The Avengers
The Avengers, 2012, USA
I’m STILL on a buzz from seeing this movie last night. It was thrilling, funny, and a real good time. There’s a reason it made more in its opening weekend than any other movie in history. Mark my words: it will end up making more money than Avatar did. The bar for summer blockbusters has been set VERY high. I definitely need to see it again, since I missed some of the dialogue and one-liners because of all of the laughter in the theatre.
For those of you living under a rock, The Avengers is an ensemble superhero movie featuring Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Captain America (Chris Evans), Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson, in the token female role) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner). They must work together to fight against Loki (Tom Hiddleston), who is trying to rule mankind by commanding an alien army. And that’s all you need to know about it going in!
One surprising highlight of the film was Ruffalo. I’ll be the first to admit that I am not a fan of the Hulk as a character. I found Hulk terrible, and The Incredible Hulk was passable at best. I was actually disappointed when they cut Edward Norton, because I did like his interpretation of the character, but I understood why it was done, considering the fact that Norton is notoriously difficult to work with. I can say, firmly, that they made the right decision because Ruffalo is, far and away, the strongest interpretation of the three. I really like that they’ve moved away from the “I don’t like myself” crap from the first two Hulk films, and that this incarnation of Bruce Banner appears to accept himself and his powers. The character also had a sense of humour about himself and others, which the previous two seriously lacked. I actually WANT to see Ruffalo in a Hulk-centred film.
As expected, Black Widow was mostly around to offer some token female eye candy. I’d suggest they make a movie about the character, but I fear that Johansson would make it woefully dull. I just couldn’t get invested in her character. To a lesser extent, I felt the same way about Hawkeye. Renner’s character suffered from poor character development (or: no character development), but he did about as much as he could with the character. I can see Hawkeye having an interesting back story.
I saw the film in 3D on an IMAX screen. I was fairly impressed with the 3D, particularly in the second half of the film. I was actually nauseous towards the end, which can be seen as a good thing or a bad thing, I suppose. It highlights just how realistic the 3D looks….but being nauseous isn’t fun! The visual effects were amazing, and the film was fun to look at.
If you haven’t seen The Avengers yet, check it out! Be sure to remember to stick around after the credits because there are TWO scenes after the credits. I won’t say a word about them, because it’s best to be pleasantly surprised by them.
I’m almost disappointed to know that the “team” won’t be getting together in all of the Marvel superhero films. I think the audience has been thoroughly spoiled by The Avengers. I’m always excited to see another superhero offering, but Iron Man 3 can’t possibly be as cool as The Avengers was.
Watching this movie has made me wonder, yet again, why I don’t read comics. I LOVE superhero movies and the stories behind all of the characters, but I haven’t really read any of the comics. I suppose it’s because I don’t know where to start. Can you pick up the latest issue and start from there, or is it best to start from a particular storyline? Or just read some of the more popular storylines before heading to the contemporary issues?