When I was 10 years old, I was sporadically collecting comic books. An Incredible Hulk book here, a Mighty Thor book there. I remember going out one weekend with my mom, one of several weekend walks we would take to the large retail strips in the Bronx for her weekly shopping trips. On the way to those shops, we would stop at one of the various discount stores where I could shop for comic books (yes boys and girls, comic books used to be sold in discount stores way back when) As I went to my usual spot to browse for a book or two, whatever my dollar bill would buy me, I came across a book that would change my life forever….The Mighty Avengers #200, written by Jim Shooter and drawn by George Perez! The cover has what I consider the greatest Avenger team ever assembled in one issue. That one book introduced me to my favorite all time artist (another story for another day) and introduced me to what would become my favorite superhero team of all time. I was an Avenger freak from that day forward. So here I am, years later walking into my local cinemaplex at 11:30 pm for a midnight showing of The Avengers. I never thought, in my wildest dreams, that I would ever see this movie made. I wished it, I thought Hollywood could do it, but never thought I would physically be going to a movie theater to actually see it. And see it I did!
Now before I go any further with my review or overview of this film, I want to thank the one and only MR. JACK KIRBY, the greatest comic book creator, writer, artist that has ever graced a drawing board for creating these great characters we see flying around the screen. With that said…as an Avenger fan, I’m going to have some gripes. The 2 most prevalent being that there are no Wasp or Ant Man (2 of the founding 5 members of The Avengers) and this team is more of an “Ultimates” version of The Avengers team rather than the regular 616 Universe Avengers we are all more familiar with. But besides those minor discrepancies, as a straight up Super Hero film…this might be the best of all of them. The film begins with Loki coming to Earth and setting his sights on something called the Tesseract (The Cosmic Cube) he is helped by an unseen figure who supplies Loki with an army of aliens know as the Chitauri. As an invasion force prepares to strike the earth, Nick Fury must rush into a program called The Avengers Initiative, a gathering of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes…Tony Stark’s Iron Man, Natasha Ramanov The Black Widow, Loki’s brother Thor, Bruce Banner The Incredible Hulk, Steve Rodgers Captain America and Clint Barton Hawkeye.
Without giving to much away, The Avengers have a bit of a bumpy ride in the beginning, working together as the circumstances of the earth being taken over by a demi god and an alien invasion seems to overwhelm. But after a tragic event, the team finally gets it together and begins to do what needs to be done.
The break out star of the film, which was a surprise to me, was the Hulk. Mark Ruffalo took over the roll from Ed Norton, and as Dr. Bruce Banner, Ruffalo plays it pretty bland. But as the Hulk, the character has many scene stealing moments, not to mention a great battle sequence with Thor on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier. The final 40 minutes of the film are balls out battle. The team gets into the thick of it and its game on. The excitement is so ratcheted up you don’t want this film to end. All the actors in the film (Robert Downey Jr, Chris Evans, Sam Jackson, Scarlet Johansson, Chris Hemsworth, Jeremy Renner, Tom Hiddleston and Ruffalo) are all excellent in their rolls, as they are all familiar with these characters from past portrayals in movies like Captain America, Thor and Iron Man (for the exception of Ruffalo). Joss Whedon does an exceptional job of keeping the glue together and balancing all those egos to fit well on film. One thing I will say about Whedon, which irks me from time to time, and I think is one of his greater weaknesses, is his use of character deaths for the purpose of just killing a character. It can be argued that for this film it was appropriate to kill a character many have grown fond of. But like in his film Serenity, killing characters to kill characters just doesn’t work all the time, and I think it’s a flaw that Mr. Whedon might have picked up while working in comic books. All in all, this is a fantastic film through out. Action at its finest. What a superhero film should be. Warner Bros. and DC Comics could learn a thing or two from Marvel Entertainment, in that Marvel doesn’t run away from the word Super Hero when promoting its films, producing its films and dominating at the box office with its films. Go see The Avengers, you’ll have a great time through out… and see “Hulk Smash”!
