The Avengers

Posted October 6, 2012 by Speed - 0 comments

In the movie Thor we saw Loki fall to his supposed death in the infinite abyss but he managed to survive and teams up with an alien race called Chitauri who enlist him to get their hands on the Tesseract, a powerful energy source that Captain America in World War 2 managed to capture from the Nazis before crashing into the ocean. S.H.I.E.L.D. has salvaged the Tesseract with the help of Iron Man and has since been looking at ways to use it as a clean energy source, but the Chitauri need it to escape from their dimension and conquer our universe. Loki is sent to Earth for this exact mission and in return for completing his mission, he will be given the reign over the our planet.

When Loki arrives, it doesn’t take Nick Fury long to understand that the world is in great danger so he and S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Phil Coulson activate the “Avengers” initiative that brings together some of the universe’s greatest heroes of all time. Tony Stark, the billionaire who’s a one man army when suited up as Iron Man, Steve Rogers, the genetically engineered super soldier who’s known as Captain America, Thor, the real god of thunder with his mighty hammer, S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Natasha Romanoff, expert martial artist and interrogator who goes by the name Black Widdow, Clint Barton, the world’s greatest marksman who’s also known as S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Hawkeye, and last but certainly not least: scientest Bruce Banner who got an overdose of gamma radiation and ever since turns into the HULK whenever he gets angry.

However, these are all very individual people with distinct personalities, have never teamed up, have never had any training together and never even signed up to be a team. Will they be able to be more than the sum of their individual selfs and defeat a seemingly undefeatable enemy?

Of course they can! It’s a superhero movie and they wouldn’t be great superheroes if they would get their asses kicked, right? But that doesn’t really matter. What matters is the journey and that has come a long way. Marvel has released The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger before getting us to The Avengers, the culmination of these films which brings together some of the most iconic characters in the Marvel universe. As such, the expectations were immense. Just as the Avengers themselves, the movie had to be better than the individual pieces, 1 + 1 is 3. So the real question is, did Marvel succeed?

Yes they did! The all-star cast does an excellent job in portraying their comic book characters, each individual hero gets enough screentime to show the character’s importance to the story, and the action scenes are just “grande”. And to top it off, there are a couple of scenes present that bring comic relief without being childish or campy. Especially the Hulk’s reaction to Loki when he starts talking to him will be plastered in my brain for all eternity as it’s one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen!

Joss Whedon shows he’s the perfect director for a spectacle like The Avengers, and he’s also the first director who actually managed to make Hulk an interesting character. And he did it so good even that the interest to see more of the Green Giant has become bigger than it ever was. If there’s criticism to be given, it’s that you watch the movie and just can’t stop thinking you want even MORE and BIGGER! Just like when you hear a great song and just want to keep turning up the volume until your head would explode.

The image quality on this Blu-ray is pure reference material. There’s nothing more to be said actually. Everything looks great, the amount of detail is stunning, the blacks are inky, and there not one scratch or spot of dirt to be found. The entire movie just looks stunning and the only (very) minor critique we could have is that night time scenes look a tidbit flatter than others.

Similarly, the sound is also demo-material with a 7.1 DTS-HD track that just blows you away during the action scenes while never ever having the effects and music overpowering the dialogues. Even when New York is getting torn to pieces, you never lose focus on what is being said and that’s only one thing where this release stands out against other great 7.1 tracks. Also the positioning is perfect, and the surround channels as well as the subwoofer are very aggressive, giving you even more the feeling of grandure and spectacle.

Great movie, fantastic image quality and terrific sound, but the extras are a bit of a letdown. We get a couple of deleted scenes, a gag reel, Whedon and co discussing how the visuals enhance the characters and story, and finally a short film about two wannabe bank robbers who find Item 47 (an alien weapon) after the fight for New York. This isn’t bad as such, but a bit more wouldn’t have hurt.

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