The Avengers was a feat of mastery of an incredibly epic proportion, plain and simple. Joss Whedon created something the film community had not seen before, an ambitious and bold piece of filmmaking that worked, down to a T. We had never seen anything of this size and originality before and it’s hard to say that we’ll ever see it again. Of course, since Marvel has no chill whatsoever, of course we’re already set up for two more sequels for The Avengers franchise following this first sequel, but is that a bad thing? Does the first return to the big screen forgo the novelty and originality that the first film had and fail miserably? Or is it even better than its initial outing?

Neither.

Avengers: Age of Ultron has everything we needed from a sequel like this. This outing doesn’t try to top its predecessor, in that sense, that’s where Avengers: Age of Ultron succeeds the most. If the film had tried to top the first outing of the famed superhero group, it would’ve fallen flat simply due to the standards raised by the first film.

Avengers: Age of Ultron also succeeds in changing its visual style from the first film (including shooting it in anamorphic widescreen instead of standard widescreen this time around, which I’m still bitter over). Whedon has chosen to place the film in less colorful atmospheres and grittier environments, placing a darker, more visceral feel to this film than the first one. The film also revels in the sheer absurdity of its premise, embracing its comic book roots over trying to impress the audience with a dramatic and dark storyline.

Robert Downey Jr. returns for the fifth time as Tony Stark, the man behind the suit of Iron Man. At this point, Downey Jr’s spiel of Stark’s personality has worn off, and he’s left to fend for himself as a much darker, more complex character to work off of. Downey Jr. is great once again as Stark and provides more dramatic heft to his character over bombarding the audience with his wit, which gets old, especially since many of Downey Jr.’s outside of The Marvel Cinematic Universe often contain this same sense of wit.

I was also happy to see development of characters not often developed in the series, especially with that of Clint Barton aka Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), with a secret of his revealed midway through the film that paves the way for some wonderful character development and added likability with his character not seen in the other films so far. Natasha Romanoff aka Black Widow (the always spectacular Scarlett Johansson) also provides much more depth to her already layered and broken character with the inclusion of a romance involving Bruce Banner aka The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), which sounds like an awful addition to the story, but actually works nicely due to the charm of Johansson and Ruffalo.

The new characters are also well played as well. James Spader’s presence as the main villain Ultron, is nuanced, sinister and magnetic in delivery, which is a nice change from the typical shoehorning of previous villains as current ones into these films. The pair of Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen (returning from playing husband and wife in Godzilla to play siblings here) as Pietro Maximoff aka Quicksilver and Wanda Maximoff aka Scarlet Witch, are also nuanced and fresh, even under some occasionally stereotypical Eastern European accents.

The scale of this film has been drastically downsized from its first outing, which could be seen as a bit of a drawback to some people, but I saw it as a chance to focus more on chemistry between characters, mainly the pairings of Romanoff and Banner, Barton and a new character and the intense and layered chemistry between the Maximoff siblings. I found this to be a nice addition as I’ve found the recent Marvel films (sans the wonderful Guardians of the Galaxy and Captain America: The Winter Soldier) to be slightly bereft of character development.

One downfall of the film comes not in its story, but in something altogether different. Since the 2011 release of Thor, all films that Marvel has produced have been released in the 3D format, all of which have been shot in 2D and converted in post production. Some of these films have succeeded in creating a wonderful stereoscopic world (Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, The Avengers) while some have failed to create much depth at all (Captain America: The First Avenger, Thor: The Dark World, Iron Man 3), unfortunately, this time around it falls underneath the latter category, which was surprising in the fact that the first film used the 3D format so wonderfully. My advice? If you can see the film in IMAX 3D, do that. If you can’t, settle for the 2D option.

Avengers: Age of Ultron isn’t perfect, it has some pacing issues and has lost it’s initial novelty this time around, but there’s no denying that Joss Whedon has created another beautifully crafted and layered universe to enjoy. The cast is fantastic as always, and the film dives into deeper territory with some under-appreciated characters for fans to eat up even more. There’s no denying that Marvel needs to calm down, because do we really need Ant-Man? I don’t think so, but I’ve found that in the franchises that includes The Avengers, the quality is consistently top notch, even if sometimes a tad repetitive. It’s sad to see Whedon depart this franchise, and I trust the Russo brothers (Captain America: The Winter Soldier) to take good care of the series. I felt the same sense of childish giddiness watching Avengers: Age of Ultron as I did with the first film, even if to a lesser extent this time around. It was unfortunately inevitable.

4/5

Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios

Directed by: Joss Whedon
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Don Cheadle, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany, Cobie Smulders, Anthony Mackie, Hayley Atwell, Idris Elba, Stellan Skarsgård with James Spader as Ultron and Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury.
Runtime: 141 minutes
Rating: PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi action, violence and destruction, and for some suggestive comments.

Marvel Studios presents, a Joss Whedon film, Avengers: Age of Ultron