Superheroic failure

Avengers: Age of Ultron is the second film in the Avengers franchise, as written and directed by Joss Whedon, and stars Robert Downey Jr as Tony Stark (Iron Man), Chris Evans as Captain America, Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, Jeremy Renner as Hawkeye and Mark Ruffalo as Dr Bruce Banner, aka the Incredible Hulk, who probably had to be included, as no one would have wished to piss him off. (‘IF HULK NOT IN MOVIE HULK WILL THROW CAR!’) I am not among the target audience for this particular genre, but I attended with my son (22), which was useful, as I found it confusing — a lot of prior knowledge is assumed — and he was able to fully debrief me afterwards as to who was who, and where Samuel L. Jackson had suddenly come from, and who’s the funny fella with the red painted face? I don’t know what it is about the minds of young men such that they get all this but do not get picking up wet towels, or coming in at
4 a.m. and closing the front door quietly, but there you are.

I am not among the target audience, and neither am I an ardent fan of these films. I didn’t grow up on the Marvel comics, only Bunty, and ‘The Four Marys’, who never had to save humankind, and were too busy having midnight feasts anyhow. But I have not proved unwilling over the years. I enjoyed all the first of the modern superhero movies — the first Superman (Christopher Reeve), the first Batman (Michael Keaton), the first Spider-Man (Tobey Maguire) — but now that the technology has moved on they all seem much of a muchness.