Avengers: Age of Ultron

Successful continuation develops on some loose ends and also manages to warn against AI. Unfortunately it suffers from being a sequel and the movie would benefit from half an hour of character background building, because there simply isn’t enough time for that, what with all the action. Even Ultron’s motivation to attempt to annihilate the Avengers seems to me unconvincingly explained, but he certainly doesn’t lack charisma. Spader enjoys himself. Sidetracking to the infinity stones take your attention the wrong way, even though Whedon tried to squeeze Age of Ultron into the story legitimately, this way it just acts as a bridgehead for the two-part Infinity War which won’t come along for another three years. The powerhouse of the movie it Jerry Renner’s quite (pleasantly) surprising Hawkeye in together with the anti-heroes Stark and Banner who spoil everything they touch. The digital orgies are occasionally a little exhausting, because the action tries to focus on all characters at once. The chemistry in the chit-chat scenes works splendidly, however. I’m quite curious how the changed team lineup affects the next Marvel movies. I’m pleased that they decided to go ahead with something like this. The vision deserves more space. (02/05/2015)

"Marvel is playing games with the audience "Find ten differences". Leaving aside the obligatory "bigger, longer, more expensive, more computer effects", it is indistinguishable from the first movie. What you would miss terribly is a charismatic villain (again), it is noticeably lacking the human element (again), what is completely absent is any fear of the characters (again), everyone is just playing with each other in a harmless way (again) and the final hour turns into one big not escalating, confusing and an interchangeable CGI action mess (again), in which just a bunch of bad guys from space replace countless robots. It is almost impossible to tell the first and the second movie apart, because each of them has the same pros and cons, so you know exactly in advance what and in what form you will get. Which, of course, applies to some extent to all (cinema) Marvel movies. The question is whether to take this established "corporate unified approach" as a good thing or bad. (01/05/2015)

The sequel to the first film, stripped of the element of surprise and enriched with a more capable villain. The action is less bloated, fits into the plot better, and expands the universe with new characters. Anyway, the predictability is even more tiring than the rest of the Marvel movies. Unless there's a major shift in Civil War, there's no point in looking at it any other way than in standby mode. (21/08/2015)

The same thing over and over again. Unfortunately, there is a lack of coherence and it lacks the dynamism of the first film. Among all the comic-book clichés, the only things that remain are the well-developed characters and the sharp emphasis on the supporting, not so powerful, yet very interesting figures (Hawkeye, Black Widow). The could have spared the nonsense with the Hulk, as well as the cheap action just for the sake of it, but those smooth digital sequences are cool, right? (even though they look lilke Zack Snyder’s stuff.) Joss Whedon doesn’t deliver anything revolutionary, he just pockets a lot of money because he does what works the most: a little bit of everything, so no one gets offended and everyone gets their fill. I wonder how many dozens of comics with the same plot narrative and framework Hollywood will have to make before audiences realise that it's all the same? Then a creator like Nolan will have to come in and rewrite history again. (01/05/2015)

Grandiose, with clear resonance, characters filled to the brim – and yet I want more. Especially since this director's oversight was likely the last. Those who followed Joss Whedon's most complex work, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, under circumstances other than coming home from school at the age of thirteen, know that some of the narrative archetypes were already being tossed out by the king of geeks almost two decades ago. And even though this time the story about how Beauty had to save the Beast (Black Widow and Hulk) and the one about the man who has no supernatural or technologically driven abilities and yet must be enough for the local gods (Hawkeye) is limited in this way, it does not yield any worse storytelling. Just tell it faster. That's also the only downside to the peak of the entire Phase Two. It has to hint at events from all the solo films and lay the groundwork for Avengers: Infinity War, so it's no wonder that there's not enough time for everyone involved. It doesn't matter for Iron Man, Thor, or Cap, because even though we adore them, we'll soon see them in separate adventures and their roles, cut down to a flawed genius, a courageous warrior, and an honorable leader, which will be more than enough. The bigger problem is with the twins, who have a lot of potential, which Ultron – functioning as their origin – has no chance of fulfilling. So there's no point in kidding ourselves, those two and a half hours are desperately short for a bunch of plotlines and two bunches of characters. If it's true that the original Whedon's cut was over three hours, I'm not surprised at all, and secondly, I request a private screening because the world would not have seen a better comic book shop. (04/05/2015)