Effortlessly ties together various story arcs, with great action and plenty of laugh-out-loud moments

Rating: 9/10 (4 May 2012)

I've never been a comic book geek but have seen all the Marvel movies thus far (the sole exception being Iron Man 2) and have loved them all. Until now, Thor was my favorite, simply because I was a huge fan of the otherworldly cinematography, the Shakespearean dialogue and characters, and because I found Tom Hiddleston's Loki to be the most captivating villain in any superhero movie to date. So, perhaps just as much as seeing The Avengers come together, I was equally stoked to see Loki again as the arch-nemesis. Simply put, he was fantastic. There is a scene when he confronts Black Widow, about halfway through the film, that is nothing short of haunting and allows him to show his full range of talents. He's brilliant.
As far as The Avengers themselves... Joss Whedon does two things very well here. First, he allows each character ample time to harness and exhibit its individual conflicts, and how they would play out among the team. After all, putting four superheroes in a room and asking them to play nicely should be no easy task, given the massive egos you would expect to be involved. Whedon plays this collective angst out very nicely. Second, he ties all the story lines from the individual movies together, in a near seamless fashion. Amazingly, everything made a good deal of sense as it came together, with no major storyline flaws. Quite the accomplishment, given the diversity of many of the stories told in each film.
Robert Downey is great, capturing the cynicism and narcissism of Tony Stark better than he did in the original. Captain America and Thor bring unexpected humanity to their roles. Mark Ruffalo as the Hulk was quite the surprise, as he does what Eric Bana and Edward Norton failed to do, and that is underplay Banner (rather than portray him as a neurotic, hyper fool). The best Hulk yet. Scarlett Johannsen does a very nice job as Black Widow, also conveying deep emotion and pain.
Probably the best dynamic is between Stark and Banner... two intellectual geeks who form quite a bond that is believable.
Lastly, I saw it in IMAX and that probably added an extra point to my 9/10 rating, as seeing it in a less profound format wouldn't quite capture everything that is on display here. All in all, definitely worth seeing and I'll be back in the theatre again before it's on DVD, which will certainly be in my collection.