The Avengers

The Avengers, by Joss Whedon, is the culmination of a multi-year, multi-film effort by Marvel Studios to present "Earth's mightiest heroes" in one movie.  Many individual superhero movies built up to this one-  Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Iron Man 2, and the Incredible Hulk films set up the story, and will increase your enjoyment of The Avengers, though if you haven't seen any of them, you'll still enjoy this flick.

The highest-grossing superhero movie of all time, The Avengers gets a lot of things right, but I'll start with where it falls down: the overall story.  The plot has some holes, and isn't overly original: an alien army is unleashed on Earth, and the Avengers have to overcome their initial distrust of each other to team together and counter the threat.  What makes this movie successful isn't the story- it's the execution.  The dialogue is often quite good, with humor well-dispersed throughout (ironically, that's what appeals to me most about this film).  Every character has his/her moments, but Iron Man steals the show as the wise-cracking superhero from the first two Iron Man films.  The action is also good.  I'm not into action movies for the sake of the action itself- there has to be a point to it- but I did enjoy the battle scenes in this one- especially the creativity with which the characters teamed to take out bad guys in some scenes.

After my initial viewing, I rated this an A-.  After further viewings, though, I find myself enjoying it more and more, despite the unoriginal plot.  Marvel (and Joss Whedon) scored a hit with this one, and many more such movies are in the works.  In 2013 alone, we're scheduled to see Captain America 2, Thor 2, Iron Man 3, and the next Avengers installment is due in a year or two.

Rating: A