Avengers: Age of Ultron arrived as one of this weekend’s big events (other than the royal baby) with the most character-packed Marvel installment yet. Around 800 actors filled the movie, yet it still managed to overflow with CGI effects. The movie shall easily be Marvel’s biggest moneymaker yet. Before this weekend, the film earned $201 million overseas. In North America, the film pulled in around $84 million on Friday, and the comic nerds will probably make multiple visits throughout the weekend. I imagine it will hit well over $200,000 total for the weekend.
As a whole, I didn’t enjoy this film as much as The Avengers, but it was a strong entry and pushed several individual storylines into progression. I still dug this movie a lot, although the opening fight scene was so relentlessly action-packed that I feared Marvel would deliver a hollow cartoon. Luckily, Age of Ultron was peppered with moments of humor, humanity, and character development. Here are my thoughts on several of the storylines:
* Black Widow and Hulk’s romance didn’t feel shoehorned into the film at all. Their attraction, mutual respect, and respective vulnerabilities felt very organic. In the context of how the Marvel films portray the MCU, this relationship makes a lot of sense. And no, Black Widow wasn’t wh*ring around in any sense of the word.
* Tony Stark still drives me insane. He’s the douche Avenger. Ultron is an annoying, smug extension of Tony’s megalomaniacal personality. Stark couldn’t help himself from messing with artificial intelligence. Unlike the other characters, Stark’s insufferable persona overwhelms his Iron Man alter ego. I was glad to see him depart at the end, but we’ll see him again in Cap 3: Civil War.
* Captain America and his Boy Scout image mostly served as a punchline in this film, which is fine. Joss Whedon always writes worse dialogue for Cap than what he receives in his standalone movies. Cap will get his due again. Thor and his gregarious, Asgardian manner of speaking were also nice comic relief.
* Hawkeye got his backstory and the homelife that Cap has always wanted. The surprise of seeing Hawkeye’s civilian family lent a nice respite from the movie’s otherwise frenetic pace. The various characters’ interactions with the children and down-home country life were very reflective of their personalities.
* The Twins (“He’s fast, and she’s weird”) were a lovely addition, especially Scarlet Witch. They were orphans in search of a family, and in the end, only one made it out alive. Poor Quicksilver went out for a greater cause. Scarlet Witch held her own amongst the group, and Hawkeye’s recruitment speech was pretty awesome.
* Vision was … a vision to behold. Paul Bettany delivered a fantastic, enigmatic performance (worth of Thor’s hammer). I especially liked the part where he was mesmerized by his own reflection.
* The film contained a zillion cameos from various MCU characters. Jane and Pepper Potts received shoutouts, but we saw many other characters. Nick Fury, Agent Carter, Maria Hill, Falcon, Heimdall, Professor Selvig, and others enjoyed appearances. No Loki and no Bucky Barnes. I was okay with no Loki because his presence is so huge (sorry, Dragonflies!), and this movie was already jam-packed. Bucky (by nature) is supposed to be “in the wind,” so we’ll see him next in Cap 3.
* The New Avengers team assembled at the end. War Machine, Falcon, Scarlet Witch, and Vision joined up with Cap and Black Widow to keep on avenging. This changing of the guard will switch things up nicely, and some people see this new team as Marvel’s overdue nod to their ongoing diversity problem.
* The mid-credits scene carried vast implications in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Thanos (the mad titan) grabs an Infinity Gauntlet and vows to collect the stones. This is a different gauntlet than the one that Thor’s father, Odin, possesses … so now we know that more than one gauntlet exists in the MCU. *Cue soap opera stare face*
