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Aaaaaaaand then this afternoon I saw The Avengers.

* UGH TONY STARK ALL MY HEARTS. I have been a Tony girl since Iron Man--don't judge me, like you're not--and I sort of...IDK, thought RDJ would maybe give 98 percent instead of 100? Nope. BOOM! fucker snuck in and gave 150. It's the hero's greater journey re: the Marvel Universe--how to play with others instead of being a lone...guy in a suit of armor. He's not at all like the guy from the start of IM1; that guy might as well literally be a Life-Model Decoy (LMD) of the real Tony Stark, who's turning out to be amazing.

* UGH MY TONY/PEPPER FEELS, THEY THROB IN MY CHEST. She's still CEO, you guys! And lightened her hair a little! And they were trying to have a nice date, and she was wearing teeny cutoff shorts (hnnnngh) and had no shoes on, and Tony was all "his first name is 'Agent'" and Tony was the one who was like, screw the free world, we are doing stuff, and Pepper was like, "Sorry, honey, duty calls." BECAUSE SHE ALSO HAS A JOB TO DO, OKAY.

* Secret extra awesome: Phil telling Thor that Jane was safe. That--we can get Portman back for Thor 2, right? We can do that? And Kat Dennings?

* I am really, really surprised Joss got the word "quim" in a PG-13 movie. I think it's like how the MPAA sometimes allows cursing if it's in a foreign language and it's not subtitled. Either that, or no one working that day knows what the word means. (Also "puling", because I don't think that word gets used enough.)

* I still managed to be surprised that Coulson died. I don't know why, God knows I've seen enough Joss Whedon stories, but it worked. I teared up like a baby, you guys, it was bad. (And I love Nick Fury so, so much, and I get that it was necessary, but I sort of want someone to punch him in the face for that shit with the trading cards.)

* THAT WAS A HELICARRIER YOU GUYS WE SAW A HELICARRIER

* I know basically nothing about the Ch'taurri (sp?), except that they're the Ultimate-verse Skrulls--and even that is sort of an analogue, not a direct translation--but they seemed to go down kind of fast when Cap (or someone) laid 'em out, and when you blow up the mother ship, they all...go down? That seems like not the best plan, if you want a fighting force. Yeah, you get loyalty, but you also get people who can be totally defeated by taking out the base.

* Those Ch'taurri worm-things reminded me of Moya from Farscape, in that they looked like biotech. Also, Moya was adorable, and those things looked fucked up.

* I would pay so much money for a Black Widow movie, you guys. Just do what ScarJo wants and make it the Bourne Identity, but with a hot Russian ex-pat female spy! Remember Blade? You can do other movies, you guys, the MU is fucking huge.

(Which is why I think MU movies work out better than DCU movies, but we'll get to that later.)

* Thor! Thor is always great. Nothing but love for that guy.

* HEY NOW LET'S TALK ABOUT BRUCE BANNER. Bruce Banner? Is great. He was taking care of people in India and hadn't had an incident in a year! SHIELD kept General Brandt (among others) off his back! He is sort of a dork! TONY HAS A NEW BRO, AND IT'S BRUCE MOTHERFUCKING BANNER.

(Also, I don't think it's on the slate of films, but, uh, could we get an Incredible Hulk 2 with Ruffalo? Don't get me wrong, I think Norton was great, but Norton wouldn't have worked with this cast and--I don't know, Ruffalo does a really good job of being Bruce Banner: usually the smartest guy in the room (depending), trying to keep a lid on his temper, and now he's starting to figure out how to use it, that he can. Remember: the only thing scarier than Hulk is Smart Hulk.) (No, not the Maestro.) (The comic nerds got that one.)

(Also also, I have always firmly been of the belief that Bruce and Betty should be together, and I didn't hate what Liv Tyler did with the part; I think her, with Ruffalo instead of Norton, would do an amazing job.)

* Give me all the Natasha/Bruce and Tony/Bruce now and no one gets hurt.

* Tony's last call was to Pepper UGH SHUT UP I TOLD YOU I HAD FEELS.

* On a shallow note--me? No. Piffle--Natasha looks a lot better with the shorter hair.

* I did my damnedest to stay unspoiled for this, and I did pretty well. I really didn't see the first-10-minutes swerve of "Hawkeye spends a lot of the movie brainwashed by Loki", but once he stopped looking like a flu-ridden zombie, uh...that. That did. Okay fine I get the Jeremy Renner thing now, okay? When he shot the one sled backwards, without fucking looking? I might have. Um. Noises were made, don't judge me.

* I don't ship Natasha/Clint, though you can certainly make a case for it being in the past. I will, however, read a hundred fics where they used to date and/or occasionally hook up now, at least until one of them starts dating someone seriously. *coughDARCYcough* *coughBRUCEcough*

* I love, love, LOVE that Natasha psyched Loki out. And that Hulk beat the shit out of him. And that Clint detonated the arrow and knocked his ass off his sled. And Tony and Steve beat the shit out of him, too. And--

--okay, my Loki feelings are not complicated, here: I don't like him. I love Tom Hiddleston, I think he does a great job, and he's a really good villain, but I don't...I get that fandom likes woobies. God knows I do it too, on occasion, try as I might to avoid it (*coughDAMONOCCASIONALLYcough*), but--I mean. The guy killed 80 people in two days. He set up Earth to be invaded by an alien race to get the Cosmic Cube (sorry, "Tesseract") back. He looks waaaaaaaaaay too happy about ruling us, and was about to kill a Holocaust survivor before Cap showed up. Yeah, dude, I get that Odin lied to you and your circumstances were shitty, but you know what? You move to a small castle somewhere in Asgard's hinterlands and--I don't know, take up free-verse poetry and sculpture. YOU DO NOT INVADE OTHER PLANETS.

* YOU GUYS YOU GUYS YOU GUYS THAT WAS MOTHERFUCKING THANOS, OKAY

Thanos, for the non-nerds, is kind of a big deal. He's the last survivor of his race--because he killed them all--and he did it because he fell in love with Death. And I mean the weird, wrong, get-a-restraining-order kind of love: he wants to murder the universe to prove he loves her. (Not that Death has a gender, but he sees it that way, so I defer.) It is sort of like if the Zack Snyder movie just BAM! went and slipped in Darkseid at the end of it somewhere.

UGH AVENGERS 2 IF YOU DO INFINITY GAUNTLET I WILL FALL THE FUCK OVER.

* "Here's my secret: I'm always angry." OKAY, SO: possibly my favorite thing about Warren Ellis' 1-year run on Thunderbolts was when a telepath tried to read Leonard Sampson's mind. (Leonard Sampson is another person who's been exposed to gamma radiation and gotten powers from it; he doesn't Hulk out or anything, but his hair is bright green and he has super-strength. He shows up in the Norton Hulk movie as Ty Burrell, the dad from Modern Family.) The TP backs off, horrified at what she sees:

"Sampson...he has all the rage that the gamma-irradiated do, that they all do. He just controls his."

Which is the same thing Ruffalo said, only a lot wordier. I don't know, that gave me shivers.

* Aaaaaand this is the long one, but:

Marvel makes better movies, I think, because they admit the world is weird.

DC doesn't, so much. Yeah, they have aliens, and vigilantes, and alien cops, and goddesses, and--really, nothing Marvel doesn't have. But with Marvel, you always...if you go back and track, nothing doesn't fit. You don't watch Daredevil and think, "Oh, it's impossible for Blade to be happening in Chicago or Russia or wherever." You don't see Spider-Man and think about how it's impossible that mutants are real. Their world is large, and weird, and delightful. And I don't get that sense with DC. I like the Nolan movies; I'd argue he does the best Bat-verse. But if they do a JLA movie--and they're talking about it--I don't think it'll do near as well as this does, and not just because Bale won't be back as Batman.

I like the idea that if you looked a few miles north, you'd've seen Andrew Garfield as Spider-Man, handling shit and making inappropriate jokes; or if you could get the X-Men back from...wherever, they'd have helped out, too. Ditto the Fantastic Four.

* I mentioned this with XMFC, but you get it again here: you watch the entire last act, the Avengers vs. Loki and the Ch'taurri, and it's believable. It doesn't feel like you're watching a movie; you're watching a window to something that's happening three universes away. I've gotten that sense with the previous MCU movies, and XMFC, and I think it works because it's building on whatever was already there, and I love that.

* NICK FURY YOU ARE THE BEST. Badass greatcoat, firing rocket launchers at planes armed with nukes, guilting the Avengers into beating Loki.

* Did not see it in 3D, don't think I lost anything because of it.

* Soooo...we all got that Alexis Denisof was the voice of--actually, no, I don't know if it was the Ch'taurri liaison Loki had, or Thanos; I don't think Thanos actually talked.

Verdict: SEE IT NOW. See it again, if you can, because no joke: this is the best superhero team movie--discounting XMFC and X2--I've ever seen.