CinemaSerf@Geronimo1967
This is not a bad follow up to the first film. "Stark" (Robert Downey Jnr.) and "Banner/Hulk" (Mark Ruffalo) have a grand design to create a computer programme that will ensure peace on Earth for ever. Snag is, that programme hoodwinks "Jarvis" as well as both of them and turns into the rather menacing James Spader iteration of "Ultron" (yes, I too thought that was a detergent!). Anyway, "Ultron" concludes, not entirely unreasonably, that peace on Earth might be more attainable if mankind were actually to be the beings eradicated, so he sets about creating the ultimate vibranium-based weapon to accomplish this most dastardly of deeds. "Stark" must now rally the "Avengers" to thwart this plan - but can they combat the seemingly insurmountable odds and rescue mankind from oblivion? The usual suspects now congregate and using their combined strength and ingenuity take on their metallic foe and his equally lethal army of minions. My favourite has to be the cute and extremely nimble "Pietro Maximoff" (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) but there are plenty of decent efforts here that give the film a collegiate feel to it. There are a lot of characters, but for the most part Joss Whedon keeps them rowing in the same direction. The dialogue is poor, though - and I found that the robotic nature of their enemy robbed the film of much of it's mythological and characterful style, replacing it with frequently over-long fight scenes that seem to wreak havoc on everyone and everything except those actually fighting. Spader has some good lines to deliver, as does Chris Hemsworth's "Thor", but oddly the two leading characters - "Stark" and Chris Evans' far too goody-goody "Capt. America" proved to be much less effective here than before, as did Scarlett Johansson's pretty underused "Natasha". Still, for the most part this long, colourful, action epic flows well and proves to be an enjoyable big screen experience.