NOOOO! COULSONNNNN! They butchered my boy! 0/5 for killing Agent Coulson! Poor Phil. That scene genuinely made me shed a tear.
The Avengers was another film that was never my favourite when it came out, but like Thor, I have a new-found appreciation for it.
The stakes were real, the writing was decent, the pacing felt good, and the humour still hits (for me).
I think my favourite part of the film was when Steve hands Fury a $10 bill. That bit was great!
If you don’t know… (optional reading, click to unfold)
…there’s this joke spanning two scenes. Since they aren’t back-to-back, many people, including myself, missed it when the film first came out. At this point, considering the age of the film, you’ve probably noticed it yourself or been told about it, but I’ll go over it anyways because I like it.
When Nick Fury goes to ask Steve Rogers to join them, Cap says, “At this point, I doubt anything would surprise me.”, to which Fury responds, “Ten bucks says you’re wrong.”. Later, when they first arrive at the helicarrier, without saying a word, Cap hands Fury a $10 bill, indicating Fury won the bet; Steve had seen something that surprised him.
Here’s the clips (with subtitles):
Another fun detail: I could hear the iPhone “Alarm” sound at the beginning during the scene where Loki shows up at the S.H.I.E.L.D. facility to steal the Tesseract.
Speaking of whom, I didn’t like Loki in this film, to me it felt like a regression from where the character was in Thor, which both IRL and in the MCU timeline, precedes this one.
The smile he keeps doing, this one…
..freaking sucks.
I don’t know what the deal is, but to me it felt like the character was less relatable in this film. I suppose I can understand not wanting a relatable villain, but you want relatable characters. In Thor, Loki was relatable - he just wanted to be loved and respected and appreciated and told the truth - but who was he relatable for in Avengers? Dictators? I can’t imagine many, if any, Loki fans, who loved the character’s introduction in Thor, found him as relatable in this one.
I briefly touched on Hulk in my The Incredible Hulk review, but I much prefer Mark Ruffalo’s portrayal of Bruce Banner, and the look of his Hulk, compared to Edward Norton’s. I thought Mark’s portrayal had a lot more depth, I especially liked the timidness of the Bruce Banner character in Ruffalo’s portrayal as well.
Don’t get me wrong, I have my issues with Hulk as the MCU progresses, we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, but that’s writing-related, not Ruffalo-related. Regardless, in this film I really like the Hulk character altogether.
Overall, as I said, I have a new-found appreciation for this film, and really appreciated the film this time watching it.
ℑ