The Avengers (3D)

What it's about:

When the safety of Earth is threatened by the re-emergence of Thor’s villainous brother Loki and a new weapon he develops that harnesses the power of the Tesseract, SHIELD director Nick Fury is forced to call in the big guns. He brings together Iron Man, the Hulk, Captain America and two of SHIELD’s deadliest agents to take down Loki and finally kick off the proposed Avengers Initiative.

What we thought:

A project long in the works, and feverishly anticipated by comic book geeks, action freaks and Robert Downey Jr/Tony Stark devotees, it’s almost impossible to fault The Avengers, now that it’s finally, actually here.

The Avengers is truly a movie event on a spectacular scale and this adds an almost impossible level of expectation on Marvel, writer-director Joss Whedon and the cast to make all those fanboy fantasies come true.

Be assured, The Avengers is all that and a whole heap of fun to boot. We’ve come to be familiar with the individual characters over the course of a few years, with two Iron Man movies, Thor and Captain America having been introduced in their own film franchises. All are present to reprise their roles, except Edward Norton who played Dr Bruce Banner in The Incredible Hulk and opted out of The Avengers to make way for Mark Ruffalo as the hot-headed green giant.

As the film opens, the Avengers are scattered: Tony Stark is developing a new power source while living in something like domestic bliss with Pepper Potts. Bruce Banner has exiled himself to India where he’s figured a way to keep "the other guy" at bay. Captain Steve Rogers is a supersoldier without a war to fight.

Scarlet Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow gets a particularly great intro, while her fellow SHIELD agent Clint Barton/Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner, who was glimpsed briefly in Thor) is compromised early on when Loki makes his entrance. When the gang finally comes together on SHIELD’s impressive aircraft carrier-cum-stealth flyer, it’s an incredibly thrilling moment, even though there is some serious doubt amongst them that it’s probably not the best idea, since one of them could explode into a destructive rage monster at any moment.

Much in-fighting ensues, especially once Loki is captured and Thor crashlands from Asgard to claim Loki as his prisoner to be dealt Asgardian justice. It’s pretty exciting just seeing all these larger than life characters all in a room together, sizing each other up and bickering like old friends.

That it all feels so natural and lived in is, of course, thanks to the wizardry of Joss Whedon himself, a true and devoted believer in the power of fantasy and science fiction as a means to explore real human relationships.

The truly magical thing about The Avengers is how well-compartmentalised it all is, allowing each and every one of our heroes an almost equal amount of screentime to flesh out their character arcs and deal with a wealth of backstory and essentially build relationships as the franchise thunders along for who knows how many more years and spin-off films. This could so easily have been a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth, and in fact turns out to be the complete opposite. The Avengers works because each character’s voice and presence matters.

The cast is as close perfection as you could imagine. I challenge anyone to suggest another actor who could infect Tony Stark with as much lovable cockiness as Robert Downey Jr, or convey the inner turmoil of Captain America – a man out of time – with the kind of affecting strength Chris Evans has brought to the character. They may wear impressive (and skintight) costumes, but the actors’ performances give weight to the characters rather than shift the focus to their heroic alter egos.

Though it’s bad boy Loki (played by a dangerously magnetic Tom Hiddleston) who steals most of the scenes, torturing the Avengers with his withering wit and steely gaze as his plot to overtake Earth and make subjects of the human race is slowly revealed. That he is Thor’s brother complicates matters even further and together with Chris Hemsworth (as the Norse god of thunder) Hiddleston’s Loki is always on the cusp of redemption (even though he’s crazier than an old lady with a bag of cats, according to Iron Man) and ever more lethal because of his sensitivity where Thor is concerned.

As expected, the chaos of the thrilling CGI action scenes as Midtown Manhattan is being obliterated by Loki’s army is a head-spinning prospect as one superhero more powerful than the next gets a turn to shine. That The Avengers is lacking an ordinary human character to ground the highly fantastical elements of the story scarcely counts against it. This is one occasion where all pretences of ordinariness should be left at the door.

Joss Whedon’s distinctive voice can be heard throughout all of the characters’ attempts at one-upmanship. It’s there in Agent Phil Coulson’s barely concealed and very sweet Captain America fandom, in the unspoken competitiveness between Tony Stark and Bruce Banner, and the roguish fun that is promised around every corner.

The Avengers is exactly what it needed to be: Over the top but awe-inspiring, faithful to the characters and the comics, whip-smart and funny and, above all, an insanely good time.