Yah! Early reviews for The Avengers are thumbs-up!

It looks like comics fans are finally getting the movie they’ve been waiting for.

After disappointments big (Green Lantern), small (Thor) and in-between (X-Men: First Class), moviegoers looking for a superhero film with equal amounts of action, laughs and even character development have something to look forward to.

Early reviews for The Avengers, which opens May 4, have been almost uniformly positive. This isn’t entirely a surprise as writer/director Joss Whedon has demonstrated time and again that he “gets it”: not only with his Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV series, sure, but also his scripts for the Dark Horse Buffy comic book series and his run on Marvel’s Astonishing X-Men series, as well as with his his sci-fi TV show Firefly and its spin-off movie Serenity – not to mention his script for the well-received current horror flick Cabin in the Woods. Time and again, Whedon has demonstrated that he understands what makes science fiction, horror, and fantasy tick, whether in movies, TV or comics.

Here are some blurbs from RottenTomatos.com:

“Like a superior, state-of-the-art model built from reconstituted parts, Joss Whedon’s buoyant, witty and robustly entertaining superhero smash-up is escapism of a sophisticated order.” Justin Chang, Variety

“Whedon pulls off a stunning feat in bringing balance to this superhuman circus, engineered to charm the geek core and non-fans alike.” Tom McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter

“Something remarkable: a superhero movie that entertains, excites, explodes, and even takes time to examine itself, and the world in which we live in.” Adam Bub, MovieFIX

“Whedon doesn’t patronise viewers. He strikes just the right tone and where there are rough edges, he uses Iron Man’s wry humor to smooth them out. The effect is totally disarming.” Stella Papamichael, Digital Spy

And perhaps most impressively:

“… the 3D actually works.” Andrew L. Urban, Urban Cinefile

Not all are positive, though…

“Apparently, bootleg copies of Transformers 3 made it to Asgard.” Amy Nicholson, Boxoffice Magazine