TOP
TENS: AVENGERS FIGHT SCENES
Welcome,
readers! Here I am again, bringing you another article of my ten
best. For this Top Ten retrospective, I present to you another
example of the cinema; the difference this time, the countdown
revolves around one specific movie from a series of successes that
have been dominating the box office in recent years. This series:
the Marvel Cinematic Universe!
Beginning
with the unexpected smash hit, Iron Man in 2008, the MCU has
had blockbuster after blockbuster for over six years, including The
Incredible Hulk, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and
Guardians of the Galaxy. Each has had it's degree of success,
but altogether, the MCU has raised itself up to be the
highest-grossing movie franchise in the United States (worldwide,
however, Harry Potter is still king). And none of these
movies have been quite as enormous or as acclaimed as the culmination
of Marvel's first phase of superhero adventures, Marvel's The
Avengers.
Featuring
masterful performances from an ensemble cast, excellent character
interactions, breathtaking visuals, and hard-hitting,
brilliantly-crafted action sequences, The Avengers is, in this
writer's opinion, nothing short of the greatest superhero movie ever
made. I have enjoyed every Marvel movie I've seen thus far, but The
Avengers has impressed me the most by far. With that said, in
the spirit of the release of the upcoming Phase 2 finale, Avengers:
Age of Ultron, and the initiation of Phase 3 with the release of
Ant-Man, I have compiled a list of some of my favorite moments
in The Avengers and listed them in ascending order of
awesomeness.
Specifically,
the fight sequences.
As
we all know, with no conflict, there is no story. Therefore, the
better the conflict, the better the story. The Avengers
leaves no shortage of conflict throughout the story, whether it is
between the heroes and the villains, among the heroes, inside any
individual character, or if it's just Tony Stark “threatening”
the Nordic god of mischief. Picking ten and putting them in order
hasn't been easy, but it has been enjoyable, and I hope you get the
same enjoyment in reading them.
10
– THOR VS. HULK
The
two heavy-hitters on the roster clash twice in this movie, and both
times have been in action-packed scenes that are a pleasure to watch.
The first sees Bruce Banner going ballistic and unleashing the beast
on board the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, with anything and everything
in his way suffering his wrath. In an attempt to quell the green
behemoth, Thor takes it upon himself to battle the Hulk and restrain
him as long as possible. At first, it's a bare-knuckle battle of
wills in the hangar, but when reason (and bare fists) are useless for
the Odinson, he summons his mighty hammer, Mjolnir, and the real
battle begins. The Hulk's ferocious strength and invulnerability
make him impossible for S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel, but one scene shows
that not even the Incredible Hulk is worthy to lift the great hammer
of Thor. The two duke it out for only a few minutes, and the fight
is interrupted by the intervention of a hoverjet (which Banner's
alter ego promptly turns his rampage towards and destroys—in
midair), so there is no clear winner. But for such a short fight
in such close quarters that ended in a draw, it was quite the brawl.
The
second fight between the two was nothing more than a single punch.
In that “fight”, Hulk is the clear winner.
9
– BLACK WIDOW VS. HAWKEYE
Two
elite agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., one a genetically-amplified super spy
and the other a master archer brainwashed by Loki, head-to-head in
the underbelly of the Helicarrier—there's nothing finer in the
realm of one-on-one man-to-(wo)man combat. After the Hulk's tantrum
ends in him being sent flying out of the air in the wake of a jet
explosion, Loki's corrupted men infiltrate the slowly-falling
Helicarrier and raise Hell—which the Avengers must somehow stop.
While Iron Man and Captain America are busy repairing the
Helicarrier, and with Thor and Banner missing in action, Natasha
Romanoff takes it upon herself to stop a corrupted Clint Barton in
his tracks. The two demonstrate perfect armed and unarmed combat
skill, with Widow disarming Hawkeye more than once and Hawkeye
matching her move for move, the fight ends with a well-aimed punch in
the face for Barton, knocking him cold and freeing his mind from
Loki's control. This fight made my list because of its
up-close-and-personal nature; Romanoff and Barton are close
comrades-in-arms, as explained by Romanoff herself in an earlier
scene (which I'll explain later). Their close relationship is
reflected in the limited space between them during their skirmish;
one scene shows them pressed so close together, the contact seems
more appropriate for kissing than fighting. Overall, it's a
well-made and symbolic scene with plenty of action.
Oh,
to be Jeremy Renner in that scene . . . .
8
– CAPTAIN AMERICA VS. LOKI
This
scene is an awesome bout between the pinnacle of human physicality
and a godlike warlord with a grudge. While the semi-assembled
Avengers try to pinpoint the location of the stolen Tesseract (a
major plot point hinted at in Thor and made the center of
Captain America: The First Avenger), S.H.I.E.L.D. sends
Captain Steve Rogers to Germany to find and apprehend Loki. When the
trickster god takes a group of hostages, Rogers steps in to protect
them, backed up by Black Widow in a hoverjet. Loki makes the first
move in attempting to destroy the jet, Cap retaliates with a
well-aimed shield throw, and the battle gets underway. Cap is
disarmed early on, but he doesn't let that stop him; he expertly
fends off Loki's attacks with his bare hands. He even goes so far as
to openly defy the Asgardian's command to kneel. But as strong as
Rogers is, Loki keeps up with him, and even gets the upper hand—a
split-second before possibly the greatest superhero entrance in the
film, courtesy of Iron Man. When Stark arrives and issues an
ultimatum, Loki surrenders, so his fight with Cap is inconclusive.
Despite that, this is only one example of a battle between the
products of science and sorcery, and though not the best (I'll
explain why later), it is still a great example at that.
7
– TONY STARK VS. STEVE ROGERS
While
not physical in any way, this confrontation deserved a spot on the
list simply due to an overload of symbolism. Once the Avengers
finally learn what Loki's plan is in being willingly incarcerated,
the group attempts to relocate Banner to avoid any potential
destructive outbursts from his alter ego. This leads to an argument
between Banner, Thor, Rogers, Romanoff, Stark and Nick Fury over the
severity of the situation and who is at fault. Rogers and Stark make
things particularly personal; Rogers is unimpressed with Stark's
brand of “superpowers”, and even less so with the
“genius/billionaire/playboy/philanthropist”'s resume. And while
Rogers refuses to believe that Stark is hero material, Stark is
equally snide with Rogers' attempts to big himself up; as Stark
outlines, Rogers was, at one point, a nobody before the super-soldier
serum experiments. The argument between the two almost reaches a
“schoolyard fight” low when Rogers challenges Stark to put on his
armor for a fight. Right when it seems the tension between the two
couldn't get any worse, Loki's brainwashed troops arrive, and the
plot takes a turn for the worse, forcing Rogers and Stark to put a
hold on their own fight and start working together. The argument
between Stark and Rogers is symbolic in that each side represents a
great point in two sides of history. Steve Rogers, a man from the
past, comes from a time in which American heroes were respected, and
justice, honor and righteousness were appraised, while Tony Stark,
representing the future, has a take on life that is almost as cold
and mechanical as the armor he wears—a reflection of his arrogance
and self-serving demeanor. No two men could be any more different,
and yet, when all is said and done, they band together to do what's
right when the chips are down. Opponents in ideals, but comrades in
conflict: an impressive and well-written character dynamic.
6
– BLACK WIDOW VS. LOKI
This
is another fight that isn't truly classified as a “fight”, but
the conflict here is just as strong, maybe even more than the last
confrontation on this list. Stark and Rogers begin to believe that
Loki is not the only problem they have; they are convinced that Nick
Fury is hiding something, and are determined to find out what.
Meanwhile, Loki is paid a visit in his cell by Natasha Romanoff, who
makes the attempt to interrogate Loki and ascertain the location of
the Tesseract—and Hawkeye. Loki is interested in the Black Widow's
dark backstory, and she explains her past as a deadly mercenary whom
Barton was sent to kill. When Barton instead reformed Romanoff and
brought her to S.H.I.E.L.D., their bond began. Loki laughs off
Romanoff's sentimentality, seeing her as pathetic for wanting to save
Barton as a way of wiping out the “red in her ledger”, and
insults her for working for dishonest people willing to murder. Loki
gains the psychological upper hand by threatening to force Barton to
kill Romanoff violently before Loki himself kills Barton (his
appellation for Romanoff, “mewling quim”, is particularly
degrading, as it is nothing more than antiquated misogyny). When
Romanoff seems broken by Loki's threats, the trickster ends up
tricked himself—he lets slip his intentions to use the Hulk to
destroy S.H.I.E.L.D. from the inside. With all the information she
needs, the Black Widow alerts the others and takes her leave,
victorious. Not only is this fight impressive in its psychological
nature alone, but it shows the Widow using her duplicitous nature to
gain the upper hand over an opponent who doesn't even know he's been
had. As powerful and intelligent as Loki is, his greatest weakness
here was his arrogance and superiority, leading him to underestimate
the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and come out of this showdown in defeat.
She's
good. Very good . . . .
5
– TONY STARK VS. LOKI
WARNING: contains spoilers.
The
last verbal battle on this list is probably the best of all of them.
With the Avengers scattered and broken after Phil Coulson's 'death',
the time to rally together and stop Loki arrives when they find the
Tesseract and the location in which Loki intends to begin his
invasion. Stark repairs his badly-damaged armor and flies out to his
own building, Stark Tower in New York, and is greeted by
S.H.I.E.L.D.'s escaped prisoner, Loki. Removing the damaged armor,
Stark confronts Loki and offers him a drink—and a set of verbal
warnings. With Loki still confident that his inter-dimensional army,
the Chitauri, will win him the world, Stark rebuts that the Avengers,
“Earth's Mightiest Heroes”, will stop him. Stark accentuates his
point with an impressive roll call—a demigod, a super soldier, a
man with “breathtaking anger management issues”, and two
assassins, all of whom are angry and out for blood. While Loki waves
them off as inconsequential (“I have an army.”), Stark snaps
back, equally unafraid (“We have a Hulk!”) The war of the words
culminates into Loki attempting to use his scepter to manipulate
Stark, only to find that it doesn't work—the scepter needs to be
pressed against the victim's heart, but because of Stark's chest
reactor, the scepter fails. Now angry at last, Loki grabs Stark by
the throat and throws him out the window, unaware that Stark had been
using his trash-talking as a distraction to prepare a new set of
armor for battle. The armor follows Stark out of the top of the
tower, equips to him and saves him from the fall, prompting a very
brief second round between the tech genius and the god of mischief.
Iron Man strikes back hard, but is forced to begin the battle against
the arriving Chitauri. At the end of this distraction (which Stark
still won, arguably), his return as Iron Man gave him another minor
victory. A double-win for Shellhead, in words and in tech—but
then, was there ever any doubt?
4
– BLACK WIDOW VS. RUSSIAN MILITARY
Joss
Whedon himself states in the director's commentary for The
Avengers that, long before this movie came out, he had been eager
to write a fight scene involving one combatant tied to a chair. This
dream became a reality early in the movie, directly after the title
screen; the Black Widow is shown in the middle of a sticky situation
involving the Russian military. With two-thirds of the dialogue in
full Russian, it explains that Romanoff had infiltrated their midst,
only to be given away by outdated information and captured. Tied to
a chair and dangled over a two-story shaft, Romanoff is on the verge
of having her tongue removed when the soldiers receive a phone
call—for Romanoff. Once Coulson, on the other end of the line,
threatens them into giving her the phone, Romanoff is reluctant to
leave her mission just yet, until Coulson informs her of Barton's
defection and the theft of the Tesseract. Bearing this in mind,
Romanoff puts Coulson “on hold”, while she gets up and begins
deftly beating her captors to a pulp while still tied to the chair.
With a series of acrobatic movements that could only be described as
what would happen if sex were made into a fight sequence, the Black
Widow breaks the chair, frees herself, and single-handedly
incapacitates the soldiers, suspending their leader upside-down over
the shaft by attaching a chain to his foot. With that, she takes her
phone and her shoes and walks away, as if from another mundane day at
the office. The fast pace and brilliance of a captive in combat make
this seemingly unnecessary scene spectacular and demonstrative of
Widow's abilities as a superhero, a spy, and an all-around strong
character.
That,
and Scarlett Johansson in a low-cut black dress is always a
plus . . .
3
– IRON MAN VS. THOR
As
I said before, this movie has its share of bouts between human
science and the world of sorcery—this fight sequence tops them all.
After Loki's surrender in Germany, the jet he is escorted to the
Helicarrier in is intercepted by Thor, who breaks in, takes Loki and
attempts to interrogate him alone on a cliff. Just as Loki refuses
to give the location of the Tesseract, Iron Man interrupts the family
reunion, the two engage in mutual trash talking in a dark forest, and
the fight begins. While Iron Man gains a few advantages at first,
through his beam weapons and gaining power instead of damage from
Thor's lightning, Thor counters with superior hand-to-hand combat
skills and super-strength that is enough to crush Stark's armor.
Both are capable fliers, both have energy projectiles, both have
augmented physicality, and both are after the same guy (who is
watching the whole thing from the cliff he was left at, with a
smile). When Shellhead and the Odinson come close to a draw, the tie
is imposed by the arrival of Captain America. Rogers breaks them up
and attempts to reason with Thor, who retaliates by slamming Mjolnir
down onto Cap's vibranium shield—which quickly proves to be a dumb
idea. With that as the obvious signal for the end of the fight, it's
sad to know that a clash of two great superheroes, possibly the best
one-on-one fight sequence in the whole movie, was a push.
But
you know something? It was one hell of a fight!
2
– AVENGERS VS. CHITAURI
WARNING: contains spoilers.
This
is the climax of the film, the moment we as comic book freaks had all
been waiting for—the moment when Earth's Mightiest Heroes would
take on legions of villains in an epic clash that spreads all over
New York City. Iron Man is forced into combat against the arriving
Chitauri after his tete-a-tete with Loki, and the device, powered by
the Tesseract, that opened the portal between their world and ours,
is protected and self-sustaining. In other words, there is nothing
left to do but fight them off. Captain America, Hawkeye and the
Black Widow take a S.H.I.E.L.D. jet to New York to repel the
invaders, and they are shortly joined by Thor and Iron Man. Unable
to quell the destruction that is already underway, Cap, Barton and
Romanoff perform more rescue and containment than actual combat. And
with Iron Man working on finding a weakness in an enormous wormlike
carrier, it seems the invasion won't be stopped so easily. Once the
group is united, though, is when Banner arrives from his unfortunate
plunge, transforms, and stopped the large creature in its tracks with
his bare hands. Stark finds a weakness, fires a few charges, and
blows the creature in half. Now truly assembled at last, Bruce
Banner, Tony Stark, Clint Barton, Thor Odinson, Natasha Romanoff, and
Steve Rogers all prepare for war.
And
Loki is only too eager to give it to them.
Cap
begins making a plan—containment. He assigns Barton to a rooftop
so he can keep his eagle eyes on the entire scene and make calls for
the rest of the team. Stark is assigned to make a perimeter, and
must reverse or stop the course of anything that gets too far out.
Thor is tasked with slowing down any newcomers and reducing their
numbers, and Rogers himself keeps Romanoff with him so that they may
fight off any and all ground troops. Finally, the Hulk is basically
allowed free reign to kill everything he sees—which he accomplishes
magnificently.
Where
climactic, large-scale battle sequences are concerned, there is
nothing finer. Whether it's watching Black Widow hijack a Chitauri
air bike, Hawkeye firing arrows into his targets without even aiming,
Cap reflecting a laser beam from Iron Man and angling it into
incoming enemies, or watching Thor and the Hulk break an enormous
carrier creature in half with a large shard of wreckage, no fight
sequence could top this monumental clash between good and evil. Even
in scenes of desperation, where the Hulk is pinned down by cascades
of enemy fire, Hawkeye runs out of arrows, or Cap is jettisoned out
of a building by a bomb, the Avengers fight on and never give in.
The fight approaches its end when S.H.I.E.L.D. high command deploys
an unauthorized nuclear missile strike on New York. This is shortly
after Black Widow learns from Dr. Erik Selvig that the machine comes
with a failsafe; Loki's scepter is capable of bypassing the machine's
defenses and shutting it down. Before they do, though, Iron Man has
an idea of a better place for the nuke—the portal. Stark guides
the missile away from Manhattan and through the hole, destroying the
Chitauri invasion force and stopping their onslaught instantly. Once
Shellhead makes it home safely, the heroes have a brief celebration
(and plans for shwarma about two blocks away) before confronting
Loki. To sum up the aftermath, Thor and Loki use the Tesseract to
return home (where the latter awaits judgment for his crimes), Stark
begins reconstruction of Stark Tower, S.H.I.E.L.D. addresses the
security council's rather stupid decision to obliterate New York, and
the so-called 'Avengers' are famous, and infamous, around the
world—and if Fury had his way, around every
world.
All
in all, an incredible battle that led to a victory for the good guys.
Nothing could make this movie any better, and no other fight
sequence in the film—or in any of the Marvel films—could have
been better.
Save
for one . . . . .
1
– HULK VS. LOKI
It's
not even a real fight. It wasn't meant to be a real fight. It
didn't even last very long. But it is HILARIOUS! During the
Chitauri invasion, Loki is blown off of his ride by an incoming
incendiary arrow from Hawkeye, and lands back on Stark Tower. There,
he is quite suddenly confronted by the beast he's been trying to
manipulate since being placed in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s midst—the Hulk.
The 'other guy' is eager to get his rage on, but Loki brazenly stands
up to him, labeling him a “dull creature” who is beneath him.
But just as Loki firmly decides not to allow himself to be bullied by
the Hulk, the jolly green giant does just that—rather violently.
He grabs Loki by the leg and slams him against the floor five times
before dropping him, shocked, broken and squealing, amongst a pile of
loose flooring. An ordinary man would surely have been reduced to
pieces by such brutality, proving that Loki is indeed a god. This
does not mean, however, that he is indestructible; the
gamma-irradiated titan easily crushes the cocky trickster and walks
away without much thought at all. Maybe next time, Loki will think
more carefully before inviting the wrath of the Incredible Hulk.
“Puny
god”, indeed . . .
There
is one more fight I'd like to bring up before ending this countdown.
It wasn't quite good enough to make my top ten, but it's still worthy
of a mention in my book:
Honorable
Mention
PHIL
COULSON VS. LOKI
WARNING: contains spoilers.
During
Loki's siege on the Helicarrier, courtesy of his brainwashed minions,
Loki makes good his escape from his prison cell. Thor, returning
from his bout with the Hulk, goes to stop him, only to be
tricked—once again—by Loki's illusions, and locked in the cage in
Loki's place. Just before the trickster activates the cage's drop
mechanism, Phil Coulson orders him (rather politely) to back away.
In the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent's hands is a reverse-engineered weapon
crafted from the remnants of the Destroyer automaton sent by Loki to
kill his brother in Thor. Coulson admits that even he is
unaware of its functions. Just before firing the weapon, however,
Loki uses his illusory tactics once again to mortally stab Coulson
from behind. That's when Loki drops the cage, sending an enraged
Thor plummeting 30,000 feet down to Earth. When the Laufeyson
leaves, Coulson confidently tells Loki through dying breaths that he
will lose. When Loki struggles to find his liability, Coulson
informs him of it: “You lack conviction.” Coulson then sends
Loki off with a super-heated blast from his weapon, titillated at
seeing what it actually does.
While
Coulson's death scene is a stir for the emotions (Marvel's Agents
of S.H.I.E.L.D. TV show puts a damper on those emotions pretty
quickly), it also serves as the catalyst that brings the Avengers
together. It even reached Iron Man in such a way that he refers to
Coulson by his first name before confronting Loki (something he is
averse to doing early on in the movie).
Thank
you for joining me on this retrospective. It's been fun running down
all of my favorite conflict-heavy moments in one of my favorite
movies of all time. I know not everyone is a fan of the superhero
genre, and not everyone has intimate knowledge of comic book
characters (yeah, I'm a nerd, I get it), but my interests are
something I like to share through my writing, and I hope to have
caused interest to pique in others. Hopefully in time, too; with
Thor: The Dark World and Guardians of the Galaxy
knocking around, I'll have to track them down and watch them soon.
The release of Avengers: Age of Ultron draws ever nearer!
Thank
you again for your time, and for your eyes.
-- J. A. G.
