Last night, Vicki and I went out into the world to see The Avengers on the big screen. We'd spent the extra money to get VIP reserved seating, which is about the only way I'd ever try to see a blockbuster on Opening Night these days.
Funny story on the way into the theatre: we decided to get our food in the VIP lounge, rather than at the regular concession stands or at our seats (which you can do in the VIP theatre). There were about 4 or 5 people ahead of us when we lined up, and we had about 20 minutes before the start-time. No problem! At least, no problem until the couple ahead of us tried to buy their popcorn, drinks and candy using their Scene card points (or something like that), at which point the process ground to a complete halt. Despite there being three servers behind the counter at one point, they wouldn't open a second cash, and so we all stood there. And stood there. And after about 15 minutes of waiting, Vicki and I finally gave up and headed inside to get our seats.
We discussed the possibility of ordering our junkfood at our seats, but decided that we didn't really want to reward that poor service model by giving them even more of our money for their highly-overpriced fare after the long a wait. So we didn't.
They started the Coming Attractions right on time, and I was excited to see the trailers for The Amazing Spider-Man and The Dark Knight Rises on the big screen. I think they showed one more trailer after that, and then the lights came back on, followed by an usher explaining that there was going to be a short delay because people were still coming into the theatre at that point. We looked at each other and knew: it was the long line behind us at the concession stand outside that were just now getting their orders filled!
Anyway, eventually The Avengers began and my long wait was finally over! We both once again didn't enjoy the 3D aspect of the presentation, but other than that it was fabulous!
Our plan is to go see it again, in 2D this time, once the crowds die down in a few weeks. There were so many great lines of dialogue, some of them lost because the crowd was still laughing at the preceding joke, making it fun to see again, I'm sure. Three of my favourite parts both involve the Hulk, who probably has the least screen time of any of the 6 team members (on account of being Mark "Bruce Banner" Ruffalo for most of the film). The first comes when Captain America is commanding the Avengers on what to do as they try to defend against a maurading horde, and he gives very detailed instructions to everyone else before ending with, "And Hulk.... SMASH!" That was extremely well-received by the audience! Another one involved Loki, which I won't spoil, and the final one came between Hulk and Thor which I definitely won't give away. Those 3 scenes alone made Greenskin's inclusion in the movie worthwhile!
I wouldn't put The Avengers quite on the same level of The Dark Knight as far as cinematic quality is concerned, but in terms of pure comic book geekasm, it's an incredible thrill! I'm so happy it didn't disappoint, and I can't wait to see it again and then own it on Blu-Ray in a few months.
The blockbuster movie season of 2012 is off to a great start, and there's only 5 weeks to go before Prometheus gets here.
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