With the long-awaited premiere of “Avengers: Age of Ultron,” Marvel once again delivered a spectacular superhero action movie. 

The movie started off with an action packed scene, showing just how tightly-knit the group of Marvel’s legendary heroes became. In the first Avengers movie, the team was still acting as individuals only brought together by an immediate threat, but this movie shows them becoming a team fighting together to defeat the still-infiltrated SHIELD. This also gave Black Widow and Hawk Eye, who were rather minor characters in the first film, more of a role in the team, showing they were just as much of an asset as the others. 

There were also various new heroes that appeared in the movie, which were not revealed quickly, but easy to spot out for any comic book-lover. Despite the new addition of characters, the movie handled it well, managing to not overcrowd the screen like some movies do. This tends to be a common trap with movies revolving around the comic book world because the universe is so large.

“Age of Ultron,” tied up the various loose ends left by companion movies of the first Avengers movie, Iron Man trilogy, “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” and Thor. “The Winter Soldier” left off with SHIELD being taken over by Hydra and left broken from the war that ensued within its own organization. The latest Avengers movie addressed this by having the team deal with this problem, which is what begins the chain of events that leads to the creation of the movie’s villain, Ultron. Also, various issues like Tony Stark’s acceptance of what happened to him while in the worm hole during the climax of the first film, and what he saw came into play here, driving the overall plot. 

The movie continuously played with the idea of the Avengers being a powerful force and just how much it could go wrong if they were to overstep their boundaries for the sake of “protecting” peace. This is reflected in the villain, Ultron, a robot designed for the protection of the human race, which eventually turns against what it was built to protect since it now sees humanity as a threat to peace. While the origin of Ultron was changed for the sake of the movie’s clarity, it was a well thought-out adaptation that complimented the companion movies well.

Marvel once again was able to balance the intense action with a light humor that kept the mood of the movie from plummeting to the dark and gritty atmosphere current comic book movies tend to fall into, making “Age of Ultron” a fun summer film.