Movie Review- The Avengers (2012)

There has been a lot of buzz about this movie, and for good reason. The Avengers has been anticipated by Marvel fans for four years now since the end credits of Iron Man. 
The Avengers revolves around the Norse God Loki's plot to use the tesseract (that blue cube thingy) to bring an extraterrestrial army from the other end of space to conquer Earth and make all humans subject to Loki's rule, since he can't be king on Asgard. The first half of the movie focuses on the differences between each of the team members and their struggles to find common ground. Tony Stark (Iron Man) and Steve Rogers (Captain America) in particular butt heads a lot, mainly because of the fact that Stark is a narcissistic jerk and Rogers is a selfless hero who puts in everything he's got.
If I told you any more than that, I would spoil most of the movie.
The Good:
I thought that there would be little time for any character development due to the fact that there are six or seven main characters and to the nature of the massive plotline. But there were some serious team-building experiences here, and you could see each of the characters begin to overcome their differences to act as a cohesive unit. The action didn't get too caught up in itself like most movies of this nature; when there was a serious moment one of the characters would often crack a joke that would lighten up the rest of the team and the audience. There were a lot of inside jokes for Marvel geeks like me, and there were also jokes that everyone could understand and laugh at. The special effects were amazing, and the action scenes were definitely action scenes. Not only was the storyline good, but it also improved the rather rushed and poorly done storylines of the movies Thor and Captain America.
The Bad:
The plot was good, but at times it felt a little too much like the plot of Transformers 3, which I hated. The climactic battle scenes of the two movies were very similar, but the one in the Avengers benefited from the jokes that would lighten the mood throughout the sequence. Loki was an okay villain but he could get a bit tedious sometimes, especially with that bratty I am the Rightful King type of attitude that he always had. The director also had a minor case of redshirt syndrome, I think.
The Rating:
The Avengers gets 4.25 stars. The bad was bad, but not bad enough to subtract too much from the overall awesomeness of the movie. Definitely worth the four years it took to get it out there. Highly recommended, and well worth the wait.
After you finish watching the movie, stay after the credits. Not just the first line of credits, but the second one as well. Don't ask why. Just do it.