Did The Avengers Live Up To The Hype?

Holy fucking shit!

That’s my review. Oh? You want more? Something in-depth, without too many spoilers? Ugh, you’re so demanding.

I suppose I can oblige.

I like to consider myself a “casual” comic book fan. I never really collected comic books while growing up; I was more interested in sports and getting girls to touch my penis. However, that doesn’t mean I don’t know my shit – but I can’t rattle off who was on the cover of issue #99 of Ant-Man.

I’m sure you’ve seen all the Marvel movies leading up to The Avengers, as I have. The two Iron Man movies, Thor, Captain America, and, to a much lesser extent, the two Hulk movies. So, staying strictly with the continuity of the film franchises, I was prepared for The Avengers. And it didn’t fail to deliver the awesomeness.

You truly get it all in this movie.

There are epic battle scenes that are not only good versus evil, but good versus good as the Avengers try to sort shit out. A lot of cock-measuring goes on in the middle of the movie before they finally get their egos in check and get to work against Loki.

There’s incredible humor, and of course it’s Tony Stark who takes the cake when it comes to the wisecracks, but even good ol’ Captain America gets in a joke or two.

There’s great tension, and for me the build up to the Hulk’s first appearance had a lot of weight. I’ll knife fight anyone who thinks that Mark Ruffalo wasn’t the perfect choice to play Dr. Banner. I was hesitant when I first heard that he was onboard, because I thought that Edward Norton had done a decent job (but, honestly, compared to Bana, my dead grandmother would have done a better job). In the end, however, Ruffalo was great. And when the Hulk finally showed up…

Fuuuuuck!

Any nerd worth his weight in pocket protectors will agree, the Hulk is the greatest ever. I might have a wet dream tonight about his scenes. He was that good. Joss Whedon did a great job with the Hulk. Not only with his action scenes, but with the overall look too. It’s spot-on.

And of course, the incredible scene at the end. Make sure you stay until the very end, after the credits. You should know this by now, with all the little Easter eggs Marvel has been sticking in these movies, but there’s not one at the end of The Avengers, but two of them, so don’t leave too soon.

The Avengers Trailer

As great as The Avengers was, I do have two small complaints:

1. The obvious similarities to Independence Day at the end. It’s small, and it’s not forced, but as soon as I saw it, I couldn’t stop thinking about ID4. Damn you, Randy Quaid.

2. The roles of Black Widow and Hawkeye. I felt that because the other Avengers all have had much more screen time in the past, that Joss Whedon may have worked a bit too hard to get them a decent amount of scenery to chew on. It wasn’t entirely forced, but most of the time they were on the screen I was hoping it wouldn’t be for very long – Mostly because I wanted more Hulk. Goddamn that shit was awesome.

Brian Simpson is a DJ at the active rock radio station 95.7 The Rock in La Crosse, Wisconsin. He’s also a hardcore Metallica fan (having been to 50-odd concerts) and a hard-riding scooter biker (his scooter is fashioned after the Green Goblin).

Yell! Rating (x/5 Skulls):

Year Released:

4 May 2012

Director:

Joss Whedon

Cast/Crew

Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Jeremy Renner, Tom Hiddleston

Genre

Action

Official URL:

The Avengers