What's Revealed in the First 'Avengers: Age of Ultron' Trailer?

5:54 PM PDT 10/22/2014 by Graeme McMillan

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Who's unhappy with Tony Stark, and what's wrong with Bruce Banner?

Avengers: Age of Ultron Marvel Still - H 2014

Marvel.com

Well, that was unfortunate timing. A day after Marvel Studios announced that the first trailer for Avengers: Age of Ultron would debut Oct. 28, it leaked online in its entirety, to the excitement of many fans. (Update: Marvel released the official trailer, and you can watch it right here.)

How Marvel Became the Envy (and Scourge) of Hollywood

With good reason, too. Mixing footage that appeared at Marvel’s San Diego Comic-Con and New York Comic Con panels with all-new material, it drops a number of hints about what to expect when the movie is released next summer —without giving too much away. Here are some important things that we noticed after multiple rewatchings.

It’s All Tony’s Fault

Will Age of Ultron set Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) apart from the Avengers permanently? Rumors that he is an antagonist in the third Captain America movie have been floating around for awhile, but this trailer shows him not only being confronted by Thor (Chris Hemsworth) in a very Darth Vader-esque moment, but also fighting the Hulk in the middle of a city.

“It’s the end,” Stark says midway through the trailer. “The end of the path I started us on.” Who is the “us” he’s referring to? The Avengers? That was Nick Fury’s idea, not Tony’s — so could this be more about the mechanical warfare of Iron Man and War Machine and the artificial intelligences of JARVIS and Ultron than a super team? Note, after all, that the first Ultron we see is made up of former Iron Man armor pieces (Weren’t they all destroyed at the end of Iron Man 3? Apparently not.)

It’s Not Easy Being Green

When he’s not a giant Iron Man-punching behemoth, the glimpses we see of Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) in this trailer make it look like he’s having a hard time of things — he collapses in the snow (the same snow that we see Hawkeye running through later, interestingly) or is curled up under a blanket while the rest of the team purposefully don’t look in his direction. Given that he’s not present in the one shot of the team that we do see in the trailer, what is going on with the Hulk during the movie?

Our Friends, Our Enemies

At one point, we see Ultron standing with the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver (Elizabeth Olsen and Aaron Taylor-Johnson), suggesting that they’re all working together — or, at least, not at cross-purposes — but Quicksilver is also the only character we get to see actually fighting Ultron at any point during the trailer, as well. So what prompts that turnaround? Maybe the scene where the Scarlet Witch falls to her knees in the middle of some urban destruction, screaming, offers a clue or two.

There Are No Problems Using Disney-Related Material

The creepy version of “I've Got No Strings” in the trailer is very effective, but having Ultron himself (James Spader) finish the quote raises the important question: Why does a killer robot have such knowledge of Disney animated movies (in this instance, Pinocchio)? Actually, even more important: Does this mean that Paul Bettany’s Vision will manage a chorus of “Let It Go” during the movie at some point? We can but hope.

Someone at Marvel Has a Sense of Humor About Things

While the trailer is noticeably devoid of the humor most people associate with Marvel’s movies — replaced with both foreboding and quick-cut scenes that offer little insight or answers as yet (the ballet thing is somehow a Black Widow reference, though, right …?) — there is something to smile about. Officially, Marvel and Disney have yet to comment, but after news of the leak emerged online, Marvel’s official account sent this tweet: