‘Age of Ultron’ emerges as worthy sequel
“Avengers: Age of Ultron” is nominally a sequel to “The Avengers” (2012), which, at over 600 million dollars, is currently the third highest grossing film ever — that is, the highest grossing non-James Cameron film ever. That’s domestic box office: the worldwide total is 2 1/2 times that.
It’s really a sequel to all the preceding films in the so-called “Marvel Cinematic Universe,” whose most recent entry was last year’s “Captain America: Winter Soldier.” The Avenger characters pop up in each other’s “solo” movies, and the world of all of the films is more or less consistent. (Notable exception: the Hulk suddenly looking a lot more like Mark Ruffalo than like Edward Norton.)
“Avengers: Age of Ultron” is not as overall satisfying as “The Avengers” or (among the solo films) “Iron Man,” but it shouldn’t represent a major disappointment to anyone except (maybe) the most fanatical of followers.
This time around, the Avengers are housed in a redesigned version of Stark Tower, the former headquarters of gazillionaire/genius/wisecracker-deluxe Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), AKA Iron Man. The film opens, however, in the Eastern European nation of Sokovia. Writer/director Joss Whedon (who also made the other Avengers title) doesn’t waste any time. The gang is only seconds — OK, maybe a minute — from launching a concerted attack on the Hydra Research Base.
The action dynamics are fine, although the story is immediately complicated enough that it’s easy to lose track of just whom the team is fighting and why. By the time they’ve torn up most of the countryside, they’ve reclaimed Loki’s Sword, which I think was the goal in the first place.
The most important aspect of that initial fight is the introduction of two new characters with superpowers. We hear “Send out the twins!” intoned like the call for the release of the Kraken, and out come the Maximoffs — Pietro (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Wanda (Elizabeth Olsen), soon to be introduced as Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch. (Wasn’t there a ’60s Bay Area band with that name?) He’s basically the Flash, she is a telekinetic mind controller, and they’re both justifiably embittered war orphans, with a hatred for Tony Stark.
And Stark may well deserve it. He’s always been arrogant, but this time around, he convinces Bruce Banner (Ruffalo, without the Hulk outfit) to collaborate with him on a dangerous scientific project behind the backs of the other Avengers. Predictably, things backfire, resulting in the misbegotten Ultron (voice of James Spader), a super robot with self-consciousness, who believes — not completely irrationally — that the human race must be exterminated to allow evolution to progress.
As we know from a million other stories (“Frankenstein,” for instance), to create sentient life in any manner other than the traditional male/female coupling is to assume the power of god. God doesn’t like that, and things will inevitably turn bad. Ultron himself identifies with the world’s best known nonstandard birth: “Upon this rock I will build my church,” he proclaims.
The rest of the movie is largely action scenes, which are well done but far from the best aspects of “Age of Ultron.” The film is most engaging when the Avengers are just hanging out, arguing and trading banter. As always, Downey gets most of the good lines, but his witty remarks are not as numerous this time out.
Despite some interesting emotional developments among the others, Stark remains the anchor — the closest thing to a protagonist. But the most compelling character in the movie is Wanda/Scarlet Witch. She has the greatest conflicts of conscience and goes through the most important changes. Olsen (“Godzilla,” “Martha Marcy May Marlene”) is terrific and comes close to stealing the film.
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ANDY KLEIN is the film critic for Marquee. He can also be heard on “FilmWeek” on KPCC-FM (89.3).