What Are You Shooting For? Lessons from "The Avengers"

Yesterday evening, I went to see "The Avengers."

Unless you live on Mars, you've probably heard of it. If you're not clear on the plot, here it is:

Iron Man, the Incredible Hulk, Thor, Captain America, Hawkeye and Black Widow answer the call to action when Nick Fury, director of the international peacekeeping agency known as S.H.I.E.L.D., initiates a daring, globe-spanning recruitment effort to assemble The Avengers team to defeat an unexpected enemy threatening global safety and security. Despite pulling together the ultimate dream team, Nick Fury and longtime confidant Agent Coulson must find a way to convince the superheroes to work together when the powerful and dangerous Loki gains access to the Cosmic Cube and its unlimited power.

You might be confused. Bored. That's kinda how I generally am regarding this sort of movie. It also brings up an important point for writers: What are you shooting for?

Obviously, the creators of "The Avengers" were shooting to entertain a younger, more male, audience. (Though as the box office has proven, nearly everyone's seen it.)

(FUTURE UPDATE: I’m lol’ing at myself. Superhero flicks generally do appeal more to guys than girls, but the biggest “Avengers” fans usually seem to be girls. Of course, who doesn’t lust after Tom Hiddleston?)

However, the movie's goal was typical for an action movie. Lotsa fighting, romantic elements present but receiving little attention. Some humor and wit, too, especially from Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.)

And cliche moments. One example is when Evil-God-Dude Loki visits Germany and suppresses a crowd outside a theater. As an Evil-God-Dude, he has a staff/sword item to magically force his minions to kneel.

Once everyone's kneeling, Loki lifts the spell and begins to give a grand speech about taking over the world. Naturally, one old man stands up, to give a short line about freedom. Then, just before Loki can evilly extinguish the man's life, Captain America swoops in.

At other times, "The Avengers" just has some faulty psychology. The worst of it arrives as the Avengers battle Loki's forces to protect Manhattan.

At a point in the sequence, Captain America swoops onto a car beside two police officers. He pauses for a moment to deliver evacuation instructions, to which one of the policemen replies: "Why the hell should we follow you?" When C.A. swiftly spins and delivers blows to two of Loki's alien fighters, the policeman also turns and begins to bark C.A.'s directions to bystanding officers.

I cringed a little at that moment. Once again, cliche resistance. But there was something else: the policeman's reaction didn't strike me as natural. Humans are sheep!: if we see a hero/leader giving orders in a terrifying situation, we're going to follow them.

Now, I don't totally want to disparage the movie. (And with Joss Whedon as screenwriter, I'm not sure it was possible for this flick to be truly bad.)

My point is the question I presented at the beginning of the post: What are you shooting for? Because, truthfully, "The Avengers" was quite a good movie. Sure, the who's-more-macho fights got tiring after a while, but there were some pretty funny moments (such as the Hulk pounding Loki against the ground, before he can give another I-am-a-god! speech.) The Black Widow was very cool, and I was interested by her relationship with Hawkeye, though it didn't receive much attention. Plus, the performances weren't terrible: I enjoyed Mark Ruffalo's (as Hulk) in particular.

So what kind of humor do you want to employ in your writing? How much action, romance? Who's your audience?

Just something to consider.

Other weekend news:

1. Loving Marina Diamandis's new album, Electra Heart.
2. Loving "Bridget Jones's Diary." Can't believe I didn't see it before! (It also inspired lots of Colin Firth love.)
3. Also: began to watch the 1995 "Pride & Prejudice" miniseries (feat. Colin Firth)

Who's your audience? Did you see anything over the weekend?