Let's complain about Avengers: Age of Ultron
REVIEW
It repeats too much of the first film
Joss Whedon's sequel to his record-breaking first film The Avengers is a solid, well-packaged superhero film. However, the story is strained in places and hard to follow in other places for those not already familiar with the comic book storylines and characters.
Suffering from the over packed feel of too many major characters taking up screen time, the movie is also hurt by being an obvious vehicle to ease the transition from an Iron-Man dominated Avengers into a different group for the inevitable Avengers III. For example, at the end Whedon seems to wipe the board clean by having Stark contemplating retirement and building a farm for him and Pepper Potts to live on (does she want a farm?), Thor flying away with other matters on his mind, and Hulk secretly escaping, guilty and worried because Bruce Banner now has to face off against the infatuation of Black Widow (Scarlet Johansson) and her ability to freak him out by touching his hand.
A bigger complaint is the repetitions from the first film. Instead of the galactic army sweeping down from a hole in the sky to attack the Avengers, there is a sameness of Ultron's robotic armies that swarm over a floating city to attack the Avengers. The man-to-man fighting repeats the chaotic visual activity from the first film, and there is the deja vu of seeing some of the same superheroes moves repeated onscreen, such as Tony Stark once again lifting a damaged airship, Hawkeye's endless arrow supply, and his jamming an arrow into the forehead of an invader in an identical fashion as was seen in Avengers I.
These are minor things but they add up to the realization that in too many places you're being sold the same screen writing and directing all over again, patched in from the first film, and quite possibly present only because film companies so often pursue the idea that a sequel should just repeat the big-hit first film, except on a bigger and more spectacular scale. Whedon is not-performing a head-fake like that in Age of Ultron, as there is a legitimate effort to explore the ramifications of Stark's peace-keeping technology and how it can all go completely wrong (and produce one of the film's best items, James Spader's Ultron, powered by a self-aware artificial intelligence that decides that the best way to save the earth is to replace the inhabitants.)
Finally there's the final observation, which isn't a complaint, that the same undercurrent of paranoia in Age of Ultron is consistent with other Marvel superhero films. Probably a reflection of the times, much like adventure and spy films of the 1970s reflected the malaise and cynicism of that era.
Age of Ultron Reviews:
Avengers: Age of Ultron is what it had to be
Your mission, Joss Whedon, if you choose to accept it, is to make a sequel to the biggest money-making superhero movie ever made.
Let's complain about Avengers: Age of Ultron
Suffering from the over packed feel of too many major characters taking up screen time, the movie is also hurt by being an obvious vehicle to ease the transition from an Iron-Man dominated Avengers into a different group for the inevitable Avengers III.
In Praise of the Avengers Age of Ultron
The special effects are state of the art and so is the superhero dramatics.
Original Page March 2015 | Updated August 2020
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