My wasted time cannot be avenged.

There are times when I really hate being a movie snob. People don't like it. They can sense my frustration with mindless garbage and they advise me to chill out and just enjoy the ride.

"It's only a movie," I've heard far too many times. Well, for me, movies aren't just movies. I have made them the primary interest in my personal time, and they will continue to play an important role in my life in the future. It is a truth that movie critics are so hard to please because they've seen more movies than everyone else. Although I am only twenty and have many more great films to watch in the years ahead, I still have seen thousands of movies, and I am less easily impressed as a result. This is a trait that gets me some criticism on occasion, because everyone thinks I just go around picking on every movie that isn't The Godfather. That  isn't true. Movies are a great art form, but movies as entertainment have their place too. But am I wrong to expect even entertainment to be above average?

Seeing The Avengers was one of the rare times I wished I didn't have an opinion. As I sat in the theater, I realized with mounting horror that I was the only person in the place not enjoying himself. I knew I probably wasn't going to like it. After all, I thought Captain America was just OK, I didn't like Iron Man too much, and I outright hated Thor. The best chance at impressing me that The Avengers had was that it was in the hands of Joss Whedon, the man behind the very creative and entertaining TV series Firefly. He could have rescued the movie from monotony by doing something nobody's done before, but his devotion to the published sources forced him to steer clear of anything unique. I can understand. He is so eager to please that he forgets we're not all into comic books.

Remember not too long ago when it was lame to be into this stuff? I think Tim Burton's Batman in 1989 was the first time that really changed and there's been a consistent stream of superhero movies ever since. Studios love churning them out because they're big piles of guaranteed profit. Film-makers love to make them because they're so easy. Just connect the dots. People are so pleased with this familiarity that they are acting like The Avengers is perfect or something. No critic seems to want to trash it, probably because there would then be a mob of millions of angry fans to deal with. As of this writing, it has a 93% on rottentomatoes, and it already broke every opening weekend record in the book. Before it's done, it will have grossed approximately 100 trillion dollars worldwide. Despite everything, it still isn't a good movie.

The main problem I have with it is that it really isn't a movie at all. It's a product that has been carefully manufactured by a group of experts who know all the right buttons to push. I watch The Avengers and it is a joyless experience. Since it's essentially a two and a half hour action scene, there is no room for imagination. I sense no love for the medium or any attempt to create something that will last more than a couple of years. That's what's so dissapointing about Whedon's direction, a good director would know that characters like Thor and Loki have no chance at infamy. The movie is so loosely pasted together, that there are parts that don't even fit right. I may be getting something wrong, but why is it in one scene, the Hulk is an uncontrollable Mr. Hyde terror that would kill his closest friend, and then in the climax he's shown patiently standing around until such time as he can fight for the good of the planet. I can only suspend belief so much.

I just plain don't understand what everybody sees in these people. Robert Downey, Jr as Iron Man really just gets on my nerves. The smart-alecky prick persona that apparently makes him so endearing is really very obnoxious. I've already mentioned elsewhere how I feel about Mark Ruffalo and his acting inability, and it's a shame to see Scarlett Johansson and Jeremy Renner get thrown away as a pretty face and a nobody at all respectively. It's all a horrendous waste of time.

So, it really does bug me when I don't like the movie everyone loves, because I feel like if I say anything about it, it's like flat out saying those people are idiots. However, I'm not going to just keep quiet and let Marvel get away with the murder of common sense. I guess I just have to keep being an annoying snob until everyone else becomes one too. I was going to say that I am waiting for everyone to mature to the point of not needing this kind of entertainment. But that is again insulting intelligence and acting like I'm better than everyone else. I've got to stop doing that.