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Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)  

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  1. 1. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)



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Nobody in this film ever felt like they developed though besides Hawkeye

was he really developed? sure, he had a bigger focus in AOU, we discovered that he has a family and that he doesn't like babysitting, but he is basically the same character we met in the beginning of the first movie. That's not character development as far as I know.

I could be wrong.

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Historically, I have not been a fan of Marvel Studios. When the Marvel Cinematic Universe started out, its first few flicks tended to be films which pretend to have some substance for 35 minutes, and then descend to mindless hitting and smashing. I was somewhat fond of Captain America: The First Avenger, as it managed to sustain its World War II theme for the entire movie, but that was virtually it in terms of the MCU films which I liked. Last year, Guardians of the Galaxy was surprisingly upbeat and funny, and it ended up being one of my favourite films of 2014. The rest of them are dull, uninventive, and fail to have the courage of their convictions.

 

So, that's a hit rate of 2 out of 10. Not great. Avengers Assemble itself was a boring, drawn out orgy of special effects and Robert Downey, Jr. talking very quickly. I'd never understood the excitement behind putting multiple superheroes on screen, and found the film dull and one-dimensional. I didn't care about any of the characters, or for that matter anything else in the movie. As a result, I went into Age of Ultron sceptical.

 

 

The plot - and I use the term loosely - is that Tony Stark (Downey, Jr.) and Bruce Banner (Ruffalo) have invented sentient artificial intelligence, called Ultron (Spader). As one would expect, it goes wrong and Ultron attempts to destroy the entire world - and so the Avengers must team up once again to stop him. In terms of its story, it's all over the place. I am no Marvel Comics fan, but I do consider myself well-versed enough in the film canon to keep up with these movies most of the time. Age of Ultron makes no attempt, however, to make any sense of its story. I don't know why Ultron has to lift up a city into the sky, I don't know why he needed huge shipments of Vibranium, I don't even know why he wants to destroy the world in the first place. His motives are, to say the least, unclear, and Whedon's narrative style is still as jumbled as it was in the first film.

 

But herein lies the difference between Avengers Assemble and Age of Ultron: Age of Ultron manages to be fun regardless. I didn't understand the plot in either movie, but it's much less of a problem here. This is down to a few reasons:

 

Firstly, the sideplate of melodrama is more focused in scope and more fleshed out in detail. Romanoff (Johansson) and Banner have a relationship that is, at the very least, engaging (though problematic, which I'll get to in a bit); Hawkeye (Renner) gets some love, in both the context of the film itself and his character arc; and the drama regarding the team composition is more functional. For the first 20 minutes or so in the film, the various Avengers are working together to not only get a mission done, but to party hard, and to make small talk. This is a vital section of the film that was missing from the previous outing - it lets us explore, even just on surface level, the interactions and relations between the characters. There's a wonderful moment in which each character tries to lift Mjolnir (hammer of Thor (Hemsworth)), and it's a refreshing, relaxed scene which reminds us that these are all actual characters, not merely tools to show off flashy special effects. 

 

Similarly, Whedon has learned from his mistake of the last film when it comes to balancing the characters. Despite adding three more Avengers to the team, the film feels more even in its characterisation. This is mainly due to Stark being pushed from his leading position, allowing others not only more screen time but more narrative importance. 

 

The biggest factor, though - the biggest change from Avengers Assemble - is its tone. Marvel films have always had their fair share of jokes, but they have - with the exception of Guardians - taken themselves a little too seriously. In contrast, Age of Ultron feels more self-aware, and as a result takes liberty with the idea of joking around. Jokes are fired off at an exuberantly quick rate, and most of them are spot on. Despite the odd awkward silence where Whedon thought something was funny and just wasn't, the film's gags are genuinely laugh-out-loud funny - and the audience with whom I saw the film seemed to agree. I found many of the first film's jokes to fall flat in their execution, but thanks to excellent comedic timing from the entire cast, a fair splitting of the jokes among each character, and a couple of great running gags, the movie had me giggling once every few minutes. Without this level of humour, I doubt I'd have enjoyed the film, but it managed to distract me from plot issues or repetition in the action.

 

There are also some strong additions to the film, including Ultron and Vision (Bettany). Because Ultron was created by Stark, James Spader is, in essence, channeling a psychotic version of Downey's Iron Man. Both characters are written as mirror images of each other, and as such, there are some terrific sections of dialogue between the two - for example, when Ultron claims he will break the world, the dialogue exchange is, "Nothing needs to be broken" - "Well, clearly, you've never made an omelette". I suspect Ultron himself has little experience in the kitchen, but the joke works, and showcases how Stark must defeat himself. Ultron does not speak like any robot I've seen, and this works to the film's advantage. Partly due to Spader's comic timing and grindy, menacing, charming vocal work, and partly thanks to Whedon's ability as a writer of dialogue, Ultron just works. Equally, Vision is a fine new character, and is the peaceful opposite to Ultron. Bettany - who is well-cast due to his soft-spoken nature and uplifting presence - brings a cool level of silence to the action-packed film, something sorely missing from the characters in the previous movie.

 

The film is not without its problems. Firstly, the elephant in the room - this is the eleventh film in the franchise. By this point, film #11 shouldn't really feel like film #1, but really, no matter how much funnier it is, Age of Ultron does little to make itself standout in the sea of superhero films. It trundles along at a fine pace but I'll be more than happy to bet that there's not a single element of the film which you can't predict. It is generic and derivative, and this is unavoidable, given that Marvel has still not managed to change this after what feels like three billion superhero films in the past 7 years. This doesn't make the film bad in its own right, but there are points in the film where you can't help but go, "Yep. We've been here before."

Another issue is Black Widow's relationship with Hulk. While, as I said earlier, the relationship does get your attention and you do care about both characters, Black Widow is strangely creepy here. Banner repeats several times that they can't be together because of how dangerous he is, but Johansson's super spy continues to drool over the sexy Ruffalo in a rather Stockholm Syndrome-like manner. Given that Joss Whedon spends so much time reminding us of how important female characters are to him, and how a one-minute Jurassic World clip proves that he's the superlative Hollywood filmmaker when it comes to gender politics, this feels out of place and hypocritical.

 

I must, finally, talk about the action, given that so much of the film consists of it. There is nothing special about much of the film's visual sequences (at least on the visual front, ignoring the dialogue), and parts - for example, the much talked-about Hulkbuster scene - feel underwhelming. But because there are so fewer buildings being knocked down, and fewer aliens to fight, it's easier to understand what's going on. There are also golden moments of action sequences which differentiate themselves from the usual destruction porn. Notably, the film - in its most tongue-in-cheek characteristic - continuously goes out of its way to save civilians in the battles. The first movie seemed to destroy and kill anyone who happens to be in the way of our heroes, and Age of Ultron spends a significant amount of time clearing civilians of the battleground The film as a whole benefits from Whedon's improved, more coherent and more stylish direction, and there's a fine balance between the battles and the amusing dialogue.

 

I'm not yet sold on this franchise - I don't believe that the current superhero obsession which mainstream audiences have is very healthy, and the fact that these films fail to do much more than be derivative sequels built to make way for the next seventeen movies is a little disappointing. But at the very least, Avengers: Age of Ultron is tolerable, and at best, it's actually quite enjoyable. Marvel has put the fun back into this series.

 

 

★★★

 

 

Taken from http://entwinedbranches.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/avengers-age-of-ultron-review.html

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My issues with Ultron as a villain:

 

- He looks corny as hell

- He is overwritten and has some really cringe-worthy dialogue

- I remember Whedon describing him as complex and multifaceted, but they barely scratch the surface of that. At the end of the day he is your run-of-the-mill villain, hell-bent on destroying the world

My issues with Ultron as a villain:

 

- He looks corny as hell

- He is overwritten and has some really cringe-worthy dialogue

- I remember Whedon describing him as complex and multifaceted, but they barely scratch the surface of that. At the end of the day he is your run-of-the-mill villain, hell-bent on destroying the world

You meant The Joker in the Dark Knight movie ?

I see.

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What the hell is up with all the F's, have to be troll votes.

I voted F.I really mean it.

 

Felt like it was just thrown at the face of audience as anyways it's going to be billion dollar baby.

 

Hurried up vfx/abrupt jumps in editing etc irked me grrrrrrrrrrrrr .........

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There really is no character development in this movie. That was my major issue. Everyone is pretty much the same from the beginning of the first movie

Yeah, but is it nessecary? Why should they change who they are? Story arcs for characters are great, but they'ren't obligatory. IMO of course.

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Yeah, but is it nessecary? Why should they change who they are? Story arcs for characters are great, but they'ren't obligatory. IMO of course.

 

It may not be necessary if the movie is plot driven but this movie was character driven so it becomes essential.

Edited by theultimatebiu
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I brought the A's and the B's on level :P. Surprised ,to be honest, though, i had thought that the B's would be well ahead of the others. Seems like this will have a cinemascore of either A- or B+. I'll give it a B+ myself but i'm going to download an english version and subtitles as soon as I can and only after rewatching thus will I be able to give a perfect opinion.

Edited by Infernus
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when I finished watching the first one 3 years ago I was pretty much floating on air, but this one I enjoyed but have some reservations. Admittedly it's a more consistent movie but there just aren't those big moments. there weren't really any parts of the last fight scene that had me all "FUCK YEAH" like the first one did. but the fight scenes were consistently cool. none I really had a problem with.

 

I did enjoy the team dynamics more in this one. None of the avengers stands-out more than the rest and I honestly count that as a good thing. and Ultron is a better villain (not really the shit-your-pants menace people wanted but he's got personality which counts more for me). The new Avengers could've been better. Vision and Scarlett Witch had/have potential, but the former is 75% build-up (Though his little moment at the end with the last ultron was my favourite scene) and the latter maybe needed just one or two more scenes for me to really connect w/ that character. Think I can grow to love them with sequels hopefully.

 

But sure,  overall I had a really good time. Pretty much what you want from these movies. Like I said in the other thread I'm not sure this one is gonna stand out much in the MCU as a whole in the years to come though.

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