or Evan?
Who the heck is Quicksilver? Some of you may be wondering. Some of you may be thinking "Duh, of course I know who Quicksilver is."
Let me give some backstory for those of you who don't know. Quicksilver, or Pietro Maximoff, is a character in Marvel Comics, the brother of Wanda Maximoff (Scarlet Witch), usually the son of Magneto, and a member of the X-Men. Recently in Cinema, we have seen two different versions of Quicksilver- Peter Maximoff played by Evan Peters in Fox's X-Men series- and Pietro Maximoff played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson in Avengers: Age of Ultron (and the post-credit scene in Captain America: The Winter Soldier). If you've been reading my blog, you also know that I have some bias in this area because Aaron Taylor-Johnson is my dream cast pick for Barty McBrown. However, my preference for Aaron's Quicksilver has more to do with me picking him as a cast pick for Bart than him being Bart has anything to do with me preferring his version of Quicksilver.
But that's kind of the point of this article- two fold. I will address why my preferred Quicksilver is Pietro Maximoff from The Avengers (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) AND I will present the question: Who is your favorite Quicksilver?
So let's get to it.
4 Reasons Why I Love Pietro Maximoff Vs. Peter Maximoff.
Reason #1: Comic Accuracy
I don't have any personal frame of reference for this because I have not read the comics. However, I know people who do, and according to my brother, Aaron Taylor-Johnson is more comic accurate than Evan Peters. Normally I don't care that much about comic accuracy because A), I have no frame of reference so I really don't care, and B) the comics are so constantly changing and contradicting themselves that the term "comic accurate" could mean 52,047,048 things. The only reason I care in this case is that I like Pietro's personality better than Peter's.
Reason #2: Aaron's Performance
Aaron's performance as Pietro was more impactful to me than Evan's portrayal of Peter. Even though Pietro doesn't have a lot of lines in Age of Ultron, Aaron managed to convey a lot of depth about the character without ever saying a word. To me, there wasn't all that much to Peter Maximoff other than serving as a comic relief. I say this without having seeing X-Men: Apocalypse, but Peter just seemed silly and nothing else. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against with silliness, but when that's all there is to a character it's hard for me to connect to them. Tigger is silly as can be, but he's also a wonderful friend and can break your heart when it gets down to it. For me, I need that depth, even if it's subtext, to care about the character. Aaron delivered that depth where Evan did not- in my opinion. On top of that, Aaron was still plenty funny as the character.
Reason #3: The special effects
The manifestation and the special effects on Pietro's powers were more believable, and less cartoony than Peter Maximoff. In Age of Ultron, we repeatedly see Pietro having to catch his breath, and while they do show his powers in slow-motion, it looks more... cinematic, less silly. Again, if you want a silly Quicksilver, there's nothing wrong with that. This is all just my opinion. Peter's powers were more often played for comedy rather than as an asset to the team. In short terms, I thought Pietro was cooler than Peter.
Reason #4: His relationship with Wanda
Pietro got to play off Wanda. Because the MCU was going to use Wanda, the X-Men series was not allowed to acknowledge her. Peter briefly mentions something about having a sister, but it's very brief. This takes something vitally important away from Pietro's character. The dynamic between Wanda and Pietro is what made them so interesting in Avengers: Age of Ultron, and it was noticeably missing in the X-Men films. Not to mention, Elizabeth Olsen and Aaron Taylor-Johnson have great chemistry!
The last reason is why I hope that Marvel finds a way to bring Pietro back through the multiverse or something. Truth be told, Quicksilver is one of my favorite MCU characters, and while his sacrifice did add a lot to his character, I still felt like his character was wasted a little bit. True, I also would love to see Wanda catch a break, but I also just want to see more of that Scarlet Witch/Quicksilver dynamic.
So what are your thoughts? Do you prefer Aaron or Evan? Do you like both for different reasons? Is there something you think they each did better than the other? Sound off in the comments!
As always, I own none of the images used in this article. Credit to the owners.
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