Mad and crazy stuff super hero stuff

Rating: 9/10 (11 December 2014)

Having enjoyed Thor and also the Iron Man films, I felt this combination should be mind blowing. I wasn't disappointed.
First of all, if you haven't seen Thor, then don't watch this film. You won't follow the set up. Its this which holds the film together and explains much.
The film starts with SHIELD'S discovery of something called the Tesseract. The Tesseract contains some kind of intense energy and SHIELD employs Dr Eric Selvig to try and understand its energy. Hot on the heels of Selvig's investigations is Loki of Asgard, a super villain and brother of Thor with breathtaking ambition. Loki comes in, uses the Tesseract to enslave both Selvig and Hawkeye and gets both on his side. Cue Nick Fury who has to get together the other members of the Avengers group. These include Natasha Romanov, Dr Bruce Banner, Captain America Steve Rogers and Iron Man Tony Stark. It also includes Thor who comes along in hot pursuit of Loki to try and bring him back to Asgard and face justice.
Cue lots of thrilling set pieces. There is Stark's extraordinary tower, based on his clean energy ideas, Thor and Loki's humorous verbal sparring parodied by Tony Stark and Tony Stark and Steve Rogers' verbal sparring. All play nicely off against each other. There is Natasha's moment with Loki, the team coming together on board SHIELD's ship and finally the incredible attack by the Chitari on New York, led by Loki.
As is usual with these dazzling things, much of the plot flies out of the window amidst the extraordinary visuals. Tom Hiddleston's Loki has a nicely subtle play out and seems to be more than comfortable in his role. Chris Hemsworth wears his Thor well. Robert Downey Jnr is as wonderfully wisecracking as ever, Chris Evans gives his elder statesman Captain America a well rounded character as totally different from his jack-the-lad role as one of the Fantastic Four, Scartlett Johansson plays Romanov with coolness and Mark Ruffalo adds a sharper performance to Bruce Banner than I've seen in a long time. Jeremy Renner is a bit too quiet for Hawkeye. Combined that with Nick Fury and the other members of SHIELD and you have experience which rises out of what could be a very overwhelming movie experience.