just a little off...

Rating: 7/10 (5 May 2015)

That's really the easiest and best way to put it. This is certainly not the worst MCU film, but it is far from the best and not the avengers sequel most were hoping for. First off, so much care and attention has gone into releasing this films in an intricate timeline, yet plays as just a sequel to avengers caring very little for the various stand alone films and the TV show. Between avengers 1 & 2, iron man, thor, & cap USA have had there own movies and 40+ episodes of AOS, yet very little is mentioned about these things. We don't see how chummy Cap and widow have become, or a mention of starks PTSD. Better example: for 10 + episodes AOS have been building up InHumans and Baron Strucker "testing" certain people (the twins) yet you don't use this incredible already developed back story to further both this film, AOS, or the future InHuman movie. Despite the fact that you've already tied this movie into the last 2 eps of AOS s2.
It comes as no surprise to now hear of Whedon's displeasure with studio notes and interference. Whether you live or hate the movie, it is clear that this just doesn't feel like Whedon, it feels like someone telling Whedon to make a Whedon film. 2 of Whedon's trademarks are his dialogue and jokes, both of which are clunky in this film. Jokes you can tell Whedon wouldn't think are funny are somehow in the movie. The most obvious examples are the Thor pool scene and Hawkeyes home, which should have been omitted and extended respectfully. Behind the scenes a combination of (whedon) being burnt out and studio notes have obviously made this film suffer unnecessarily.
But the biggest problem of all is Ultron himself. Always Whedon's Achilles heel has been his inability to build formidable and believable villains, but Ultron is possibly his worst attempt, which is a shame considering how dangerous and formidable he was in the books and should've been on film. No time is devoted to developing him at all, it's literally, he's born and then there's hundreds of him, seemingly out of nowhere, with maybe 30 seconds devoted to building his army. For God's sake he's the smartest most sophisticated A I ever conceived (save for Jarvis) and his evil plan involves a meteor and not something nuclear connected to a mainframe? That's nonsensical. In avengers 1 we get an alien army complete with giant metal worms led by Loki that took all 6 avengers to stop. Here we get an army of ultron, from nowhere, when let's be honest, vision and scarlet witch could have easily defeated all the ultron robots by themselves. In addition not enough time is spent on the twins either, made even worse by their AOS tie in that should've been.
All that said, I still found this movie entertaining and rewatchable (I've watched twice before writing this), but as a popcorn flick, which sucks sense the MCU, for the most part is more than just good popcorn flicks. But to be fair it would be hard for any film to live up to not only the hype, but the incredibly high bar set by previous MCU installments. To the studio... wise up, you've already interconnected these installments very intricately use it. To Whedon... go home, rest and count your $$, you've earned it but it has clearly taken its toll.
7.0 (avengers 1 is 8.9)