Review of Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) by Timothy T — 26 Dec 2015

Warning: SPOILERS.

More characters than a Russian novel, but with dialogue written by a 12 year old. Age of Ultron feels like the runner-up in a 5th grade writing competition.

This film represents a new low for the Marvel films as the writing takes a backseat in a stretch limo. Paraded before us is a medley of subplots apropos of nothing meant to set up future films. One almost imagines filmmaker fat-cats seated around a table counting their money, puffing cigars, and laughing at the expense of their audience; perhaps brainstorming future cash-grabs to separate unsuspecting victims from their money such as a movie starring Vision or a Hulk-Black Widow romantic comedy.

First, let's talk about the dialogue. Much of it is stale. The humor feels like the sort of bland banter that's been injected into every action movie since the beginning of time. The more serious dialogue feels like trailer bait, as characters contradict themselves and spout meaningless filler.

Beyond dialogue, the subplots range from bizarre to pointless. Did we really need a forced romance between Black Widow and Bruce Banner? Did we really need to know that Hawkeye moonlights as a farmer? Did we really need to watch Thor go on a peyote-induced spelunking adventure? Did we even need half the characters in this story?

That brings me to my next point; too many characters. Just for posterity, let's name them all: Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, The Hulk, Black Widow, Hawkeye, Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, Vision, Ultron, and Nick Fury (and that's not to mention all of the side characters like Falcon and War Machine). By my count, that's 11 characters all vying for screen time. This leads to a hap-hazardous plot-line that stumbles along like a college freshman after an all-night bender.

Speaking of the plot, haven't we been through this story a million times already? Robot become sentient, robot wants to kill humanity, rinse and repeat. I was hoping the final fight would include Skynet, HAL 9000, and Megatron. Maybe they're saving that for the next Avengers movie.

Even with a terrible script, sometimes good acting can help redeem a movie; but those seeking it from this film will be left wanting. No one seems to care and therefore nothing is remotely believable. Rob Downey Jr rushes through lines, Scarlett Johansson delivers lines in monotone voice and dead-pan stare, and James Spader makes a cartoon character out of one of Marvel's most iconic villains. I half-expected Tommy Wiseau to pop out at some point.

Well, now that I've gotten all of the negatives out of the way, I suppose I should talk about some things I liked about the film. Unfortunately, I'm somewhat at a loss. I suppose I could say that the special effects were pretty good and some of the action sequences were decent, but, in totality, that means that this films is about as enjoyable to the average American whether it is shown in English or Korean.

In summary, I'm giving this film 2 stars. Sorry, Marvel; your movie about AI is artificial, but not intelligent.