Born on February 7, 1960, James Todd Spader, or more aptly known as just James Spader, dropped out of school at the age of 17 to move to New York to pursue a career in acting. At 21 his first major acting role was in 1981’s Endless Love, but did not have a staring role until four years later in Tuff Turf.
You might know some of his more important films like Pretty in Pink and Mannequin. However, he has been in a lot of amazing films and franchises including Stargate. Later, in the 2000s he reachieved fame and long running success acting in roles in Boston Legal alongside Will Shatner, and as one of the main roles in the TV Series The Blacklist from 2013 through 2023 which ran for ten seasons.
During that time, and the reason we celebrate his birthday during the Comics Round-Up is that in 2015, during his tenure in The Blacklist, he took up the vocal work as the psychotic and genocidal Ultron in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. At the time, Age of Ultron was viewed poorly, but in recent days has gotten some more positive look backs. During either of those periods though, no one specifically thought that Spader did anything less then an amazing job as the character.
With that in mind, and in celebration of that role, we wanted to talk about the comics that helped to create Spader’s awesome comic book movie role!
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Avengers #58 (1968) While not the first appearance of Ultron, this book does discuss and reveal the actual creation of Ultron, and how he was created by Hank Pym and his brain based on the neural pathways of the same. As you’ll see in the following entries, these comics are very important to Ultron, and while the movie Age of Ultron focused on Tony Stark being in the Pym position, these books do cover the story used in the films. |
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Avengers #55 (1968) While the first appearance of Ultron did exist in the prior comic (#54) in that issue he was called the Crimson Cowl for the Masters of Evil. When they succeeded in their mission, he removed the cowl and unveiled himself as Ultron, a robot who was not a human. |
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Avengers #57 (1968) Continuing on the story of Age of Ultron showcased in comics, this issue showcases Ultron creating Vision and sending him to get his revenge on the Avengers, but Vision turning on his creator/father figure, and joining sides with the Avengers to take on and out the machine. |
What are your favorite Ultron storylines?
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