And I'm very glad I did. And therefore, I can say, if you are like me -- if you do not read comics, if you don't always enjoy excess violence, if you think that action movies have to have a heart -- you will like this movie anyway.
The main reason? It was written by Joss Whedon. And in case that isn't reason enough for you, I'll expound: Joss does things right. I may not have seen even half the things that he's famous for, but I know that much.
And one of the things he does best is clever, whip-snapping, funny dialogue. It's practically a Whedon requirement. And here Tony Stark gets most of it, and of course delivers it brilliantly, with the requisite amount of sass and sarcasm. There are also great visual gigs -- from Grand Central station getting destroyed and no one seeming to care, to the Hulk punching Thor's hammer, to the fantastically awkward post-credits scene. Not being familiar with source material, I don't know what this movie would have been in different hands. But one thing is clear -- that when Joss came on board and grabbed the script to do an unrestrained rewrite, things got exponentially better.
