[Quora Answer] Vision's Powers in Infinity War

Another day, another Quora answer in place of an actual post. This one has some spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War, so read at your own risk.

Spoilers...

Seriously, don't even read the title if you haven't seen the movie.

See more of my content on Quora.

Why Do Vision's Powers Fluctuate in Infinity War?

I believe the in-universe answer is that Corvus Glaive’s…well…glaive, was designed to pierce anything. The glaive “disrupts my phasing” he says. Since Vision’s powers mostly revolve around “hardening” or “softening” his body, the glaive effectively makes the bulk of Vision’s abilities unreliable at best. He’s still got the space laser thing going for him, but that’s pretty much always had a slightcollateral damage issue.

In a crowded city, like at the beginning, he probably didn’t want to risk it, even at the cost of his own life, until it was absolutely necessary.

Most likely, Corvus’s attempts to remove the stone directly with his glaive interfered even with that. I’m guessing Thanos didn’t send Corvus specifically after Vision just because he thought it would be a fun match-up. Pretty much all the Children of Thanos have some sort of advantage during their initial showing. Maw can hold his own against Strange. Corvus can overpower Vision.

Towards the end of the movie, Vision seems like he still hasn’t fully recovered from Corvus’s attack on him. He acts like he’s injured pretty consistently. It’s also possible, too, that whatever Shuri was doing to attempt to remove the stone from him was also weakening him, as it effectively would involve slowly cutting off his access to the source of his powers.

The out-of-universe reason is that Vision and Wanda needed to be in danger, and Thanos and the Children of Thanos needed to seem like a credible threat. Hard to threaten a guy who can make himself intangible at will. So give Corvus the ability to cancel out that power.

Problem solved.