WHEN I WAS a kid, my comic fanboy buddies and I all really liked the Vision in the Avengers. We rooted for him to succeed and especially to “get the girl”— that gorgeous Wanda.  The Vision and the Scarlet Witch seem like an ideal couple.  He wore green and she liked red.  It made perfect sense. The only problem was that the Vision was an android.

In Marvel comics, in those days, an android was defined as a sort of smart robot.  Today we’d call it AI.

Wanda’s overprotective brother Pietro, aka Quicksilver, wasn’t happy about this romance. He viewed this mixed marriage as an abomination. How could his lovely sister fall in love with a machine? He’d whine about it all the time and I was pretty clear that he was the intolerant one in this little drama.

So you’d think I’d be more receptive to and supporting of this new actress, Tilly Norwood.  You may have heard of her.

At a panel at the Zurich Film Festival (can you imagine if this debuted at a NYCC panel instead?) comedian and producer Eline Van der Velden explained that actress Tilly Norwood has attracted attention from multiple Hollywood agents.

She may not be what you think of as a Hollywood actress. Not yet. She’s an AI creation—the first creation to emerge from recently launched AI talent studio Xicoia, a spin-off from Van der Velden’s AI production studio Particle6.

The comedy sketch called the AI Commissioner served as a showcase for Tilly. You can give it a look-see here.

So given all my fanboy years of liking the Vision, you’d think I’d be a bigger fan of Tilly, right?  Somehow…it’s just creeping me out. And the Hollywood community has been swift to react too. Emily Blunt is disappointed in the Hollywood agencies who would explore signing the AI. Whoopi Goldberg spoke out too, explaining that “you can always tell them from actors”.  Screenwriter-Actor-Producer-Columnist Janelle Riley wasn’t happy either.

SAG-AFTRA Statement on Synthetic Performer

SAG-AFTRA believes creativity is, and should remain, human-centered. The union is opposed to the replacement of human performers by synthetics.

“To be clear, “Tilly Norwood” is not an actor, it’s a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers — without permission or compensation. It has no life experience to draw from, no emotion and, from what we’ve seen, audiences aren’t interested in watching computer-generated content untethered from the human experience. It doesn’t solve any “problem” — it creates the problem of using stolen performances to put actors out of work, jeopardizing performer livelihoods and devaluing human artistry.

But this has been going on for a while. I’ve just been asleep at the wheel. In fact, two weekends ago, the NYTimes ran a story about AI influencers. I learned that Lil’ Miquela was introduced in 2016, she now claims to be 22, She’s a Brazilian-American teen from California and she’s already been in ad campaigns for Calvin Klien and Prada. Mia Zelu is newer to the scene, but she made headlines for attending Wimbledon.  I’m still trying to wrap my head around that one.

Of course writer-artist Howard Chaykin and editor Mike Gold prophesied all this in the brilliant ‘80s comic American Flagg. The original premise with a that an actor was replaced by an CGI version of himself, so he became a cop in a creepy future where the world is over run by giant corporations. Somehow, to me, that seemed so far ahead in the distant future.  I’d never have to worry about that in my lifetime, right?

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As a quick addendum – if you’re into exploring the day-after-tomorrow type futures via literature I have two ideas for you. Let me recommend the return of Rucka’s & Lark’s Lazarus series this last iteration is called Lazarus : Fallen, and the debut novel of Eiren Caffall: All the Water in the World. I really enjoyed this book—it’s a quick read– especially the NYC scenes.