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Marvel’s The Avenger: The Gang’s All Here
by Sandra Olmsted
With so many characters reprising roles, writer/director Joss Whedon’s enjoyable, if lengthy, installment in the Marvel franchise seems familiar.
Robert Downey Jr. is back as Tony Stark/Iron Man; Chris Evans returns as Steve Rogers/Captain America, and Chris Hemsworth is once again Thor. Scarlett Johansson returns as Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow, and Jeremy Renner again plays Clint Barton/Hawkeye while Clark Gregg, Stellan Skarsgård, and Samuel L. Jackson reprise their roles, respectively, as Agent Phil Coulson, Professor Erik Selvig, and Nick Fury. Only Ed Norton is AWOL, but Mark Ruffalo takes over the role of Dr. Bruce Banner/The Hulk. Even a villain, the damaged demigod Loki, is played
Whedon’s film has lots of big battles and small fights and the snappy, and often snappish, exchanges provide comic relief and attempt to create a back story for the characters. When Loki, the bad-seed brother of Thor, returns to earth to reclaim the Tesseract, a blue cube capable of producing enough clean energy to power the world but also creates a portal to the other side of the galaxy, only the Avenger can save the earth from Loki’s plan to enslave the earth by bringing an army of the Chitaurian warriors through the portal.
One of the fun things about this incarnation of Marvel Comic’s Avengers is the oil and water mix of personalities. When asked by Rogers what he is without his suit of armor, Stark quips, “Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist,” but Rogers retorts, “I know guys . . . worth ten of you.” When Banner disparages Loki, “That guy’s brain is a bag full of cats. You can smell crazy on him,” Thor warns Banner not talk about his brother like that; however, when Thor is reminded by Natasha that Loki killed 80 people in two days, Thor quickly states, “He’s adopted.” Because the quips and barbs go by quickly, the audience must listen closely to catch the funny lines.
Once the portal is open, after what is an extremely lengthy and needlessly complicated setup, the big battle rages for quite some time, but much of the fighting doesn’t seem focused on closing the portal, which continues to spew alien warriors. The film spend so much time getting the super heroes into scrapes to make them become a team that the big finale seems anticlimactic, and, in some ways it is, because the franchise needed to create the Avengers as a team in order for the next installment to work. The future adventure is hinted at in a snippet in the midst of the end credits, so viewers should stay in their seats a few extra minutes.
Working from Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s comic book and a story co-authored by Zak Penn, Whedon plays with a number of interesting representations, such as those invested in the characters of Steve Rogers/Captain America and Tony Stark/Iron Man. Rogers and his Captain America function as touchstone of old fashion values and, because of his WWII origins, are a reference to an American touchstone — the great victory of WWII. Another moment is also a touchstone of human will: One old German stands up to Loki and tells him “There are always men like you.” On the surface, Tony Stark represents the modern and the financial with his savvy, self-centered industrialist while his Iron Man alter-ego is much more philanthropic. Most of the film’s representations carry symbolic meanings, which adds another level of interest to the story.
What makes The Avengers worth seeing is the great special effects, imaginative contraptions such as alien ships which look like dragons and S.H.I.E.L.D.’s the Helicarrier, characters who interactions create sparks, literally and figuratively, and a powerful, if somewhat under used, cast. The film is not as likable as Captain America: The First Avenger or as fun as the two Iron Man films, but it is certainly better than Thor. The Avengers is a Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures release of a Marvel Studios and Paramount Pictures production. In theaters now, The Avengers runs 142 minutes and is rated PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action throughout, and a mild drug reference.
