AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON

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Dear Readers, 

I am, in fact, not dead.

After sitting out for most of the summer, I’m back for some more comic book movie action. And there’s plenty to get into. Avengers: Age of Ultron, the biggest of them all, was digitally released last week, so here’s my take on Marvel’s latest behemoth of a movie.

There’s a point in Avengers: Age of Ultron when Vision, a purple-faced robot, appears and Cap says, “I’m getting a little tired of ‘new.’” I hate to say it, but I am too, Cap. I am too.

I think a lot of critics agreed that A2 was overcrowded with new additions, and it’s easy to understand why Marvel went that route. Audiences have already seen the Avengers assemble, and without fresh blood, Age of Ultron would have looked and felt a lot like the last Avengers movie: Iron Man and Cap bicker, other characters crack wise, and a whole lot of CGI foot soldiers get tossed around by the Hulk et al.

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One of those new characters is Vision, played by Paul Bettany, a kind of cybernetic superpower whom Bettany plays as an all-knowing, angelic figure. Unfortunately, besides Vision, the new additions don’t really add a whole lot to the story. Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver have lame Russian accents and a grudge against Tony Stark, and Ultron hardly qualifies as an interesting villain. Say what you will about James Spader, but a robot that thinks tossing a city in the air equates to an asteroid? I thought Ultron was smarter than the average robot.

It also doesn’t help that Ultron is entirely CG, giving him very little presence in each of his scenes.

I hate to say it, but Marvel often lacks an interesting villain, unlike DC. It was true for Guardians of the Galaxy and it was true for Ant-Man (which I’ll review very soon). Netflix’s Daredevil has definitely bucked the trend, though. And how? Fisk (a.k.a. Kingpin) is a human being with a relatable backstory, relatable weaknesses and motivations. Ultron is a robot that surfs the Internet for a few minutes after being created and decides that humanity has to die. And that makes it all the more laughable when the movie treats Ultron like a human being, with mood swings and bravado. There was an opportunity to create a truly menacing villain, one that doesn't think like a person, one that's always one step ahead. But, instead, his personality resembles Loki's and he's rather dull as a result.

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On top of that, the movie is overstuffed with plot. It’s hard to keep of track of which character is where, doing what and for what reasons. The most thrilling sequence is the fight between Iron Man and Hulk in South Africa, but that too was little more than filling. And we had to rush through Ultron's origins to fit it all in. There was a point when the Avengers first started talking about Ultron and I thought to myself, "Wait, we're here already? Ultron didn't even exist two minutes ago and now he's an established threat?"

SPOILER ALERT: In A2's climax, Scarlet Witch rips Ultron's "heart" from his body and crushes it. Just let that soak in. Ultron has a heart and if you crush it, he dies. That small moment sums up the movie quite well for me — a story with an artificial heart that makes no sense whatsoever. 

In the post-credit sequence, Thanos slips on the infinity gauntlet and says, “Fine, I’ll do it myself.” Well it’s about damn time, Thanos! You’ve been trying to get less powerful minions to gather the stones for the last three years. What have you been doing all this time, floating around in your space chair!?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a huge Joss Whedon fan, but I’m hoping the Russo Brothers are able to inject more life into the next two Avengers instalments.