Age of Ultron acts as a fun vehicle to
introduce new characters, phase out (temporarily, I stand sure) old characters, and solidify the new Avengers roster.
Ironman 2 tried to achieve the same
ends, to introduce its fans to Black Widow and War Machine. Ironman 2 failed to function much
further than that and thus became the only real disappointment in the Marvel
Cinematic Universe.
Ultron introduces us to Scarlet Witch
and Quicksilver, two properties that Marvel and Fox fought over for years.
Back when Marvel
Comics faced one of many bankruptcies, they saved themselves with the sales of their
movie rights to several of their properties, to include Spiderman and Fantastic Four. This also included the sale of cinematic
rights for X-Men to Fox.
However, in
Marvel’s comic universe, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver serve not only as
Avengers, but also as mutants, the children of super villain, Magneto, who
appears regularly in X-Men.
Producers for both
movie franchises dispute who, therefore, owns the rights to Scarlet Witch and
Quicksilver.
Fox decided to use
Quicksilver in their latest X-Men movie, Days
of Future Past, but they avoided Quicksilver’s name and relation to
Magneto, treated him as a different character that just happened to share
Quicksilver’s superhuman speed.
Marvel, as a
preemptive strike against litigation, decided that Quicksilver and Scarlet
Witch no longer existed as mutants, let alone X-Men (Marvel somehow sold the
very concept of mutation to Fox).
These two characters
now officially gained their super powers via experimentation.
Fans receive
explanations for these experiments in Marvel’s television show, Agents of Shield.
That same story
arc from Agents helps to set the
stage for Marvel’s movie, Inhumans,
scheduled for release in November of 2018.
Ultron, meanwhile, offers a lot of
action, excellent characters, great dialogue, and topical, political debate—all
the ingredients that helped MCU rise in a genre so few producers take seriously.
Tony Stark (Iron
Man) and Steve Rodgers (Captain America) butt heads often.
Both of these characters represents a different point of view, born from the best of
intentions, on how to keep the world safe (one made billions of dollars designing
weapons, and the other carries a giant shield).
The previous movie
to feature both of these characters, Avengers,
ended with a massive, destructive assault against New York, an obvious
representation of the 9-11 terrorist attack.
Stark and Rodgers
argue about the best way to prevent the next attack.
Scarlet Witch even
uses her super powers to force Stark to visualize his worst fears, to motivate
him to act out of terror, behave in reckless fashion for “the greater good.”
However, when Scarlet attempts to use those same powers on Rodgers, he visualizes only what he lost
from WWII. He recalls the costs of war.
Artificial
intelligence serves as another subject of debate in Ultron. Robots, especially those with artificial intelligence, seem
to surface in abundance in this year’s movies (Terminator, Chappie, Ex Machina, Star
Wars, and so forth).
I cannot help but
wonder about Thor’s current relationship with his girlfriend. Thor can’t get a
regular job. He stands overqualified for most anything. Plus, he entered our
country illegally—don’t roll your eyes at me!
I imagine that
Thor just hangs out at Natalie Portman’s apartment and drives her nuts.
Yeah, I meandered
all over the place with this review, but, honestly, do you need me to tell you
about this movie’s qualifications? You must
know by now if this experience interests you.
The next Marvel movie,
Ant-man, continues to command my
curiosity. Why would Marvel choose to end phase 2 of their theatrical releases
with Ant-man rather than with the
obvious choice of Ultron? Time shall
tell.
Daughters of Darkwana received a sweet, succinct
review, which you can read here, http://www.thebookeaters.co.uk/daughters-of-darkwana-by-martin-wolt-jr/
Also,
the third book in my series, Diaries of
Darkwana, recently arrived on Kindle. You can find the entire series at http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_2?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Darkwana&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3ADarkwana
An
inside look at my novels (such as Daughters of Darkwana, which you can now find on Kindle) at Darkwana.blogspot.com
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