OFFICIAL RESPONSE: "AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON" WAS DOPE!

   I prolonged the publishing of this review simply so that more people may have a chance to view the film prior to reading. With that said, this will be a spoiler-free look.

    In this film, Tony Stark and Bruce Banner try to jump-start a dormant peacekeeping program, only to have things go awry. Trying to establish an artificial intelligence known as Ultron to essentially replace the Avengers as the first line of defense against another other-worldly force, Ultron becomes obsessed with the idea that the Avengers are actually the biggest threat and seeks to destroy them. It's up to the Avengers to stop the villainous Ultron from enacting his terrible plans. As the 11th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, "Avengers: Age of Ultron" has a lot riding on in it. The first "Avengers" film was so fantastic that the immediate anticipation for the follow up film was nothing short of immense. There was an enormous amount of hype for this movie and the question everyone had going into it was: Would it live up to the hype? My answer to you is: Yes...and No.

  With the first "Avengers", we as an audience were introduced to and experienced solo films within this growing cinematic universe. We fell in love with the characters and the actors that played them. Seeing them all together on the big screen for the first time was nothing short of magical. The famous scene where the camera circles the heroes as they brace for another wave of alien enemies as the Avengers theme blared through the speakers, is forever etched into my brain as one of the coolest moment on screen. How do you top that?

   Let's get it out there, Age of Ultron was...fantastic! It was everything I had hoped it would be and more. However, in its opening weekend it has gotten a ton of mixed reviews. Personally, I feel we've come so far as an audience that when we tend to hype a movie, we hype it up so much that no matter how great the film actually is, it ultimately falls short in our eyes, and I feel that's what's happened with this film. Joss Whedon made the best movie he could. There were a lot of moving parts with this film. I won't spend a lot of time hashing out plot details, but I'll just point out what I think really works for this film.

   The first thing is the action. You'll be hard pressed to find another Marvel movie with cooler action sequences than this one. Even cooler than the first Avengers. Seriously. I've gone on record for saying that "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" is probably the best Marvel film to date, and I'd struggle to suggest otherwise. Age of Ultron outdid the first Avengers dramatically, and that's what is important. It's tough to compare the Avengers films to any of the other solo films anyway, simply because they're much more dense; much more convoluted with "stuff". We have 6+ heroes all fighting for screen time and we as an audience want to see them all do their thing. That's where Age of Ultron shines. The solo films of Phase One (Pre-Avengers) introduced us to the characters and the world, building up to the ultimate release with Avengers. The Phase Two films have given us more of that, expanding the universe and building on the foundation of the first films. The freedom with Age of Ultron is that it isn't bogged down with a lot of explanation. It kicks you right in the face with an opening action sequence that is an absolute joy. It's as if Joss Whedon was saying, "Here! This is why you came! This is why you bought a ticket." And it doesn't let up. In particular, there's a couple of "money shots" that gave me goosebumps. If you've seen the film you'll know what I'm talking about. Slow motion action at its finest.

   The film is a tad darker than the first Avengers, and rightfully so. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has reached a pivotal moment, with SHIELD in disarray and HYDRA scattered, this film needed to make an emotional shift to compensate for that. Enter Ultron. An artificial intelligence created by Tony Stark essentially turns on them as seeks the Avengers' annihilation. The fantastic James Spader plays Ultron and does so masterfully. At times though it's hard not to see Ultron as just another typical bad guy, but the core aspect of his villainy is his connection with the Avengers, more specifically Tony Stark. Spader brings the gusto to this role. His voice work for the character was absolutely fantastic. Ultron is evil yet equally charming; maniacal yet equally comical. He's an intriguing antagonist, one the Avengers have a huge difficulty facing.

   As I mentioned before, with the Avengers films you run the risk of losing out on a lot of character development for the sake of awesome screen time full of action. Since there really is no need to establish who these characters are since we've seen them now in ten other films, Whedon carefully balances the screen time between all the heroes, as well as making room for some development for certain characters. Hawkeye has a much larger arc in this film, which Jeremy Renner handles very well. Without giving away any details, one might argue that he actually is the glue that holds this team together. Yeah, the guy with the bow and arrows is actually important.

  The introduction to the Maximoff twins, Wanda (Scarlet Witch) and Pietro (Quicksilver), is another highlight. Elizabeth Olsen as the Scarlet Witch probably has the most emotional and most complete arc throughout the film. Her brother, played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson does a good job playing the same-but-different character as Evan Peters in "X-Men: Days of Future Past". Their powers are visually stunning and really bring a new feel to the franchise; dealing with (what the film calls) "enhanced" humans.

   The greatest addition, at least in my book, is Paul Bettany as The Vision. Words cannot describe the awesomeness...

   The writing for this film is really well done. There are so many quips and one-liners that it just adds to the overall experience. From top to bottom, this film rocked. Separating out the Avengers films, including the third which will be split into two films, you almost have to look at them from the perspective that they're their own franchise within the larger franchise. Age of Ultron, I feel, did what it set out to do, and that was to bring the magic once again and blow it up. Everything is heightened; the action, the drama, the cinematography, the writing, the stakes, everything you would want from an epic Marvel movie, you get with Age of Ultron.