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Subj: Re: Thoughts on "Iron Man and his Avenging Friends" Posted: Mon May 07, 2012 at 02:47:00 pm EDT (Viewed 596 times) | Reply Subj: Thoughts on "Iron Man and his Avenging Friends" Posted: Sat May 05, 2012 at 05:51:45 pm EDT (Viewed 2 times) | ||||||
Quote: As my thread title indicated, Tony Stark is clearly the star of the show, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, because Robert Downey Jr has been great as the character. I also liked Mark Ruffalo as Banner a lot, and Jackson was fine as Ultimate Nick Fury. The guy playing Loki made the villain quite hateable, so he did his job. The others didn't have as much to do, especially poor Hawkeye, but I liked the set up of his and the Black Widow's relationship. Thor had some of the cooler moments in the film: when he first arrived and then his fight with the Hulk were great. Sadly, as much as he is my favorite character, Captain America seemed almost unnecessary. He didn't have any great lines or moments that would show the viewer why he's supposed to be the heart of the team. I'd agree with this, largely. Cap needed more of a chance to shine, as even with the Super-Solider formula it didn't seem like he could do much that the Widow couldn't. I liked that they at least bowed to his combat experience, but more certainly could have been done. Quote: First issue: Agent Caulson dying. Whedon can't help himself can he? The need to kill a tertiary character in an abrupt, shocking manner must be wired into his DNA. That's not what bothered me, though. Caulson never really was all that interesting to begin with to me, so him getting a sceptre through the heart was no great loss. But the idea that it was his death that unified the Avengers to look past their differences and become a team was ridiculously heavy handed. Frankly, it made them look like dopes. Hundreds if not thousands of people had been killed by the villain before this. The villain manipulated and nearly killed the heroes themselves. Then there's the fact the villain is planning on taking over the entire world. None of these were a suitable rallying cry for the Avengers. The goof with his near mint trading cards buying it was. Stupid.You definitely had the feeling Coulson's days were numbered the moment Whedon was signed to write and direct... He's exactly the kind of character Whedon likes to kill off. At least here it was intended in service of the story (whether it worked for you or not), as opposed to just being a shocking, random "cost of war" kind of thing that he often does. It worked all right for me because of that bit of dialog between Cap and Stark. Really, Stark was the one who needed the motivation more than any of them to quit treating it like a fun puzzle. His "We're not soldiers!" line was telling because, at that point, everyone who was left besides himself actually were. Cap had just come from WWII, so losing allies wasn't new to him. For him, the trading card thing wasn't so much motivation to stop Loki (he had been all about the mission all along), it was to instill the idea that he wasn't fighting for a world in which he no longer belonged after all. Quote: Second issue: The Evil Council's plan to stop the invasion. I get that its to set up friction between the establishment and the Avengers, because a movie can never, ever, portray any governing institution in a positive light without reminding people of Watergate, Iran-Contra, or the War or Terror, but man, Powers Boothe and company took it to the next level. Because it would have made a lot more sense to launch a bunch of nukes into the portal to blow up the aliens instead of destroying the city they were attacking. It also would have made the Avengers fairly superfluous, and given that the plot point shouldn't have been introduced at all.Honestly, I don't know what to make of that Council. If they had represented some actual governing body, I might have had more of a problem with it... but I don't really expect a shadow cabinet to be altruistic. What it does is throw real doubts on how altruistic SHIELD itself is. I agree that the "Nuke NY to save the world" plan just raised the issue of why there wasn't a better military response. However, it's the hyper-technological nature of the Marvel universe that makes it seem like shooting nukes through that portal should have been a viable option (which is a fair charge to level if that's the standard for the universe portrayed.) Certainly, in real life that kind of bizarre, specific targeting seems like it wouldn't be easy to do, especially quickly... but then we don't have giant, cloaked, flying aircraft carriers and Iron Man armors. | |||||||
