Runtime: 2 hours, 21 minutes
Rating: PG-13
Director: Joss Whedon
Quick Impressions:
I’m almost 32 weeks pregnant now. The baby is measuring quite large, and I also have extra amniotic fluid for some reason. So these days when I look in the mirror, I see the CGI hulk where I used to find a bashful Mark Ruffalo.
Okay so that’s not a perfect analogy. (I’ve never looked much like Ruffalo, and I’m not particularly green.) But still, I’ve identified with the Incredible Hulk’s metamorphic personality since childhood, and lately there seems to be a physical resemblance, too.
That’s why we just saw this movie on Saturday, three long weeks after its actual release. Until now, going to movies alone has seemed like more trouble than it was worth. But my husband and children actually had the time and inclination to go this weekend, so I found the courage to venture to the theater with them to watch Avengers: Age of Ultron (aka Tony Stark’s Frankenstein aka Pinocchiultron).
Is it as good as the first Avengers movie? No.
It’s an odd film, actually. It certainly isn’t bad (despite what I’d heard), and it’s also not a masterpiece (despite what I’d heard). (Word of mouth on this one has been frustratingly mixed. I hate not seeing popular movies the first weekend that they’re out so I can judge for myself without first hearing everyone else’s opinions!)
The most accurate way to describe Avengers: Age of Ultron is to say that it’s decidedly Joss Whedony.
The greatest enemy lies within! We’re tearing ourselves apart! We won’t allow ourselves to be happy! All our nightmares are coming true! We give birth to our own greatest fears! These are all particularly Whedony tropes, and this movie thrives on them. In some ways, the experience of watching Age of Ultron almost perfectly mimics what it’s like to follow any series created by Joss Whedon ever.
(The greatest surprise of the film, honestly, is that Linda Cardellini’s character makes it to the end credits along with her two closest Avenger buddies. When I saw how warmly chummy they all were, I felt vaguely concerned that at least one of them was not much longer for this earth.)
Honestly the first Avengers movie has more energy and better pacing. It’s faster, funnier, brighter, and more child-friendly for sure. This installment is darker, messier, definitely more adult. I will say, however, that this time around both the story and the characters’ behavior actually make more sense. It’s a well written film, superior in many aspects to its predecessor, yet (bafflingly) it’s nowhere near as much fun to watch. Both the action sequences and the visuals seem markedly less inspired (but that may be partially because we saw it late on a less than optimal screen).
Still Age of Ultron has merits enough to make it a more than watchable summer blockbuster, and my daughter (6), my stepson (12), my husband, and I all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. (Even my youngest seemed engaged in the experience, if his frequent kicks count for anything.)
The Good:
Ultron himself is a huge asset to the film, chiefly because of James Spader’s excellent voice work. The decision to write Ultron as the true child of his creator Tony Stark was genius, and Spader really sells it. (What a great voice he has!) The film essentially gives us its most witty and charismatic character fighting a battle for earth’s survival against an even less emotionally mature/stable yet slightly more resourceful/impervious version of himself. It’s an excellent way of dramatizing inner conflict (the type of thing Robert Downey, Jr. conveys best).
In fact, a brilliant aspect of all these Marvel Universe movies is their wise decision to utilize Downey well, to create a part for him that allows him to play to his strengths as an actor. When I was a kid, so many of the “popular” (i.e. money-making) movies forced great actors into limiting, cookie-cutter roles with forgettable lines. The movies didn’t make any time to showcase individual flare.
Not only does Downey get all the best, most witty lines, but he’s allowed to deliver them in the most witty/realistic manner. (The early bit with the secret passage, “Yay!” seems perfectly suited to the styles of both Downey and Whedon, and is one of those endearing traits that make the movie far more enjoyable for the audience than it would be in less deft hands. You feel like you’re watching The Goonies for grown-ups or something, made by people who have seen such films countless times themselves. The comments that would ordinarily be made by the audience are now given directly to the actual movie characters. The movie is in on the fun.)
Iron Man is not my favorite Avenger, but I can’t deny that Robert Downey, Jr. gets all best lines (or anyway, the funniest lines) in this film (though Samuel L. Jackson made me snort and giggle once, too). Stark’s “Eugene O’Neil long” quip isn’t the kind of thing that makes you laugh out loud, but it’s still really endearing for its sheer wit. It’s also thoroughly in character. That’s the way Tony’s brain works. He’s quick and glib and associative and funny…and underneath all that, deeply tormented and unstable. (His line about reinstituting prima nocta actually made me laugh out loud, and I was the only one in the theater who did. That surprised me. Did no one else find that funny? It was so unexpected and appropriate and tossed off with such deadpan aplomb. (Not that his character would do that, but that he would joke that he would, playing on others’ perception of his flaws.) I thought it was the funniest thing in the whole movie, just because it was so random and unexpected. I couldn’t believe no one else laughed. I mean, as a historical reference, the joke is rather obscure, but surely every adult in that auditorium had seen Braveheart. (That’s what made the whole thing so funny for me. It’s something I haven’t even thought about since the late 90s, and suddenly it shows up as this random, throwaway joke that Tony knows Thor won’t even get anyway.))
I actually applaud the choice to make Tony so much wittier than all the others. His sense of humor reflects both his intellect and instability. He’s quick, but he’s not very steady. Far too often, writers ruin sitcoms by attempting to make every single character on screen unrealistically witty. This is good writing. Humor comes naturally to Tony. It reflects his racing thoughts and serves as a kind of defense mechanism.
And making Ultron an “evil” version of Tony is genius. I’ve heard some people complain that Ultron doesn’t seem like enough of a threat. Are you kidding? He’s much more of a threat than Loki (because he has no sense of humanity. Even Loki—though another type of creature—has some tender feelings similar to those experienced by human beings. Take his genuine grief at his mother’s death, for example.) Ultron is extremely unhinged and dangerous, and that checks out because his “father” Tony Stark is also kind of dangerous for the same reasons. Stark is rarely in control of himself and is clearly frightened by his own failings. When Pepper Potts is not around to keep him in check, who knows what he might do! (It takes him all of ten minutes to (inadvertently) set the world on a course for total destruction in this film.)
I like all the Pinocchio singing, too. (Well, at least, I liked it initially. I feel like it gets increasingly heavy-handed and overused as the film goes on. But Disney is in charge of Marvel now, so I assume they don’t want their product placement subtle.) Actually—from my dim memories of the dark, bizarre novel my mother read to me when I was five—Age of Ultron actually has more in common tonally with the Pinocchio source material than with the Disney version (although, come to think of it, that’s pretty dark and twisted, too—misguided, neglected children encouraged to follow their ids until they turn themselves into jackasses!)
So I think the premise of this installment is actually quite thoughtful and well plotted. (Well executed is perhaps a different story. I think the story has more profound themes this time around, and the characters’ actions in general make much more sense. But the first Avengers is still far more fun to watch.)
Lack of a credible threat is actually a problem in most of the Marvel movies if you ask me. (The stakes never felt high to me in Guardians of the Galaxy, and I’m nervous that I won’t be able to take Thanos seriously in the next Avengers sequel. He hasn’t exactly left me quaking in my boots so far.) Ultron is actually one of the most plausible villains in my opinion. He poses a genuine threat because he basically represents the dark side of one of the heroes and summarily goes about exposing all of the Avengers’ weaknesses and limitations. Also he’s right. Humanity is doomed. Human life on earth is not exactly a permanent proposition. I would expect the exploration of such themes by Joss Whedon, but that doesn’t mean such an approach is inappropriate. The scariest thing about The Avengers is the Avengers themselves. Anyone with that much power had better know how to use it. (And who knows how to use that much power?)
I also like that we see so much more of the real Hawkeye this time around. (Jeremy Renner kind of got short-changed in the last film.) I really like the side storyline about his personal life, and the evolution of our understanding of his relationship with Black Widow. I think Age of Ultron also gives Thor a pretty cool and vital (if truncated) role. And as the natural foil to Tony Stark, Captain America also gets a satisfying, flattering part.
Seeing Andy Serkis (in the flesh!) was a bit of a highlight for me (although I thought his character was underutilized—as were Idris Elba and Stellan Skarsgard. It was like, Yea! They’re here…but do they need to be?) (I wish I could embrace the talented Don Cheadle as Colonel Rhodes, but I really loved Terrence Howard in that part so much and still prefer his spin on the character and can’t seem to get over it, not even after all this time.)
I really liked Aaron Taylor-Johnson’s interpretation of Quicksilver. The character’s animation was really cool. (My daughter kept saying, “I wish I could run so fast I would just disappear. I’m going to practice that at home.”) But Taylor-Johnson’s acting was also top-notch. (I like him much more here than in Godzilla. He’s really a pretty good actor, but usually everyone either fixates on his unusual personal life or fails to notice him at all.) Elizabeth Olsen is also good as Scarlet Witch, and it’s nice for Paul Bettany that he finally gets to appear in a Marvel movie after all this time voicing Jarvis.
Best Scene:
After the movie, I polled my family to learn their favorite scenes, and was absolutely stunned that my stepson also named my personal (unstated) choice. Ordinarily, he and I appreciate different aspects of a film. He’s usually all about well-choreographed action (though he’s also a fan of scenes depicting close male bonds and betrayal), and I’m much more into character development and plot.
But this time we were in perfect agreement. Both he and I like the “hammer scene” best, the moment when all of the Avengers are sitting around a table at a party taking turns to see if any of them is “worthy” (i.e. able) to lift Thor’s hammer.
I like the scene for two reasons.
1) It’s a breath a fresh air. Up to that point, we’ve been thrown into the middle of already advancing action, and everything has happened quickly and violently. There’s just been a lot going on. Now we get to pause for some much needed character interaction. The moment is pretty funny, kind of light. Everyone gets great lines and plenty of time to approach the problem in a unique fashion reflecting his or her character.
2) What initially looks like a fun, throwaway scene turns out to be a great example of efficient writing, later enabling the story to advance quickly and seamlessly because thanks to this earlier hammer scene, a pivotal plot point is established in about two seconds.
So not only is this engaging scene tons of fun, it’s also vitally important. To me, it’s the clear highlight of the film. In fact, once my stepson mentioned it and I chimed in my surprise and agreement, both my husband and my daughter declared that this was also their second favorite scene.
My husband had first mentioned the moment when the Scarlet Witch is first able to penetrate Ultron’s mind. And my daughter championed the moment when “Black Widow gets out of the cage.”
“And why did you like that scene?” I asked her.
She stared at me like I was a complete idiot and replied, “Because Black Widow gets out of the cage.”
She loves Black Widow.
Best Scene Visually:
I wasn’t too impressed with the look of this movie, but that may be because it’s already been out for three weeks, so we saw it on a smaller, inferior screen. In an auditorium with a bigger screen and better sound, the technical aspects might well have come much closer to knocking my socks off.
Probably all of the nicest moments visually belong to the Maximoff twins, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch. Their powers conspicuously look much cooler on screen than any of the abilities displayed by the core heroes. (Honestly Hawkeye and Black Widow always look best in action to me, which is odd because they are the two Avengers without actual super powers.)
X-Men: Days of Future Past makes excellent use of Quicksilver, too. (It’s so weird that two franchises are simultaneously using such different iterations of the same character.) He was great in that movie, but I prefer the way his powers are represented on screen here. My daughter was absolutely obsessed with the way he seemed to run so fast that he would disappear and tried the replicate the effect for the rest of the weekend.
The Scarlet Witch’s powers look pretty nifty, too. (Watching her wiggle her fingers and make the red mist come out, I always remember when my daughter was a toddler, threatening her brother by extending her hands and yelling, “Power!!!” I would ask, “Where do you get your power? Where does your magic come from?” and she would answer, wide-eyed and earnest in that squeaky little voice of hers, “From my arms!”)
Best Action Sequence:
I also found the action sequences in this movie kind of disappointing and forgettable. Like I’ve said a million times, though, I am not the right person to judge action scenes. Often I go into sensory overload and zone out during scenes of intense, frenetic activity and loud explosions. That said, I have liked the action scenes in many Marvel movies, but I found these bland and generic. They could just as easily have existed in any action movie.
My husband pointed out that the action scenes in the first movie are like that, too.
I said, “I guess. I don’t really remember them,” which pretty much made his point. I added, “But some Marvel action scenes have been excellent.”
“They can’t all be like the last action scene in the second Thor,” he reminded me. (We both agree that all of that crazy epic wormhole battle chaos represents the pinnacle of plot specific Marvel action scene excellence.)
“True,” I said, “but there have been some other great ones. That scene with Samuel L. Jackson in the car is just phenomenal. That was just great filmmaking, just riveting. That’s just a great scene period, regardless of genre. And the fight in the elevator is also intense and excellent. Memorable.”
“Those are both from the same movie,” he pointed out. “So I guess it’s good that those directors are in charge of the next Avengers movies.”
I love Joss Whedon. I truly do. But I agree with my husband that the Russo brothers are much better at directing action scenes.
My husband then mentioned another point we’ve both agreed on in the past. The new Spiderman movies (whatever their failings) feature well thought out, enemy specific encounters and let Spiderman use his unique abilities as part of the fight choreography. My husband then pointed out that this movie does a bit of that when it shows how well Thor and Captain America use their hammer and sword in tandem. He’s technically right, but that still didn’t make much of an impression on me as I was watching. I can’t help it.
Probably my favorite moment of action is the quick action that follows a long-delayed kiss late in the film. What happens there seems true to the character performing the action.
All told, the film’s most memorable action sequence is probably the Hulk Buster interlude (although I also feel like that’s one of the least relevant parts of the movie, just thrown in to be cool—unless they end up facing Hulk as an enemy in a later film, which I suppose they could.)
The floating city looks cool, too, but the action that transpires during that lengthy sequence is very inconsistent in quality.
The Negatives:
Black Widow is my daughter’s favorite character, and to be honest, she’s become my favorite, too, though I’m not sure exactly why. I like all the characters (though when it comes to standalone movies, the two Thors are my favorite. The most recent Captain America was pretty great, though.)
For some reason, I just connect emotionally with Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff more than with any of the other characters. I doubt it’s simply because she’s female since typically the gender of the character doesn’t particularly matter to me. (As a child, I always identified with Luke Skywalker.) Maybe it’s something about Johansson’s performance (though I’m not sure about that either. All the principals—and most of the supporting cast—are quite good actors.)
Maybe it’s that Black Widow is so captivating because so much of her past remains mysterious. (She really needs a standalone movie. Since Scarlett Johansson wants to do one, I don’t see why that hasn’t happened yet.)
In the first Avengers, my daughter’s other favorite character was the Hulk (whom she called The Green Goblin at the time.) Can you blame her? Bruce Banner/the Hulk pretty much has the most conspicuously crowd pleasing part in that film. I loved him, too. (I’ve loved the character since childhood and was surprised by how well Ruffalo portrayed Banner.)
This time around, I think Ruffalo is the most short-changed when it comes to screentime and character development. He’s on screen a lot, but his entire character arc is reduced to the (almost non) development of the relationship between Bruce and Natasha. Both Hulk and Black Widow get slightly cheated by this if you ask me.
They’re both such great characters, fan favorites (at least in my family), but this time around, all we really get to see of them is how they might be very slowly falling in love with each other. On paper, the romance between them makes sense, but I feel like it falters a bit in execution. It feels slightly forced or something. I think the thing is, it needs more time. But there isn’t more time. There are twenty million characters in this movie, and they’re all up to something complicated.
Marvel should make a standalone Black Widow movie and put the Hulk in it (or vice-versa). Surely none of us would want to be reduced to the awkward relationship we have with our current crush, but that’s the treatment these two get in this movie. In order to make any time at all for the romance, the movie refuses to give these two anything else to do. And the romance never fully gets all the way to where it’s trying to head, either. (The relationship between Black Widow and two other characters feels much more natural, real, and less forced.)
To be fair, I’ll admit that this did not bother anyone else in my family. But it bothered me.
Then again, speaking of needing more time, I couldn’t believe we didn’t get to follow Thor’s side quest a bit longer. I mean, basically it’s like, “Okay off I go to do incredibly cool stuff that is vital not only to the resolution of this film but to the overall story arc of the entire franchise. And you’ll get to watch what I’m up to for two and a half seconds. In the meantime, please enjoy these random scenes of generic violence and witty bickering.” (Of course later I read that Joss Whedon actually wanted these scenes to be longer, and the studio refused, so I suppose knowing that helps me forgive a little.)
I think the main thing wrong with Avengers: Age of Ultron is that it’s sometimes difficult to watch. Not that it’s bad. (It’s not bad. The story is actually quite thoughtful and well written with profound themes and likable characters.) But it’s so intricate and densely plotted—so much is going on for so many people at all times!—that it gets a bit overwhelming. At times the movie is more stressful to keep up with than fun to watch. I think it’s the kind of film that would improve on multiple viewings (not because the plot is difficult to understand or hard to follow but because all of the action is so relentless that the overall experience is a bit exhausting).
The writer in me wishes that the studio would follow up Age of Ultron with several films, a separate movie for each Avenger that retells the same story from each hero’s particular point of view. The action here is of such epic scope that the story almost seems to require this type of treatment. (No sane studio executive would ever greenlight a project like that, though.) But I think those smaller, more focused films might be more enjoyable and satisfying to watch (in the way that it’s a far more pleasurable experience to eat a piece of pie every evening for a week than to attempt to cram the whole thing into your mouth at once and polish it off in one sitting).
But considering the amount of material Whedon has bit off with this story, I find it quite incredible that he manages to enable us to digest it at all. This is a well-made film that never becomes incoherent or boring, and, honestly, given its scope, pulling off that much is a remarkable feat on the part of the writer/director.
Overall:
My family had a great time watching Avengers: Age of Ultron. It’s not a perfect movie, but watching it was the perfect way to spend a stormy Saturday afternoon. In perfect honesty, I prefer the first Avengers because it’s simply more fun to watch (odd because this film actually has a better story). But all of us are excited to see what happens next to this shaken crew of heroes in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, and of course, the next actual Avengers movie is on the horizon, too. Marvel makes a ridiculous number of movies these days, but we don’t want them to stop. That’s for sure. Though lately Marvel projects vary a bit in quality, the four of us like them all, and the studio can count on us to keep buying tickets for the foreseeable future.