I thought it was a pretty good film t first, but overtime I became more critical of Age of Ultron.
There are too many separate character arcs, which makes developing them properly nearly impossible in 2 and a half hours. Only Tony and Steve really get a clear direction for their characters, and it's largely because they can double as set-up for Civil War. Thor just kinda disappears to get half naked and hint at his third movie, Black Widow and The Hulk have their terrible romance, Hawkeye gets a bunch of death flags for red herring purposes, and the Maximoff twins never have their grudge against Tony brought up after their Heel–Face Turn. Avengers 1 worked because it was able to unite a cast of very different people under one common goal, and gave them all the same arc to keep focus on it. Splitting the character development arcs up into several directions means only a few will benefit from it it, while the others are left in the dust.
Our main villain, Ultron, asks us if there's such a thing a "too much Whedon?" The answer is yes. Ultron fails to keep his menace when it matters most because Joss' need for Bathos ruins almost any tension his scenes display. The problem isn't that he's too human, rather that he's too much like a typical Joss Whedon character. The kind that can't stop quipping like a smart alec even when it doesn't do the character any favors. Even Ultron's Colony Drop fails to remind me that the character is a threat. James Spader acted him well, but this wasn't a very graceful use of a top Avengers villain.
The Black Widow/Hulk romance really needs it's own section for how badly it's handled. First, it comes out of nowhere after 3 films with Natasha getting more believable subtext with Tony in Iron Man 2, Clint in Avengers 1, and Steve in The Winter Soldier. The only onscreen interactions I saw with Nat and Bruce were hostile and antagonistic. Them getting together now just reeks of asspull. Secondly, This is their character arc for the film, which composes of Nat hitting on Bruce, Bruce and Nat confiding over their differing inabilities to conceive children (which was handled in a pretty tone deaf way), and Nat forcing Bruce to turn into the Hulk for the finale. Riveting stuff. Third, anything good from their character interaction could have been better accomplished by making them friends, which means I found some good stuff in there but didn't like that it was presented romantically. Finally, Joss saying me wanted to make a film without a Token Romance only to do this is really hypocritical. I see why some would like it, especially because it was Nat initiating the romance, but I couldn't.
Hawkeye getting more to his character is good, and The Vision was well used, but it's really a weaker retread of Avengers 1 when I look back at this film.
Ultimately, a failure in expectations.
I thought it was a pretty good film t first, but overtime I became more critical of Age of Ultron.
There are too many separate character arcs, which makes developing them properly nearly impossible in 2 and a half hours. Only Tony and Steve really get a clear direction for their characters, and it's largely because they can double as set-up for Civil War. Thor just kinda disappears to get half naked and hint at his third movie, Black Widow and The Hulk have their terrible romance, Hawkeye gets a bunch of death flags for red herring purposes, and the Maximoff twins never have their grudge against Tony brought up after their Heel–Face Turn. Avengers 1 worked because it was able to unite a cast of very different people under one common goal, and gave them all the same arc to keep focus on it. Splitting the character development arcs up into several directions means only a few will benefit from it it, while the others are left in the dust.
Our main villain, Ultron, asks us if there's such a thing a "too much Whedon?" The answer is yes. Ultron fails to keep his menace when it matters most because Joss' need for Bathos ruins almost any tension his scenes display. The problem isn't that he's too human, rather that he's too much like a typical Joss Whedon character. The kind that can't stop quipping like a smart alec even when it doesn't do the character any favors. Even Ultron's Colony Drop fails to remind me that the character is a threat. James Spader acted him well, but this wasn't a very graceful use of a top Avengers villain.
The Black Widow/Hulk romance really needs it's own section for how badly it's handled. First, it comes out of nowhere after 3 films with Natasha getting more believable subtext with Tony in Iron Man 2, Clint in Avengers 1, and Steve in The Winter Soldier. The only onscreen interactions I saw with Nat and Bruce were hostile and antagonistic. Them getting together now just reeks of asspull. Secondly, This is their character arc for the film, which composes of Nat hitting on Bruce, Bruce and Nat confiding over their differing inabilities to conceive children (which was handled in a pretty tone deaf way), and Nat forcing Bruce to turn into the Hulk for the finale. Riveting stuff. Third, anything good from their character interaction could have been better accomplished by making them friends, which means I found some good stuff in there but didn't like that it was presented romantically. Finally, Joss saying me wanted to make a film without a Token Romance only to do this is really hypocritical. I see why some would like it, especially because it was Nat initiating the romance, but I couldn't.
Hawkeye getting more to his character is good, and The Vision was well used, but it's really a weaker retread of Avengers 1 when I look back at this film.