Avengers: Age of Ultron - Nuff' Said!

  Just when you thought Marvel Studios had out done themselves with Guardians of the Galaxy, they managed prove us all wrong and produce another epic all star super hero team up known as Avengers: Age of Ultron. 

  Taking inspiration from the 1960's Avengers and bringing the infamous genocidal Ultron to life and having him battle the earth mightiest heroes, along with bringing in old and new faces into the battle. this movie goes all over the world, featuring the legendary Marvel city of New York, South Africa, South Korea and the fictional country of Sokovia. All of the founding Avengers appear like Iron man (Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), The Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and of course Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson). This awesome cast list is then backed up by James Spader giving his voice for Ultron, Aaron Taylor-Johnson plays the smart mouthed speedster Quicksilver, Elizabeth Olsen as the chaotic Scarlet Witch and Paul Bettany as The synthezoid Vision. With a cast like this how could you go wrong and with the genius that is Joss Whedon I don't think you can. 

Warning spoilers below. 

  So the main story of Avengers: Age of Ultron is that now the world is safe from Loki and the Chitauri, now they're mopping up what's left of Hydra after the events of Captain America: The Winter Soldier and hunting for Loki's sceptre so they can take back to Asgard, they come across The Twins; Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch. After a successful mission Stark and Banner examine the sceptre and find a thinking programme within it. This programme becomes sentient, take the name Ultron from Stark's peace keeping programme and infiltrates Stark's technology and disables Jarvis, Stark's loyal computer programme. Ultron builds a body and reeks havoc in the Avengers tower and states his going to save humanity by destroying it (villain logic). 

  So the Avengers rally and chase after Ultron to South Africa where they encounter The Twins once again this time working with Ultron and this time Scarlet Witch messes with all of the team which leads to a balls out "Holy S**T that was epic" fight between Iron man and Hulk. The battle wrecks half of South Africa and a dozen buildings (which would make Superman jealous), we get to see the Hulkbuster armour in action and they batter each other until Hulk regains his senses. The team regroup and recover after getting their asses handed to them by Ultron and The Twins. The Avenger prepare for round two which results in them trashing half of South Korea, Black Widow being captured by Ultron but they do end up creating The Vision so that's a win. Scarlett Witch and Quicksilver learn that Ultrons plan is to destroy world and they are totally not down with that, so they rebel and offer help to the Avenger because they're just a pair of messed up kids with powers. 

  Now with new members to the team, the Avengers plan the final fight with Ultron in the fictitious country of Sokovia, where he's been secretly building a huge F'N jet propulsion system under the city which will lift it up into the sky and then drop causing extinction level event. The Avengers rally once again and battle the legions of Ultron bots and try to stop the city from rising and when all seems lost, Nick Fury shows up with a helicarrier (because he Nick Fury, that's why). They use the helicarrier to save the citizens of Sokovia, and all of the Avengers team up in one huge badass fight with all of the Ultron bots, Iron man, Vision and Thor melt Ultron Prime, but sadly in the evacuation Quicksilver get gunned down saving Hawkeye, Scarlett Witch flips out destroying every Ultron bot surrounding her but leaves her post and one shot up Ultron bot gets through starts the doomsday process leading to the avengers trying to save everyone they can. Scarlett Witch finds what was left of Ultron Prime and tears out his mechanical heart in the spirit of revenge. Thor and Iron man stop the landmass from destroying the world by shattering it, Hulk leaves in the quinjet and Vision destroys the last Ultron bot. The movie ends with the Avengers at their new base with Thor gone back to Asgard, and both Iron man and Hawkeye leaving the team, only Captain America and Black Widow are left to train the new team members. The last scene show Scarlet Witch, Vision, War Machine and Falcon are now Avengers and Rogers is cut off before he finishes the infamous line "Avengers Assemble". The after credits show Thanos putting on the Infinity Gauntlet and stating he will take things into his own hands thus setting up for the Infinity war. 

  There were plenty of awesome elements in this film, but James Spader's performance as Ultron was scarily convincing and amazing, he breathed life into the character in way no one else could, he achieved this by making Ultron more human that machine, Ultron's reactions were perfectly human, even his language was human and the way the character came through the screen. Seeing that Ultron's psyche was based off Tony Stark's it only fitting he would have the personality of a human, what makes Spader's performance even more impressive was how he translated the fact that Ultron believes he saving humanity but is actually going to destroy humanity and that he doesn't know the difference, and the interesting element is that he got the philosophy from Tony Stark's psyche, which could possibly be the foundations for Civil War. 








  Since the after credits clip of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, the anticipation of seeing the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver being apart of the Avengers was building to boiling point. The two characters comic book history is long and full of madness and family drama. Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen did a fantastic job as The Twins even though I still find it weird because they played husband and wife in Godzilla, but their acting made me forget that fact. Johnson portrayed the more cocky and arrogant Quicksilver that one in X-Men: Days of Future Past and Olsen is first movie incarnation of the Scarlet Witch, and she plays a very grounded and emotional woman who can tap into other peoples emotions and it probably the most powerful member of the Avengers. It was good see that there characters weren't wasted and they were given sufficient screen time. 

  The introduction of The Vision was expertly done, using the Mind Infinity stone to give the synthezoid life and having Paul Bettany play him was a genius casting choice. Bettany is one of the few actors in the world that can literally play any role he's given and make the role his own. Vision's character in the comics was always trying to truly understand what it means to be human and the only way he could do that was to join the Avengers and fight along with them. Because Vision carries the Mind Stone and thus gives him an insight into the major threat that is too come, this makes Vision a centre point in the marvel movies to come and his awesome line "I'am on the side of life" can only an epic foreshadowing of the space lord of death, Thanos.

  I can't write about this movie without mentioning the awesome fight between The Hulk and Iron Man in his hulkbuster armour dubbed "Veronica". This fight was every comic book fan's nerdgasm on screen, comic book are renown for epic hero fights such as Hulk vs. Thing, Drax vs. Thanos, Iron Man vs. Dr. Doom, Wolverine vs. The Hulk and even Batman vs. Superman. Epic comic book battles are usually landmark points in comic book story arcs and so its fitting we get to see one in the movie that ends phase three of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. 

  The most interesting dynamic thrown in the film was the developing romance between Banner and Romanov. To most comic book fans this element was found to be very confusing because The Hulk always loved Betty Ross even when she became Red She-Hulk (yeah digest that one) and Black Widow ended up having 'relations' with Hawkeye and then Captain America in the comics. Personally I was on board with this story development simply because storyline wise both of the characters have had terrible pasts, they've both been shunned by the world for their actions and the two getting together will develop both characters and bring out more well acted emotional scenes that can fill the gaps between epic fighting and explosions. 

  With all of the awesome characters in this film, I though the interaction between Captain America and Thor was spot on, their team work with dialogue and whilst fighting was one of the defining elements in the film (especially the shield and hammer combo moves). In the comics Thor always held Steve Rogers in high regard after witnessing his courage and valour in combat equally Rogers knew he could always trust Thor because his outspoken mentality and always speaking his mind, this respect even led to Captain America being able lift Thor's hammer Mjolnir in the Fear Itself arc. 

 With the Marvel Cinematic Universe ever expanding with new characters and a new team of Avengers. It's going to take alot of original thinking and revolutionary film making for Phase Three to top the last two phases. I like how Kevin Fiege ends every phase of movies with an Avengers movie and how all of the secret ending amount to an epic conclusion. Avengers: Age of Ultron was another incredibly victory and featured awesome scenes, balls out fights and even more foundation building for future characters and movies. I hope by Infinity War we'll get to see all of the MCU characters come together in massive showdown with big bad titan Thanos, but the question is where will Marvel and Disney go from there?