Movie Review: The Avengers

Article by John McHoneyCombs
|
May 11, 2012
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Directed by: Joss Whedon

Starring: Robert Downey, Jr., Chris Evans

Grade: A

Comic book fan-boys: the wet dream you’ve been waiting for has finally arrived. With The Avengers the first blockbuster of the summer is here. The plot has to do with Loki (that emo guy from Thor) coming to Earth and blah blah blah Tesseract blah blah blah gamma radiation. Look, let’s stop fooling around here: no one is coming into this movie looking for a story. You just want to see superheroes punch things to death.

The Avengers could have just been as easily titled Iron Man and His Band of Background Superheroes because Robert Downey Jr. does a fantastic job as the fast-talking Tony Stark that you won’t really care much about anyone else. Now, that’s not to say that Downey is the only good part about this movie; nearly everything in it is lifted out of the superhero story rulebook. The pacing is appropriate, delivering action and comedy whenever you’re starting to feel the least bit bored. Honestly though, if you’re bored throughout this movie then you might want to check your pulse. Even our managing editor was pissing herself in excitement next to me. Trust me I know, I could feel the puddle forming by my feet.

The one downside to this movie is Samuel L. Jackson’s character, Nick Fury. His lines felt forced, and his whole side plot does not interest the viewer as much as the intense action scenes between the film’s core characters. On the flip side, the one surprisingly strong performance comes from Agent Phil Coulson, played by Clark Gregg. He’s been the kind-of-annoying background character in past Marvel films, but here he’s surprisingly funny, thanks to unforeseen character development in this flick. As much cannot be said for the new kids on the block, Hawkeye and Black Widow. They're attempt to flesh out their characters was wasted time in this film. But you already knew that.

If you’re plunking down some cash for The Avengers, make sure you see this movie in a loud theater, preferably in IMAX. This film is made for surround sound and HD. However, be ready to be sitting in a theater surrounded by absolute morons. The average IQ in the movie theater will be lower than the Hulk’s. Idiots and their children will be drawn to this film because they get the chance to see bright explosions and loud noises. There was a kid sitting behind me who, after seeing the trailer for Battleship, remarked quite plainly, “Dat. Looks. Good.” I proceeded to smack him and his mother for raising a child who would be even allowed to think something like that. Also, any of the girls that you’re lucky enough to see in there are just interested in staring at Captain America’s juicy muscles, not your comic book-reading ass.

All in all, The Avengers is grand and does an excellent job setting itself up well for a sequel, which promises to be good assuming they land Joss Whedon again. This movie had every chance to shoot itself in the foot and just be a giant turd, considering half of the film’s featured superheroes had pretty lackluster feature movies. Director Joss Whedon managed to strike the perfect balance of comedy, action, and even a bit of drama to keep audiences genuinely interested for the whole two and a half hour run time. If you ever read comic books as a kid, it is your life’s duty to go see this film and jerk off to it in the back of the theater. For everyone else, take a break from finals and shut your brain off to see the Hulk murderpunch bad guys.