If you’re one of the few dozen people in the world who hasn’t seen The Avengers yet, I’ll tell you the best way to take it in. Hit a matinee screening in a theater filled with kids—especially very small roundheaded ones, the ones still closer to being animals than people—that’s where you get the purity of the experience. Kids can hardly get over how much they love this movie—it’s beyond their frail strength to contain it. They let out these wild shouting laughs—HAAAAH-hahahahahahaha!!—to signify maximum glee.
I like to see the kids happy. It’s a weakness of mine.
There’s this one scene where the Hulk—the favorite of all the children, naturally—he’s their man—picks up the villain Loki, who’s in the middle of a pompous speech about his own godly powers, and holding him by his feet, swings him overhead and smashes him on the floor repeatedly, from one side to the next, smash, smash, smash. The way the kids shrieked with joy over this was really heartwarming, a young-primate recognition of the thrilling destructive force you can generate with the overhead-arm-swing.
So I watched The Avengers in the spirit of gentle amusement. Comic books aren’t my thing and writer-director Joss Whedon gives me a pain, but hell, this experience wasn’t designed for ME. It’s a kid-and-young-adult extravaganza. I admit it’s a little weird the way the whole world seems to be trying to cram into that demographic, making this movie the biggest box office champ since the last crossover juvenile-to-adult sensation, Harry Potter. Kid stuff, that’s where the pop culture excitement is these days. Admittedly, kid stuff is strangely colonized by greybeards in baseball caps and sneakers still cuddling their Star Wars action figures and grandmothers swooning over cute teen vampires. But that’s a rant for another day. Today we’re sticking with gentle amusement.
I’m sure I don’t have to tell you the plot, but for form’s sake I’ll give you the gist. There’s this Blue Cube of Power, I forget what it’s called, doesn’t matter, that’s being studied at the Super Secret Underground Headquarters presided over by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), stalking around in a black leather coat and eyepatch.
His grim-faced military-assistant types also stalk around, especially this one tall narrow brunette female second-in-command who’s given so much screen time overall that it’s crazy, makes you start wondering what the hell, is she a superhero in training or something that we should care? Or she just looks so blandly like a comic book drawing of a hot female, she’s reassuring to Marvel fans? Or maybe we’re over-thinking this, and she’s the producer’s girlfriend?
Anyway, the demigod Loki (Tom Hiddleston) still on the same quest for multi-world domination that he was pursuing in the movie Thor, busts in and steals it. During the first battle for the Cube, he “turns” a couple of characters who are on “Team Good” to “Team Evil” by sticking his pointy blue-glowing sceptor/spear thing into their chests.
So you’re already expecting the comic relief you get later: Loki stabs Tony Stark’s chest with his blue glow-stick and hits the metal Iron Man battery-pack where Stark’s heart should be, and it makes a humorously anti-climactic clinking sound, followed by an awkward pause. Ha!
Sounds kind of corny, you say? Oh, that’s nothing. Massive corn-shucking in this film, corn piled everywhere, cornpone, corn fritters, corn syrup, corn as high as an elephant’s eye, the Feast of Our Great God Corn!
Moving on, Nick Fury assembles the team of superheroes to recover the Cube and defeat Loki. We like seeing heroic teams assembled, the whole process of having to go get each separate member and persuade him or her to join and all that, ever since Seven Samurai nailed it down as a super-satisfying narrative development. So we get Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Captain America (Chris Evans) and the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), and later we’ll have to recover Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) from the forces of darkness. Initially they all dislike each other and squabble and indulge their egos and have to learn to Work Together As a Team.
This part of the film is largely modeled on the old World War II propaganda-movie, featuring a platoon of melting-pot Americans of assorted races, ethnicities, religions, creeds, and regional backgrounds who have to overcome their differences to become a fighting unit to beat the Axis powers.
Which is appropriate, because if you want to get analytical about it—and nobody does, since I haven’t read a single review that’s mentioned it—this movie reveres retro, naïve, blinders-on World War II-era patriotism. That’s why Steve Rogers/Captain America and Tony Stark/Iron Man are the main two superheroes pitted against each other in a clash of old vs. new American values, and ultimately Tony Stark cedes authority to Captain America, who becomes Team Leader.
Captain America starts off as a pathetic “Iceman,” literally defrosted after 70 years. Hopelessly out of touch with contemporary culture, he’s a stalwart, square, provincial American lunkhead who never gets the joke. Informed that Loki and Thor should be feared as demi-gods, Captain America says flatly, “There’s only one God, ma’am, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t dress like that.”
Tony Stark is merciless with him, and rightly so. Stark represents the superhero as wised-up ultramodern man, trusting almost nobody, committed to Doing Good in a tricky, wary, complicated way that’s necessary in such a corrupt, impossible world as this one. To him, Captain America’s a big dope in “a spangly suit,” a liability.
He’s right, of course, but this movie’s never going to let Stark lead. No, instead we go back one more time to the “Greatest Generation” myth that what you really need to win a world war is a big heart, a big stick, big pecs, and big reverence for authority.
I’m heading into a rant again, aren’t I? Sorry! But it does get a bit thick, the way every world war, even the fantasy one involving Norse gods, is just World War II all over again. You’ll hardly believe your eyes and ears when Loki flies down to the Stuttgart Opera House just so he can confront a bunch of German opera-lovers, fascist-style, telling them they don’t really long for freedom, they long for subjugation, stuff right out of Hitler’s Mein Kampf playbook. They all kneel before him (Germans! Sheesh! What is wrong with those people?) except for one brave old guy, clearly meant to be a menschy survivor of the Nazi regime. Here’s their timeless exchange:
Loki: “In the end, you will always kneel.”
Old Mensch: “Not to men like you.”
Loki: “There are no men like me!”
Old Mensch: “There are always men like you.”
You begin to feel sorry for poor Loki after awhile, because no one seems able to grasp the demi-god concept in this movie. Every order of being in the galaxy is just another buncha fellas like the ones we had to fight back in dubya-dubya-two.
But there’s no point griping about established superhero fantasies at this late date; the fucking things are set in stone. You risk sounding like some idiot Village Voice critic (Karina Longworth, in this case) who just can’t grasp the concept of popular entertainment and is always moaning about the lack of depth and seriousness in big loud wisecracking 3-D action jamborees:
The final act of The Avengers consists of an insanely complex action set piece, containing some truly cool visual shit, not least the alien army summoned by Loki, which arrives in some kind of undulating, indestructible, prehistoric flying fish. But really, who cares about another battle? We know how this is going to end. The long, technically bravura sequence is given dramatic tension only by occasional scraps of dialogue, such as a two-line exchange between Natasha and Barton over a job they worked in Budapest, alluding to the mysterious lives they’d all been leading before this movie. Then, a few minutes later, Iron Man breaks a moment of tension with a homophobic wisecrack. Every time the movie hints at something rich and evocative, Whedon undercuts it with a punchline—his instincts as a big-picture storyteller crippled by his short-term need to please the crowd.
Yeah, you don’t want any crowd-pleasing when you go see a superhero movie, you’re really hoping for something more like Ingmar Bergman’s Scenes From a Marriage. But somehow, dammit, it’s never the least bit Bergmanesque. A critic’s lament!
Anyway, back here in the world of sane moviegoers, there’s lot of loud, diverting nonsense going on in The Avengers, and plenty of time for each of the actors/superheroes to do an enjoyably hammy turn amidst all the CGI. Except, strangely enough, Robert Downey Jr., who actually contains himself here, perhaps under some contractual obligation to steal only a certain percentage of scenes and let the other, slower actors have a chance. Mark Ruffalo method-acts the hell out of his Bruce Banner/Hulk character, doing all sorts of “interior” work, hunched postures and half-swallowed lines indicating suppressed emotion, which is all delightful, but none of that helps him as much as his remarkable facial resemblance to The Hulk. Ruffalo looks like a repressed, incipient Hulk anyway. The buff Chrises, Hemsworth and Evans, are more steroidally expansive than ever, muscle-wise, and that’s their real cinematic fascination. Chris Evans’ head looks too small and pointy for his immense puffy shoulders.
Look Ma, no CGI!
As for Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, I read an amazing review by Roger Ebert in which he claims he and his film critic pals had a long conversation after the movie, trying to figure out what her superpower is. He and his hundred-year-old, asexual film critic pals, one assumes, if they really had to wonder. We’re getting dangerously far away from the visceral joys of film when Scarlett Johansson doing martial arts in a catsuit doesn’t register as a super-powered sex bomb.
Or maybe—and I may have mentioned this before—maybe we need some younger, or at least livelier, film critics.
Read more: action film, comic books, Hulk, Iron Man, Joss Whedon, Mark Ruffalo, Robert Downey Jr, Samuel L. Jackson, Scarlett Johansson, superheroes, The Avengers, Thor, Eileen Jones, movies
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75 Comments
Add your own1. gc | May 7th, 2012 at 6:28 pm
Well observed re the nostalgia for World War II film moral simplistic-ness.
I’m afraid I was too busy being annoyed by the “New York/America coming together” 9/11 nostalgia to notice.
2. GhostUnit | May 7th, 2012 at 6:36 pm
I can’t get over how stupid it was the way the alien army was defeated:
So all it takes to defeat vastly superior alien technology is to launch one (1) run-of-the-mill nuke at them? boy, we have dozens of thousands of them just in America!
And then the rest of the army drops dead when cut-off from the mothership? how convenient.
Indeed, this movie is for kids. But I’m an adult now… I can only partially enjoy this kind of movie anymore.
3. motorfirebox | May 7th, 2012 at 7:49 pm
The thing about Cap is, he really is old-school. He is an old-school liberal: a New Deal Democrat, from back when the Dems were the Christian party; he’s a fan of social justice, labor unions, equality for minorities, and going to church every Sunday. The kind of creature you rarely see today outside of certain coffee shops, and not to be confused with the today’s avarice-driven “Christian” right wing.
Ebert’s review is hilarious. Complain that Avengers is same-old same-old and then make the joke about comic book nerds needing to get laid more? Tone deaf much? Biggest box office draw in history = no longer the territory of guys who live in their moms’ basements.
4. DrunktankDan | May 7th, 2012 at 8:04 pm
Wow that article needs an edit.
So, uh, should I take my girlfriend to see this or not? Will I get a blowjob out of it or a yawn?
Questions that need answering. . .
5. Kyle | May 7th, 2012 at 8:04 pm
Ok first the chick u wine about in the begging of ur rant is agent hill who helps tony stark betray the worlds super heroes in civil war sec caps not dumb he’s out of time and sad and having flash backs he isn’t easily tricked he doesn’t know this world he is lost he knows stealth special ops and has experience and is a genius traction who knows this weapon iron man can’t be trusted and his cocky attitude he does not represent the young he is a perfect showing of the rich baby not getting what he wants
6. Sam | May 7th, 2012 at 8:25 pm
God bless ya – an excellent piece of writing. And yes, I am one of the “dozens” who hasn’t seen this nor shall I.
As for Ebert, christ he used to party with Hef but yeah now he’s a wizened old lump. I bet you he’s going to live another 20 years though.
7. rick | May 7th, 2012 at 8:38 pm
“Masterpiece of 11 year old cinema” is how I described this, so I agree with Eileen, I think. If you were 12, this would be your favorite movie. I liked it a lot, even though I almost *hated* “Thor,” “Captain America” and “Incredible Hulk.” The final act is the best superhero battle in the history of these movies. Roger Ebert should read Wikipedia articles about comic book characters like a normal human, “Black Widow” has no superpowers.
8. bulfinch | May 7th, 2012 at 8:52 pm
I’m glad kids still like this stuff. As a painfully shy kid from a troubled home, grape Crush, a cheek-full of Now & Laters and my stash of lifted comic books really got me through. There’s just something about newsprint splashed with half-tone color and talk bubbles that helps usher away the crud. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ve ever seen that magic translate well to film. In particular, the costumes. They always seem less…fun.
Seeing these same heroes ‘n’ villains today, rendered all spit-shined and waxy-looking in the various movie trailers for this and other films, I’ve noticed how everything seems a little attenuated; less spazzy and splashy. The costumes are toned-down, festooned with super-technical and clunky molded inserts and misc. quasi military accoutrement. What is that? A bid to make them look less hokey? Who’s that for? Where are the tights and primary colors? Where’s Thor’s cool winged hat? Where’s Captain America’s royal blue chainmail? The Hulk’s crazy purple trousers? Why does everything look like Kevlar and Gore-Tex? why are the colors so muted and Ralph Lauren-y? In the comic books, Spider-man always had a cheap-ass costume and sometimes you’d see Peter Parker, a hand-to-mouth photojournalist, sitting on the edge of his single bed, stitching up some tears to his tights. That was cool.
9. Vendetta | May 7th, 2012 at 11:09 pm
Was a good a popcorn entertainment flick. Saw it with all my younger siblings, everyone had a great time.
10. The Gubbler | May 8th, 2012 at 2:42 am
When I was a dumb kid (or “fucktard” if you like), The first three Superman films blew my mind.
A few years ago, I watched Superman III again.
It still blew my mind.
Even Ingmar Bergman might have appreciated it. Perhaps that is a bit of a stretch. Superman was in the original movie however, locked in a small space (something near to a closet) on his journey to Earth by his father who also happened to have some sort of leadership role in the Krypton community. Perhaps Kryptonite’s true debilitating power was in bringing back supressed traumatic memories of that experience.
I don’t know if Bergman ever saw the Superman movies.
I assume film critics still by and large suck, but perhaps some of them at least can remember the charm, simplicity and effectiveness of well done pre-CGI special effects, especially when there was good music behind them.
Perhaps I am being tedious, but does anyone remember Bigfoot and Wildboy???
Anyhow, the bottom line for me is the superhero movies they are making these days are no damn good, and the kids these days will be much worse off for having watched them. Imaginatively stunted most likely.
Also, if you want to save this poor generation from total ruin, at least give them Latin American studies in high school.
11. The Gubbler | May 8th, 2012 at 2:54 am
Superman Vs. Clark Kent
(the aspect ratio is off)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XY3dxb5OpIw
12. El Hombre Malo | May 8th, 2012 at 2:57 am
Allways envisioned C.America as a true Rooseveltian. Lee and Kirby were both left leaning and the writers that took over in the late 60s and 70s were for the most part college educated urbanites.
.
How else would a spanish kid of communist parents end up liking a guy who wears a star spangled unitard?
13. The Gubbler | May 8th, 2012 at 3:42 am
And lastly. I would like to say, that I hope all of you found my Superman comments at least slightly less sucky than those made by “Bill” (or wussy-ass Quentin) at the end of Kill Bill Part II (I was also disappointed by the end of Superman IV which I did not mention on purpose, but perhaps disappointed is the wrong word as Superman IV had much more potential than the Kill Bill thing, though there were a couple of moments unlike in Inglorious Basterds which apart from the projection on smoke effect was pretty much worthless IMO (how I hate that man’s dialogue, he never ceases to rub me the wrong way, and how dare he extoll the virtues of Chartreuse which I am sure he has not a clue how to properly drink)).
14. notabooj | May 8th, 2012 at 5:08 am
This is what I dig about the eXiled.
You have this:
That’s gold, for any kind of “social commentary” site. Especially one that’s “progressive”. That observation has so much fat on it, you have to take a crap an hour after you dig in. The infantilization of the American mind by consumer culture (a call for us to take up Our duty, to tell them what’s really good and gently nudge and goad them away from prole dross)! Something something superheroes, something fascism! The nerd-punching practically writes itself.
But here, it gets a nod, and that’s it. I love that kind of genuinely populist restraint.
@3
I like your description of Cap. That’s a Captain America whose movie I’d want to see.
Plus, you have to understand that when a person, especially a status-anxious low-end critic like Ebert who’s desperate enough that he’s willing to take anemic punches at video games of all things, is talking about “nerds”, they’re really talking about class.
Incidentally, I’d recommend Paul Fussel’s “Class: A Guide Through the American Status System” for examination. It’s been a while since I’ve read it, and I was a different person, so there might be some poison in there that I missed, and it’s old, but still.
15. Amit Chokshi | May 8th, 2012 at 5:25 am
Pretty snarky commentary that reveals little knowledge of the actual comics. And yes there are of course many formulaic aspects of it but not to the detriment of the story.
First of all, the movie is supposed to be based on the Marvel comic universe Avengers characters. Let’s also first note that Marvel has primarily written a lighter type of story for its primary characters – Spiderman, Fantastic Four, Avengers – some like X-Men became much more serious (and I think X-Men First Class got into that storyline a bit) as were some Hulk storylines – but Marvel storylines are not going to be written to be highly serious so the movies, if attempting to be faithful to the storyline and overall atmosphere of the comics, would seek out this light hearted setting. The Avengers are not like Batman.
Downey Jr is a great Iron Man IF you have ever read the Iron Man comics. Captain America is SUPPOSED to be idealism personified and guess what he IS the leader of the Avengers in the comic books, really has nothing to do with what Whedon infused into the movie. Iron Man and Capt America don’t get along in the Marvel storyline either. In fact the two have been at very opposite ends of things (Civil War storyline). The movie was faithful to what the comics were so your quibbling about stuff that originated in soem cases from the 60s…
Next touching on the WWII feel…again this is due to a total lack of understanding of the Marvel universe. Marvel’s main creative team was Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Stan “Lee” Lieber infused a number of WWII aspects into his main characters. Capt America’s main opponent Red Skul was a Nazi…Spiderman’s parents were killed by Nazis…Magneto of the Xmen storyline escaped from Nazi concentration camps. These have been consistent themes in Marvel storylines since the 60s – 2000+.
There’s plenty of formulaic stuff, gratuitous a$$ shots from GP and SJ, but the actual interaction of the characters was excellent and a lot of your “ah ha” points are due to having no familiarity with the storyline. Or better said, you pointing out the WWII melting pop approach as some sort of key technique used in the movie would illicit a “no sht” reaction to anyone familiar with Marvel superheros – the melting pot and fighting amongst those with different backgrounds before ultimately uniting – fantastic four, x-men, avengers – key part of the marvel universe for decades.
16. Ozinator | May 8th, 2012 at 6:13 am
Americans are embarrassing. Weren’t comic books back when these simple heroes were created, just a way for gay writers and artists to express their fetishes in repressed times? I remember reading an interview with Gore Vidal where he delighted over Charlton Heston having no idea he starred in his big gay movie. I imagine these comic book authors feel great to see all the bullies want to be batman and superman.
17. ariot | May 8th, 2012 at 6:26 am
I get it is a comic action romp for kids and kids at heart. What I dont get is the cultural tweenification of everything– EVERYTHING!
18. Leviathan | May 8th, 2012 at 6:30 am
Finally! A snarky but smart review of the best snarky but smart film of the decade.
A couple of points you may have missed. I think part of Whedon’s amazing genius in this film is that he gives the fanboys (and girls) a stand-in, forces the superheroes to notice him, then gives him the most memorable line AND heroic sacrifice scene! Stellar!
And this gets to the bigger point of the film, which is that no one, and I mean NO ONE should ever unquestioningly follow orders or blindly follow anything or anyone. There it is, the American ideal, updated and superheroified. In an age when all systems are corrupted, we always have to question who is barking orders at us. So Nick Fury doesn’t follow orders, and none of his men do either. Even Captain America learns the value of questioning authority here. Does this mean the end of “civilization?” Hardly. It is crowdsourcing elevated to a higher order. Or maybe crowdsourcing was inspired by the occasional and temporary coming together of superheroes in the face of calamity?
Loved this movie. Can’t wait to see it again. Reminded me of Star Wars, which I saw as a child 7 or 8 times. It is much better, by the way, if you either read the comics (I didn’t) or saw all the earlier films (I did).
19. gc | May 8th, 2012 at 8:05 am
&8
Agreed.
20. Jaime | May 8th, 2012 at 8:38 am
@8 – the tweaks to the iconic costumes you’re wondering about are attempts to make the costumes more ‘believable’, no doubt to better align them with the BICYCLE THIEF-esque Neo-Realist elements that are part and parcel of cinematic adaptations of superhero stories. Really – read up on the studio’s endless conceptual paroxysms over Superman’s costume before they finally made SUPERMAN RETURNS and settled on…the original costume.
21. piss sculpture | May 8th, 2012 at 9:32 am
Ebert should just be thrown in an incinerator already, nowdays he’s a bitter dying troll, nothing more.
22. radii | May 8th, 2012 at 10:55 am
Hollywood has done a pretty good job, overall, with these superhero movies the past 10 years or so, but they are just flash and dazzle and mostly hokum … hopefully, one day, we’ll get an interesting director doing The Inhumans, or an Avengers movie with Vision, Wanda and Dr. Strange
23. zog | May 8th, 2012 at 12:15 pm
The avengers movie was the first one I had ever seen in 3d. They made me buy the glasses, which is now stored in the glovebox of the Toyota I live in coz I wont get caught like that again but it was fun, I must admit.
@3 I know! Its terriblle how movie scriptwriters resort to the whole “destroy the mothhership and deactivate all the drones” BS. Like aliens thousands of years more advanced than us wouldnkt have figured out some basic autonomous functions we’ve been using since we figured out how to kill a terrorist groom and bride with a robot plane. (Special mention in this regard for the utterly rancid Battle: Los Angeles)
As for you Eileen: I don’t know what you look like. I don’t know if you are really John Dolan. I don’t know what you smell like… but I want to breed with you.
24. Tice with a J | May 8th, 2012 at 4:19 pm
Sounds kind of corny, you say? Oh, that’s nothing. Massive corn-shucking in this film, corn piled everywhere, cornpone, corn fritters, corn syrup, corn as high as an elephant’s eye, the Feast of Our Great God Corn!
Hey! I resent that entirely accurate assessment of a movie I enjoyed!
Corniness aside, thank you for the insightful review. For what it’s worth, I unironically love “The Avengers”. I’m a big fan of the old comics that inspired the movie (the Blue Cube of Power is called a “tesseract” in the movie, but I prefer its original title, the Cosmic Cube) and I had a lot of fun seeing my favorite ridiculous four-color fantasies spring to glorious life.
That said, I’m glad they toned down some of the more ridiculous elements when translating the comics to film. As I see it, the comic book format both has a greater freedom to exaggerate than film does and a greater need to exaggerate. The comics had to do all they could to bring the worlds and characters to life. If they replicated all that in the movies, it would be so flamboyantly bombastic that nobody would believe it for a second. As it stands, I’m rather pleased with the artistic decisions they made in making this movie, and I look forward to seeing Captain America punch some neo-Nazis in his upcoming sequel.
25. Flying Kiwi | May 8th, 2012 at 7:10 pm
I’d noticed a film with this title doing the rounds and thought it was salute to the great British TV series “The Avengers” from the ’60s with Patrick McGoohan as John Steel and – the template for super-powered sex bombs plus genteel modesty – Diana Rigg as Emma Peel.
Had it been I still would not have gone to see it as there is no way Hollywood could ever recapture the pure, understated, slide-sideways-past-the-censor eroticism of those adventures (although one episode with Emma doing S&M was banned by US censors!)
26. matt | May 8th, 2012 at 7:31 pm
“Kid stuff, that’s where the pop culture excitement is these days. Admittedly, kid stuff is strangely colonized by greybeards in baseball caps and sneakers still cuddling their Star Wars action figures and grandmothers swooning over cute teen vampires. But that’s a rant for another day. Today we’re sticking with gentle amusement.”
Write it up Eileen! I think most of us can see this colonization of “kid stuff” by old men who have nothing else going for them. An eXile style attack on such people would feel mighty nice.
27. Trevor | May 9th, 2012 at 5:25 am
It sounds pretty terrible but par for the course for Whedon. I don’t know why the geeks are always so enamored with that hack.
28. techno | May 9th, 2012 at 10:30 am
Am I the only one around here who did not grow with this stuff? My parents were both part of the Swedish-American / Midwest / Lutheran anti-war movement in the 1930s. Both my grandfathers had protested USA entry into World War One and refused to cooperate with their draft boards. The chance that my parents would have allowed a Marvel comic book into our house was considerably less than zero.
And you know, they were right. There IS a link between subjecting children to this sort of warmongering propaganda and a population that is OK with Gitmo and torture—that actually cheered when we invaded Iraq. The rest of the world hates us for our murderous ways. I am not sure we should be celebrating the cultural roots of everything that makes us evil in the eyes of everyone else on the planet.
29. gc | May 9th, 2012 at 11:17 am
So basically, your grandparents were willing to let imperial Germany conquer France and Russia, and your parents were prigs.
Well sure. (Though Marvel comics when you were a kid has nothing on more recent products – Independence Day, Braveheart, Armageddon, Saving Private Ryan, South Park, 24 Hours, and so – when it comes to warmongering and generally promoting stupid brutality.)
But then, there’s also a link between dogmatically anti-war/anti-violence art and the democratic countries leaving the Nazi Germany alone until it was too late.
Which, maybe, you think was a good idea anyway, but wasn’t.
So, basically, yes, suspect messages in The Avengers – but then, suspect messages in the anti-war movement of your parents too.
And no, you’re not the only one who didn’t grow up with this stuff. Some of us had more pretentious geeks for parents and grew up with Tolkien instead.
30. gc | May 9th, 2012 at 11:18 am
(continued) Oh, and that was @28, if you can’t tell.
31. mijj | May 9th, 2012 at 12:29 pm
… pfft! {spits in general direction of stinkin’ american “Avengers”} .. the proper Avengers were John Steed and Cathy Gale!
32. Cum | May 9th, 2012 at 12:40 pm
Man, I really wish the Exile had a discussion forum so I could read the other exiles mock all the fake-progressive blog praise for Obama’s weak-ass proclamation of support for same sex marriage. seriously, by saying it should still be left up to states to figure out, he’s not really taking a stand for human rights. Here’s what the log cabin republicans (ugh) have to say, and they’re right:
blah blah blah more fake progressive blogs fellating obama for declaring he is no longer a homophobe. it’s up to the individual states to decide? fuck that, i agree with the log cabin republicans:
The Log Cabin Republicans’ R. Clarke Cooper was quick to try to discredit Obama’s announcement, calling it “cold comfort” and “offensive and callous” in the wake of the defeat in North Carolina yesterday. “This administration has manipulated LGBT families for political gain as much as anybody, and after his campaign’s ridiculous contortions to deny support for marriage equality this week he does not deserve praise for an announcement that comes a day late and a dollar short,” Cooper said.
33. John | May 9th, 2012 at 1:33 pm
Relax. Don’t flatter yourself. Germany could not conquer Russia. Only reason USA stormed Europe `44 is because they saw Red Bear is on the angry charge toward Berlin, and if they didn’t enter the war now England and Spain would celebrate comarad Stalin’s birthday as national holiday.
34. techno | May 9th, 2012 at 3:11 pm
@gc Nothing like historical revisionism. The fact is, no USA involvement in WW I, no Hitler.
Love how you warmongers always bringing up “the good war.” Well, there ARE no good wars and any conflict that included Dresden, Hiroshima, Auschwitz, Stalingrad, etc. etc. certainly was not an exercise in virtue.
Besides, the Avengers is moronic beyond words. Hope you enjoy it.
35. The Gubbler | May 9th, 2012 at 3:12 pm
@ 29
Even after the US was committed to WWII, no one in the Roosevelt administration gave a flying fuck about the concentration camps.
There were a lot of anti-jewish groups and Nazi sympathizers, in the US.
The State Department supressed intelligence about the concentration camps. They refused to bomb the death chambers in Auschwitz though they flew hundreds of missions directly above it (one bombadier accidentally dropped some bombs on Auschwitz), and had a policy of specifically not rescuing peole from the concentration camps (because they were concerned about some kind of “refugee problem”). Also they refused to make allowances for the hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees fleeing the Nazis, and had a policy of perpetually stalling those that applied in the usual manner under usual quotas.
Check out “The American Experience: America And The Holocaust”.
@ 28
You probably are the only one. Anyway, your grandparents sound pretty swell to me. Wilson was a tool.
36. Anonymous Internet War Nerd | May 9th, 2012 at 5:44 pm
@29
RE: “It was filthy hippies like you that let the Nazis come to power!”
Don’t mistake cowardice for pacifism. The allied powers weren’t being cowed into inaction by some non-existent pacifist faction, they just had crappy strategy and leaders who wanted to sit back and preserve their money while their allies did all of the heavy lifting.
Take, for example, the issue of France and Britain dicking around during the “bore war” while Hitler was annexing Poland and signing treaties with the Soviets.
Oh, and Great War Imperial Germany wasn’t conquering shit. They had to sign a treaty with the Russians so that they could place all of their forces on the western front, and the French/Brits were still grinding them down. Even before US involvement, the Germans were begging for peace because they were running out of men and their civil society was collapsing. To the extent US intervention shortened the war, it was lengthened when our generals insisted on stretching the war out for a few more months so they could rack up more medals.
Don’t post unhistorical bullshit on a site frequented by War Nerds, please.
37. Goofi | May 9th, 2012 at 8:44 pm
Jim Goad is the Incredible Koch.
38. Petkov | May 9th, 2012 at 9:16 pm
Eillen should start writing book reviews too. That way we might be lucky enough to savor her review of “50 shades of grey”.
Scarlet Jo’s curves are nice, nonetheless. Coke bottles, indeed. Americans sure know how to sell pure crap.
39. notabooj | May 9th, 2012 at 10:18 pm
@26
You know, if you masturbated regularly– and don’t feel guilty about it, which is important– you’d find ideas like this popping into your head a lot less often. Doesn’t that sound like fun, not being constantly nettled? Just a helpful tip.
40. darthfader | May 9th, 2012 at 10:28 pm
Look at the bright side: the people who actually designed these characters got screwed out of any and all royalties decades ago by a phalanx of attorneys
41. gc | May 9th, 2012 at 11:16 pm
@33
You seem confused.
The “conquer Russia” comment was made in reference to World War I.
As for “don’t flatter yourself” – well, again, I’m chalking your apparent belief that I’m identifying with Germany to confusion.
42. gc | May 9th, 2012 at 11:40 pm
@34
Nothing like historical amateur hour.
Sure, no US involvement in WWI, no Hitler! Because without US involvement in WWI, no Great Depression – oh wait, no. Well then, no US involvement in WWI, no German panic about Russia’s massive population and economic growth – oh wait, that doesn’t work either. Well then, no US involvement in WWI, no German hysteria about increasingly intermarrying with their own and corrupting the race – oh wait, nope.
The fact is that there could easily have been a Hitler, with or without US involvement in World War I. And the US entering World War I didn’t ordain that there would be a Hitler or that he’d get as far as he did – there were, of course, an infuriating number of missed chances to get rid of him before World War II.
The other fact is that if the US had stayed out of World War I, and Hitler (or somebody like him) had ended up in charge of Germany anyway, Germany would have started World War II even stronger.
What’s that? World War II wasn’t an “exercise in virtue”? Well knock me over with a feather, I never thought of it that way before!
Yup, I guess you’re right. The United States shouldn’t have fought Nazi Germany after all. Come to think of it, neither should anybody else! Sure, that means the Nazis would have finished with the Jews and then gone to work on the Slavs and God knows who else. Not to mention continued to force authoritarian governments on the French, the Dutch, and so on who’d previously been living under democracies.
But hey, it’s not what the other guy is doing that matters! It’s whether or not you’re stopping him for virtuous reasons.
Hey, come to think of it, the Civil War wasn’t mostly fought for virtuous reasons either. Guess we shouldn’t have fought that one! Sorry, Scarlett, it was all a mistake – you can have your slaves back now.
43. gc | May 9th, 2012 at 11:41 pm
(continued)
Correction:
no German hysteria about Jews increasingly intermarrying with their own
44. gc | May 9th, 2012 at 11:53 pm
@ 35
Well, I guess that settles it. Shouldn’t have committed to WWII at all! Sure, that means the extermination camps would have finished what they started. But hey, that’s not what counts.
While we’re on the subject of you being stupid, the Allies might not have done it anyway, but bombing Auschwitz accurately enough to be sure of hitting the gas chambers instead of the barracks was logistically impossible.
45. Ian | May 10th, 2012 at 12:21 am
“waffentwerp” is a good word, but i object to your use of the umlaut. still not as bad as taibbi fucking up “Wehrmacht” in the exile book, though. no, not as bad at all.
big hugs, hairy bear.
46. gc | May 10th, 2012 at 12:22 am
@36
Ba ha ha ha ha ha! I’ll get to why I’m laughing in a minute.
I’m assuming you meant to say “Don’t mistake pacifism for cowardice.” Anyway, while there are obviously admirable motivations for pacifism, there are also plenty of unadmirable motives besides cowardice – stupid self righteousness for one (“War is never justified. I don’t care about the consequences; that’s my creed and I’m sticking to it.”), short sighted selfishness shading into racism for another (“Not our country, not our problem”).
And one reason for Britain and France not doing anything even after declaring war was exactly that they were trying to avoid sending their soldiers into another World War I scale massacre. (So they waited until the Germans did it for them.)
All Quiet on the Western Front, La Grand Illusion, and so on didn’t create that mentality. But then, Marvel comics (or Mel Gibson or whatever) didn’t create the neoconservative mentality. But they might have contributed to it, and they certainly didn’t do anything to counter it.
Okay, now the funny part:
Imperial Germany did indeed sign a treaty with the Russians. And in said treaty, the Russians gave them everything in red: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Armisticebrestlitovsk.jpg
Okay, so now that we’ve established that you’re an idiot, about the question of whether or not Britain and France could have won without American military help (they certainly couldn’t have won without American financial help): Maybe, maybe not. A few soldiers can mean the difference between victory and defeat, and the second battle of the Marne was a close thing. Maybe the Americans who were already in France at that time made the essential difference, maybe not.
Either way, anybody who, in 1917, thought that Britain and France were certain to beat Germany on their own, and that therefore there was no need for America to get involved, was a moron.
47. gc | May 10th, 2012 at 12:31 am
(continued)
Actually, that isn’t fair the Marvel. They made liberal gestures too.
48. tam | May 10th, 2012 at 1:40 am
I think it’s funny how the media in general and Marvel in particular always seem to overlook Thor’s first big screen appearance in The Parallax View, probably on account of him being so unwholesomely used as a creepy symbol of American Fascism.
By the way, anyone who likes this website is going to have much more fun watching that film than The Avengers (which is basically an unironic remake of Team America : World Police)
49. The Gubbler | May 10th, 2012 at 2:47 am
@ 44
Don’t shoot the messenger buddy. I was only trying to help. And please don’t get all pissed off and throw a fit because I called you buddy. I was only trying to be nice.
NARRATOR: …Other government agencies refused to cooperate, as in late 1944. The board endorsed a proposal from American Jewish leaders to bomb the gas chambers at Auschwitz, but the proposal was sabotaged.
JOHN PEHLE: The Jewish agencies themselves weren’t sure that they wanted us to arrange this. Bombing railroad lines is not very effective ’cause they can be rebuilt overnight, so it involved wiping out the extermination facility. And finally after much soul-searching, we recommended this to the War Department.
NARRATOR: Auschwitz was located in a strategic oil-refining district in Poland. The refineries were no farther than 45 miles from these crematoria.
JOHN PEHLE: After we recommended to the War Department that the extermination facilities at Auschwitz be bombed, we were told that this was not possible. When we pursued this further, we were told that this would involve bombers being sent from England and that jet fighters could not escort bombers that far, and therefore it was not possible to do this. Later, perhaps after the war, we discovered that at the very time we were recommending this, bombing all around Auschwitz was going on from Italy, and we had been misled.
NARRATOR: Some 2,800 bombers targeted the oil refineries during the months when 150,000 Jews were being gassed. On two occasions, fleets of heavy bombers actually flew past the gas chambers, aiming for the I.G. Farben fuel factory less than five miles away. A few bombs accidentally hit Auschwitz itself, killing 85 prisoners, civilians and SS guards. This photograph makes clear the War Department refused to consider the destruction of Auschwitz as part of its mission.
-from “The American Experience: America And The Holocaust”, which I still recommend you check out (maybe after you have calmed down). It is much better with the images.
Anyway, here is a link to the transcript:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/holocaust/filmmore/transcript/transcript1.html
How about all the other stuff I mentioned???
Do you have a problem with any of that???
Gonna show me how stupid I am???
50. Hick | May 10th, 2012 at 5:07 am
“Stark represents the superhero as wised-up ultramodern man, trusting almost nobody, committed to Doing Good in a tricky, wary, complicated way that’s necessary in such a corrupt, impossible world as this one.”
Film Noir. I should read up on it, did it flourish in the 1930s when the economy was in the shitter? Or was it more a 1940s or even 50s thing?
“the begging of ur rant”
If I ever write something of the caliber of The Crying Of Lot 49 or The Curve Of Binding Energy or Gravity’s Rainbow, Sir, this shall be its title.
3-D, is it becoming the norm for movies to be in 3-D now? I’m not wired for 3-D, literally. Scientists trying to figure out how to get robots to see their way around ought to study me, with my one good eye. If movies are gonna be 3-D, they should me in half price.
51. Ozinator | May 10th, 2012 at 5:29 am
gc can’t be corrected because she/he is a supremacist full of hate and embarrassingly says shit that just can’t be retracted and wouldn’t even be said by a reasonable person in debate. Look at how she/he is fixated (monomaniacal?) on Jewish suffering. She/he attributes racial evil to Germans by claiming that Hitler would have risen to power even without the shameful conditions placed on the Germans after WWI. gc gets so upset with people understanding history because to her/him, it’s all examples of good vs evil and what side you are on.
52. Flatulissimo | May 10th, 2012 at 5:48 am
I liked the comment sections better when they weren’t all GC arguing with somebody else, all the time.
53. gc | May 10th, 2012 at 7:27 am
@49
Already answered in the first paragraph—BZZZZZZZAP. Thine prayers have been heard and answered by the AEC.
54. gc | May 10th, 2012 at 12:27 pm
@52
Feel free to join in any time. Really, there’s nothing I like—BZAAAAAAAP!
55. Flatulissimo | May 10th, 2012 at 12:32 pm
Thanks be unto ye, AEC. Amen.
56. Ozinator | May 10th, 2012 at 2:59 pm
lol…I love this place. I guess it’s time to pee on gc’s corpse. NO, YOUNG TROLLHOPPER. NO ONE GETS TO PEE ON CORPSES AROUND HERE WITHOUT EXPLICIT PERMISSION FROM THE AEC. EXPECT 4 TO 6 WEEKS FOR REPLY.
57. gc | May 10th, 2012 at 3:04 pm
Hey EC. Can I call you EC? AEC feels so formal, and I feel like I’ve become really close to you. YES, THE GOOD AEC IS ALWAYS HERE WITH YOU, LIKE A BAD CASE OF THE ROIDS.
Remember this piece? —> http://www.exile.ru/articles/detail.php?ARTICLE_ID=6355&IBLOCK_ID=35&PAGE=1
(Before your time?)
I have made more comments here than anyone should. This is understood.
But that’s whom you’re making feel like part of the cool kids now.
HUSH HUSH NOW GC. REMEMBER: PRAYER HEALS. SO DO CASH DONATIONS.
58. Zoner | May 10th, 2012 at 3:27 pm
Though I enjoyed the movie, I gotta agree with Jones that Loki comes off kind of pathetic. Lesson #1 in blockbusters, the villain must always be cool. Loki’s just unwanted and unloved (though if I were him I’d hate Thor too). Might have helped if he could have offed a hero or two, but no chance of that in a movie where all the major characters either have their own movie franchises or the option for one.
59. tam | May 10th, 2012 at 3:47 pm
Found that great bit of The Parallax View with Thor in it online :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNMi8fXi5Os
It’s a massive ‘spoiler’ though so don’t watch it if you have any intention of ever watching the film. (Which you really ought to; it’s one of the best horror films ever)
60. iCONOCLAST | May 10th, 2012 at 7:32 pm
Sounds kind of corny, you say? Oh, that’s nothing. Massive corn-shucking in this film, corn piled everywhere, cornpone, corn fritters, corn syrup, corn as high as an elephant’s eye, the Feast of Our Great God Corn!
If Eileen is secretly a Khornate cult worshipper, I really couldn’t tell. That in itself is quite an achievement.
61. Anonymous Internet War Nerd | May 10th, 2012 at 8:51 pm
gc, you’re dumb and ignorant. I was going to reply to you, but since everyone on here already knows that you’re dumb and ignorant I’ll save the time and—BZZZZZZZAP. WATCH WHO YOU’RE CALLING DUMB AND IGNORANT. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU WENT HUNGRY TO SACRIFICE YOUR HARD EARNED FOOD STAMP MONEY TO THE AEC? GC IS A PIOUS MAN WHO TREMBLES BEFORE THE AEC AND OFFERS UP GIFTS TO PLACATE HIS ALMIGHTY FURY AND GREATNESS. THAT DOTH MAKE GC BOTH SMART AND KNOWLEDGABLE. LET THIS BE A LESSON TO ALL YE UNBELIEVERS.
62. Peter | May 10th, 2012 at 9:47 pm
Is it lonely at the office? You seemed to be the only one who writes for this website at the moment.
63. gc | May 10th, 2012 at 10:09 pm
Well all you had to do was ask a girl nicely.
64. micheal | May 11th, 2012 at 5:07 am
For God’s sake, would the Exile please review the documentary Knuckle as soon as possible … Mr Brecher? Dr Dolan? Mr Ames? Ms Jones?
Hello? …
65. kyeshinka | May 11th, 2012 at 11:12 am
What happened to Mark? Has Putin sent his friends to stick an icepick in his head or am I angry that my mom died from anal rot?
66. DrunktankDan | May 11th, 2012 at 4:58 pm
All praises be to the AEC.
We shower upon thee gifts of speed, oxy, and prostitutes of questionable age.
67. Arch Stanton | May 12th, 2012 at 1:24 pm
Ya’ll got a lot of time (and money) on your hands don’t you? But I get the feeling that history will conspire with contemporary events to provide you with some more constructive activities. And as to your money, it’ll be sprouting wings fairly shortly.
68. Sylocat | May 12th, 2012 at 7:59 pm
Oddly, in the comics, it’s Iron Man who’s the right-wing neo-fascist, and Captain America who is (in most of his various incarnations) relatively liberal, or at least not automatically deferential to authority (a lot of his monologues in the comics are sermons about doing what you think is right regardless of what anyone tells you blah blah blah).
Not that I’m unhappy that they toned down that portion of Tony Stark’s character for the films. Particularly since his solo movies have been the most popular ones of the four main franchises thus far, which is why he was always front-and-center of the marketing.
But anyway, the REAL reason I love this movie is actually rather simple: During the epic half-hour-long battle scene, I could tell who was who, who was doing what, why they were doing it, and where they were in relation to each other.
You wouldn’t think this would be a problem for movies with gazillion-dollar budgets, but as I watched The Avengers, I realized just how much this has been missing from “serious” action films of late. It’s the problem I had with Transformers, The Expendables (and all the other right-wing macho gun born horseshit), and Green Lantern… and it’s also a problem I’ve had with Joss Whedon in the past (the space battle scene in Serenity was suitably epic in concept, but I had to watch it twice on DVD, with the English subtitles on, just to figure out who was firing at who), so it’s a doubly pleasant surprise. There was precious little shaky-cam, there was shot composition, and the colors were vibrant enough that I could tell one costume from another.
69. tierbess | May 13th, 2012 at 6:21 am
Fantastic review! I saw the movie and was equally perturbed by the gratuitous, chest-thumping WWII-era patriotism. The kids watching this movie are being propagandized with this narrative and turned into unthinking drones, the perfect complacent citizenry that is subservient to the extractive and parasitic 1% elite.
70. gary | May 14th, 2012 at 2:29 pm
thats why people have kids…to make more likeminded people,usually it dont work…and stop shitting on woody wilson..he timed ww1 almost perfectly..letting the europeans slaughter each other for three years then stepping in and finishing it reletively cheaply..don’t forget the telegraph the germans sent to mexico saying they would supply arms for an invasion of texas..think about all that mexican-german oompah music (shudder)
71. Ted | May 18th, 2012 at 8:47 am
Kids, in the Summer of 2012. You’re Aunt Robin started a new job, working for some secret government think tank…
72. Mr. Bad | May 21st, 2012 at 8:33 pm
Fuck. Germans. Comparing the Indian Wars or even slavery to what the Germans perfected with loving efficiency from 1933-45 (only 12 years!) is an intellectual stunt worthy of Eichmann himself. Germans are still terrorizing Europe with puppet Italians in the wings … http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-16/draghi-signals-ecb-won-t-keep-greece-in-euro-area-at-any-cost.html.
Let me repeat. Fuck. Germans.
That is all.
73. Ozinator | May 24th, 2012 at 11:13 pm
@72
“Indian wars” lol
so wholesome! not like the “Jewish wars” at all. Don’t have the figures on how many African slaves (or Indian Slaves- whom were actually “cleansed” at many times instead of utilized as worked slaves)died in forced labor but I betcha you don’t have the number of Jews who were killed for being Jewish without first being worked to death–like all slaves tend to be. Why is the horror forced on innocent people of Jewish background worse than that imposed on Communists (most of whom were Jewish), French, Poles and gypsies? Much less, Native Americans and African slaves???
Fuck Germans indeed, but more so for what you last related! Are you so sure it is Germans doing this, or rather an undemocratic ruling elite? Remember, it’s illegal in Germany to even say what I have said here. You should LOVE them for how much they collectively guilt over Jewish suffering.
74. Ozinator | May 24th, 2012 at 11:17 pm
and appologies, you didn’t specify jews but Europeans. Africans and Indians have the trump in any case if we have to unfortunately for argument, count and determine who were and still are the biggest victims
75. Lou Bliss | June 9th, 2012 at 6:17 pm
NYT’s Review of Spider-Man 2
A. O. SCOTT (June 29, 2004)
On the way out of the advance screening of ”Spider-Man 2,” I asked my son, who is nearly 8 and whom I had brought along for some unscientific audience research, what he thought of the movie.
As he usually does, he mentioned the scary parts and the cool parts, of which there are many. ”But there was one part,” he said, ”that I really didn’t like.” That was when Peter Parker threw his costume in the trash and declared that he was ”Spider-Man no more.”
”He can’t do that,” my son complained. ”It’s not right. We need Spider-Man.”
And so we do.
——————————————-
Maoist review of Spider-Man 2
[We] said that “Spider-Man: The Motion Picture” (2002) has some redeeming value on the basis of its depiction of asexuality, but it cannot ignore the fact that “Spider-Man’s” Amerikan flag-waving fans are cheering for something that in the real world would be called “capitalist police repression.”
If the bourgeoisie want to sic their thugs on each other, MIM would not get in the middle of this fight, but it does not support pig repression in the abstract when Spider-Man (Tobey Maguire) has his knee-jerk reaction every time he hears a police siren. If Spider-Man had any (spider-) “sense” at all, he would fight the police repression under which gold miners work in Azania and China to produce the gold coins stored in the vault of the bank that is robbed in the movie.
In fact, exactly why is Dr. Octavius / Doc Ock (Alfred Molina) a villain? And Spider-Man the hero here? This is not made clear in the movie.
Dr. Octavius wants to develop cheap fusion power in order to help feed starving people. At most, he can be accused of either dishonesty, naivete (for working for Osborn), or utopianism.
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