Despite getting this film a whole week before the states, I decided to wait a week before chugging out a review. Some might say I was just incredibly lazy, and they would be totally and utterly correct. All you need to do is just look at the timestamps between this and my previous post to understand how good I am at chugging out content. However, Avengers demands my attention since it is probably going to be the biggest film of the year. At least that's what I expect until Christmas comes. Superheroes, evil super robots, mindless action; it would seem impossible for me to dislike this movie. In actual fact, I do love this movie, but not as much as I thought I would. To know it all, here is my review for Avengers: Age of Ultron.
"How do you hope to stop me?"
A Brief Overview
Earth's mightiest heroes are back and they've been doing a lot of superhero work. Under the leadership of Captain America (Steve Roge- I mean, Chris Evans) and the sponsorship of Ironman (Robert Downey Jr.), the team of the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) have been taking down Hydra basses all over the globe.
"Wow, I just realised Ruffalo is spelt like buffalo, but with an R."
If you need a refresher, Hydra is basically an old nazi organisation bent on using super villainy stuff to rule the world. These human crooks are easy pickings for the Avengers, but the Ironman is thinking of all the bigger, alien, baddies out there. The best solution for an alien threat has got to be an artificially intelligent robot army hellbent on protecting the earth. Right? Ultron (James Spader), the artificial intelligence created by Ironman decides that the best way to protect the world is to destroy the Avengers, and the rest of the human population along with them. He's also got a sparkling body too.
"Blah blah blah, Ultron versus the Avengers. FIGHT!"
My Thoughts
One Big Action Scene
The one definitive thing that Age of Ultron does well is action. Director Joss Whedon certainly decided to focus on the action quite a bit in this movie. In all honesty, I love how much action there is, but I don't like how closely it's treading along the lines of a turn-off-your-brain-and-shovel-popcorn-down-your-throat kind of film. I wanted to see Ironman square off with Ultron, and I got that. I wanted to see Captain America square off against Ultron, and the film delivered.
I also wanted to see how Ultron created his badass body and turned into the philosophical entity he was, but I only got seconds of that. The amount of time we get actually developing characters in this movie is significantly lower than the previous Marvel films. I'm not saying that Ultron is a weak character. In fact he is my favourite Marvel villain so far. What I'm saying is that the ratio of action to drama to humour to intermission was heavily skewed towards the punching and busting. More on this when I get into the pacing of the film.
Just like the heading of this subsection, Age of Ultron is one big epic action sequence. If you like action, like I do, then you'll love this movie. However, it can get tiring trying to take everything in when there's always something going on. Definitely a good movie to see with a group of people.
A Killer Villain
Ultron is my most favourite villain of the MCU so far. Not only is he practically Ironman, but he is also very philosophical. You will see him giving little soliloquy-esque declarations to both his allies and enemies. I love how much he brings the aspect of God into this film. Sure he's no evangelist, but he likes to ponder on humanities integrity and our worthiness of existence. As you may have heard from the trailers, his solution to humanity's need for salvation is to drive us to extinction.
Even as a robot, Ultron tries to embrace humanity as much as possible. It's almost as if he's giving us a chance. Ultimately, he decides that our feelings and opinions are worthless, but the few seconds we get to see him communicate and reason with the human characters in the movie are pretty touching. As you will see in the film, he is developed just enough for us to care about him. Well at least I cared about him. I'd love to see Ultron return as a recurring threat in future MCU films.
"Cos they don't give spoilers like they used to."
The Achilles Heel - Pacing
The biggest problem with this film is definitely its pacing. Not only is the distribution between drama, comedy, and action really funky, but sometimes the dramatic and heartfelt scenes we get aren't the ones we want. The lovey-dovey interactions between Johansson and Ruffalo were overemphasised. There are more concise ways of dealing with those kinds of moments. In general I feel like we didn't learn enough about the characters in the film except for the top billed actors. It makes this movie very franchise dependant, which is great for "business" as you'll want to watch the other films.
I might just have a thing for those montage-prep scenes but I think more emphasis on the creation of Ultron and the build up of the threat he poses might have raised the stakes even higher. It's hard for me to suggest how to improve a film's pacing issues, as I'm not a filmmaker, but I believe cutting out some action for more intermissions would be a good start. Give us time to absorb what the Avengers just did in that scene. Let us gather our thoughts on the possible repercussion of a slam down between the Hulk and Ironman in Wakanda. Provide more time for the dust to settle!
My Score - 8/10
All in all, my inner fanboy and action junkie was satisfied by this film. All that pent up desire to see things go boom and superheroes go nuts was catered to by this two hour endeavour. There were just enough easter eggs, although I wanted more, in this film to keep flipping out at all the right moments. We're given a good villain in Ultron, who ends up doing some really evil things. I mean, there were moments in this movie where I questioned the PG13 rating. However, there are definitely some things that can be improved in terms of pacing and character development. Surprisingly, I walked out of the theatre with an 8/10 in mind, and after some consideration I will stand by that rating.What about you? Are you too fanboy to see the flaws in this movie? Am I too snobbish to enjoy this film? What's your rating? Let me know in the comments!
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