Marvel's The Avengers Review

The Avengers are gathered by S.H.I.E.L.D. to save the world from an incredibly hostile takeover by Loki and his alien army.

The movie is a triumph! The sixth installment of an on-going epic in the true sense.

I was slightly worried when they initially hired Zak Penn to write The Avengers since he was responsible for writing such comic book stinkers as Elektra, X-Men: The Last Stand and Fantastic Four (take into consideration they were all executed by Fox, and I don't mean executed as in "made into films" I mean executed as in "taken under a bridge and shot in the back of the head"). Even Edward Norton felt he needed to re-write Penn's script for The Incredible Hulk before he took on that film, so you could understand my concerns in the beginning. Fortunately, when comic book fanatic and Buffy creator Joss Whedon was hired to direct (an inspired choice in my opinion) he had the opportunity to re-write The Avengers and touch up the Captain America scripts. I hope Marvel gives Whedon the chance to stay as a constistant presence for the studio. His style and comedy really shine through, knowing every characters personality, traits and history. You can tell he's a big fan and knows what fans want.

Chris Evans is perfect as Captain America! I was happy to see him more as the leader, butting heads with Tony Stark and even getting to steal a couple scenes being inadvertently hilarious! Well, inadvertently on the characters part. Intentionally for the film, of course.

It was really cool taking a sneak peak into Tony Starks life with Pepper Potts since Iron Man 2. As well as getting to see some new Iron Man armor. Robert Downey, Jr. really turns up the smugness and it's awesome.

Thor was great and his introduction to The Avengers, meshed very well. Especially with what was established in the first 10 minutes. Chris Hemsworth emodies the comic book character, Thor.

As for Bruce Banner, I still like Norton the most, but nobody could possibly hate Mark Ruffalo. He looks like the nicest guy who ever lived. It did take me a while to get used to him in the role, but goddamn that was one hell of a HULK! If anything, the Hulk stole the show. That's all I'll say about that.

Loki has to be the best comic book villain since Ozymandius in Watchmen. He looked liked the a walking, talking human virus that had to be destroyed before it killed everything and everyone.

Black Widow was a surprise favourite. I don't think she used her stingers all that much, if at all and I wished they had filmed that Hawkeye/Black Widow Budapest adventure they kept referencing. Scarlett Johansson whipped herself into unbelieveable shape for this!

Hawkeye was cool, but he was the one Avenger who seemed a little off. I didn't really dig his costume and his lack of head gear was distracting. The tidbits concerning he and Widow's backstory were good, but at least one film featuring them should be in order.

Nick Fury is kind of mundane. It feels like Samuel L. Jackson is just going through the motions.

The action was mind-blowing. The more I think about it, the more I want to watch it all over again.

Next year Marvel Studios plan to release Thor 2, Iron Man 3 and Captain America 2 in 2014. I hope to see an Ant-Man, Black Panther, Doctor Strange, Luke Cage or a little Namor in there.

What did you think?