The Avengers

[Nevermore]

Thinking about it, that's probably how Loki intended to get Banner to hulk out.

[sickrubik]

That's what I assumed as well.

[RhyssaFireheart]

Plus, isn't there a point where an image of the staff is shown on some screen in the plane/carrier that was bringing Hawkeye & crew to invade the helicarrier?  I kind of assumed Loki go captured as a decoy and so that the bad guys could find the helicarrier by tracking the staff somehow.  Fucking up the team and messing with their minds was just dessert for Loki, not to mention getting to trap his brother Thor, lock him up in a cage meant to hold the Hulk and then drop him out into open air 30,000 feet up. 

[Ironwood]

 

[HaemishM]

Yeah, the fact that the staff was messing with them was "kind of fucking obvious"

Not just the staff, but Loki in general. His plan was to prevent this super-hero team up from happening, and to get Banner to Hulk out and pound Loki's brother Thor into paste. He had come to the conclusion that that was his best way to get these powerful beings the fuck out of the way, including SHIELD. He might have needed to be captured so that Hawkeye could locate the Helicarrier with all the heroes on it, since the thing is pretty much invisible otherwise. And he probably did it because he wanted to watch the heroes tear each other apart from close up.

It's not a great plan, but most of Loki's plans in the comics are never that good either.

Did the Joker do it better? Well, of course, but that was a movie of a different type. That was a crime movie that happened to have caped heroes in it. This was 4-color sheer comic book style stuff.

[LK]

OK, I'm with that plans so far, but it seems to ignore the revelation made after the incident: to make the team-up happen so that he could defeat them at their prime in front of everyone. I thought that was his original motivation ... to prove himself and demoralize Earth into submission by defeating Earth's greatest heroes in direct combat.

Edit: On second thought -- the "diva" part was to launch the invasion on Stark Tower so everyone could see it coming in a way that was unmistakable and the most demoralizing. Facing the Avengers directly wasn't a part of proving himself.

[Samwise]

Yeah, the fact that the staff was messing with them was "kind of fucking obvious"

Which still begs the question of why it was just lying around there.  I mean, Loki's retarded for not having any kind of plan and/or the plan is "I'll get them to play with my magic stick that automatically scrambles the brains of everyone in proximity" and every single one of the Avengers are retarded for falling for it.  Either way it's not really fantastic writing when you stop to think about it.

[CmdrSlack]

Yeah, the fact that the staff was messing with them was "kind of fucking obvious"

Which still begs the question of why it was just lying around there.  I mean, Loki's retarded for not having any kind of plan and/or the plan is "I'll get them to play with my magic stick that automatically scrambles the brains of everyone in proximity" and every single one of the Avengers are retarded for falling for it.  Either way it's not really fantastic writing when you stop to think about it.

Less thinking, more Hulk Smash.

[Evildrider]

The staff wasn't just laying around, they were running tests on it.  They were all in Banner's lab.

[sickrubik]

The staff wasn't just laying around, they were running tests on it.  They were all in Banner's lab.

Yeah, i'm not sure where else it WOULD be. "Hey, this thing turns people, including some of ours, into zombies... maybe we should try to figure out how it works. Best put it in a closet."

[Thrawn]

This entire thread is starting to make me think of the 2/10 meme now for some reason.

http://knowyourmeme.com/photos/238423-210-would-not-bang

[Velorath]

WHY ?  WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY ?!?!!!

Loki gets captured.  That gets his staff on the helicarrier where it can be tracked by Hawkeye.  The staff arguably also allows him to increase the tension between the team from a distance (as opposed to directly controlling someone through touch).  Just prior to the attack on the Helicarrier, when Fury confronts Stark and tells him that they're supposed to be working on tracking the Tesseract, Banner mentions that the program is running and should have a location pinpointed soon (I believe he said within a half an hour but I'd have rewatch it to be sure).  During the attack, when Hawkeye fires his arrow on the bridge that disables the second engine, it also disables all the computers on board including the one Banner was using to track the Tesseract.  Ultimately, the attack on the Helicarrier prevented the Tessereact from being located until after Selvig was able to get it set up at Stark Tower.

[Samwise]

The staff wasn't just laying around, they were running tests on it.  They were all in Banner's lab.

Yeah, i'm not sure where else it WOULD be. "Hey, this thing turns people, including some of ours, into zombies... maybe we should try to figure out how it works. Best put it in a closet."

Yes, with all the whizbang technology and high-tech labs on board that carrier, the only two options for dealing with potentially hazardous substances are "put it in a closet and ignore it while we argue" and "put it on that table over there and ignore it while we argue".    Good thing that table was there or they'd have had to put it on the floor.  Somebody could have tripped.

[Lakov_Sanite]

They were only arguing because of the staff.....

also yes, the lab with "the smartest man in the world" is a bad place to put tech you are trying to understand...really?!

[Abagadro]

This isn't a "plot" movie. It's a "characters bounce off each other movie" so none of this bothered me in the slightest.

[Samwise]

I'm thinking maybe if you thought it was dangerous and/or important, you'd have it behind a radiation-proof shield and/or have a lot of impressive-looking scientific instruments pointed at it to figure out if it was emitting any kind of mind-altering radiation or mystic vibrations or some other comic book pseudotechnobabble.  I dunno.  What was he doing with it on the table in that little stand before they started arguing about Nick Fury?  Hefting it to try to figure out how much it weighed?  Is that the extent of what he was able to do with all the resources of SHIELD at his disposal?

The more I think about it, the more I think the writer felt like he wanted to do SOMETHING with the staff there but he couldn't actually figure out how to write that scene in the time/budget allotted, so he just sort of left it lying around in the background and let the comic nerds could fill in their own blanks. 

But as Ab said, the point of the movie was to have things fighting things, and it succeeded at that admirably.  They could have just cut most of what happened on the helicarrier to leave more time for Hulk smash and I'd be happy.

[Mattemeo]

*cough* it was there to help triangulate the location of the Tesseract; they were taking gamma readings from it and relaying it into the information they were getting from the readouts nationwide.

This shit isn't hard people. But my god, you all try to make it so.


Rewatched it today. Almost every. Single. Complaint. uttered in this thread is dealt with wholesale in the running. The only thing, the ONLY thing that comes across as a misstep, and that no one seems to care about so far, is that Thor just 'appears' and Loki explains it away by saying "oh dad probably did that". It's not a massive difference to Loki's own magic trick in the crater-ized SHIELD facility, it's just much cheaper.

[Samwise]

I still think (and I actually had this thought during the movie while the staff was just sitting on the table with nobody paying attention to whatever it was or wasn't doing) that potentially dangerous radioactive alien mind-control whatsits should at the very least be on the other side of a set of robotic arms, like real-life scientists use when they're playing with dangerous radioactive whatsits:



So I guess the problem that I have with the "the staff was secretly controlling everyone's minds with gamma radiation" Loki plan is that it means I'm smarter than all of the geniuses in the movie.   And if that doesn't strain your suspension of disbelief I don't know what.  

[Evildrider]

It wasn't the gamma radiation, which was negligible, as it was the reason they needed Banner's help to find the thing,

[Mattemeo]

Yeah, but you're thinking waaaaay too rationally. Which is what geniuses aren't known for.

Tony Stark is a hands on kind of cool guy, doesn't afraid of anything etc. "Gamma radiation? COOL! Maybe it'll spark ol' Banner up and I can look into setting up the Hulk Buster"
Bruce Banner is GAMMA RADIATION MAN. He's not bothered by shit emitting gamma radiation because what harm could it possibly do him now? I mean, it might hurt Stark but he's a bit of a dick.
That no one else that comes in the room cottons on and says "hmm, maybe you boffin types might like to put that behind some FUCKING SHIELDING" is because BINGO, it's already affecting them.

I am smert. I hav movie comprehenshun.

[Nevermore]

I still think (and I actually had this thought during the movie while the staff was just sitting on the table with nobody paying attention to whatever it was or wasn't doing) that potentially dangerous radioactive alien mind-control whatsits should at the very least be on the other side of a set of robotic arms, like real-life scientists use when they're playing with dangerous radioactive whatsits:



So I guess the problem that I have with the "the staff was secretly controlling everyone's minds with gamma radiation" Loki plan is that it means I'm smarter than all of the geniuses in the movie.   And if that doesn't strain your suspension of disbelief I don't know what.  

It's always a good idea to try to inject real world science into a comic book world.  You know, the same world where someone thought it was a good idea to build a flying aircraft carrier.  (insert the obligatory 'yo dog, I heard you liked flying...' joke). 

[Merusk]

"Loki was carrying it around, why the fuck would we worry."

ta-dum.   Yes, it's a bloody stupid argument because Loki is some extra-dimensional being.   And? People don't do dumb shit with things they don't understand like ALL THE TIME?!  Even educated professionals who should know better?  Riiiiiight.

[CmdrSlack]

This thread needs more "Hulk . . . smash."

[Ironwood]

In defence of Sams point, even Starks fucking DAD used robotic arms when he was playing with the tesseract.

See;  Captain America:  The First Avenger.

[Ironwood]

The only thing, the ONLY thing that comes across as a misstep, and that no one seems to care about so far, is that Thor just 'appears' and Loki explains it away by saying "oh dad probably did that". It's not a massive difference to Loki's own magic trick in the crater-ized SHIELD facility, it's just much cheaper.

Actually, that bit was mega clear to me.  Loki said 'I wonder how much Dark Energon father had to use to send you here'  (Yes, I'm paraphrasing a little). 

Job done.

[Bunk]

In defence of Sams point, even Starks fucking DAD used robotic arms when he was playing with the tesseract.

See;  Captain America:  The First Avenger.

We're talking about Tony Stark and Bruce Banner - both shown in previous movies to have a general "fuck it, I'll just test this on myself" attitude.

[Thrawn]

This thread needs more "Hulk . . . smash."

Only if it's this thread being smashed out of existence, I think it's beyond saving.

[Ironwood]

In defence of Sams point, even Starks fucking DAD used robotic arms when he was playing with the tesseract.

See;  Captain America:  The First Avenger.

We're talking about Tony Stark and Bruce Banner - both shown in previous movies to have a general "fuck it, I'll just test this on myself" attitude.

Oh, I know.

Though to be fair to Stark he was, you know, dying and whatnot.

[Reg]

This is the best movie thread since the beret-wearing hordes descended on Avatar to declare it "unoriginal."

[RhyssaFireheart]

[Ironwood]

That's some mullet.

[Furiously]

Thor looks like he didn't go through an awkward stage.  Bastard.

[Ironwood]

Australian tho.  They tend not to have 'em.

[murdoc]

This thread needs more "Hulk . . . smash."

[Lakov_Sanite]

I actually like they gave the hulk body hair.