THE AVENGERS REVIEW

Avengers was on my most awaited films of 2012 list.
So, does it disappoint? Of course NOT. I never doubted you, my dear Whedon. 

There are tons of reviews out there, and you can pick any one of them up and read them and it won’t change the fact that you’ll be watching this film (unless you’re an idiot, in which case, get back to your made-for-TV romcoms). So why read this? Because it’s a review by a comicbook fan for a movie for comicbook fans (and others) directed by THE comicbook fan of our era.
And Avengers is (arguably) the greatest most perfect comicbook adaptation ever.
Now, I’m not saying it’s the greatest comicbook movie ever (Batman Begins/Dark Knight still holds that position) but it is the best adaptation of a comicbook ever. Dark Knight doesn’t feel like a comicbook, but it is a better movie. But this one, it feels so much like a comicbook. And I think that’s because of Joss Whedon, who’s got quite a lot of experience writing comics (Astonishing X-Men, Runaways, Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and he’s marvelous here. HE’S THE REAL STAR. Nobody else could have done it better. He handles the characters amazingly well, and gives each character their time to shine. A character like Hawkeye or Coulson is given as much importance as Iron Man or Thor. And Hulk…he’ll have you cheering and screaming and laughing, because this is the best interpretation of the Hulk so far.

A lot of twitter reactions say that Iron Man overshadows every other character in the movie. Those reactions are absolutely wrong and possibly written by RDJtards. Nobody overshadows anybody. They stand together in the movie. Side by side. As a team. As. They. Should. And I absolutely applaud Whedon for that. I had some fears that Iron Man would serve as the leader-type given his current popularity, but that isn’t the case. Captain America LEADS the Avengers, and Whedon gives us good reason why he SHOULD lead them and why everyone else is listening. But since Whedon has to appease Robert Downey Jr’s ginormous ever-expanding ego, he does something really cool with Iron Man, but handles it so that it doesn’t overshadow other characters.  To get these guys together and to do such justice to them… Whedon accomplishes an absolutely impossible feat and I congratulate him for that.

Hiddleston is amazing as Loki. It also helps that he looks so much like the Loki of the comicbooks. When he gives you that maniacal grin, you know that they couldn’t have gotten anyone better for it.
I love the Avengers. I love how they were handled and I love how they are treated with such respect.

What I didn’t love in the movie is Nick Fury. Whedon writes him as a manipulative General who’ll do anything in his power to save the world and it isn’t his fault that Fury doesn’t shine. It’s Samuel L Jackson’s. A person’s badassocity can only carry a character till so much, and I feel SLJ isn’t fit to play Fury. Sure, Fury’s shrewd and manipulative, but he’s also noble. And that’s where SLJ fails. He just didn’t shine like the rest of the cast, and it wasn’t because he was underwritten or anything… SLJ just couldn’t pull it off. And I’m saying that as a huge Samuel L Jackson fan who keeps on using his dialogues in real life situations, mind you.
Another thing I didn’t like was the story. It felt as if someone handed Whedon an outline of the Ultimates comicbook and told him to write a screenplay off that. I feel Marvel didn’t really trust him enough to come up with a marvelous story. So the story as a whole is lackluster. But you’ve got some great dialogue and some magnificent action sequences, so all is forgiven. Avengers could have been a much better movie, in my opinion, if they let Joss Whedon off the chains and let him do whatever he wanted. Maybe he’ll get more freedom while doing the sequel (which is very likely given the Nerdgasm-inducing mid-credits scene.)

And then there’s the Chitauri (AKA Skrulls) (it isn't a spoiler, they're namedropped five seconds into the movie) who look nothing like Skrulls and behave more like Random Alien Army. But that isn’t a problem because the last hour or so of Avengers is absolute carnage. But within this carnage is drama. These aren’t just a few cool scenes that show off CGI unlike the Bayflicks. You do get the sense of something happening. You care about the characters. You want them to win. And you’re most probably cheering for them and you don’t even know it.
The dialogue is amazing and smart and all kinds of awesome and it is an absolute act of sin to not listen to it. Do yourself a favour: if anyone’s talking in the theater, tell him/her to shut the fuck up and if they don’t listen throw a tub full of popcorn on their head (as I did). Whedon is a maestro of dialogue, and every bit of it in this movie is nothing short of brilliant. And most of it will make you laugh out loud. I guarantee.
Avengers is a movie made by people who love the characters, and it shows, because that love kind of crosses over to you from beyond the screen. And I love that. This is how movies should be made. Out of love and a little bit of respect, and not out of formulas or magic potions or whatnot the industry believes in.
8/10
Avengers opens on 4th May in the United States. It is currently running in European and Indian theaters.