Biggest Films of 2012 - The Avengers

As the boringly predictable awards season has now come to a close, we can look forward, sidewards, upwards and diagonally (basically any way but backwards) to the rest of 2012. Join me as I take an objective, fair and (dare I say it) borderline humorous look at the biggest blockbusters and films to grace our screens in the coming months. Day by day for the next 10 days I will give my thoughts and opinions on the biggest films 2012 has to offer, all in the name of good debate and buzz building ahead of this year€™s cinema. After yesterday's The Hunger Games, we now move on to The Avengers... Release Date: 26th April (UK), May 4th (US). WHAT COULD BE AWESOME ABOUT IT: Well. IT€™S THE AVENGERS! It€™s what we sat through Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2, Thor and Captain America for, and after all the hype I doubt anybody can wait to throw away the origins tales and embrace the no holds barred, huge budget action bonanza that will greet us this April (or May for US readers). This film is the culmination of all Marvels€™ ambitions over the past six years, and you can tell from the trailers they€™ve thrown all they can at it. It looks like a visual feast with a highly respectable all star cast and an expanding of the universe they have carefully crafted that makes it a rather mouth watering prospect on the horizon. If it strikes the correct balance between action and story, it could lift Marvel films into a new level of awesome. WHAT COULD SUCK ABOUT IT: Anyone who saw my Avengers Assemble trailer review will already be aware of my misgivings about The Avengers. Is it this year€™s Transformers 3? The trailer is a constant bombardment of explosions without any indication of emotionally anchoring its audience to the story; which is all well and good. But we could just watch Transformers 3 on Netflix and at least get the amusement of Rosie Huntington Whiteley€™s concentration face as she tries to run in heels; and not have to put up with 2 hours of trying to justify Scarlett Johansson€™s outfit as something other than a slap in the face to the Suffragette movement. Furthermore, the constant stream of Marvel flicks over the past few years has left the idea of their films as a rather tired one. With directors unwilling to stamp a style or tone on the films and the constant barrage of origin stories leaving audiences feeling like every Marvel film is a carbon copy of the previous. Whilst not fixing something that isn€™t broken (they make money don€™t they?) is a functional idea, their unwillingness to take risks has hamstrung Marvel into a stream of tonally similar movies that fail to push the boundaries. Trailer; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tY9DnBNJFTI Predicted Star Rating: 3.5/5 Could be messy, vacuous and tiresomely repetitive. However it is The Avengers, and Joss Whedon is more than capable of anchoring this into something that might contend with The Dark Knight. Predicted Box Office Gross: $1 billion + A huge line of previous films, all Box Office Successes, means this has guaranteed success. Couple that with a huge budget, huge advertising campaign, there is very little doubt that this will break the 1 billion mark, the question is how far they can take it. Tomorrow: I shine a light on Prometheus (Greek mythology humour win) for you all.