Avengers: Extended Edition, The

This is a great alternative way to watch The Avengers. With a lot of additional material added in, it fleshes out the characters in ways that add a lot of value and some insight, particularly Hulk, Captain America, and Hawkeye. The scenes are considerably upgraded from their original, raw look, and blend in almost seemlessly with the film, since Whedon used different camera techniques at different times anyway.

The net effect of some of the most notable changes here is to make the parallel between 9/11 and the Battle of New York more obvious. Maria Hill opening by talking about what a disaster it was, cut with the scenes of civilians climbing from rubble, really ground this in the human cost of super hero battling. I think that's the intention of the deleted scenes with the waitress and the cop at the end. The cop storyline ends with a bunch of unfinished effects, so sadly those bits are cut and his sub-plot doesn't seem to go anywhere. The waitress plot show aliens rounding up civilians and corraling them to be exterminated, like Nazi gas rooms...a perfect situation for Cap to bust up. It's pretty heavy for the film, possibly one reason why it was cut, but also really slows down the action and adds a fair bit of length. The film is almost definitely better without these scenes.

Overall, I think the theatrical cut is still my preferred version, as the Maria Hill opening/closing isn't as strong as Sam Jackson's. These added scenes are great though (waitress/cop aside) so it's a tough call. Thankfully, this is a great enough movie to warrant rewatching multiple times, both ways.
(Full review here: https://boxd.it/2OZ6Yp)

In its current form, The Avengers is one of my all-time favorite comic book films, not to mention one of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's best installments. This fan-edit attempts to integrate previously deleted material into Joss Whedon's narrative with surprising success. While I did miss the chilling original opening with Loki encountering the Other, I loved the addition of Maria Hill talking to the World Security Council about the Avengers and Nick Fury. The way that this interrogation is written and acted adds a lot to the story and also adds a lot to Hill's character, which I really appreciated. I also really liked that there were more moments with Ashley Johnson's waitress character to add more of a ground-level human perspective to the Battle of New York. All the footage is put together fantastically from start to finish, and it further strengthens what was already a strong plot and characters in the theatrical cut of the film. This runs at just a little over two and a half hours long and yet the pacing is always smooth. I loved this, and it kind of makes me wish the deleted footage was kept in for its release in theaters, because they really do offer genuinely terrific character moments. Not to mention, more Ashley Johnson and more Harry Dean Stanton will never not be a plus.

I am very grateful toward samspider3 for making this edit, it is well made and the cuts are very seamless.

Unfortunately most of the added stuff has been cut from the final movie for a reason, and I think that only 1 or 2 scenes should really have made it in because they detract from the main story, especially the waitress scenes, the added Loki scene, and Maria Hill replacing Nick Fury in the council scenes I'm not too fond of because 1. Nick Fury is a much more interesting character and is better written and 2. Samuel L. Jackson is a better actor than Cobie Smulders, at least in my opinion.

However, the editing is VERY well done, 10/10 from a technical standpoint this is a marvelous edit, really worth your time. Video/Audio quality is much better on the original but that's only because the deleted scenes are not available in HD (they're not on the blu-ray). The added scenes add a depth to some of the side characters and even some of the main ones, like Cap. His additional scenes really stand out as the best in my opinion.

Still, the action intercuts toward the end detract from the story so I don't think this will replace my Avengers copy for this movie seeing as most of it is really superfluous. I do think every MCU fan should watch this at least once though, it's well worth it.

Thanks again samspider3 for making this!

Once again Sampspider brings some excellent deleted scenes back into the place where they should have been in the first place. The edit is totally seamless (which proves how skilled he is) and the added scenes round the film without making it longer or breaking the pace at all.
A must watch for the MCU fans.

I was fortunate enough to get a copy of this from the editor.

First off, let me preface this by stating that I am a huge fan of the MCU, and really admire the effort that Marvel has expended to create a cohesive universe for their characters. That said, Avengers is not one of my favorite films in the series.

We have this apparently huge secret organization essentially running the planet, and no one knows about it--but that's acceptable, and there's no fallout from the events in NY. I had a difficult time swallowing that.

What this edit does is add in the deleted scenes, and bring back something much closer to Whedon's original vision of the film. He humanizes the characters, and gives SHIELD some pushback against the "World Council" through the Maria Hill debrief, which now frames the film, and also makes the events of the film, at least in my opinion, more believable.

The edits are, to my eyes, seamless. The film is richer with the addition of the scenes, and makes the story, especially the Steve Rogers story, much deeper.

This will be the version I choose to watch going forward. Great job!!