Avengers 2: The Age of Ultron (April 2015)

Disney will be perfectly happy to sell Germans The Avengers by streaming or Blu-ray sales. Like the rest of us, there is little that a theater owner can do anymore other than to accept the terms offered.

 

I suppose I'm asking for a spoiler, but I see Hayley Atwell (Agent Carter) is in this.
So, is it in a flashback, or is she elderly again like in the second Captain America film?
Just curious.......

 

Spoiler

It's kind of a flashback. Kind of.

--Geoff

 

Oh man, the myth that just refuses to die.

 

Be thankful that those living in inferior countries haven't posted a full review with spoilers yet. I saw it some days ago but will keep my mouth shut until it gets a US release.

For now, I'll just say that at the beginning of "Avengers 2" we get a nice "homage" to the several "look at Scarlett's bottom" scenes of the previous film and that, some minutes into the movie, just when I was thinking "why oh why Paltrow and Portman aren't in this?", the filmakers came out with a laughable (not in a good sense) Downey Jr.-Evans dialogue to justify the absence of Pepper Potts and Jane Foster from the plot.

Btw, really strange that Disney/Marvel are releasing a massive blockbuster such as "Ultron" in some euro countries before the USA.

 

Doh, they're predicting the opening weekend could make as much as $210M-$230 million, which means The Avengers could have the biggest movie opening in history:

http://deadline.com/2015/04/avengers-age-of-ultron-u-s-weekend-box-office-opening-record-1201417420/

 

You say that like it's a bad thing.

 

Watched it earlier this week and liked it a lot. Good chemistry between the actors, like old friends who are totally comfortable in each other's company.

 

Hmm, I am torn on this one. So much of it is just loud and fast and cartoony - but not in a good way. We've reached a point where we have too many characters, and I find myself aching for more attention for Cap and Thor, at the expense of Iron Man and Hulk. (And no, I don't like the romance between Nat and Banner - both actors try to make it good, but it feels shoehorned into the plot.) And don't get me started on that frakking deus ex ending. (Yes, I know we were supposedly set up by the "something spectacular" joke, or whatever he said earlier. I don't care. It sucked.)
Things I liked:

• The cocktail party. Some character moments with genuine humor, unlike so many of the other "jokes".
• Lizzie Olsen. Because yes.
• Vision turned out pretty cool.
• Linda Cardellini. Oh, hell yeah. She has the wrong name, job, and hair color, though. ;-P
• Widow's using Cap's shield in battle. In fact, Cap's shield gets all kinds of awesome uses. I like the way he and Thor have worked out some team moves with it.
• Widow's backstory, kind of. More that and less jokes about showering with Banner, please.

Incidentally, speaking of Widow, is it possible ScarJo was in the early stages of pregnancy when filming? Those things were HUGE, even for her. Not that I am complaining.
I guess I will give this picture a "Like".

 

Her daughter is 8 months old so, yeah she was very pregnant during the filming of the movie.

 

No Spoilers! My family just got back from seeing it. Wonderful film. We all enjoyed it (ages Dad 50, Mom 49, Daughter 16, and Son 15). We also all agree that our favorite Marvel film has been Avengers, then Avengers 2, followed by Captain America: Winter Soldier, so it's in good company. Lots of nice intimate moments as well as epic battles! Well done, Joss and all! Can't wait for Captain America: Civil War!

P.S. Wanted to see it in 2D, but couldn't. We are not 3D lovers, but it was one of the most immersive uses for 3D we have seen, very effective. Probably 3D is the definitive way to see it. Not too dark either!

 

Is this one going to beat "Avatar"?

 

Doubtful. Avatar is still the king at $2.787 billion, and Cameron also holds the #2 position with Titanic at $2.187 billion. Avengers is a distant #3 at $1.518 billion.

However... the trades are saying that Avengers 2 is 40% ahead of where the first one was in the first year of release. I believe the movie has already made $300M worldwide in the last few days and it hasn't quite opened in America. It'll go north of a billion, but the question now is how high.

I would much, much rather a fun, interesting movie with real characters and decent dialogue makes this kind of money than some goat turd like Furious 7. I'm the guy who's always saying that you can have filet mignon and also enjoy cheeseburgers, but I think Avengers is a really great gourmet cheeseburger, while Furious 7 is a day-old cheeseburger that's been lying under the heat lamp for the last 24 hours and tastes like shoe leather. It resembles a cheeseburger, but no way is it a good one.

 

I don't think a Marvel movie has the reach and scope to pull that off, not yet anyways. If there's one movie this year that has a chance it would be Star Wars, the 1977 movie adjusted for inflation (worldwide box office), is right up there with the two Cameron behemoths and Gone with The Wind. In my opinion you need broad relatable themes that people across different cultures and sensibilities can can connect with (universal truths that apply to most everyone) in order to be a worldwide phenomena and you have to do it in a fresh and entertaining way. Sounds simple on the surface, obviously it's not. Marvel is kind of tied down by it's comic book history, stray too far and you risk alienating the fans to got you there, I think they should take a risk with some of their characters and really branch away from their stock stories or they might be quite satisfied to simply rake in the cash levels they're currently making and not mess with the formulas until they have to.

 

I was able to see it for free last night and enjoyed it very much. I think it's about as good as the first one. B+

 

$27 million in late-night Thursday showings.

 

I wonder if that includes the $65 tickets for the 11-movie marathon? I considered attending. But I know I would never get through all 11 films in a row. I calculated that I would have to watch at least 4 films besides ULTRON to more or less break even. But I am glad I didn't do it because 1) I would have had to watch the 3D ULTRON and 2)My serpentine belt broke two days ago. LOL Glad I didn't spend the money on marathon movie tickets.

 

Saw it this evening. Not bad, not brilliant either. I don't think the general story idea was all that inspired (like "Days Of Future Past" was). All that crash, bang, whallop and destruction got rather tiring after a while and I don't feel like seeing another film like this. It even put me off seeing the new Mad Max for that reason. The best parts are the gags.

 

Saw it this morning ,not bad at all but can't see me rewatching it for the next 20 years like other movies.The set up for Thanos in the next few movies looks cool,gotta wonder if there will be a GOTG crossover in the last one.

 

Going tomorrow.

 

Saw it and liked it, though not as much as the first Avengers, first Iron Man, and second Captain America.

My only complaint is that too many characters are introduced without really explaining them with much of a backstory.

Those not familiar with Quicksilver, The Scarlet Witch and The Vision might be confused. (Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch were actually X-Men in the comic books before they were in the Avengers comic books.) The actor who portrays Quicksilver is a different actor who portrayed him in the last X-Men movie. Don't know why that is.

As with ensemble movies like this, it is hard to give enough screen time to enough of the actors. Of course Iron Man is still considered the main draw, so it seems Robert Downey Jr. got most of the screen time. Though, after that, I think the rest of the main ones got equal time amongst themselves.

James Spader (voiceover) portrayed an excellent Ultron (Spader just has that type of voice.)

I do like how some of the Marvel movies (Thor, Captain America, Guardians of The Galaxy, etc.) are being tied together with the Infinity stones/guantlet and with Thanos probably as the puppet master (not Loki.)

 

Different studio (Avengers is Marvel/Disney, X-Men is Fox). The studios share the rights to the character so they can each create their own completely unrelated versions...but they are not in the same "universe".

 

I knew that and just wasn't thinking when I wrote the above statement.

 

Probably still a spoiler, so:

Spoiler

I was thinking, with that big shiny jewel on his forehead, that Jarvis had turned into a cousin of big blue swinging dick dude from Watchmen

--Geoff