Age of Ultron (2015) Directed by Joss Whedon. Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo. IMDB says: “When Tony Stark tries to jumpstart a dormant peacekeeping program, things go awry and it is up to the Avengers to stop the villainous Ultron from enacting his terrible plans.”
After the mega success of the first Avengers film and all of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) films released since, Avengers Age of Ultron was sitting pretty at the top of many movie goers most anticipated list. In a way, most people aren’t seeking any reviews for a film like this because they have already made up their minds about watching it. Yet here I am to confirm that Ultron is just as fun as its predecessor even though I found myself starting to nitpick annoyances.
At this point I’m well initiated with the MCU but still in the dark about the comic origins of these characters. While I enjoy these films, I have no interest in mapping out all of the films that will come out in the future or hypothesizing what will happen and when. So going into Age of Ultron, I know as little as I need which turns out just fine of course. In this film, the Avengers are moving on from the events of the last 100 films and maintaining order the best they can. But a new threat dominated their playing field – an impossibly advanced artificial intelligence that you know…wants to kill everyone. So once again we find the Avengers team at odds with one another and they have to remember that huge lesson I thought they learned in the first film about working together. Admittedly, this is well worn territory for the crew and viewers but there is a lot of BING BANG BOOM in between to distract us.
Truthfully, Age of Ultron is a blast. Start to finish the movie is massively entertaining and a whole lot of fun. I saw this in 3D which I don’t recommend but visually the movie demands a big screen experience. So just in case you are that one person on the planet that was on the fence about it – I’ll go on record and recommend you see this in theaters. As stupid as it sounds, this is the definition of a popcorn movie that succeeds with entertaining the audience and demanding kernel consumption.
In the end, I still enjoyed the first Avengers film more. Part of that is how low my expectations were the first go around. But I was thinking pretty hard about why I felt so strongly with this notion of liking the first film and what makes me enjoy one Marvel film versus another. I thought about all of the movies I like and dislike and the particular points in this film that rubbed me the wrong way. I’ve always said that I prefer origin stories but why? What is it about those types of stories that I find more worthy? Age of Ultron brought to light the core reason that I feel this way. With origin stories, you’re new to the character and their powers and what they can do and how they interact with the universe and other people. Everything is fresh and exciting in way of discovery. But the more characters you get familiar with, the more you understand about how various stones and shit operate and the more room there is for the story to get messy. And Ultron is narratively much messier than any other Marvel movie so far. There are so many other plot lines and films to set up while still introducing new characters and attempting to make you care about them. I found during the more serious parts of this latest flick that I didn’t care as much as I felt I should because I wasn’t familiar with the characters (looking at you Scarlet Witch & Quicksilver.) It’s largely a pacing issue that’s unavoidable but an issue nonetheless. What director Joss Whedon does well is insert corny jokes and jabs at well-timed moments so the viewer chuckles instead of groaning over the strange exposition that just took place. These distractions work fine but becomes distinctly more apparent the more they are forced in. The best parts of the film are those fun scenes/jokes that don’t serve to beguile the audience but come from a place of authenticity.
All in all, I’ll be watching this again and recommending it repeatedly. It’s a good time even with the irritations and I’m sure you’ve already bought a ticket anyway.
