Avengers Congregate – New poster revealed … but is it any good?

Today we were treated to two revelations regarding The Avengers. The first, some news which is about as welcome as a fork in the leg, is that the UK title is Avengers Assemble. Or if that sounds too natural, Marvel Avengers Assemble. This is to avoid confusion with the 1960’s TV show The Avengers. Unless there was a massive green superhero wearing purple shorts in the TV show, Disney should probably credit UK audiences with a little more intelligence.

That said, people recently walked out of The Artist in Liverpool because they didn’t realise it was a silent film, so maybe this is fair enough. In fact, the more clarity the better; let’s add “THIS FILM CONTAINS SOUND” on the bottom of the poster for Avengers Assemble, or as everyone will be calling it, The Avengers. 

Congratulations to the classroom full of children who came up with that name. Presumably they were trying to think of the least memorable, least cool sounding title possible. I know it’s their battle cry, but a name for a movie? It’s probably the first time the word “assemble” has been used in a film title, and for good reason. It brings to mind board meetings and bureaucracy; hardly the associations you look for when marketing a big Marvel event. It sounds like it will open with Thor running through the minutes of the last meeting. They might as well have called it Avengers Congregate. Not to mention the Anchorman co-option of the phrase.

The second revelation came in the form of a new poster, as shown above. Look at it. Keep looking. Notice anything weird? Well Captain America is taller than Thor, Black Widow is taller than Nick Fury, and The Incredible Hulk is doing his best Godzilla impression. Okay, so it’s perspective; Captain America is standing on something and Nick Fury is standing a long way behind (a really, really long way behind), but it still looks odd.

This is probably because the characters are all very clearly cut out and stuck on to this poster, and for that we have the classroom of school kids to thank once again. Let’s just hope they used safety scissors. By the time it came to pasting Hawkeye on they’d gotten sleepy and given up, hence why he looks like he’s lopsidedly staggered into shot ten minutes late and reeking of booze. It just looks lazy and familiar and dull, especially when compared with the excellent recent posters for The Dark Knight Rises and The Amazing Spider-Man.

These are cleverly designed posters which actually make these films look intriguing, while Joss Whedon‘s shiny mess leaves us already bored with The Avengers. Sorry, Avengers Assemble.

Clacked by Dan Meier
on Mar 02, 2012 @ 13:30 EST5EDT