In terms of great comic book movies, it can be argued that the genre didn't really find it's legs until the early 2000s with Bryan Singer's X-Men and Sam Raimi's Spider-Man. Some have argued as far back as Tim Burton's Batman, but Burton's Batman, like Richard Donner's Superman (1978) was more of an anomaly then a standard bearer. Actually, I tend to think that comic book movies didn't truly hit their stride until 2008's Iron Man, which started the great run up to what is probably the genre's best film ever: 2012's spectacular Marvel's The Avengers (the actual onscreen title, by the way).
The Avengers is a crossover movie with the heroes and/or supporting characters of five previous Marvel movies. The loose umbrella of films that came previously became known as the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Nothing like it had ever been attempted in the movies before. Surprisingly, despite the risky endeavor, the film works beautifully.
Iron Man, Captain America, Black Widow, and the Incredible Hulk--or more specifically Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Natasha Romanoff, and Bruce Banner--are called upon when Loki, brother of Thor, steals the Tesseract, a mystical cube he intends to use to conquer the world. Loki has also taken over the minds of Dr. Erik Selvig, who he plans to use to help him harness the power of the Tesseract, and a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent named Clint Barton, code name Hawkeye, who he plans to basically use as an assassin. Thor joins in when Loki is captured to try to make him give up the cube. But as Nick Fury points out, Loki seems to be the only person who wants to be on the Shield Heli-carrier.
The problem with comic book movies in general is that so few people know how to make a good one. Too often have comic book movies gone for camp or at least what they think is camp, such as the dreck that mostly made up 90s comic book movies, or else they tend to just be about explosions and fights like X-Men III: The Final Stand. Amazingly, Richard Donner laid out the blueprint for how to do it right in 1978, but too many people have missed that blue print. Luckily, Joss Whedon wasn't one of those people.
Donner taught these movies how to have a sense of humor but also a genuine sense of menace and Whedon improves on that idea with The Avengers. Yes, there's some funny bits in the film, but Loki and the Chitari are not jokes, even if Loki makes a couple of wisecracks himself. If Tom Hiddleston's Loki isn't the best comic book villain of all time, he's in the top three for certain. Maybe Heath Ledger's Joker and Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor edge him out, but it's pretty close.
This is Robert Downey Jr.'s fifth appearance as Tony Stark/Iron Man, while everyone else except Mark Ruffalo as Banner is on their second appearance. Downey has made Stark his own and turned a character not many people cared/knew about before his movies into a major player. Chris Hemsworth likewise is the living embodiment of Thor. Ruffalo becomes the third actor in the past decade to take on playing the Hulk and while I really liked Edward Norton in the role, Ruffalo is easily the best. Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow shows she can play with the big boys and surprisingly doesn't look ridiculous doing it. Chris Evans is the best actor to ever play Captain America and I frankly can't wait for Captain America: The Winter Soldier in a couple of months. Samuel L. Jackson and Clark Gregg do their usual bits as Nick Fury and Agent Coulson. Actually, Gregg has been the glue through most of these movies as the only two he doesn't show up in prior to this are 2008's The Incredible Hulk and 2011's Captain America: The First Avenger. He's a fan favorite and gets one of the best scenes in the movie when he squares off against Loki. Although the funniest scene in the movie is still Hulk meets Loki.
Whedon's film also improves on the idea of a comic book team up movie. If you really look at prior films like the X-Men, most of the movie relies on a couple members of the team, with the rest basically the useless army. The Avengers, however, gives every major player something to do and not just once in the movie. The movie treats every major hero equally, giving them all bits of business, good lines, and heroic things to accomplish. The same can be said of the actors playing those characters. The only one who tries upstaging the others is Hiddleston, and well, he's the villain with a flair for the theatrical.
As far as the 3D goes, it's a conversion from 2D. It happens to be one of the best conversions, but it's still a conversion and as such is bound to fail when compared to movies shot in Native 3D. The conversion manages to eek out some decent depth, but the pop-outs would have looked far more impressive had the movie been shot that way. Unfortunately, this is a situation that is not about to change with Marvel movies.
Is Marvel's The Avengers the best comic book movie ever? I think it just might be. Every so often a movie comes along with a sense of "wow" to it that just captures the imagination. This is one of those movies. I've already seen it half a dozen times. I try not to rewatch movies too often in order to keep them fresh but I find myself wanting to toss this in every few months. It's a great film with the right balance of story, humor, and action to please any movie buff.
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