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5 Oddly Specific Ways In Which Avengers: Age Of Ultron Defines The Franchise

With the release of Avengers: Age of Ultron, the franchise now appears to have a few interesting quirks hidden in its super successful formula.

4) Tony Stark’s Enlarged Sense Of Humor

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Robert Downey Jr. in The Avengers

That was a dick joke. There are many like it to be found in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but with Age of Ultron, we’ve achieved peak peen humor in terms of abundance and absent subtlety. Specifically, it’s Tony’s boner for boner jokes that Ultron really expands on from the first movie. Remember when Loki tried to do the scepter-brainwash thing on him in Avengers, and how hilarious it was when it failed? It’s a great gag that dryly subverts an expectation previously setup by the film. When Tony follows it up with a crack about “performance issues,” getting thrown out a window mid-smarm is what’s actually funny about the beat.

Ultron has Tony making an identical impotence joke when the Avengers are taking turns trying to lift Thor’s hammer, and this is mere foreplay compared to the climax of penis-related wordplay Tony is firing off by the film’s end. Obviously, it’s really easy for a writer to erect a dick joke or two, but at the current rate, you can predict Infinity War – Part I to sound more like a Judd Apatow joint than a comic book movie, along with one other thing…