Avenged

Who would've thought seeing The Avengers this evening would get me to end my 10-month posting drought?  Folks, it was that good.  Such a Joss Whedon movie, which in this case is a very good thing.  His dialogue is always at the very least funny and clever, and here it was also in service of a reasonably smart plot, some fabulous action, and a bit more complexity than one usually gets from this sort of fare.  Speaking of which, my brain compels me to place this in some larger context, which is very hard to do right after seeing something, but I'll give it a shot with my All-Time Top 5 Superhero Movies (one film per franchise, mmkay?):

5. X2: X-Men United - First Class was also very good, but this was the best of the lot.  I love origin stories, but some franchises get a lot better when they have room to spread out and give the characters more interesting decisions to make.

4. The Incredibles - I wonder if there's an American filmmaker more criminally unknown than Brad Bird.  Every film the dude has made - Iron Giant, Ratatouille, and the latest Mission Impossible - has been exceptional.  This one was genuinely funny, a kinetic blast, and a welcome jab at the idea of being mediocre to fit in.

3. Spiderman 2: That last part goes double here.  It was a real treat to see the identity reveals in here - both to the subway car full of strangers and to Mary Jane - that we don't usually get to see, even if it didn't leave as many interesting things to do in the pretty boring third film.

2. The Avengers - So much fun.  Just see it.

1. The Dark Knight - A dark, complex plot that forces the good and the innocent to continually make impossible moral decisions, and maybe the best villain portrayal in film history.  It's going to be hard to top this one, which I say in spite of the somewhat disappointing wrap-up of the Harvey Dent story line.  Can't wait to see the last one this July.

What say you?