The Avengers / Tropes E to L

Tropes A to D | Tropes E to L | Tropes M to P | Tropes Q to Z | Tie Ins | YMMV | Trivia

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The Avengers provides examples of the following tropes:

WARNING: Spoilers from the earlier films are unmarked.

E

• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • Thanos' appearance here isn't really easy to reconcile with the motivations we're given in Avengers: Infinity War. Even if we accept that he was speaking metaphorically about "courting Death" it still implies that he's motivated by a chance for thrills, far removed from the purpose-driven character we see later.
  • Lou Ferrigno helps provide some of The Hulk's roars alongside Mark Ruffalo to make him sound more monstrous in this film, something he doesn't do in future Marvel movies. Furthermore, Hulk's singular line in this film has him speaking with Bruce's normal voice, whereas later films has his voice pitched down whenever he talks.
• Easily Forgiven: When Thor realizes Loki's still alive, he shows up to bring him home, despite his crimes in Thor. He begs Loki to give up his madness and come home.
• Easily Thwarted Alien Invasion: The Chitauri turn out to be a Keystone Army, and other than their Leviathan transports are inferior to Loki's generic human soldiers. Lampshaded in The Stinger: They were expecting negligible resistance from a race of pushovers going by what Loki told them.
• Eat Me: Tony's approach to a giant alien Leviathan with impenetrable armor. It's even lampshaded by Tony, who asks Jarvis immediately beforehand if he's ever heard of the story of Jonah from The Bible.
• Eat the Bomb: Bruce Banner sarcastically asks if Fury wants him to do this with the Tesseract.
• 11th-Hour Ranger: Hawkeye spends most of the film Brainwashed and Crazy and isn't freed until before the end battle with Loki and the Chitauri.
• End-of-Episode Silliness: In the famous post-credits scene, the titular characters are eating in silence in a shawarma restaurant.
• Energy Absorption: Iron Man's suit absorbs Thor's lightning bolt.
  Jarvis: Power to four-hundred percent capacity.
  Tony Stark: How about that? [fires a supercharged repulsion blast back at Thor]
• Epic Fail: Loki attempts to subdue Hulk in Stark Tower by yelling at him. It gets him slammed into the ground repeatedly mid-speech. Granted, Loki is having a Villainous Breakdown, but it still isn't one of his better ideas.
• Epic Movie: It has a huge, climactic battle and has so many characters larger than life that the movie effectively had five preceding movies!
• Epic Tracking Shot: During the final battle in New York. The single shot pans between Black Widow, Iron Man, Captain America, Hawkeye, Hulk and Thor all fighting through the Chitauri hordes across the city, both on their own and in pairs.
• Equal-Opportunity Evil:
  • Loki's henchmen seem fairly diverse, at least racially. Where they're from is never specified though; Hawkeye just refers to them as enemies of S.H.I.E.L.D.
  • Given events in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, some of them may have been HYDRA agents who later claimed Loki's brainwashing as an excuse. (It's also possible not, because HYDRA probably doesn't want anyone but themselves taking over the world.)
• Establishing Character Moment:
  • Maria Hill shows up in the beginning of the movie, butts heads with Nick Fury over the evacuation of a S.H.I.E.L.D. facility, and gets into a car chase with an escaping Loki that ends up with her driving backwards at full speed trading gunfire with another vehicle, all before the title credits.
  • In his first five minutes, Loki slaughters half-a-dozen S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel, puts the mind control whammy on some main characters, and steals the MacGuffin.
  • Black Widow's first appearance in the film has her utilizing the rather unique interrogation techniques on some rogue Russians, and then kicking ass and taking names when Coulson contacts her about Hawkeye being compromised by Loki.
  • It's subtle, but Bruce Banner's humanity is the first thing established about him. When a little girl comes begging for his help healing her sick father, Banner's compassion overrides his better judgment; in fact, this is the bait Black Widow uses to draw him into their initial meeting. This moment is an extremely effective contrast with the jibes later in the movie about Banner being a "beast" or "monster".
• Establishing Team Shot:
  • The rotating team shot of Hawkeye, Thor, the Black Widow, Captain America, Iron Man and Hulk.
  • Another one after the climatic battle, when Loki turns around and sees the entire team glaring at him.
• "Eureka!" Moment: When Stark is discussing Loki's actions, he mentions that Loki wants his name on his own personal monument, then realizes he built such a place, with its own unlimited power source.
• Everybody's Dead, Dave: A deleted scene shows Steve Rogers looking at folders about his former allies Howard Stark, Jim Morita, and James Montgomery Falsworth are listed as dead. Peggy Carter is listed as retired, and Bucky is declared M.I.A.
• Everybody Owns a Ford: The movie features numerous Acuras.
• Everything Is Online: S.H.I.E.L.D. searches for Loki by accessing every security camera on the planet... if it's wireless-connected.
• Evil Brit: Played straight with Tom Hiddleston's Loki, subverted with the British member of the World Security Council, and averted with Jarvis. Also averted with Thor. Although Chris Hemsworth is Australian, Thor speaks with an RP accent (of varying quality).
• Evil Gloating: Loki loves to gloat, though he has a tendency to underestimate his audience.
• Evil Is Hammy: While Loki is still subdued compared to Thor or Odin, he still gets his moments of this when he wants to make a speech or some grand gesture. Otherwise, his style is to savor the scenery, more than outright chew it.
• Evil Plan: Loki wants to rule the earth. For this reason he works with the Chitauri and steals the Tesseract to create a portal for them. Or so he claims. He didn't tell Thanos how tough humans are, and that portal only let a few hundred aliens through at a time. New York City alone has more police than that army had soldiers. At the end of the movie, Loki is back home with his family, Thanos has lost the Tesseract and the Staff of Control, and Earth has hardened itself against a second invasion.
• Evil Will Fail:
  • "You're going to lose. It's in your nature. You lack conviction."
  • As well as Tony's comment that "There's no throne."
• The Evils of Free Will: Loki twice gives a speech about this, first when he appears at S.H.I.E.L.D headquarters and later in Germany.
  Loki: Is not this simpler? Is this not your natural state? It's the unspoken truth of humanity, that you crave subjugation. The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life's joy in a mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end, you will always kneel.
• Exact Words:
  • In Stuttgart, Loki threatens the old gentleman defying him and says, "Look to your elder, people." Just as he fires an energy bolt, Cap intervenes and reflects it back on him. Cap is probably older than most (or all) of the people there.
  • Captain America tells Thor to "put the hammer down." Thor puts the hammer down... on Captain America.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy Hawkeye's cover story when approaching the Helicarrier.
    Control tower: We have you on record but not on schedule; what is your haul?
    Hawkeye: Arms and ammunition.
  • Tony Stark tells JARVIS to blow off Agent Coulson's call because he's "not in". He is standing on the balcony right outside.
    Stark: I'm not in. I'm actually out!
  • And a few seconds later...
    Stark: I did do the heavy lifting. Literally, I lifted the heavy things.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Tony Stark, upon working out Loki's plan:
  Tony: ...And Loki, he's a full-tilt diva! He wants flowers, he wants parades, he wants a monument built to the skies with his name plastered on—
  [realizes he's describing Stark Tower and in turn, himself]
  Tony: Sonofabitch.
• Expert Consultant: Mentioned in passing to explain why Jane Foster isn't present^note Natalie Portman was pregnant at the time and thus couldn't appear in The Avengers; S.H.I.E.L.D. set her up as a consultant for a distant, remote observatory to keep her out of harm's way.
• Explosions in Space: Done correctly at the end of the film. The nuke Tony steers into the Chitauri mothership detonates as an expanding sphere, with no mushroom cloud or Planar Shockwave.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: Loki starts off with tidy hair that doesn't reach his shoulders during Thor. When he returns as a would-be world conqueror, his hair is quite a bit longer and noticeably un-cared for. This serves as an indicator that he's considerably less stable than before, now more of a straight-up villain rather than a sympathetic Anti-Villain.
• Eye Colour Change: Loki's staff changes people's eyes blue when he mind-controls them. On the DVD commentary, director Joss Whedon explains that this was actually something they added in post-production to make the difference between brainwashed characters and people acting under their own will clear, and so that there was a clear visual sign in Hawkeye when he finally broke out of it, which makes his teammates taking him back more understandable.
• Eye Scream:
  • Hawkeye, while Brainwashed and Crazy, has a decidedly blunt approach to bypassing retinal scanners, and Loki is happy to oblige him. It's presumed that the remote eyeball thing that Loki jams into the German scientist's head is at least painful, if not resulting in the loss of the man's eye.
  • Hawkeye shows a desire to "put an arrow through Loki's eye socket".

F

• Face-Revealing Turn: The post-credits stinger, as the mysterious figure Loki has been working for slowly turns to reveal a grinning Thanos.
• Failed Attempt at Drama:
  • Thor throwing his weight around with Loki, ordering him to "Listen well, brother..." He doesn't get too far in his speech before Iron Man rockets into him and tackles him off the cliff.
  • Loki's dramatic failure to brainwash Tony thanks to the latter's miniature arc reactor.
• Fake Nationality: invoked Black Widow, being a master manipulator and spy, can pass herself off pretty convincingly as an American. Whether this is done deliberately by the film makers or it's a case of Scarlett Johansson Not Even Bothering with the Accent (the character is traditionally portrayed in most iterations with a Russian accent and using Gratuitous Russian) isn't elaborated upon.
  Natasha Romanoff: Regimes fall every day. I tend not to weep over that, I'm Russian — or I was.
• Family-Unfriendly Death:
  • It goes by very quickly, but when the Hulk is fighting several Chitauri on a rooftop before being swarmed by their gliders, he palms one guy's head and crushes his skull like a grape.
  • Also when Cap fights the Chitauri after giving orders to the NYPD he grabs one of their arm cannons, cuts the arm off and then dumps it out of the gun. Later, when he jumps into defent Clint and Nat he slices open another Chitauri's chest with his shield, though that too occurs quickly and is easily missed.
• Fanboy: Agent Coulson is a pretty big fanboy of Captain America. He also watched Rogers while he was sleeping. We... we mean... he was... he was present, while Rogers was unconscious, from the ice.
• Fanservice: Pretty much every character at some point either, if they're a lady, show off their behind in tight spandex, or if they're a dude, their chest in tight muscle shirts, or wears a suit that exposes their bare and toned arms.
• Fantastic Racism: Loki views humans as an inferior race meant for slavery. He sums up this opinion pretty succinctly when he and Thor are talking on the mountain:
  Thor: You think yourself above them?
  Loki: Well, yes.
• Fantasy Kitchen Sink: As one reviewer noted, in theory taking a hero from epic fantasy and putting him together with two heroes with utterly different science-fiction origins, a 1930s/40s style pulp action hero, two escapees from a Jason Bourne film and a Bond-styled superspy organization, all fighting another epic fantasy character leading an alien invasion really shouldn't have worked so gloriously well.
• Fatal Family Photo: Coulson's trading cards. Tony also makes mention of a cellist girlfriend whom Coulson had been seeing in his spare time.
• Fate Worse than Death: Thanos has something special planned for Loki, should he fail to fork over the Tesseract. Since Loki fails to take over Earth, he better hope that his Asgardian brethren protect him indefinitely by locking him up. God only knows what his benefactor will do to him for the rest of eternity if he finds Loki.
  The Other: You think you know pain? He will make you long for something sweet as pain.
• Faux Action Girl: Subverted by Black Widow, who appears to have been beaten and cowed by the Russian mobsters. They even mock her supposed tough reputation. However, this is all a play to get them to reveal information. Once she is tasked with a much more important mission she quickly breaks free and dispatches them.
• Fauxshadow: Come on, you know you thought the Mjölnir/Cap's Shield shockwave trick and Thor's lightning charging up Iron Man's armor was going to come in handy during the climax... but it doesn't.
  • They make good use of it in the Endgame sequel though.
• Fear of Thunder: Justified, when Loki becomes uneasy when a storm starts, prompting this exchange:
  Captain America: What's the matter? Scared of a little lightning?
  Loki: I'm not overly fond of what follows.
• Feet-First Introduction: How we meet the Black Widow, tied to a chair, with her shoes off.
• Female Gaze: The male heroes' chiseled physiques are often on display. Even their civilian clothing often includes tight muscle shirts. However, only a newly de-Hulked Bruce Banner is seen shirtless.
• Fighting from the Inside:
  • Selvig manages to install a fail-safe in Loki's portal that would allow it to be shut down, even while he is deep under Loki's control.
  • Heavily implied with Hawkeye. He shoots Fury in his armored vest, which Fury notes in a deleted scene, and later when Loki asks him what the Tesseract showed him, he responds "My next target," while looking at Loki. And more than that, he misses hitting Maria Hill with a handgun early on, and later when fighting Natasha (his closest friend) on the Helicarrier, he fails to hit her with his arrows (though the first time, she side-stepped it at close-range before he fired). And that's what he's best at.
  • The Hulk helps out his fellow Avengers during the climactic battle, in contrast to attacking them earlier in the film. Either Banner's feelings toward the rest of the Avengers have changed, causing the Hulk to behave differently toward them, or Banner is actively guiding the Hulk's actions from the inside. Banner himself always attempts control over the Hulk, as quite plainly demonstrated by his first involuntary Hulk-out: he gives Natasha an utterly anguished look as the transformation takes hold, and actively hurls himself away from her as the change takes place.
• Fire-Forged Friends: An element of the story is that the members don't get along at first but eventually become friends and learn to work together.
• Fish out of Temporal Water: Captain America, falling exactly in line with his comic counterpart. Played for Drama or Played for Laughs depending on the situation.
• Five-Man Band: For the bulk of the movie there are only five avengers because Hawkeye is brainwashed. They fit the archetype well until the final battle.
  • The Leader — Captain America. Type II in practice and Type IV in theory. It takes him a while, but eventually he realizes his good heart and tactical knowledge are what is needed to bring the team together.
  • The Lancer — Iron Man. The total opposite of Captain America and the most resistant to being a team player. However, his loose cannon recklessness saves the day several times and conversely it is eventually he who benefits the most from having people watching his back.
  • The Big Guy — Thor is a boisterous Proud Warrior Race Guy. Between his Super-Strength, hammer, and Shock and Awe powers he's the strongest of the team. Bruce as the Hulk also qualifies.
  • The Smart Guy — Bruce Banner was reassured he was recruited for his scientific expertise and that his purpose was to track the Tesseract. Aside from the climax this is his purpose. Stark, also being a super-scientist, is a secondary example but fits Lancer better. The two of them bond over Techno Babble.
  • Stealth Expert — Black Widow, by virtue of being the girl of the group, her ability to get to places where people don't want her to be, and her use of emotions to manipulate villains.
  • Sixth Ranger — After being knocked out of his brainwashing, Clint Barton becomes this just in time for the final battle.
• Five Rounds Rapid: The NYPD is seen firing at the Chitauri with just their handguns. Black Widow also uses handguns and is shown to be rather effective with them, although she trades up for a looted Chitauri weapon.
• Flaw Exploitation:
  • Black Widow manipulates Loki's love for "The Reason You Suck" Speech to get important information from him. The Chitauri use his thirst for revenge and "worthiness" to have him fetch the Tesseract.
  • This is Loki's favorite tactic, but it is used against him in the climax. Tony realizes that he and Loki aren't so different, and this helps him figure out that Loki would sacrifice pragmatism for showmanship, which would end up biting Loki hard.
• Flying Firepower: Essential in how the final battle plays out.
  • When Thor arrives on the scene, the first thing he does is rain lightning down on the soldiers threatening the Badass Normals. Cap then charges Thor (one of only two members of the team that could fly high enough) with using his lightning as artillery to bottleneck the Tesseract portal.
  • But even moreso, this is Iron Man's specialty. His armor is extremely fast yet highly maneuverable, which is a huge advantage against the Chitauri. Furthermore, because of his speed and firepower, Cap places him in charge of containing the enemy to a few blocks. To see just how well Tony can pull this off, check out his feats in The Oner. He provides cover for Black Widow, Cap and Hawkeye in the span of a few seconds.
• Foil: The heart of the humor and drama of this movie lies in the similarities and contrasts of the lead characters.
  • It's taken to ridiculous extremes with Tony to the point where it's not just that he stands in stark contrast with every other main character, but even with himself, (Tony at the beginning vs. Tony at the end).
  • Bruce Banner vs. Tony Stark: Both are genius-level scientists, and harbor mutual respect for each other. While both have a dark side, they are completely different personality-wise. Bruce is, by necessity, mild-mannered and cautious to control his id, while Tony's flamboyance and irreverence are the tip of his self-destructive decadence.
  • Tony Stark vs. Steve Rogers: Apart from being tied by family history, both are motivated by a sense of American patriotism and a desire to end wars and bring peace to the world. But Tony and Steve are completely different in terms of temperament and modus operandi, and Steve has uneasy memories of having worked with Tony's father. According to Robert Downey Jr., Tony has heard so much about Steve from his dad that he's like a big brother he can never live up to. Also noted is that Steve and Tony are the two main benefactors of Howard's legacy: Steve couldn't have received the Super Soldier Formula without Howard (he wouldn't have even met Dr. Erskine if he hadn't watched Howard's performance), while Tony inherited everything from his father.
    
    In an odd contrast, going back to their origin movies, how they received their powers and what they had before them are on the opposite ends of the spectrum: Steve had no physical resources, but had the moral and personality traits necessary for super-heroism, and was handed the Super Soldier Formula on a platter. Tony, who was given a lot of outside resources but nothing internally, didn't just have to build his armor, but he also had to create the whole superhero mindset from his previous status as a "genius billionaire playboy philanthropist". On top of that, Steve received his powers because he wanted to go from his life to the front lines, while Tony built his so he could escape for his life from the front lines! Heck, even the scientific workshops where their powers began; Steve's was nicely furnished, clean, run by a government agency, while Tony's was in a cave with a box of scraps. Then there's the chase post-lab shootings, Steve's running to catch an enemy and with Tony, the enemy is chasing him!
    
    It reaches the point where it just somehow suffers from Steve not bringing up a few stories about Howard, or at the very least a photo of the Captain and Howard together (but if Pepper Potts almost didn't appear in the movie, then there's no way that was making it in).
  • Thor vs. Steve Rogers: Both are old-fashioned in ideals and aesthetics, initially felt ill at ease on modern Earth, and are driven by a sense of duty before their homeland. Still, both find it difficult to comprehend each other — they are two very different kinds of old-fashioned, after all. They also share a lack of understanding of modern idioms. Thor and Steve's origins are also from opposite directions. Thor was born into power and privilege, a spoilt, proud, but well-meaning child, abusing his strength as a bully. Steve was a sickly, skinny little orphan from Brooklyn, weak and poor, but possessing an unshakable sense of justice, standing up against those he felt needed standing up to despite his weakness. Thor was stripped of his gifts and learned humility. Steve gained strength as a reward for his virtuous nature.
  • Steve Rogers vs. Bruce Banner: It's only touched on briefly, but Steve Rogers is the Super Soldier experiment gone right, while Bruce Banner is the experiment gone wrong (or "wrong").
  • Natasha Romanoff vs. Clint Barton: Secret agents with Dark and Troubled Pasts, a sense of chilly professionalism, and a deep, long-standing friendship originating when Clint made a choice that perhaps Natasha wouldn't have.
  • In addition, Loki has traits that resonate or clash with the leads: Asgardian origins (Thor), intelligence, mercurial temperament, and love for theatrics (Iron Man), manipulation of emotions (Bruce Banner), disregard for freedom and human life (Captain America), a lack of empathy (Black Widow), and a disregard for free will (Hawkeye).
  • All four of the main powered heroes have different ways by which they acquired and use their powers. Iron Man had no power, but built them on his own in a time of crisis. Thor was born with power, then stripped of them and learned humility to use them responsibly. Bruce Banner was given power he never wanted, and it is a struggle for him to control it. And Captain America was born with weakness, but granted power by a benefactor. Iron Man has some resentment towards this in particular because he's the only one whose abilities, aside from his intellect and charm, could be realistically negated. (You can't untrain Widow or Hawkeye, nor is there anyone to strip Thor of his powers, cure Banner of the Hulk, or negate the Super Soldier Serum in Rogers.)
    Tony: You're a lab experiment, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle.
• Food End: At least in the U.S. release. There's Shawarma!
• Forbidden Chekhov's Gun: The whole team (minus Tony) spends a lot of time trying to keep Bruce Banner calm. Then the alien invasion arrives.
  [alien leviathan starts heading towards the group]
  Captain America: Dr. Banner! Now might be a good time to get angry.
  Banner: That's my secret Captain. I'm always angry.
  [Banner Hulks Out and punches the leviathan]
• Foreshadowing:
  • Not long before The Reveal, Coulson makes an offhand comment to Thor that he "changed everything".
  • Very subtly done in the scene where Natasha and Banner meet for the first time, when she has a child lure Banner to a isolated house in order to ask him to return to S.H.I.E.L.D. Pay close attention to the background when Banner is speaking. There are many green objects and green streaks of paint, all in sharp focus. When Natasha is shown, there are also green objects and green paint, but further in the background and out-of-focus. As the scene progresses, the green objects behind Banner get more obvious. This progression coincides with Natasha slowly realizing that the Hulk is very close and she starts treading very lightly.
  • Cap telling Tony that he's not the kind to sacrifice himself for a greater cause.
  • A very subtle one in the beginning: Barton shoots Fury on the chest, even though he would have normally been able to hit him on the head. It shows that Loki's Mind Control is not 100% perfect. Later it turns out that the brainwashed Selvig was able to install a backdoor to turn off the Tesseract and the portal.
  • Loki's new staff that was given to him by the Chitauri's leader. It's mind control powers hints that it is the Mind Gem from the Infinity Gauntlet and that the leader is Thanos.
  • Very early in the battle with the Chitauri, one of the air speeders chasing Iron Man smashes into a building because it couldn't turn fast enough. Barton later points out their poor maneuverability to Tony, who immediately puts the knowledge to deliberate use.
  • One for Iron Man 3 with Tony testing out a new device that'll allow him to call his suit to him in case of long distance emergency. He expands upon it in the third film.
  • Watch carefully when Nick Fury brings out Coulson's blood-stained trading cards and says he got them from Coulson's jacket. Agent Hill gives Fury a "What the hell?" expression. Later she calls Fury out on this saying that the trading cards were actually in his locker.
  • Another subtle one for Captain America: The Winter Soldier: Before Banner suggests other methods, S.H.I.E.L.D. attempts to find Loki by tapping into pretty much every camera or digital device on the planet. This is also how HYDRA will pinpoint targets for its scheme to eliminate any and all potential challengers before they even suspect danger.
  • When Selvig asks Barton "where did you find all these people?" Barton's response is simply, "S.H.I.E.L.D. has many enemies." As Captain America: The Winter Soldier will reveal, it's likely these are just S.H.I.E.L.D. staffers who know how to subvert and destroy their own organization.
  • Also, the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier has a cargo hold full of HYDRA weapons and crates stamped with the HYDRA logo. One can wonder how many HYDRA items were present on board during the operation.
  • When Tony arrives on the bridge and starts dumping exposition, he pauses to shout "That man is playing Galaga!" The primary objective of Galaga is to shoot aliens descending from the top of the screen, which is exactly how the final battle plays out.
  • A very subtle one. In Natasha's Establishing Character Moment, she's apparently at someone's mercy, feeling threatened and vulnerable, only for her to reveal that this was exactly the position she wanted to be in to con information from the one who thinks he's in control. This is exactly the method she uses on Loki to find out what he wanted on the Helicarrier.
  • In her first meeting with Bruce, Natasha is established to be rather afraid of the Hulk, shown when Bruce faking an angry outburst badly rattles her into immediately drawing her gun and needing him to speak calmly and non-threateningly to her to get her to regain her composure. Later in the film, she's quick to assume that Loki's plan is centered around unleashing the Hulk and leaves the interrogation with no inkling of his true plan, having Barton and a squad of mercenaries track his scepter to find and attack the helicarrier.
  • Among the list of past atrocities that Loki throws in Natasha's face is "Dreykov's daughter". This becomes significant in Black Widow (2021).
  • During various interviews from people after the Battle of New York, one person, Senator Boynton of the United States Government argues that there should be an Super Registration Act for any damages the Avengers and the Chitauri caused during their fight. Captain America: Civil War would grant his wish with the Sokovia Accords after the team's battle with Ultron.
• For the Evulz: Loki probably didn't need to shove the eye scanner into that guy's eye quite so hard... or gleefully.
• Freedom from Choice: Loki claims that this is what humans need.
  Loki: I come with glad tidings, of a world made free.
  Fury: Free from what?
  Loki: Freedom.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus:
  • When Iron Man crash lands after pulling his "Jonah" stunt, the building behind him is actually the shawarma joint he later mentions wanting to try out.
  • The blueprints Tony's studying in the very last scene are of Stark Tower, with floors labeled for each Avenger to live in.
  • After Bruce blurts out that he once tried to kill himself, the expression that flits across Tony's face is utterly terrified and heartbroken.
  • If you look closely, Stark tower is not only where the current Metlife Building stands, the tower itself appears to be growing out of the Metlife building's lower half.
  • When the S.H.I.E.L.D. sensors interrupt Banner's speech ("Sorry kids, you don't get to see my party trick") it shows that the energy source is in NYC. (Banner gets a quick Oh, Crap! moment.)
  • When Thor gets up after getting locked inside the glass cage with Loki outside sneering at him, if you look sharp you can see the real Loki sneaking out of frame on the right while the image of Loki talks to Thor.
  • As soon as Hawkeye tells Stark that the Chitauri "can't bank worth a damn" and to "find a tight corner," JARVIS is already plotting his course to slalom through the buildings.
  • As Agent Hill is trying to shut down the rogue bird using her console, one can see that the WSC override code has locked her out of the system. Fury takes matters into his own hands.
  • The equipment monitoring Loki includes a heat signature detector, which shows Loki having a very low body temperature due to his being a Frost Giant.
• Friendship Moment: Tony tells Phil to pick a weekend, he'll fly him to Portland to see his girlfriend. "Keep love alive."
• Funny Background Event:
  • As the team is busy striking a badass pose, watch Tony crack a trademark smirk when Loki finally accepts his offer for a drink.
  • The Shawarma Palace, in the second stinger, was given an "A" rating by the NY restaurant board, the certificate on the back wall when the Avengers are eating there.
  • During Bruce Banner's transformation into the Hulk aboard the Helicarrier, a floor panel says "WARNING CONTENTS UNDER PRESSURE" with arrows pointing to Banner.
• Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: When Loki is talking about living in his brother's shadow, Thor points out that sorting out family issues and seeking recompense for imagined slights is a slim excuse for conquering a planet.
• Fun with Acronyms: S.H.I.E.L.D. really loves 'em:
  Joint Projects with NASA:
  Advanced Dark Energy Physics Telescope (ADEPT)
  Dark Energy Space Telescope (DESTINY) (OK, that one is stretching it)
  Supernova Acceleration Probe Lensing (SNAP-L)
  Potential Energy Group/Alternate Sources/United States (Project PEGASUS) (The research facility where the movie begins.)
• Fun with Alphabet Soup: The Gag Dub by Coldmirror has this conversation:
  Phil Coulson: Was ist eigentlich in Buchstabensuppe drin?^note  What's actually in alphabet soup?
  Steve Rogers: Ein Haufen blöder Buchstaben.^note  A bunch of stupid letters.

G

• Generation Xerox: Captain America's initial dislike and butting heads with Tony Stark mirrors the relationship he had with his father, Howard. Although not as unrealistic as it's usually done, since Tony displays a lot of his father's quirks and attitude.
• Genius Bruiser:
  • Captain America, both a Super-Soldier and a brilliant strategist (or at least, a very competent field soldier), as the final scene shows.
  • Also Loki, who might not have the strength of Thor, but is still a badass Asgardian.
  • Tony and Bruce as well, being both scientific geniuses and capable in combat as well.
• Genre Blind: Thor, yet again, is lured into a vulnerable spot by falling for Loki's trick of creating false images of himself.
  Loki: Are you ever not going to fall for that?
• Get A Hold Of Yourself Man:
  • Steve does a subtle one to Tony when the latter, not having Cap's combat experience or training, is having a Heroic BSoD over Coulson's death.
  • Thor gets one when he first confronts Hulk on the Helicarrier. He tries to get through to Banner. "Banner, try and think. We are not your enemy." Unfortunately, Hulk isn't in a mood to listen.
• The Ghost: Jane Foster is mentioned as working at a private observatory in Tromsø and doesn't make a proper appearance in the movie at all.
• Giant Flyer: The Leviathans, gigantic flying serpent-like creatures that carry hundreds of Chitauri soldiers.
• Glasses Pull: Done by Coulson in the first scene of the film. Especially notable because those are sunglasses and it is during the night.
• Glassy Prison: The S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier contains one as a Tailor-Made Prison for the Hulk but they are using it to hold Loki that can be dropped 30,000-odd feet out of the bottom of the ship at the push of a button. He escapes (surprise, surprise) and traps Thor in it, who escapes by smashing his hammer through the glass.
• A God Am I:
  • Loki has developed a full-blown god complex — which is rather appropriate, given that, in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Asgardians were mistaken for and worshiped as gods.
    Black Widow: They're basically gods.
    Captain America: There's only one God, ma'am, and I'm pretty sure He doesn't dress like that.
  • Loki later tries to give his A God Am I speech to the Hulk. Let's just say he won't be doing that again anytime soon.
  • Thor also starts slipping into this when everyone in the lab argument scene was succumbing to the discord field that Loki's staff was giving off.
    Thor: You people are so petty. And tiny.
• Godwin's Law:
  • Invoked, appropriately enough, by Captain America, who compares Loki to the man he dealt with "the last time I was in Germany." He may technically have been referring to Red Skull rather than Hitler but they were both Nazi and he could be referring to both of them.
  • Same by the elderly German in the same scene who refuses to kneel.
    Elderly man: There are always men like you.
• Godzilla Threshold:
  • Fury states that the events of Thor proving humanity wasn't alone in the universe prompted S.H.I.E.L.D. to initiate Phase Two in the event that a hostile alien threat attacked Earth and crossed the threshold. Later, the WSC decides to go ahead and nuke Manhattan, in the event that the Avengers can't force the Chitauri back. Also discussed by Loki and Nick Fury.
    Loki: How desperate are you? That you call on such lost creatures to defend you?
    Fury: How desperate am I? You threaten my world with war, you steal a force you can't hope to control, you talk about peace, and you kill 'cause it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did.
  • Also, in a more literal sense, Captain America telling Bruce Banner that now might be a good time to get angry.
• Go-Karting with Bowser: Tony pours himself a drink as he talks to Loki and even offers him one. May be a slight subversion, as he seems to be using this as a cover to discreetly put on bracelets that match his Iron Man suit. We subsequently see that these allow the suit to 'lock-on' to him after Loki throws him out of the tower.
• Good Guns, Bad Guns:
  • S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are mostly armed with Glock pistols and M4A1 carbines. Bad guys use a mix and match collection of weapons that wouldn't look out of place in your average MW2 match or, in the case of the aliens, high-tech blasters.
  • The Reveal of Phase 2 being the reverse engineering and development of weapons based on HYDRA technology serves to sow quite a bit of discord amongst the heroes, partly due to them being left in the dark about this plan. Captain America and Thor in particular are very upset by this, for different reasons.
• The Good Guys Always Win: The Avengers band together and save New York City and the world with zero casualties to the team itself.
• Good Is Not Dumb: Captain America, who despite his belief in doing the right thing and following orders, knows as much as anyone there's something insidious about S.H.I.E.L.D.'s "phase two" program.
• Good Is Not Nice: Almost everybody, as is often the case in the Marvel Universe.
  • Tony Stark is of course a conceited and arrogant jackass who has problems with authority, but still a man who wants to make up for his past failures.
  • Thor still has shades of being a Boisterous Bruiser that smashes first and asks questions later, but he follows his heart and demonstrates Undying Loyalty to his family, allies, and the Earth itself.
  • The Hulk is a rampaging id monster which smashes friend and foe alike during his temper tantrums, but just because he doesn't like you doesn't mean he won't protect you. Simultaneously, just because he fights alongside you for the same cause doesn't mean he's above sucker punching you later.
  • Hawkeye and Black Widow are assassins and former criminals who won't hesitate to do what needs to be done. That doesn't stop the two of them from being loyal to each other and to their comrades.
  • And Nick Fury, who will employ every dirty trick he can think of to get the job done. Of course, the job is preserving worldwide freedom.
• Good Is Not Soft: Steve Rogers is a nice, lovable guy and the only straight-up hero... but he'll throw you out of the Helicarrier to your death even if you're a brainwashed mook, or rip the arms off of invading Chitauri if it means protecting the innocent.
• Good Is Old-Fashioned: Invoked and discussed several times, mostly regarding Captain America. The conclusion is that old-fashioned heroism is is exactly what people need during Earth's Darkest Hour.
• Good Old Ways: Being old-fashioned is Thor's and Captain America's trademark, although it's significantly downplayed compared to many of their previous portrayals.
• Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Captain America, after Iron Man puts the nuke into the portal and falls back to Earth before the portal closes.
  Steve: Son of a gun.
• Graceful Loser: Loki would like that drink now, thank you.
• Grand Staircase Entrance: Loki shows up at a museum gala in Stuttgart, Germany, strolling down a huge marble suitcase in an impeccable suit to the soothing strains of a string quartet. Then, in time to the quartet, he whacks a guy with his staff and stabs another in the eye.
• Gratuitous Russian: Black Widow speaks decent Russian (although not like a native she's supposed to be), while working undercover and being interrogated by a Russian general (who also has an accent, as he's played by a Polish actor). At the end of that scene, she exclaims "Bozhe moi!" ("My God!") after finding out that Coulson wants her to bring in Bruce Banner (the only person that terrifies her). Apparently, Scarlett Johansson had a voice coach train her to say Russian words.
• Greater-Scope Villain: In The Stinger #1, the greatest villain of this story is revealed to be Thanos, but he's otherwise uninvolved with the plot.
• Green Aesop: This is central to the plot. The Tesseract is a clean power-source, Stark Tower runs on self-sustaining energy, and so on. Although, one of the key fights of the film ends up leveling half a forest. It also causes severe complications at the climax — self-sustaining energy is hard to just switch off.
• Grenade Hot Potato: A group of alien Chitauri soldiers during the invasion of Manhattan have cornered a large number of civilians in a bank. From the second floor, one of them prepares to throw a powerful energy grenade below to kill dozens of people. They get interrupted by Captain America, however, who knocks the grenade out of the Chitauri's hand and starts brawling with them. As the counter on the bomb audibly winds down, one of the Chitauri frantically picks up the grenade and starts turning around to throw it at Cap — who jumps into the air and holds his shield between them. The Chitauri tries to throw the bomb after him — as much to hurt Cap as to just get the grenade away from himself — but he can't even manage to get it out of his hand before it blows up, enveloping the entire second floor of the bank in the explosion and blasting Cap out a window and onto a car below.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: Early in the battle, Hulk snatches one of the Chitauri that are climbing a building and tosses it at its companions, knocking them off the wall.
• Guile Hero: Black Widow's favorite interrogation technique is to make the bad guys feel powerful with her acting skills and then listen to what they let slip in their victorious rants.
• Guns Akimbo: The Black Widow uses two glock pistols at the same time fighting the Chitauri.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: A rare gender inversion in the team of Hawkeye and Black Widow: while both are entirely capable in the other field (she's a crack shot and he can certainly deal damage hand-to-hand), Natasha is the superior martial artist while Clint is the finer marksman. The trope is still somewhat played straight in that while Natasha is certainly technically more skilled in hand-to-hand combat, Clint is still able to get the upper hand thanks to his superior brute strength, forcing Natasha to resort to more creative tactics in order to defeat him (there's also the fact that she's trying to subdue him, not kill him, so she isn't going all-out).

H

• Hair Flip: Two of them in rapid succession during the climactic battle, first by Black Widow after letting herself drop on top of the Stark Tower and then by Loki after landing on the platform of the tower following Hawkeye's Trick Arrow exploding in his face.
• Hand Signals: A Chitauri squadron leader uses the "hold fire" sign then a slashing motion to allow his troops to combine their barrage on The Hulk. Unfortunately for him, that just makes The Hulk angrier.
• Hannibal Lecture:
  • Loki's other favorite tactic; he loves the chance to tear apart Black Widow from inside his cell.
  • This is also Black Widow's preferred method of interrogation: get captured, act vulnerable and nail her "captor" with information they felt comfortable enough to share with their "victim". See directly above.
• Hard Head:
  • Thor. At one point, he headbutts a fully-suited Iron Man, and the latter ends up in far more pain (this is assuming Thor felt any pain at all, which he may not have). If you look closely, you can even see that Iron Man's helmet is dented. Then, when Captain America breaks up the fight, he throws his shield to get their attention. It bounces off of Thor's bare forehead, and the way he reacts (or, really, doesn't react) makes it look like Cap's shield is made of Styrofoam. Sort of justified as Asgardians are much more durable than humans.
  • Played straight with Hawkeye. Despite being punched in the face and bashed against a metal railing hard enough to knock him out and break off Loki's mind-control, when he wakes up later, he seems to only suffer from some headache/fatigue that clears out quickly. Mere hours later, he's back in full shape, fighting the Chitauri invasion as if nothing happened. In reality, he would have required hospitalisation (or at the very least serious medical attention) and a full recovery would have taken days, if not weeks.
• Hate Plague: Not that the Avengers weren't getting on each other's nerves before, but just being in the room as Loki's mind-controlling scepter supernaturally raises the tensions to near-violence. When Banner starts getting angry, he picks up the scepter without realizing it. Revised by Kevin Feige: Loki's scepter is made from the Mind Stone, one of the Infinity Stones. Furthermore, according to Marvel's site, Loki himself was also affected by the scepter: it fueled his hatred of Thor and humans of Earth.
• He Didn't Make It: Nick Fury says that "[the medics] called it" in reference to Coulson's death.
• He Had a Name: And it's Phil.
• Headbutting Heroes:
  • Thor and Tony's first encounter, when they fight over custody of Loki. Literally.
  • Stark and Rogers, which makes perfect sense considering their vastly different personalities. At one point, Rogers is begging Tony to put on his suit so they can fight one another.
  • All of them get into a verbal sparring match onboard the helicarrier.
• The Heart: Coulson pulls the team together. He geeks out over meeting his hero, Captain America. He recruits Tony, he secures the Hulk. He brings in Natasha to rescue Hawkeye. He understands what everyone needs to hear to get them in the fight. And then Loki stabs him in the heart and the team finally stops arguing and unites to Avenge him.
• Heel–Face Turn: Subverted. In the fight between Thor and Loki, Loki seems to start doing this, but eventually decides that "it's too late", stabs Thor and flees.
• Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: A S.H.I.E.L.D. fighter pilot lifts the visor from his eyes for no apparent reason besides letting the audience get a better look at his fear when his attempt to subdue the Hulk fails.
• Help, I'm Stuck!: When Bruce Banner along with Natasha Romanoff get thrown into another room due to an explosion, Romanoff’s leg is tightly stuck under metal poles. As she tries to free herself, Bruce starts turning into the Hulk. With a big yank, Black Widow was able free her leg.
• Heroes Gone Fishing: In the second Stinger at the end the exhausted Avengers actually go to the shawarma joint that Tony mentioned and sit around a table eating in silence.
• Heroic BSoD: Romanov is reduced to hugging her knees and shivering after a near-death experience against The Hulk. She snaps out of it when a call to take down Flying Monkey Barton is put out, though.
• Heroic Neutral: Banner doesn't want to get involved in the fighting, mostly to keep Hulk at bay, but he changes after some character development.
• Heroic Sacrifice:
  • Discussed when Captain America thinks the other Avengers (particularly Iron Man, who's a Take a Third Option kinda guy) aren't heroes at all because they're not willing to make the "sacrifice play", as he calls it. It's a Call-Back to Captain America: The First Avenger and how Cap wound up in the future in the first place.
  • Coulson's decision to face Loki alone. Even with the big anti-Destroyer gun, he seemed to think his death would inspire the Avengers to work together in order to avenge him.
  • Tony eventually does attempt this, and while he does survive his heroic act of driving a nuke into space, he did it accepting that he may die.
• Heroic Safe Mode: Natasha assumes Bruce Banner is concentrating on doing good works, avoiding things like soldiers and guns, so he can minimize his stress at all times.
  Bruce: Avoiding stress isn't the secret.
• Hero Insurance: After everything's said and done, one of the many news reports tries to blame the Avengers for the damage to the city. Fury conveniently fails to ask where the Avengers were going after their mission is complete, precisely to avoid such questions.
• Hero of Another Story: Every member has had his own movie or at least a minor role (or cameo) in a previous film.
• Hero Stole My Bike: The Avengers snag a S.H.I.E.L.D. quinjet to take to the final battle. An agent mentions they are unauthorized, but Captain America quickly shuts him up.
• Hesitant Sacrifice: Subverted. When Tony Stark sacrifices himself to save New York, he does so completely calmly and professionally, without a fuss, hesitation, or even any kind of acknowledgement or last words other than trying (unsuccessfully) to call his girlfriend to say goodbye. However, the expression of sheer, naked terror on his face as he flies himself into space through the portal, where he knows he will die, effectively serves this trope's purpose anyway. Tony survives just barely.
• Hidden Heart of Gold: Tony Stark is pretty adamant that none of title characters other than Bruce ever find out he actually gives a damn. A prime example: when he's alone with Coulson, Tony's seen assuring him that all Coulson has to do is say the word and pick a weekend, and Tony will personally fly Coulson to Portland to make up with his cellist ex-girlfriend and "keep love alive!" Much later in the film, after Coulson is killed, Steve cautiously asks Tony if he had a wife, to which Tony replies "There was a cellist -- I think" and then proceeds to snort derisively and fumblingly call Coulson an idiot for trying to take on Loki while turning away so Steve can't see the tears in his eyes.
• High Collar of Doom: Loki sports one which, while relatively subdued, is larger than in Thor.
• Hobbes Was Right: Loki holds this belief about humanity:
  Loki: [to Thor] The humans slaughter each other in droves while you idly fret. I mean to rule them and why should I not?
• Hoist by His Own Petard:
  • Thor tries to fry Iron Man with a bolt of lightning. Though it causes some damage, it also charges the armor to quadruple capacity, which Tony uses immediately to blast Thor with a supercharged repulsor discharge.
  • In the movie Thor, Loki took control of the Destroyer and sent it to Earth to get rid of Thor. It also did a number on Agent Coulson's men. It was trashed and its remains were picked up by S.H.I.E.L.D. Fast forward to the present, and Loki is blasted through a bulkhead by an Earth-made BFG built from Destroyer technology, wielded by Agent Coulson. It doesn't kill or seriously harm Loki, but it probably hurt his pride at least a little.
  • Loki decides to hijack Stark Tower, and its arc reactor to power the portal. However, this gives Tony an opportunity to switch out the Mark VI suit, which had been severely damaged in battle, and get into the Mark VII suit. If the battle had been held anywhere else, Tony would not have had that opportunity, and would have been significantly less effective in battle.
  • Black Widow uses a fallen Chitauri weapon to use against them at one point, and is actually very proficient at it.
  • Loki's scepter serves as a tool for shutting down the portal to the other dimension.
  • It was S.H.I.E.L.D. screwing around with the Tesseract that sets the whole plot in motion. But, in a bit of brilliance from Joss Whedon, it is also the portal being generated by the Tesseract itself that allows Iron Man to deposit a nuke right into Chitauri HQ, effectively stopping their invasion cold (and possibly wiping out their army altogether).
• Hoist Hero over Head: Inverted; Thor (a hero) does this to Loki (a villain) during their fight in New York.
• Holding the Floor:
  • Fury attempts it against Loki during the opening sequence, as the remaining energy from the Tesseract threatens to make the underground facility collapse.
  • Later, Tony Stark's borderline Cloudcuckoolander monologue when he first arrives on the Helicarrier successfully distracts the group while he slips his hacking device onto a nearby computer.
  • Also, Tony's Badass Boast to Loki in Stark Tower is undoubtedly at least in part to stall for time while Jarvis preppes his Mark VII Suit. Loki notices that Stark is stalling but mistakenly assumes that he is just trying to prolong the arrival of the Chitauri army.
• Hollywood Tactics:
  • For what is explicitly an army bent on conquest, the Chitauri make very little effort to do anything except fly around and blow stuff up. They don't seek out enemy emplacements or forces, they don't attempt to capture any beach-heads, and some of them take hostages for no apparent reason. They act more like super-powered rioters than an army that intends to capture and hold territory.
  • Loki choosing to site the main battle in New York City is also an example of this. Cities are much harder to capture or hold than open territory, and New York, with its many skyscrapers, limited sight lines and maze of underground tunnels, is harder than most (though that's justified by his pathological need to be seen to win by as many people as possible).
  • Averted by Captain America — he orders Iron Man to set a perimeter, Hawkeye to act as spotter, Thor to close the gate to prevent more enemy coming through, and while his command to Hulk isn't the greatest, it's probably the best tactical use one can make of an enormous green rage monster.
• Home Field Advantage: The film's finale takes place in New York City. Captain America, being a native New Yorker, (even if 70 years out of his native time), is able to quickly formulate battle plans and issue orders as the battle develops.
• Honor Before Reason: Captain America, while retaining his core sense of honor, averts this. Despite his initial insistence to Tony and Bruce that they should trust in their orders, Cap does take their skepticism seriously, and does some off-book investigating of his own. He ends up beating Tony to the punch in calling out Fury.
• Hood Hopping: Cap hops along a few car roofs while avoiding explosions.
• Horrifying Hero: The Hulk may ultimately fight against the villains, but he is very much a monster that strikes terror into the bravest of men. Even the normally expressionless Black Widow trembles in fear whenever the Hulk threatens to come out and when he first emerges, Bruce Banner is writhing in pain as it sounds like his bones are breaking while a monster takes over his body.
• How Dare You Die on Me!:
  • Tony takes Agent Phil Coulson's Heroic Sacrifice really badly, calling him an idiot for facing Loki alone and hopelessly outmatched.
  • Also when the Hulk roars Tony back to consciousness.
• Hulking Out: It is the Hulk, after all.
• Human Popsicle: Unlike Captain America: The First Avenger, we do get to see Steve's frozen fate, which is briefly shown in a series of flashbacks that he has while working out.
  Tony Stark: Yeah, you may have missed out a few things, doing time as a Cap-sicle.
• Humans Are Insects: Discussed:
  Nick Fury: We have no quarrel with your people.
  Loki: An ant has no quarrel with a boot.
• Humans Are Warriors:
  • Tony invokes this when talking with Loki, that even if he wins, humanity won't simply lie down and submit.
    Tony: You're missing the point — there's no throne, there is no version of this where you come out on top. Maybe your army comes, and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you... 'Cause if we can't protect the Earth, you can be damn well sure we'll avenge it.
  • After the Avengers repel the Chitauri invasion, the Other informs his master that humans are not a species to be messed with.
• Humiliation Conga: Over the course of the movie every single Avenger and Agent Coulson manage to land at least one good hit on Loki, with the amount of them increasing by the finale.
  • Captain America takes Loki in one on one combat. Though he manages to throw in a few quips and put up a decent fight, he's on the losing end before Iron Man shows up.
  • Nick Fury turns Loki's previous retort about how "an ant has no quarrel with a boot" on its head by locking him in an enormous cage and declaring himself the "boot".
  • Black Widow lets Loki go into full Hannibal Lecture mode and allows him to think he's reduced her to tears... before revealing she was just waiting for him to give his real plan away. "Thank you for your cooperation."
  • Coulson is fatally stabbed by Loki, but bravely tells him that Loki is doomed to fail. As the latter tries to retort, Coulson shoots him through the wall.
  • Iron Man likewise has a lecture battle with Loki, then is immune to his attacks. Both succeed, as Loki's plan follows through and Tony is only stalling, but Loki's Villainous Breakdown begins.
    • It can be argued that JARVIS also got a shot at Loki here, if the Mark VII's deployment-pod sideswiping him on its way out the window wasn't just a coincidence. Given how precisely the AI pilots other suits in Iron Man 3, it was probably deliberate.
  • Thor is outsmarted by Loki earlier but when the two fight in the climax, he maintains the upper hand, forcing Loki to flee.
  • Hawkeye fires an arrow at Loki's glider, which the latter catches in midair before it explodes and sends him flying.
  • The Hulk grabs Loki mid-monologue and beats him into the ground. Many times, in rapid succession, with one brief pause before continuing.
  • When confronted with the entire team together, Loki doesn't even bother resisting.
    "Has everyone here had a chance to talk to, and beat up Loki?"
• Hyde Plays Jekyll: Bruce Banner briefly pretends to be on the edge of Unstoppable Rage to mess with Black Widow.
• Hyperspace Is a Scary Place: Falling through the void opened by the Bïfrost has done a number on Loki, such that he remembers it as Thor throwing him into it and now he's here to conquer Earth, quite a bit less stable than he was in Thor.
• Hypocritical Humor:
  • "You people are so petty... and tiny." And:
    Thor: Have care how you speak! Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he's my brother.
    Natasha Romanoff: He killed eighty people in two days.
    Thor: [hesitantly] ...He's adopted.
  • In a meta-example, an interviewed New Yorker (played by Stan Lee) scoffs at the idea of superheroes existing in New York.

I

• I Am Not Left-Handed:
  • Bruce Banner's secret to keeping his Hulk Mode on standby is to stay just angry enough... all the time.
  • Once again, Thor initially holds back when fighting Loki, not wanting to hurt his little brother. And once again, Loki pushes Thor too far and is promptly stomped. Director Joss Whedon even described this point as Thor "finally having enough of Loki's shit."
• I Cannot Self-Terminate: Bruce Banner, literally. He mentions that he tried to commit suicide by orally shooting himself once, but he went Hulk and spat the bullet out.
• I Surrender, Suckers: Loki does this when the Avengers capture him for the first time, only for him to subtly manipulate all of them and cause conflict among the heroes (and essentially make them all fight each other.)
• Icy Blue Eyes:
  • A visible effect of Loki's brainwashing. Everyone under its influence is suitably cold and ruthless, except for Selvig who is more "For Science!".
  • Thanos has them as well.
• If It Swims, It Flies: The Helicarrier can serve as both an Airborne Aircraft Carrier and a regular aircraft carrier, the former presumably meant for covert operations since it comes with an Invisibility Cloak.
• If Jesus, Then Aliens: Captain America. While he refuses to believe Thor and Loki are gods ("There's only one God, ma'am, and I'm pretty sure He doesn't dress like that."), he accepts that they're magic-using aliens without question. Of course, he has seen the very-unscientific powers of the Tesseract first-hand, so it's not that much of a stretch for him. Steve is technically correct, as well, given that in the movie universe, the Asgardians are supposed to be Sufficiently Advanced Aliens.
• Ignored Epiphany: When the Chitauri are attacking New York, Thor tries for a last time to approach his brother, trying to make him aware of the destruction and the hypocrisy of his plan. For a short moment, Loki seems genuinely shocked, telling Thor that "it's too late to stop it". But just when Thor responds that they can do it together, Loki stabs him and flees.
• I Have No Son!: Subverted and Double Subverted by Thor with regards to his adoptive brother Loki. Hilarity Ensues.
  Bruce Banner: I don't think we should be focusing on Loki. That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You can smell crazy on him.
  Thor: Have care how you speak. Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he is my brother.
  Black Widow: He killed eighty people in two days.
  Thor: [hesitantly] ...He's adopted.
• "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: Thor attempts this with Hulk the first time. Amusingly, the fact that Hulk sucker-punches Thor later on shows that the only thing "in there somewhere" was "the other guy".
• Immune to Mind Control: Loki tries to brainwash Tony Stark after he has had enough of Tony's attempt to distract him with an Evil Will Fail lecture. This hilariously fails when his mind control scepter just does a *ping* and shuts down after coming into contact with the arc reactor in Stark's chest. He's so baffled that he even gives it a second try. Still no dice.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Coulson is shuffled out of the picture courtesy of a spear through the back from Loki. Believe it or not, the film was actually rated R because of this scene, at least before minor edits were made.
• Imported Alien Phlebotinum:
  • The Tesseract in general.
  • The remains of the Destroyer, as well.
• Impossibly Cool Weapon: Front and center (and Invoked by Method Studios in the main-on-end credits).
  • Captain America's Mighty Shield.
  • Mjölnir, Thor's hammer.
  • The Iron Man armor.
  • Coulson's BFG which was created from the Destroyer in Thor. Now given the name "Coulson's Revenge" in the Marvel: Avengers Alliance game.
  • Loki's mind-controlling scepter.
  • Hawkeye's Trick Arrows.
  • Black Widow's taser bracelets.
  • Hulk.
• Improbable Aiming Skills:
  • Hawkeye — as the name implies — carries this trope far beyond the Hollywood standard. He manages to land a USB arrow into a computer, exploit 100-mph winds to curve an explosive arrow around a ship to hit from the other side, and hits speeding enemy hovercraft unerringly. He takes down one of them simply by anticipating its flight path, while looking in the opposite direction. In one scene, Hawkeye is targeting some Chitauri chasing after Iron Man.
  • Nick Fury lands a hit on the engine of a jet taking off, with an unguided RPG launcher, using iron sights, with one eye.
• Improvised Lightning Rod: Thor uses the Chrysler building as a makeshift lightning rod to attack the Chitauri aliens and Leviathians.
• In Case You Forgot Who Wrote It: The movie's full title is Marvel's The Avengers, probably to help avoid confusion with the 1998 film based on the unrelated series of the same name.
• I Need a Freaking Drink:
  • When Tony first confronts Loki to "threaten" him, part of his Casual Danger Dialogue is, "Sure you don't want a drink? I'm having one."
  • Loki decides to take Tony up on his offer of a drink after he's defeated and cornered by the entire team.
• Inherently Funny Words: Shawarma.
  Tony: I don't know what it is, but I wanna try it.
• In Name Only: The alien invaders are called the Chitauri. In the comics, the Chitauri are the Ultimate Marvel version of 616 Marvel's Skrulls, shape-shifting aliens whose modus operandi is impersonation and infiltration (see the Skrull-centric storyline Secret Invasion). The movie Chitauri take a blunt Attack! Attack! Attack! approach. They do resemble heavily-armored Skrulls, however. The movie rights to Skrulls were technically tied to the Fantastic Four, and therefore owned by Fox at the time (prior to its eventual buyout by Disney in 2019). The choice to use the Ultimate equivalent is a conscious use of this trope.
• Insignificant Little Blue Planet: This is the Chitauri's and Thanos' attitude towards Earth, until the Avengers prove them wrong.
• Insistent Terminology: Bruce Banner does not turn into the Hulk. He turns into "the other guy". All the other characters continue to refer to his alter ego as the Hulk, however, and Bruce himself slips up once before correcting himself. This is likely Speak of the Devil — Banner doesn't want to give the Hulk any extra power.
• Inspirational Martyr: S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Phil Coulson's brutal murder by Loki moves the superheroes to finally come together as a real team, as well as giving new meaning to their codename. Nick Fury even tells Rogers and Stark that Coulson died believing in the idea of the Avengers.
• Instant Allegiance Artifact: The scepter Loki uses to brainwash Hawkeye and Erik Selvig.
• Instant-Win Condition: Apparently, Chitauri all die if you blow up their command ship. The leading theory is that the Chitauri are somehow linked to their home-ship, similar to the Buggers in Ender's Game. And since the Leviathan ship seemed to be biologically related to the Chitauri themselves, this is entirely plausible. Joss Whedon notes in the commentary that he didn't particularly want to do this, but the movie was already two hours long and it was easier.
• In the Back: Loki stabs Coulson from behind with his scepter.
• Invisibility Cloak: A partial one. The underbelly of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier displays the sky above the ship, making it invisible to ground-based observation.
• Invoked Trope: A favorite of Natasha's; she twice sets herself up as a weak, vulnerable girl who's in over her head to get intel she needs out of her antagonists. It works both times.
• Iron Butt-Monkey: While Loki acts the part of an intimidating villain commendably, he gets many a moment of glory and gloating snatched from him by Coulson's last shot, Hawkeye's surprise bomb arrow, and Hulk beating him like a rag doll.
• Ironic Echo:
  • In Tony's introduction scene Tony is trying to convince Pepper to take some credit for the Stark Tower idea.
    Tony: Give yourself 12%.
    [a bit later, when Agent Coulson interrupts them]
    Tony: I thought we were having a moment
    Pepper: I was having 12% of a moment.
  • When Loki first appears, Fury tries to defuse the situation by saying "We have no quarrel with your people." Loki responds "An ant has no quarrel with a boot." When Loki is captive on the Helicarrier, Fury says that one button is all it will take to jettison the cell, Loki included, and remarks (pointing at Loki) "Ant..." (points at button) "...Boot."
  • "Well, let me know if 'real power' wants a magazine or something", in response to Loki's boasts.
  • A more serious one: while ferrying Captain Rogers to the Helicarrier, Agent Coulson says that "Maybe people need 'old-fashioned'" in response to Captain America's traditional suit, but clearly referring to the ideals Captain America represents. Later, at the team's darkest moment, Fury suggests that believing in heroes might be "an old-fashioned notion."
  • Tony sarcastically remarking that Coulson's first name is "Agent", then later, "His name was Phil." Bonus points for it being said both times in the same room.
  • "Put on the suit." Takes on a new meaning when Banner swiftly and painlessly transforms into The Hulk.
  • And earlier when Rogers is challenging Tony Stark to a fight. Once stuff starts blowing up, he says it again completely seriously.
  • In Loki's original A God Am I / "The Reason You Suck" Speech in Stuttgart, he says it's in humanity's nature to be subjugated. Later a dying Phil Coulson tells Loki he will be defeated, since it's in his nature.
  • Captain America tells a police sergeant to put people in the buildings and cordon off the area and then the police sergeant asks why he should follow his orders. Some Chitauri attack and Captain America beats the tar out of them. The sergeant then orders his men to do exactly what Captain America said.
• It's Personal: Tony theorizes that this was Loki's purpose in attacking the Helicarrier while getting everyone to fight amongst themselves. He later congratulates Loki for making it this, as he's successfully managed to piss off every one of the Avengers.
• It's the Only Way to Be Sure: The World Security Council decides to stop the Chitauri threat by nuking Manhattan while the Avengers are still fighting there. Fury dismisses this as "a stupid-ass idea." In fact, if he weren't a hands-on boss with a rocket launcher, there'd have been two incoming nukes and things might have gone very badly.
• I've Come Too Far: Loki says this word for word to Fury when Fury tries to convince him not to declare war on Earth.
  Fury: This doesn't have to get any messier.
  Loki: Of course it does. I've come too far for anything else.

J

• Jekyll & Hyde: Banner and the Hulk. Banner's Character Development has him realizing that the Hulk isn't some villain: he's just a part of Banner driven by the doctor's own simplest desires, which needs to be accepted rather than constantly restrained. This leads to the final battle, where Banner willingly transforms to help the Avengers and the Hulk willingly follows Captain America's orders.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • Black Widow's reaction when Cap asks what Tony is without his armor and he answers "Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist".
  • Tony to Steve "You're a laboratory experiment, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle". Harsh but true, compared to Tony and Banner's intelligence-derived powers and Black Widow and Hawkeye being trained, Cap's power was handed to him for being a Nice Guy.
  • When the Avengers learn that Fury is developing weapons based on the Tesseract and everyone calls him out on it, he retorts that he had no other choice given how technologically inferior Earth is when compared to the other races on the universe like the Asgardians. Given that more than a few of them are aggressive, Fury's wariness is hardly unjustified.
• Jump Scare:
  • Earlier in the film, Bruce Banner invoked this to Natasha in his Troll-ish moment to pretend he's gonna Hulking Out.
    Bruce: [in deadpan tone] [Fury] needs me in a cage?
    Natasha: No-one's gonna put you in...
    Bruce: STOP LYING TO ME!
    Natasha: [freaks out and draws her gun]
    Bruce: [chuckles, looks obviously amused and satisfied] I'm sorry, that was mean, I just wanted to see what you'd do.
  • Later in the Helicarrier, Bruce as the Hulk popping up out of nowhere and roaring at Natasha (again).
• Jurisdiction Friction: S.H.I.E.L.D. and the World Security Council want Loki to be judged for his crimes on Earth, while Thor insists that he must "face Asgardian justice".
• Just Plane Wrong: The scene with the S.H.I.E.L.D. "F-35" escort aircraft:
  • The F-35 model with an internal gun is not the same model that can hover.
  • That hover length would have had the aircraft falling out of the sky without the aid of the Hulk.
  • The muzzle flashes come out of the jet intakes — an enormously bad idea as 1) you don't want to reduce the amount of air you can intake by having guns in there, and 2) you'll send the spent shells right into the jet engine.
  • Minor example; Aboard the helicarrier we get a glance at an AV-8 "Harrier" jump jet with "FF" blazoned on the tail. This is the emblem of the USAF First Fighter Wing, based in Langley, VA. Trouble is, the U.S. Air Force doesn't operate Harriers; First Fighter is equipped exclusively with F-22 "Raptor" fighters.
• Just Train Wrong: At the beginning of the scene introducing Black Widow we see an establishing shot of a Norfolk Southern freight train passing by the ratty looking warehouse where the heroine is conducting an interrogation. The only problem is that the scene is set in Russia where American locomotives cannot operate (the train tracks have different widths).
• Just You and Me and My GUARDS!: Black Widow seeks out Bruce Banner to recruit him with assurances it's only the two of them. Then he starts Suddenly Shouting because he "wanted to see what she'd do." (what she does is immediately pointing a handgun at him.) Once it's clear he's not turning into an enormous green rage-monster, she tells the veritable SWAT team surrounding the house outside that they can stand down.
  Bruce Banner: "Just you and me", huh? [Black Widow is visibly mollified]

K

• Keystone Army: The Chitauri, apparently. Once Iron Man nukes the mothership, all units on Earth cease functioning. Whedon has said that he wasn't happy about using it, but needed a way to skip the "cleanup" phase of the battle.
• Kick the Dog: Loki's pleasure in murder and destruction, such as the Eye Scream.
• Kidnapped Scientist: Astrophysicist Dr. Erik Selvig is kidnapped and brainwashed by Loki to help build a portal device powered by the Tesseract.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: Agent Coulson. "It's alright, sir. This was never going to work unless they had something... to..." What's the betting the end of that sentence was going to be "avenge"?
• Kill the Cutie: This being a Joss Whedon production, we should have known that Coulson taking a level in adorkable by fanboying over Captain America was not going to end well.
• Kirk Summation: Thor (between trading blows) tries to make Loki realize that even if the invasion succeeds, it's highly unlikely that the bad guys he's working for will allow Loki to rule the Earth afterwards.
• Kiss of Life: Averted, but thoroughly lampshaded and Played for Laughs when Tony Stark wakes up after falling back to Earth following him flying the nuke into the wormhole:
  Tony Stark: What just happened? Please tell me nobody kissed me.
• Kneel Before Zod: In Stuttgart, Loki forces almost an entire crowd to kneel before him and tries to do the same to Captain America.
• The Knights Who Say "Squee!": Agent Coulson is a huge fanboy of Captain America. Trading cards are involved. Plus, it turns out he helped design Cap's modern-day costume.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: After being blown up, beat down by Thor and the Hulk, and watching his army die, Loki wisely comes quietly.
• Kubrick Stare: Tom Hiddleston seems to have this down to a fine art, especially the first time we see him.
• Kung-Fu Sonic Boom: This is what we get when Thor's god-hammer Mjölnir hits Captain America's vibranium shield. It levels a good acre of forest.

L

• Lampshade Hanging: Quite a few subtle ones, which if you've seen the previous films, you catch right off the bat.
  Tony Stark: Uh, Shakespeare in the park?
  
  Natasha Romanoff: This is monsters and magic and nothing we were ever trained for.
• Lampshaded the Obscure Reference: This is inverted with Steve. Since he's been frozen for nearly 7 decades, modern references, like Stephen Hawking and Pilates, are lost on him, but he's giddy that he knows what Nick means by flying monkeys.
  Steve: I understood that reference!
• Laser-Guided Karma: Loki spends much of the movie belittling Bruce Banner/Hulk, basically describing him as a mindless uncontrollable subhuman to anyone within earshot, even to his very face. Loki even manages to use Banner's more vicious side to steam-roller S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers. No prizes for guessing who gets to ram a thick, humbling slice of marble and concrete flavoured pie down his slimy gullet in the denouement!
• Last Breath Bullet: Downplayed and a heroic example. Coulson gets one of these in on Loki after being stabbed through the chest, but Loki is virtually unharmed and manages to escape anyways.
• Last-Second Chance: Thor's fight with Hulk starts off as this, but Thor stops trying pretty quickly. Later he tries it with Loki and it works just as well.
• The Last Thing You Ever See: Loki tells Black Widow that he has this in mind for Barton:
  Loki: I won't touch Barton. Not until I make him kill you! Slowly. Intimately. In every way he knows you fear! And when he'll wake just long enough to see his good work, and when he screams, I'll split his skull!
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: If you've missed some of the movies from the MCU, there'll be quite a few spoilers for you, particularly in regards to Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger.
• Laughably Evil: Loki; there's something very amusing in the way he dances circles around the heroes, while gleefully mocking them at the same time
• Layman's Terms:
  • Both inverted and played straight when Tony Stark is delighted to be able to speak seemingly Techno Babble with Bruce Banner, much to the bemusement of Captain America.
    Steve Rogers: Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?
    Bruce Banner: He got to heat the cube to a hundred and twenty million Kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier.
    Tony Stark: Unless Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect.
    Bruce Banner: Well, if he could do that he could achieve Heavy Ion Fusion at any reactor on the planet.
    Tony Stark: Finally, someone who speaks English.
    Steve Rogers: Is that what just happened?
  • When Stark is trying to talk Rogers through helping him fix the destroyed propeller of the Helicarrier:
    Tony Stark: Take a look at the panel and tell me what you see.
    Cap: It appears to run on some form of electricity.
    Tony: Well, you're not wrong.
  • Steve is forced to interrupt Tony's technobabble-laden explanation of how he's going to get back out of the engine: "Speak English!"
• Lead the Target: Strongly implied by Hawkeye. One shot has him rather spectacularly looking at a target while apparently pointing his bow the wrong way. Careful analysis shows that he's aiming quite in advance of his (fast-moving) target to hit it dead on.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Nick Fury gives a report to the World Security Council where he mentions that their Phase 1 weapons development program is nearing completion and that they are getting ready to move on to Phase 2, much like the MCU at the time of the film's release.
• Leave the Camera Running: The entirety of the second stinger but they did do three separate takes so they could pick out the best.
• Leeroy Jenkins: Iron Man gives us this gem after Thor arrives on Earth and snatches Loki from the quinjet:
  Steve Rogers: We need a plan of attack!
  Tony Stark: I have a plan: Attack.
• Leitmotif:
  • Whenever Cap does anything awesome, notes of his theme plays.
  • Invoked by Stark when he flies in during the Captain vs. Loki fight. The stereo of the S.H.I.E.L.D. helicopter overhead is commandeered by Stark, and seconds before he shows up, "Shoot to Thrill" starts playing. It probably wouldn't count if Stark hadn't intentionally played the same song in his first scene in Iron Man 2.
• Lensman Arms Race: Thor states that S.H.I.E.L.D.'s experiments with the Tesseract have started one: it's the equivalent of an otherwise unremarkable postage stamp in Eastern Europe or Africa suddenly acquiring full nuclear capability. Once Earth re-ignited the Tesseract, it was no longer an Insignificant Little Blue Planet in the CIA Galactic Factbook — it's now a potential rival. And when the Avengers wiped out an entire force of Chitauri and thus earned Thanos' attention, it was equivalent to said postage stamp wiping out a Spetsnaz unit and thus earning Stalin's attention!

• Let's Get Dangerous!: Invoked by Nick Fury at the end, that Earth is no longer an insignificant little fish in the galactic pond.
  Director: Was that the whole point of this? A statement?
  Nick Fury: A promise.
• Let's You and Him Fight:
  • Thor's introduction, after Cap and Stark have "captured" the surrendering Loki, is to burst into their transport and remove his brother by force. This could prove an obstacle to saving their world, so both heroes jump out of the plane to give chase. The showdown involves a lot of snarking and pummeling, and answers the question of what happens when a near-unstoppable hammer swing meets an unbreakable shield.
  • Also, the Hulk briefly chases Black Widow and tangles with Thor when he first "meets" the team. Loki planned to use The Hulk to destroy the Helicarrier and all of his enemies along with it.
• Letting the Air out of the Band: In the "performance issue" scene, ominous music rises dramatically as Loki is about to touch Tony Stark's chest with his spear tip... and then, clink. Can count in-universe too with the mind-control gem emitting a humming sound just before contact, which also putters out after the clink.
• Lifesaving Misfortune: Tony Stark implies to Bruce that his Freak Lab Accident might have been this.
• Lightning Bruiser:
  • The Hulk is phenomenally strong (strong enough to rival mighty Thor), but the movie also does an excellent job of portraying just how dangerously fast he can be for his size, particularly when he's tearing things up with remarkable agility in the final battle. Also, the scene of him chasing Black Widow has her running for her life down a small corridor and Hulk catching up to her while smashing through barriers.
  • Thor is the physically strongest member of the team (perhaps rivaled somewhat by the Hulk), able to break out of the Hulk's designed cell, is agile enough to dodge a plane wing hurled at him by the Hulk, and travels at great speed. He even looks like a blur when he saves Black Widow from the Hulk. Also, he can actually harness the power of lightning with his hammer, making this trope both figurative and literal.
• Like Cannot Cut Like: Inverted: the only thing that can breach the Tesseract-powered portal generator's barrier is the scepter, which is said to be "powered by the Tesseract" in this film and was later retconned into containing a different Infinity Stone.
• Living Legend: All the Avengers but mostly Captain America. Tony Stark uses the phrase itself.
• Living Ship: The Chitauri have the Leviathans, armored dragons that also act as transportation for ground troops. As with the Chitauri themselves, they seemed to be mechanical to some extent as they die when the mothership is destroyed.
• Lock-and-Load Montage: When the team decides to collectively get dangerous, we are treated to a montage of Captain America and Iron Man suiting up while Thor grabs Mjölnir and Hawkeye checks his bow.
• Lodged Blade Removal: Loki and Thor fight each other and the latter implores his brother to see the horrors of his attack on New York and stop. Loki appears to be considering his words for a few moments before stabbing Thor with a push knife and getting away. Thor proceeds to simply pull it out and toss it before immediately going back to the fight, merely looking frustrated. Justified since he's a god.
• Logo Joke:
  • The Marvel and Paramount logos are seen inside the Tesseract.
  • Also seen at the end of the movie. Stark Tower's "STARK" logo gets all the consonants removed during the final fight. What's left? A very stylish 'A', similar to the one in the classic "Avengers" logo.
• The Loins Sleep Tonight: When Loki tries to mind control Tony Stark, it fails when the staff is blocked by the reactor in Tony's chest. He puts on a look of mock-sympathy and draws a parallel to erectile dysfunction.
  Loki: This usually works...
  Tony: Well, performance issues, it's not uncommon. One out of five...
  Loki: [chokes Tony] You will all fall before me!
• Loony Friends Improve Your Personality: Bruce "the Hulk" Banner only starts to come out of his shell when Tony "Iron Man" Stark starts teasing him — mostly because Bruce's... impressive anger management issues mean that people tend to walk on eggshells around him a lot, and Tony is treating him like a person, not an unexploded nuke that happens to be able to talk.
• Love Is a Weakness: Loki claims this at every possible opportunity. He’s talking from personal experience.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: After Captain America breaks up the fight between Tony Stark and Thor and tries to convince Thor to "put the hammer down", Thor acts on those words by smashing Captain America with it. Captain America blocks it with his shield, which indeed protects him from a blow from the hammer of a Norse god — by reflecting the force of the blow in all directions in a shockwave that levels everything in the immediate area.

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