The High Price of Expecations

Shifting a bit away from politics for a while, though this topic could easily be placed in that realm, too, but as we get closer and closer to the release of The Avengers: Age of Ultron, I am watching as my nerd friends start to noticeably quiver in anticipation.  Being a fellow nerd, I too share in the excitement, but as I have discovered over the course of the past year or so, I am much more excited for the DC Universe movies, like Batman V. Superman, Wonder Woman, Suicide Squad etc.  This is not because I truly believe Warner Bros./DC will manage to reach the heights of quality and consistency that Disney/Marvel has been able to do, but it just really comes down to how I like my superheros, which is more on the "super" side that just everyday folks with skills.  For instance, I am much more a fan of The Flash TV show over Arrow, even though Stephen Amell could have his way with me any day of the week.  The more out there and fantastic it is, the more likely I am to geek out.

So, my overall anticipation of Ultron is pretty muted.  I suppose part of it could be Ultron himself. Since I am not a big comic book nerd, I really had no idea about Ultron and his history with the Avengers.  He is not really a household name like, say, The Joker or Loki from the previous films, and without that cache, the whole character is a bit of cipher to me.  Also, the story of a sentient robot who evolves and rebels against it's creator is certainly well trod in the science fiction universe.  I fully realize that the vast majority of the story has not been spoiled in the trailers, but everything so far, while being of obvious quality, has left me pretty cold.

My friend, Ed, however is like a 5 year old on December 1st.  The anticipation for Christmas is real, and he just cannot wait for it to get here.  He is a Marvel true believer, and I cannot begrudge him his excitement.  However, it has made me wonder if the movie could every possibly live up to his hype for it.  The first Avenger's movie was less of a sure thing than we remember.  While Marvel had done the next to impossible by launching individual movies for Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor, I think everyone was unsure whether they could pull of the epic team up, and while Joss Whedon was not exactly an unknown quantity, insomuch as his writing and some directorial credits, he had never taken on a movie of that size before.  The number of directors that have been chewed up and spit out by giant Hollywood movies is pretty legion, but when The Avengers actually worked and worked wonderfully, all of those doubts dissipated into the the dustbin.

I suppose part of me is waiting for the fall.  We have certainly never really seen a hit machine like Marvel in the history of Hollywood.  To have all of these movies be a hits in addition to it being a shared universe is truly something pretty exceptional, and perhaps they have every chance of keeping the cash cow mooing for years to come.  Word began to leak last night of the first internet critic's viewing of Ultron, and once again, the word is shock and surprise that they were able to pull it off. I suppose at some point there will be a failure. Ant Man certainly had enough trials and tribulations coming to the screen to end up being a mess, but the likelihood is that they will once again pull something from nothing, like they did with Guardians of the Galaxy. The bottom line is that for the nerds this is a Golden Age, and while we still continue to have extremely high quality, the superhero movie genre will continue to meet or exceed our expectations.