Movies

The problem I had with Avengers 2 is that I wasn't sure what the theme was supposed to be. I understood what was happening, what the motivations are, but what was it about? If it's about the Avengers learning to work together despite their fears, that seems pretty lame because they learned to work together in the first movie, overcoming Loki's manipulation that turned them all against each other. Was it about how the Avengers weren't needed anymore, something which Ultron was trying to get through to them? If so, that message is shot to death when the new team shows up at the end. Or was it purely about this particular team deciding to hang up their capes? If so, Tony is the odd-man out, since there's no character motivation in the movie for him to give up, other than perhaps his recurring trauma over the nuke event.

One message that bothered me was Ultron itself. The idea is, or was, that Tony Stark creates an AI network to safeguard the planet, from aliens and possibly from mankind itself. Near the end of the movie, where he basically wants to re-purpose the Vision body to be that AI guardian, Captain wants to stop him. Presumably out of the fear that Tony will fuck up and make another AI threat. Tony says something like "I don't want to hear the "Man shall not meddle!" speech anymore" to Bruce when first discussing the Ultron project, referencing the argument that AIs shouldn't be created because creating life is wrong or that mankind shouldn't overstep it's bounds, etc. Ultron's fall towards evil is, without Bruce pointing it out, basically the physical interpretation that "man should not meddle". So so far the movie is sorta following that argument.

Except Jarvis exists. Hell, by the end of the movie Tony creates FRIDAY to help him during the final battle.

It's clear that Jarvis (and probably FRIDAY) aren't as advanced as the scepter AI, but the basic point remained - Tony had already created examples of incredibly friendly AI that can successfully manage a company and that Tony trusted enough to run his Iron Man and Iron Legion suits.

In that way, any objections to Jarvis being downloaded into the Vision body sorta fly out the window. The team, and Tony, already trust Jarvis enough with potentially dangerous technology.

Unfortunately, the movie, at least to me, thematically smashes this point too, since it requires the intervention of Thor and his magic god powers to make the Vision alive. Reinforcing the idea, at least symbolically (with Thor's thunder giving that spark that Tony's computer coding couldn't) man couldn't meddle in the affairs of creating life.

And, in the end, Ultron is basically right. Tony wanted to change the world, build an army smarter than any previous person, autonomous and ever vigilant that would defend against alien threats. The rest of the team didn't, because they wanted to save the world but not change it.

I mean shit, what does Captain America do? Goes back to his military base, calling it home. He starts up a new Avengers program. Captain's argument that they'll face the threat "together" if another alien armada shows up is short sighted at best, dangerous at worst. It assumes that their little team of people will be able to respond to an army of invaders.

Tony could have, and should have, rightfully pointed out that Jarvis operated the Iron Legion during their initial assault on Striker/Strucker?/whateverhisname's base in the first scenes of the movie. He could have easily said that it is entirely within his capability to add more Iron Legionnaires and have Jarvis control more of them and that relying solely on their little group is absurd.

Tony, and probably Bruce, were the only people who seemed aware that their little group can't, and shouldn't be the only line of defense the Earth has. Something which Captain Fury knew in the first movie when SHIELD was using alien technology to build advanced weapons. Those three characters wanted to change the world, Captain America didn't. He wanted to stay in a military base, play hero because he didn't have a home to return to, and, frankly, didn't want to make the effort to build a home. It's exactly like Ultron said, he's only special because of a war.