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Look, you don't walk into the second Avengers movie unsure if you'll like it. Even before your headache from the 3-D glasses sets in, you've made up your mind. So to expedite the process, please read one (and only one) of the following reviews based on your expectations.
{OPTION 1} I love the Avengers! Yay, there's another Avengers movie!
You're going to love Age of Ultron! It's got the Avengers in it!
You'll squee all over yourself each time a familiar character from your childhood appears on screen. You'll be slightly annoyed whenever Joss Whedon takes liberty with the canon, but you'll forgive him because, man, everything looks so cool! You'll love the portrayal of Ultron from the ramshackle first appearance (that sounds like it's voiced by Tom Waits) to the smooth and witty version with even more personality than in the comics. It's so much fun.
Joss is especially talented at capturing people cowering in cars while heroes fight above them. This is an underappreciated, but incredibly important skill for a movie emphasizing the human cost of a battle for Earth. Isn't it great that he's in charge of this series? I like him even though his first name is super weird.
Critic's Grade: A-
{OPTION 2} Somebody dragged me to The Avengers! Jesus Christ, why are there so many people in this movie?
Buckle up, because it's gonna be a long ride. Like the first movie, the main impression from Age of Ultron is "too many dicks on the dance floor." But it gets worse. In between giant, smashy fights, each of the 2,000 characters gets a dark past, a love story, a moment of self doubt, and a separate resolution. It takes a while.
And, for some reason, Marvel/Whedon decided now would be a good time to add even more Avengers. Why do we need more Avengers? There are already too many goddamn Avengers! I never thought, "I wish this movie had more Avengers. And if possible, can you borrow a couple from the Twilight franchise and add a guy wearing the same shade of lipstick as Scarlett Johansson but, like, on his whole fucking head? Thank you."
In between all that, there's lots of fighting. Sometimes it's exciting, but too often it's just two indestructible characters bashing each other into stuff, as if they've forgotten they're both indestructible. Later, a bunch of flying robots that are impervious to bullets are, for some reason, very vulnerable to a bow and arrow. All in service of Ultron. The villain makes way more sense than the first film's alien-gods, but with INCREDIBLY DISTRACTING robot lips and robot teeth. Seriously, try not to look at Ultron's mouth because you won't be able to look away. ALEX FALCONE.
Critic's Grade: C+
WWeek 2015