Movie Title
The Avengers (aka Avengers Assemble)
Year
2012
Genre
Action, Adventure, Comic-Adaptation
Story
The is a culmination of a series of post credit scenes of the following Marvel movies from the past 4 years namely:
Iron Man
Incredible Hulk
Iron Man 2
Thor
Capt America
The movie opens off-planet with Loki making a deal with an unidentified Alien. The deal was for Loki to deliver the Tesseract (an object that Marvel fanboys would immediately recognizeas the all-powerful Cosmic Cube) in exhange for an alien army so that he may attack Earth, his brother Thor's adopted world.
The Alien army Loki recruits are the Chitauri, the Marvel Ultimate Universe's version of the Skrulls. These little inconsistencies can become points where fanboy geeks would nit-pick about but as far as the general movie-going audiences are concerned, it doesn't really matter. However, on Marvel's part, it's a great marketing strategy as the prepare their movie going fans for both the Marvel & Ultimate Universe books.
SHIELD has custody of the Cube and was studying it's potential as an unlimited power source when Loki appears and seizes it from right under Fury's nose. In the course of the battle, Loki mind-controls Hawkeye, Dr Selving (chief scientist studying the Cube) and several other SHIELD agents, destroying the SHIELD Base in the process. This is when we get to see the famous SHIELD Heli-Carrier make its big screen debut. It's impressive!
Retrieving the Cube has now become top priority and apparently it emits Gamma Radiation, and hence, can be tracked. Black Widow is then recalled from a mission to recruit Dr Bruce Banner (aka Hulk) as he is the top scientist on Gamma Radiation and can help them get the Cube back.
Meanwhile, Tony Stark (Iron Man) & Capt. Steve Rogers (Capt America) are on-board as part of the mission to locate Loki and the Cube.
They get an opportunity to confront Loki as he needed a rare metal called Irridium to stabilize the Cube before he could open an tele-portational gate to bring the Chitauri to Earth. The Avengers (Black Widow, Iron Man & Capt America) capture Loki and was on their way back to SHIELD when Thor drops in and seizes Loki from the Avengers.
As with most comic books, upon any first meeting between heroes, they have to duke it out. So, this formula is put to good use on the big screen as we see the Main Avenger guys (Thor, Cap & Iron Man) dish it out before they realize they are all on the same side.
The mind-wiped SHIELD agents and Hawkeye then attacks the Heli-Carrier to help Loki escape. In the midst of the attack, the Hulk comes out to play and Thor immediately knows that he's the only one who could face the Green Goliath. Fanboys would love the part where the Hulk tries to lift Thor's Hammer - Mjolnir but fails.
Loki brings the aliens to attack Earth with Manhattan as the beachhead. That's where the Avengers head toward.
All hell brakes loose as the alien hoards come in thru' the portal in droves. The Avengers are spread thin as they're tasked with rescuing the people, fighting the aliens, close the portal and capture Loki.
Watch the movie to see how the heroes save the day!
Acting
Well, what can I say? It's a superhero movie!
Overall
It is by no means perfect as I do have gripes about a few things. However, I believe my gripes are only because I'm a fan-boy geek who'se been reading the comics for years and nothing would ever please us. However, for the general public, this is indeed 1 of the, if not THE best Super-Hero movie to date!
Here are my gripes:
Thor without his helmet for the ENTIRE MOVIE!!!!!
What's with Cap's white shoulder stripes?
Iron Man, Cap, Hawkeye (supposedly a top-secret agent) & Thor showing their faces so openly. C'mon!
The Avengers, especially Capt. America, do not kill! However, in this movie, the Avengers are pretty trigger happy. They kill mind-controlled SHIELD Agents & Chitauri as though they were playing a video game.
Hawkeye could've worn his Ultimates version goggles. Plus, he's too sombre. Give him back his witty banter!
In the final battle, Capt. America and Thor behaved more like spectators than heroes (and leader in Cap's case) as they see Iron Man save the day by going into the Portal. Cap and Thor would've put in at least 3 contingencies before Iron Man had even gone in.
The mixing up of the Ultimate & Marvel Universe Proper is really confusing for fan-boys like me, but then, as I had said, it's clever Marketing Strategy on Marvel's part, so it's all good.
It's a great Super-hero flick that combines an almost perfect blend of action, characterization, humor, Marvel Lore & Mythos and good pacing.
LASTLY, I need not remind you that there is a post-credit scene (C'mon, you guys already know this by now!) where we finally see who it was Loki was making a deal with at the very start of the movie - Thanos!
We have seen Thanos' Infinity Gauntlet before. It was in Odin's Weapons Vault from the Thor movie.
http://jmerb.blogspot.com/2011/05/movie-review-thor.html
Verdict: Go watch it
AGAIN!
Rating: 7.5/10
