Avengers: Age of Ultron Review

I have to admit, I’m a bit of a late comer to the whole Marvel craze.  I had seen the old Spiderman movies with Tobey McGuire way back in the day, but since then I hadn’t really seen anything.  My brother is really into them though, so while visiting him one weekend we decided to watch Avengers.  I figured, “Hey, Disney owns it now, and I write a Disney blog, so I should probably figure out what this is all about!”  And to my surprise, I really enjoyed the Avengers.  This sequel was just as good, if not better.

This movie has a lot going for it.  It has a great cast, many of which we are familiar with from the first movie, but some newcomers as well.  The characters are interesting and develop more throughout this film.  If you haven’t seen all of the Marvel movies (like all of the Captain America or Iron Man films) there might be a couple of references that are lost on you, but overall it shouldn’t be a problem.  We have two new main characters, who are apparently X-Men that normally go by Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch.  This had to be told to me after the fact because I had no idea, but I’m sure many of you other fans will think I’m silly for not knowing.

The plot is what you would expect from a superhero film – it holds your interest well and it is filled with plenty of action.  One of the highlights for me, though, is how funny it is.  There are some really great one-liners and comedy thrown in to lighten some of the tension of the more violent/action filled scenes.

I don’t want to spoil too much of the plot, but I’ll give a basic overview in case you’re wondering.  Iron Man and Bruce Banner are working to create “Ultron,” a super robot/A.I. that will help protect and bring peace to the world.  Not surprisingly, their creation turns on them and the heroes must figure out a way to stop Ultron from destroying the entire planet.

I thought Ultron was a pretty interesting villain.  He was created for good and turned out evil, so he has some twisted logic for why he is doing what he’s doing.  And of course because he was built to be such a powerful creation, he’s very difficult for them to defeat.

Really, my only complaint about the film was that at 2 hours and 22 minutes, I found it to be a little too long.  I think even cutting 15 minutes would have helped a lot.  My brother insists that most people will think I’m wrong, and that they were outraged that the film wasn’t an hour longer like before it was edited.  There is one scene where Iron Man is trying to take down the Hulk from causing too much destruction, and it just went on and on.  Maybe some people are really into watching that for 15 minutes but it got to be a little bit much for me.  I like a well balanced movie with action, emotion, and comedy.  With a couple of small exceptions, Age of Ultron did this pretty well.

As someone who doesn’t really have much background information on the Marvel universe, I was a little bit confused by the ending.  I’m not talking about the final battle with Ultron, but literally the last 5 minutes of the movie and the aftermath of it.  Old characters seemed to be leaving and new ones were being introduced, I suppose to set up the third film, but it did leave me with questions.

I was very pleased with this movie and if you like any of the other Marvel movies, I think you’ll really enjoy this one.  And if you’re a Disney fan but hesitant to jump into the Marvel universe like I was, then I suggest watching the first Avengers.  You might enjoy it more than you think, and then the second one is definitely a must-see.