AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON | Review

If this wasn’t the most anticipated movie of the year, I don’t know what was. Maybe Star Wars, but on a much smaller scale, I feel – people who watch Star Wars have generally been watching it for years, much like Star Trek. But Avengers is like pizza. EVERYONE loves pizza, whether you’ve just eaten it for the first time (you poor, unfortunate soul) or if you’ve been stuffing your face with it after breakups since time immemorial.

Ok fine, not pizza. Ice cream. Or gossip. Or fat kittens. Something everyone loves is what The Avengers franchise is.

Ok maybe not everyone, like the people who stand up and leave before the credits are over. Dwanzis. (WHO does that willingly in a Marvel movie)? ANYHUE.

There are a lot of things that you could say go right in a movie, but isn’t it so much more fun to say what went wrong? 😉

 Avengers: Age of Ultron picks up in pretty much the same place the last one left off. When The Avengers (2012) ended, it gave the impression that the heroes were going their different ways, but would…wait for it…assemble, when the need would arise again. And the post-credit scene from Captain America: The Winter Soldier that features to super-powered beings trapped in a glass cell…

So the need arose. Now they are looking for Loki’s sceptre, which of course, someone is using for ill gains to do strange things with humans – a throwback here, from Hydra in the olden days. The plot thickens – the sceptre revolves around a misguided villain’s plan to save earth from itself.

I’ll just say at the beginning, I give the movie a strong 7 and a half. The script, as usual, was beautific – everything RDJ says is comic gold, especially when he walks of sets of interviews – the acting was pretty much on point – the villain was excellent – , and the action was good (there’s a part that will remind you of World War Z and you’ll shiver involuntarily).

**** HERE IS WHERE THE SPOILERS COME IN ****

The first battle scene in the forest had the crappiest CGI I have seen since Spartacus. It was blisteringly obvious, and thus, blisteringly awful. I died a thousand deaths pointing out the glaring fact that someone in effects needs to be fired.

It was so very bad.

It looked like someone’s 14 year old niece who was playing with Paint decided to try their hand at movie editing.

Ugh.

The female roles in this movie were bad. Scarlet Witch was cool, I guess, but not particularly witty or smart. Black Widow was caught up in her (badly developed) romance with the Hulk, which was cute (but come ON. Women who can’t give birth aren’t monsters. Who wrote that farcical line? That was the only flaw in the script). Pepper and Jane (RDJ and Thor’s significant others) didn’t appear at all. The Korean chick (obviously an attempt to play to Asian audiences, but it is fine. I am not even hating) had a minimal role to play, as did Cobie Smulders except maybe to smoulder us with dangerous shield looks/tight fitting bodycon CIA dresses. Meh. Underwhelming female representation and/or coolness.

Underdevelopment was a strong theme in this. Apparently Whedon had to cut out 140 minutes of the movie to make it fit but HONESTLY, I WOULD HAVE PREFERRED THAT HE KEPT THOSE MINUTES IF IT MEANT THAT WIDULK/VISION/QUICKSILVER WERE DEVELOPED BETTER. I like Quicksilver. But what was that brief shallow screen time? I mean, he was only marginally better explained than his sister, which is saying a lot in itself. And Vision. Really? He tied up the movie in a neat little android bow? Come on. That Saviour wrap up was waaaaayyyy too easy.

As for the romances that were sprung upon us. Widulk, and Hawkeye’s mysterious entire family. Too sudden. I want my 140 minutes, Joss. Come ON. We sat through freaking Gone with the Wind and LOTR!  Are you kidding right now?

I don’t know about that ending. I think The Avengers will have to come back, regardless of the fact that they are training a new squad. And about that word new. I love Falcon, so I am down for him. But I’m side eyeing those other members a good one. I will wait and see f they actually make something of the other characters. See this is why comics are important. Sigh.

But you know what at the end of the day it is still a really good, and really entertaining, movie, not least because of the reappearance of the wonderfully talented Don Cheadle, and the eclectically incomparable James Spader as a manipulative, brilliantly twisted, intricately and delicately portrayed (fine. I admit it. I’m in love with James Spader. Sue me. I still don’t like Blacklist.) bad guy who just sounds exactly like him – they even tilt their head the same! So it is a hearty YES from me. It’s hard not to crucify the second movie for not being as good as the first, but I can’t help it *coughTransformerscough* It’s not the first one, but it’s a good one.