It’s hard to believe anyone hasn’t heard of this movie or have some idea of what it’s about. Easiest way to boil down this overstuffed epic is that Tony Stark (with an assist by Bruce Banner) crams his hubris down everyone’s throat (again) creating a world threatening robot take over (again).

There’s a lot going on in Avengers 2 and that is it’s greatest weakness. It’s packed with characters and everyone has to get their own screen time to justify their existence. This means that the pace of the movie is shockingly fast. You just whip from scene to scene with very few breathers. Stuff just happens to happen. Tony and Bruce work for awhile on creating the Ultron Artificial Intelligence program and give up on it for the night to go to a party. Right after that (literally, a few seconds), despite making very little headway, the thing kicks off on it’s own and builds itself. Then there’s the stuff that makes little to no sense (like the physics of a moving train) and Thor’s heavily edited subplot where he disappears on a side mission for a bit and then flies back into frame just in time for an integral moment that couldn’t be done without his powers.

Two new characters, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, are brought in resulting what I thought were apathetic results. I didn’t care for either despite some valiant attempts (namely Hawkeye, who everyone rolls their eyes at when the heavy hitters like Hulk and Captain America are standing by) to make them fun and useful.

I think my biggest problem is that it much of the movie felt like a retread. Despite the scale being much bigger, it checks all the boxes. Teamwork fights, Tony Stark causing the central conflict, a big action piece solely for Hulk to be Hulk. A finale consisting of another disposable swarm getting shot and mangled. Having Hulk and Thor is actually rather redundant, because they both fill the heavy hitter role. You need something massive moved or punched? Either one can do it. Plus, just about everything is computer generated so once the action gets going, it’s just pixels running into pixels. There’s little weight to the movie.

With that out of the way, there is some great stuff too. It’s got a few great jokes and character flare ups that are well executed and perfectly placed (CA trying to pick up Thor’s hammer, Tony picking on just about everyone). Ultron and Vision look really good and Watching Hulk go bezerk is a blast (despite me ragging on it a bit in the paragraph above, it was my favorite action scene). The times when things slow down and everyone gets to interact are often great (Nat and Bruce is a neat and thoughtful dynamic). Hell, Hawkeye gets to actually do things! Avengers gets a lot of the summer blockbuster movie parts right.

Too much of a good thing applies most to Age of Ultron. With so much to juggle it’s easy to get distracted and lost. A streamlining of things is in order I think. Despite pulling in over a billion dollars at the box office, I hope the powers (the ones that wear dress attire) at Marvel recognize that they have to tend to their garden before it gets unmanageable and fans shy away.