The Avengers (2012)

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I can still remember the hype between my peers and me on this project coming to light. I mean, this was it! A movie that so many people thought would never come to fruition finally came to the big screen, and there was no way it wouldn't be glorious. We don't think about it much nowadays, but at the time, this was completely unprecedented. Although we had team-up movies like the 'X-Men' films already, this marked a handful of separate intellectual properties crossing over in a way we never really thought possible.

Mr. Kevin Feige took this idea that comic book movies could potentially cross over with each other because comics do it all the time, ran with it, and it was one of the simplest yet groundbreaking ideas, not just in comic book movie history, but, from my perspective at least, in overall cinematic history. The formula of introducing heroes over the course of a few years, only to have them come together in the end, worked out beautifully, as there was no real need for a lot of character intro and development throughout the film. We already knew what we needed to know about all of these characters going into this.

The plot digs up the Tesseract (from 'First Avenger') for SHIELD to study. Remember that, back when this came out, this was the big MacGuffin, and what it would become later was just one of six powerful Infinity Stones. The Tesseract turns out to function as a portal through space, and fast than you can say "assemble," Loki (Tom Hiddleston) turns up, aiming to use the Tesseract to summon an alien army known as the Chutari to attack Earth, and allow him to rule it with an iron fist because he's still hurt about getting denied that Asgardian throne. This ends up being the threat that brings the Avengers - Earth's mightiest heroes- together.

Going back to what I said about "there was no real need for a lot of character intro and development throughout the film," of course, that only truly applies to Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) and Bruce Banner (now and since portrayed by Mark Ruffalo). Though side characters in previous films, they do manage to give us a bit more background on Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), as we learn that they're old friends who have worked together on covert missions in the past, a friendship that would later become very important.

With Thor's brother, Loki, as the central villain in the film, one might assume Thor would take centre stage as the primary hero, thereby tilting the team dynamic. Surprisingly, however, they nailed it with the dynamic. Something about watching geniuses Banner and Stark work together always intrigued me, and they play pretty well off each other. You also get the first personality clashes between Stark and Rogers here, which would eventually lead to 'Civil War.' Interestingly enough, going back to this, you can see a lot of seeds planted for things to come.

To me, this is pretty much the epitome of a great, not so much a "superhero film" but a comic series adaptation. The way I see it, 'Thor' put his fist through that wall of "keeping it grounded", but 'The Avengers' demolished the wall clean through and said "it's time to make things actually look like a comic book". It was truly a breath of fresh air and ushered in a whole new standard when it came to letting superheroes loose, and for once, not completely grounding them. There was even this crazy thought of "it can only get bigger and better from here." And it did (well, for the most part)!

'The Avengers' stands out as one of my all-time favourite films, largely due to what it represented at the time and what has come out of it since. When you get right down to it, it's one of the most important (like it or not) films ever created, heightening everything superhero films could be. While it's understandable that superhero fatigue has set in among most people nowadays, one still can't deny the power this movie had at the time, making the box office explode with sales, becoming ultimately successful, and going down in history as a benchmark for the superhero genre, which, itself, would also explode after this.

5/5

MID-CREDIT SCENE: Failing the first attack on Earth, Thanos is notified and teased to be a part of the upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe, and the 'Infinity War' storyline was coming.

POST-CREDIT SCENE: Perhaps more famous than the mid-credit scene, The Avengers sit around eating shawarma in the aftermath of the Battle of New York.

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