Age of Ultron: Review
Written & Directed By: Joss Whedon
Starring: Lots and lots of Hollywood folk; just read the review already.

Age of Ultron is stuffed with all the trappings audiences could ask for in a summer blockbuster, but is AOU a better movie than its predecessor?

The Plot: When Tony Stark’s global peacekeeping effort goes to poop, Earth's mightiest heroes: Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), and the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), assemble once more to save life as we know it from the destructive artificial intelligence known as Ultron (James Spader).

As with any summer superhero blockbuster “Avengers: Age of Ultron” is loaded up with lots of spectacular action sequences and special effects for audiences to "oh" and "ah" about. At times the action and CGI feels so enormous that this movie could have easily floundered into disaster of Michael Bay portions. Luckily, Joss Whedon understands the importance of balancing the excitement with just enough ancillary moments to allow itself to catch its breath. Bruce Banner and Black Widow get romantically complicated, Cap and Iron Man squabble over contrasting viewpoints, Hawkeye gets a meatier part this time around, and we are introduced to a new Avenger (the Vision).  

Age of Ultron is fun ride for sure but I dare to say that as much as I liked AOU, I didn’t quite love it. For me the snags rest in the narratives inability to make me ever question the outcome. Of course it’s a foregone conclusion in a superhero movie that good will defeat evil (I get that). Nevertheless, with other Marvel movies there are genuine moments where you are so engrossed in the story that you may actually lose sight of this simple fact and begin to even wonder how the heroes will save the day. I didn’t really feel that this time around. In fact, the Avengers have become so good at Avenging that I found myself wondering how Ultron was going to stand a snowballs chance in hell against them.