I finally got the chance to see the movie last night, and I was impressed with how well the overloaded scow managed to sail - indeed, how many times it managed to appear (with suitable tricks of script-writing light) almost elegant.
My BB and I agreed that one of the biggest failings for us was technical; far too many action scenes were edited and paced in extreme close up with fast cuts. It made for a remarkably claustrophobic feel. If there had been some distancing and a slight slow-down on the cuts, each of the action scenes would have benefited greatly; cut 10 seconds off of each of the middle two or three battle scenes and they'd have benefited that much more.
That cinematographic style choice baffled us, but it was definitely a technical failing, a style stumble rather than a substance problem, or so it seemed to us, and certainly to me.
I'm one of those people who had enjoyed the thought of a Clint/Natasha romantic relationship of some sort; past or present - and yet, I was delighted to see Clint's family. With the exception of the "faithful wife is proud of her husband, is pregnant, and spends much of her time in the kitchen" trope - that was hard to get around, and thank heavens that the actress chosen to be Clint's wife sold herself with intelligence, and built herself as a real person. I very much liked that she and Natasha are friends; it neither negates any past sexual/romantic relationship between two very good friends who've been in intense places together, nor requires any retconning of the family out of existence. I'm afraid, however, that you're probably right; there are many fans who will be delighted to fridge the entire family, or demonize them. Natasha would disapprove. So would Phil.
Natasha's budding relationship with Bruce feels organic to me, because there were the seeds of friendship sown in the first movie. Once again, the only part where I rolled my eyes was when Natasha chose to illustrate her admittedly monstrous upbringing (so far, every dramatic presentation of the Red Room has been delightfully horrific, in Agent Carter and here) not by saying "I became willing as a child to kill people on orders," but to say, "they gave me a hysterectomy as a graduation present, so I can't be a baby-machine anymore, and of course, by implication, a woman who can't make babies is a monster." Gaaaaaaaaah! Everywhere else, however, Natasha - who is, perhaps, my favorite Avenger, was her awesome, thoughtful, vulnerable, dangerous self. She and River Song are the people I want around when my world needs saving.
I was more impressed by the twins than I thought I would be, and I may differ from you by saying that I found them less bland than I thought they would be. However, this being Marvel, and especially with the constant Chekov's gun of "The Cradle," I suspect we may find that Pietro was less than most sincerely dead.
All in all, I give it a B, and pop that up to a B+ when, as I said, I consider how overloaded the scow was.
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My BB and I agreed that one of the biggest failings for us was technical; far too many action scenes were edited and paced in extreme close up with fast cuts. It made for a remarkably claustrophobic feel. If there had been some distancing and a slight slow-down on the cuts, each of the action scenes would have benefited greatly; cut 10 seconds off of each of the middle two or three battle scenes and they'd have benefited that much more.
That cinematographic style choice baffled us, but it was definitely a technical failing, a style stumble rather than a substance problem, or so it seemed to us, and certainly to me.
I'm one of those people who had enjoyed the thought of a Clint/Natasha romantic relationship of some sort; past or present - and yet, I was delighted to see Clint's family. With the exception of the "faithful wife is proud of her husband, is pregnant, and spends much of her time in the kitchen" trope - that was hard to get around, and thank heavens that the actress chosen to be Clint's wife sold herself with intelligence, and built herself as a real person. I very much liked that she and Natasha are friends; it neither negates any past sexual/romantic relationship between two very good friends who've been in intense places together, nor requires any retconning of the family out of existence. I'm afraid, however, that you're probably right; there are many fans who will be delighted to fridge the entire family, or demonize them. Natasha would disapprove. So would Phil.
Natasha's budding relationship with Bruce feels organic to me, because there were the seeds of friendship sown in the first movie. Once again, the only part where I rolled my eyes was when Natasha chose to illustrate her admittedly monstrous upbringing (so far, every dramatic presentation of the Red Room has been delightfully horrific, in Agent Carter and here) not by saying "I became willing as a child to kill people on orders," but to say, "they gave me a hysterectomy as a graduation present, so I can't be a baby-machine anymore, and of course, by implication, a woman who can't make babies is a monster." Gaaaaaaaaah! Everywhere else, however, Natasha - who is, perhaps, my favorite Avenger, was her awesome, thoughtful, vulnerable, dangerous self. She and River Song are the people I want around when my world needs saving.
I was more impressed by the twins than I thought I would be, and I may differ from you by saying that I found them less bland than I thought they would be. However, this being Marvel, and especially with the constant Chekov's gun of "The Cradle," I suspect we may find that Pietro was less than most sincerely dead.
All in all, I give it a B, and pop that up to a B+ when, as I said, I consider how overloaded the scow was.