The Avengers Critics Reviews Thread - Part 3

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This is a continuation thread, the old thread is Here

[Thread Manager]

This is a continuation thread, the old thread is Here

[xeno000]

The vile creature is upon us. Thread closing in 5...4...3...2...1...

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Yep there it is, right on schedule. Thread Manager!

[xeno000]

Now back to our regularly scheduled movie reviews.


Boston Herald: ‘Avengers’ full of Hulk-ing fun (B)


I totally missed Tony calling Loki "Reindeer Games."

[thalidomide]

Thread MANAGAH!

[xeno000]

I don't know if this was posted before --

Detroit News: Review: 'Avengers' is quite simply fun (B)

[Chewy]

Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun

[Pond]

In the sun,sun,sun...

[thalidomide]

[xeno000]

Originally Posted by Chewy

Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun

Everybody keeps using that damned word! Don't they know that heroing is dark, serious business? There's just too much humor and action in this flick. Whedon needed to make his jokes unfunny, dress all of the characters in black leather, cut back the effects shots and limit the action to a couple of low-budget looking sequences where no one used their powers in order to save money.

Thor: "Dost thou know what happens to a Chitauri that gets struck by lightning?"

Chitauri soldier: "Skraaa?"

Thor: "Nothing. That **** costs money."

[xeno000]

Originally Posted by Pond

In the sun,sun,sun...

It's cold outside
There's no kind of atmosphere
I'm all alone,
More or less
Let me fly
Far away from here
Fun, fun, fun
In the sun, sun, sun
I want to lie shipwrecked and comatose
Drinking fresh mango juice
Goldfish shoals
Nibbling at my toes
Fun, fun, fun
In the sun, sun, sun...

--Theme song from Red Dwarf


It's rather sad that I can still sing that from memory.

[Whiskey Tango]

Originally Posted by thalidomide

[thalidomide]

Originally Posted by Whiskey Tango

lmao Whiskey, you're one funny dude

[Suzanne78]

Claudia Puig (Top Critic) of USAToday's positive 3 star review:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/.../1?sf4110837=1

Marvel's The Avengers (*** out of four, PG-13, opens at select theaters at midnight, nationwide Friday) offers maximum bang for moviegoing buck. Audiences are treated to the snarky wit of Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), the unmanaged anger of the Incredible Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), the patriotic derring-do of Captain America (Chris Evans), the hammer-wielding Norse justice of Thor (Chris Hemsworth), the sly fearlessness of Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and the fiendishness of arrow-wielding Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner).

It's essentially six movies in one, which might account for the nearly 2½ hour length. While it's slow getting started, The Avengers is a splashy superhero mash-up that should please breathless fanboys. It also has a broader appeal for mass audiences with its fast-paced comic banter and exhilarating action sequences under the capable helm of director/co-writer/unabashed fan Joss Whedon.

[Suzanne78]

And AO Scott's review, which seems... mixed I think?

So “The Avengers,” which has been foreshadowed by post-credits teasers in (deep breath), “Captain America,” “Thor,” “The Incredible Hulk” (the one with Edward Norton) and both “Iron Man” pictures, is not without its pleasures. Written and directed by Joss Whedon, this movie revels in the individuality of its mighty, mythical characters, pinpointing insecurities that are amplified by superhuman power and catching sparks that fly when big, rough-edged egos (and alter egos) collide. The best scenes are not the overblown, skull-assaulting action sequences — which add remarkably little that will be fresh or surprising to devotees of the “Transformers” franchise — but the moments in between, when the assembled heroes have the opportunity to brag, banter, flirt and bicker.

The secret of “The Avengers” is that it is a snappy little dialogue comedy dressed up as something else, that something else being a giant A.T.M. for Marvel and its new studio overlords, the Walt Disney Company. At times — when various members of a game and nimble cast amble in and out of the glassy, metallic chambers of a massive flying aircraft carrier, cracking wise, rolling eyes and occasionally throwing a punch — the movie has some of the easygoing charm of “Rio Bravo,” Howard Hawks’s great, late western in which John Wayne, Angie Dickinson, Dean Martin and Ricky Nelson did a lot of talking on their way to a big and not-all-that-interesting shootout.

while “The Avengers” is hardly worth raging about, its failures are significant and dispiriting. The light, amusing bits cannot overcome the grinding, hectic emptiness, the bloated cynicism that is less a shortcoming of this particular film than a feature of the genre. Mr. Whedon’s playful, democratic pop sensibility is no match for the glowering authoritarianism that now defines Hollywood’s comic-book universe. Some of the rebel spirit of Mr. Whedon’s early projects “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “Firefly” and “Serenity” creeps in around the edges but as detail and decoration rather than as the animating ethos.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/04/mo...vies&seid=auto

I expect this to be a rotten. Ah well, can't win them all.

[MessiahDecoy123]

Roeper >>>> AO Scott

[Suzanne78]

I guess he didn't like that last act then? Based on his review of CA:TFA, I underestimated his dislike of Marvel's shared universe concept.

[mace1]

Movie Review: 'The Avengers'
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
5 stars
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertain...sEnabled=false

[xeno000]

Originally Posted by Suzanne78

And AO Scott's review, which seems... mixed I think?






http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/04/mo...vies&seid=auto

I expect this to be a rotten. Ah well, can't win them all.

I don't quite know what to make of that. While I'm sure it will be tallied as a bad review, Scott certainly doesn't make it easy for the reader to discern his intent. His real beef with the movie seems to be that it's a big budget studio film that will make a lot of money.


Since I never expected a positive review from the New York Times I can't say I am surprised or disappointed. In fact, it isn't nearly as cutting as I expected it to be. Perhaps the critic-proof nature of the film, the fact that it is already a global blockbuster, plus the fact that plenty of his peers loved it, left Scott feeling too dispirited to unleash his rage against the corporate machine.

[PokeJ]

I'm still curious to see if David Denby likes it. AO Scott was long shot.

[xeno000]

Review: 'The Avengers' is a Friday Night SmackDown


A positive review (no letter or numerical grade), but dismissive in tone.

[Suzanne78]

Originally Posted by xeno000

I don't quite know what to make of that. While I'm sure it will be tallied as a bad review, Scott certainly doesn't make it easy for the reader to discern his intent. His real beef with the movie seems to be that it's a big budget studio film that will make a lot of money.


Since I never expected a positive review from the New York Times I can't say I am surprised or disappointed. In fact, it isn't nearly as cutting as I expected it to be. Perhaps the critic-proof nature of the film, the fact that it is already a global blockbuster, plus the fact that plenty of his peers loved it, left Scott feeling too dispirited to unleash his rage against the corporate machine.

Yeah, even the chosen blurb establishes the jist of Scott's issue with the movie - it's that it's a comic book movie that, for him, despite a few bright spots, is too much of a corporatized, static machine.

I kind of feel he's in the minority though. But I do get the feeling that if any reader doesn't go see Avengers based on his review, they probably weren't keen on seeing it anyway.

It's amazing that one negative review in a sea of positives can bring down the RT score a lot. Already at 93%.

[MessiahDecoy123]

Regarding AO Scotts review what is "cynical" about the superhero genre?

[xeno000]

Originally Posted by MessiahDecoy123

Regarding AO Scotts review what is "cynical" about the superhero genre?

Apparently, the desire to make money by making films that audiences are eager to see is cynical to Scott. Turning a profit is the goal of most filmmakers, but it seems to be anathema to some of the top critics.