When Hulk and Thor were side by side punching aliens whilst riding atop an intergalactic cyborg dragon, I realized I had the goofiest look of 6-year-old wonderment on my face.
Scenes like that are why comic book movies exist. More please.
Me too–I had a big gape-mouthed smile on my face during the whole final battle. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt like that at the movies.
This pretty much describes me as well. I only went to see this movie because I had free tickets to it. I did enjoy it, though. It’s more of a summer blockbuster movie than it is a Joss Whedon movie, but if you are a fan you can definitely see his hand at work.
It’s not a character movie, or anything, but the characters are there, and are interesting and likeable. There were enough of the trademark Joss dialogue and one-liners to make me happy. I appreciated the fact that while there was an awful lot of property damage, civilians tended not to die, just run around screaming until a superhero swooped in to save them. The violence is fairly non-threatening.
I’m glad I saw it, and if I’d paid for it, I would have felt I got my money’s worth, even if it is not my favourite movie ever. If you really hate superhero movies and CGI, you probably won’t like it, but if you are just meh about them, then the movie probably has enough other bits to make it watchable.
I have a question for those who have seen it, about the Hulk:
When David Banner first changes into the Hulk on the flying ship, he seems completely out of control, trying to kill Scarlett Johansen, and happily tearing the ship apart. But at the end of the movie, he leaps up to catch the falling Iron Man, and puts him safely on the ground. How did he have so much control and intelligence there when earlier he was mindlessly destructive?
BRUCE Banner, if you please. They changed that back for the old TV show either because they didn’t care for the alliteration, or they thought Bruce sounded too gay. No one knows for sure. But it’s always been Bruce in the comics. /nerdrage
Now,
[spoiler]Bruce’s Hulk-out on the Helicarrier was a classic couldn’t-help-it Hulk out. Either the fall, or the stress from Loki’s staff poisoning the team and making them argumentative triggered it. This is why he’s kind of the mindless rage monster here. And he simply attacks whatever angers him at the moment.
In the big battle, he Hulks-out by choice, and the movie implies that he then has more control over the Hulk’s actions. Both types of transformations are straight from the comics. There’s at least a dozen more variations on Hulk’s mindset in the comics as well – ranging from a 100% rational and cognizant Banner’s mind in Hulk’s body to a mindless engine of destruction.[/spoiler]
Here’s my post about it: I was an Avengers extra - Cafe Society - Straight Dope Message Board
Just wanted to pile on and say I saw it this weekend with two of my kids, and I freaking loved it so much. I saw it in 3D, and even though it was converted rather than filmed natively in 3D, I came away very impressed, and glad I’d spent the extra $$$, which is more than I can say for a lot of 3D movies lately.
I can’t believe I was nervous that Joss might not be able to pull this off - he did a masterful job. Here’s hoping he has a cut of the profits in his contract.
My take…
The first time that Banner hulks out and is an out of control rage monster, he seemed to be actively trying to fight becoming the beast…and that just gives the hulk more power in his rage. The second time, he doesn’t fight the beast…he embraces him, and in doing so, has a lot more control over the Hulk’s actions. This is all helped by Stark encouraging him to embrace his hulk side, telling him that he’s a “man walking on tip-toes, when he should be strutting” and encouraging him to embrace his “terrible privilege”.
Something that occurred to me: Thor mentions that Loki’s plan. How did he find out what it was? Did Loki say something to him? (I tried to make it vague to avoid spoiler tags.) And yes, I probably could have watched another hour of those characters all argue and fight.
Though I’m STILL unsure of Hawkeye’s usefullness on the team.
Two-and-a-half hours of pure eyegasm. The only thing I could pick on (and this is really reaching) is that Captain America’s moves were very… un-superhero-like. Him jumping down from obstacles looked akin to the 50’s superhero movies before they hired choreographers.
What got me the most about his movie was the humor. You had your pure slapstick moments like:Hulk punching Thor offscreen for no reason whatsoever.But then other comedic touches were much more subtle: The Avengers assemble on the street in New York, all arriving in their super-cool ways. Finally, here comes Bruce Banner putting in on a piece of crap motorcycle. Brilliantly funny.Really, the movie was pretty much flawless.
“How does he see the monitors on the left?”
“He turns his head.”
$200,000,000 opening weekend, breaking the record by $31 million (HP-DH2). More interestingly, the grosses were 2,500% more than the #2 movie, Think Like a Man.
Is there an unofficial in-universe explanation for why none of the other superheroes living in the New York area (Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, X-Men, etc.) showed up to help fight the aliens? I understand that the real reason is these characters belonging to different movie studios.
It seems that Hulk does remember (for a moment) the hits that Thor gave him with his hammer during the fight in flying carrier.
One of my favorite bits of Whedon-esque dialogue that no one has mentioned:
Thor: Watch your tongue! He is my brother.
Black Widow: He killed 80 people in two days.
Thor: [beat] He’s adopted.
My only bit of confusion:
At the end Why do the aliens all stop fighting and shut down after Iron Man nukes the mothership?
Favorite bit:
“And Hulk? Smash.”
“Grr”
Apparently the mothership was remotely controlling the entire alien force. It’s a familiar sci-fi trope, The Phantom Menace ends in the same way.
Ah-hah! I was trying to remember the one plothole I saw, and that was it.When redirecting the nuke, how did Tony Stark know that there would be a mothership on the other side of the portal, that a nuke would be able to destroy it, and that destroying it would shut down all of the soldiers? Did he find that out from Hawkeye, or is this one of those “Just go with it, okay?” moments?
He had to direct the nuke somewhere, and through the Portal was the best place for it. He didn’t need to know that there was a ship there, just that it would kill a bunch of aliens and not explode in Manhattan. It was just luck it worked as well as it did. Also, it stands to reason the aliens had a base somewhere. He didn’t know they did, but it was highly probable.
He’s not necessarily going hand to hand with the most powerful baddies, but It doesn’t hurt to be backed up by the best archer in the world. He can pick guys off from great distance, strategically place explosives and such, etc.
I’m not sure he did. The nuclear missle had to go somewhere other than Manhattan before it blew up, and the other end of the portal was a good a spot as any. Actually, better than most because it was (1) much farther away than diverting the missile space-ward and (2) the enemy was coming from there. The cutting-the-puppet-strings effect was serendipity. 
Damn, ninja-ed by Larry Borgia. :smack: 
I’m certainly no comic-book fangirl but I really enjoyed this movie. Especially RDJ’s Ironman, but that goes without saying.
My husband and I busted out laughing at:
“That man is playing Galaga!”…and then it shows the guy going back to playing it.