The Avengers take on a dangerous foe. Avengers Assemble.

Avengers Assemble – When powerful alien technology ‘The Tesseract’ is stolen from S.H.I.E.L.D headquarters, the citizens of Earth are threatened with slavery. Captain America, Iron Man, The Hulk, Thor and Black Widow must work together as a team to stop the evil forces who now have the power to destroy the planet.

Avengers Assemble (2012) – Director: Joss Whedon

Is Avengers Assemble appropriate for kids?

Rating: 12

Running Length: 143 mins

Starring: Robert Downey Jnr, Samuel L Jackson, Tom Hiddleston

Genre: Action/Adventure, Comic Book

REVIEW: ‘AVENGERS ASSEMBLE’

This is the 6th instalment of Marvel’s ‘Avenger’ series and the first of the actual ‘Avenger’ movies. Joss Whedon masterfully brings together the heroes Iron Man, Captain America, Black Widow, The Hulk, Hawkeye and Thor as ‘The Avengers’. We have seen all of these characters before in their respective movies (although Black Widow had only previously become a character in Iron Man 2 and Hawkeye had only a minor role in Thor) and what could have become a clumsy battle of the egos is a brilliant example of writing for an ensemble cast. The characters complement each other perfectly without losing the essence of what made them special in their previous movies.

As with previous Marvel movies, ‘Avengers Assemble’ is an action packed affair with plenty of comic book style fighting. The story moves at a good pace and each character has good dialogue and plenty of screen time. While ‘comic book’ may appear to be more of a children’s genre, ‘Avengers Assemble’ is mature enough to entertain adults while the excitement will keep kids hooked.

CONTENT: IS ‘AVENGERS ASSEMBLE’ SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN?

The opening scene introduces the antagonist as he attacks the S.H.I.E.L.D headquarters. During this fight scene people are seen being stabbed, mostly with a large spear but once in the neck with a knife. There is no blood but it is still rather graphic, albeit short.

Another scene shows a high-class event in Germany being attacked. The antagonist throws a man down, pulls out a sharp, whirring three-pronged weapon and shoves it into the man’s face who is seen to struggle. A character outside the building holds a similar weapon to a security panel and the image of an eyeball is seen coming through, making it clear that the antagonist is violently ‘scanning’ his victim’s eye. A clip of this scene is included below. It is the most violent scene of the movie and we feel that if a child can watch this without concern, they should be fine with the rest of the movie.

There are several scary monsters in the movie. ‘The Other’, who the main antagonist is working for, may be particularly frightening for children with his scary voice, grotesque appearance and threats to other characters. However he is only present for two short scenes. The aliens which attack a city in the finale may also be frightening for younger viewers. They relentlessly attack the heroes and innocent people on flying vehicles and also use gigantic metallic creatures that have sharp, metal teeth that look like huge blades.

There is some bad language in this movie which borders on moderate, however it is not excessive. One character is called a ‘mewling quim’. This is a very old fashioned swear word which could be repeated by children who probably won’t know what it means.

CAN I SEE A CLIP?
VERDICT: IS ‘AVENGERS ASSEMBLE’ FOR KIDS?

Overall this movie will appeal to children due to all the exciting action sequences and should be appropriate for most. There are a few scary bits in it but they are not sustained and they are outweighed by the comedic moments so they shouldn’t have any lasting effect. We would particularly recommend this movie for children aged 8 and over, although we would advise caution as young viewers are likely to be distressed by the ‘eye’ scene.

  • Violence: 3/5
  • Emotional Distress: 2/5 (a tragedy befalls the heroes and there is sustained grief among them as a result)
  • Fear Factor: 1/5
  • Sexual Content: 1/5 (Black Widow wears clothes which accentuate her curves in typical comic book style, certain camera angles are clearly designed to highlight this)
  • Bad Language: 1/5
  • Dialogue: 1/5
  • Other: Deals with themes of teamwork and it’s power to overcome individual differences, self sacrifice and being true to oneself. The characterisation of the antagonist plays on pride, obsession and the difficulty in stopping what you start.

Words by Laura Record

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