In terms of movies this summer has gone down in history as one of the most epic on record. The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, The Amazing Spider-Man, and Prometheus were all highly anticipated, large budget works. Though all have points worthy of praise and fault worth critiquing, the best movie overall in my humble opinion as a reviewer was The Avengers.
As a film Avengers had the most stacked against it. It was a sequel to four other movies. Other film series have tried crossovers on a large scale and have been met with limited success. The best known ones were Alien vs Predator, and Freddy vs. Jason, neither of which were cinematic marvels. Avengers needed to please the fans of Captain America, Thor, Hulk and Iron Man movies, not just the core comic fans. It ran the risk of being unbalanced where once character took the lead with the others falling by the wayside. . It could have been all ‘splosions with a thin storyline. Fortunately for the nerds of the world it avoided that pitfall. The characters all had a moment to shine. Interpersonal chemistry was spot on. There were even brief moments of humor, adding levity to the intense action. The recasting of Ed Norton with Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner was a blessing in disguise. Ruffalo stole every scene he was in by being calm and subdued. As a result Avengers stands tall as one of the most successful films in history.
Not everything was perfect. Hawkeye‘s storyline was a little lacking. He spent the majority of the film as a brainwashed villain. On one hand it gave the character something to do without stealing screen time from more interesting characters like Cap, Thor, Iron Man or the Hulk. On the other hand Jeremy Renner is a good actor and I want to see what he could do with the cocky smartass archer. After seeing all the characters at each others throats I wanted a bit more development towards them becoming brothers in arms. Its ok a few more shawarma runs and they’ll be there.
Despite those small pitfalls, Avengers was a fun summer movie. Good defeated evil on the battle field of New York City, and the people rejoiced. I want to know what’s in store for the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s phase two. Besides the obligatory sequels for the big three there are so many more options to expand the universe. I want to see something with S.H.I.E.L.D. Potential titles like “Black Widow: The Red Ledger” “Clint Barton Codename: Hawkeye”, and of course “Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.” practically write themselves. Like every other fan on the internet I really want to see Phil Coulson return as the Vision. Avengers more than lived up to the expectations, it surpassed them.
On a scale of one to epic (epic equals 10) Avengers gets a 9.2
On a Scale of 1 to Epic (Epic = 10): 
