At this stage of the game, it seems impossible to be truly surprised by a Marvel film. That’s not necessarily a knock against the billion-dollar team that effectively changed the way people make and watch superhero movies when they introduced the now-fabled “Marvel Universe,” it’s just that, well, when you sit down for a Marvel movie you pretty much know exactly what you’re going to get in terms of drama, story, action, and character. That doesn’t change with Avengers: Age of Ultron, which brings about an end to the second phase in Marvel’s plan for world cinematic domination with the usual solid skills that we’ve come to expect.

I’ve enjoyed all the Marvel films that I have watched to more-or-less the same degree, but that doesn’t mean Marvel is infallible. Despite the overall enjoyment factor of the film, with this, its eleventh film, writer-director Joss Whedon seems intent on pushing some of Marvel Films’ more tiresome elements to the extreme. For instance, Avengers: Age of Ultron isn’t just full of whippy quips from its handsome, athletic cast — it’s positively drowning in them. Every single scene features at least two (usually several more) of the sarcastic, wise-cracking retorts, and by the film’s third hour (it is 141-minutes long) they have ceased to amuse and instead take the attention away from the whiz-bang effects and highlight the lazier-than-usual writing. Top points to that “Catholic rabbits” gag, though.

Read the rest at Weekly Gravy.