So I am watching the avengers movie

[Simon_Jester]

Hm.

What would the military shoot at those big flying leviathans? They look like an antiship missile would do for them, but antiship missiles aren't designed to hit flying targets.

Charitably, the Council of Vague may have decided that a nuclear attack was in order simply because the aliens were for now contained, but were far too airmobile to stay that way. If the Chitauri suddenly stopped fighting stupid and used their hoverboards to just... fly and scatter in all directions at several thousand feet and 100-200 miles an hour in vast numbers, how the hell would the military contain them? We can shoot down any single aircraft moving at (or above) those speeds, but thousands of individual tiny targets?

[Sea Skimmer]

Maverick, SLAM (which is a Harpoon base anyway), larger SAMs, laser guided bombs, moving target capable JDAM (slow enough), rockets, iron bombing, they are more then are slow enough, strafing, every anti tank weapon, artillery fire, slow once again, warship guns. That works until someone mods the software to let our anti ship weapons fly at any altitude they want, though I'd be in favor of team Maverick blowing them all to hell before that happens or the Russians or Chinese can show up with some of their more amusing stand off weapons.

The world has a lot of IR guided anti ship weapons which will have no problems homing. Unless those things are going to break the sound barrier, and mount an actual armament, I'm not seeing the problem. Its hunting season on a mechanical air whales, no bag limit! Honestly did anyone count? Did they even really destroy more mass of buildings then September 11th did? Yeah I think we can wait to see if the invasion is actually more dangerous then the opening video of World in Conflict.

The US has 12,000 AMRAAM missiles alone meanwhile, really think the mobilized world can't deal with thousands of flying aliens on basically surf boards that demonstrated no capability that would even let them survive attack helicopters? This justifies killing millions out of hand in a plan that might not even work how? I mean fuck, blowup the building the portal generator is on top of, and see if it falling to the ground in a giant pile of debris has an effect first. Or launch a damn nuke into the portal FIRST and wipe out the invasion force on the other side!

Seriously those big flying things got destroyed by a guy in a metal suit, and no matter how tough the suit was it just wasn't going all that fast, which means they can't be all that strong. Knocking out the buildings just means they have a lot of momentum, as September 11th showed a plane made of thin soda can can blast through a heavy steel building.

I'd forgive the battle a lot more though, if not for how protracted and shitty the movie was leading up to it. It seemed clear that they really just wanted to make another Ironman movie, but had all this useless baggage tacked on depriving the movie of any focus. Too many of the Avengers were too weak to be even remotely relevant to the storyline they had that ends with useless mook-airwhale attack. This no doubt is why the writers realize that oh god this battle doesn't work at all as a battle, we need to give these guys some piss minor stuff to do. I love hawkeye on the rooftop being all clever picking off the enemy one at a time. If he had a machine gun he could have killed thirty times as many as they wizzed by like idiots. They could have spun some situation where say, the stealth of a bow compared to a gun or Ironman's palm blast whatevers mattered because the enemy was lethally powerful, but na... why think, the audience is dumb as a brick anyway.

[Alkaloid]

It does however mean that when you have an ensemble cast, you better not have the vast majority of your actors playing roles that are not integral to the main plot. I mean, you can cut the hulk, and the central plot loses nothing. You can cut the Russian girl and the archer and the plot loses nothing. You can do the same with Captain America, who did the least of any of the guys.

So you are left with Thor and Iron Man, both who can carry the movie.

In good stories you cannot have two thirds of your cast do nothing.

I don't know that it's right to say they weren't integral to the plot. They all had roles in the whole thing, be it as the antagonists main goon, the guys trying to find/fistfight Loki or the guys keeping those guys pointed in more or less the right direction. Saying they lose nothing by cutting characters isn't really reasonable either. Ensembles aren't good because everyone divides up an equal share of the important tasks and does them, they're good because watching the group interact is fun. You'd 'lose' nothing by cutting half the cast of the mighty ducks, Lando in Star Wars or Kreiger in Archer but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's better off not having them.

They could certainly have done things better or made them more interesting. Cap running around finding struggling groups of police or soldiers and inspiring them with Patriotism and AmericaTM to try and organise some sort of co-ordinated defense/evacuation could have been much more interesting than him standing in the street brawling, and given him more purpose/made him look heroic.

Hawkeye was the least interesting choice to be brainwashed because he's the only character we have no actual idea about before the movie starts, and having him pretty much immediately stand on the roof making pretty trick shots once he recovered was a mistake because the only real sense of him we had was 'has history with Romanov'. They could have actually made us care in some way about his brainwashing if they pretty much only show us that the normally cold, pragmatic Romanov is a. really cut up about his kidnapping/slavery situation and b. that she is really concerned by his uncharacteristic ruthlessness/brutality as they stealth through the city trying to get to Selvig post recovery. Gives us an idea that he lost something.

Oh but they rescued some random hostages, because the evil alien invaders are taking people prisoner instead of murdering them out of hand, even while they aren't even clearly winning the fight outside. How evil are these guys really?

To be fair man, they weren't taking hostages. When Cap busts into the bank thay have a whole bunch of people downstairs and the guy standing on the balcony is prepping a grenade. That's pretty fucking evil.

[Simon_Jester]

Maverick, SLAM (which is a Harpoon base anyway), larger SAMs, laser guided bombs, moving target capable JDAM (slow enough), rockets, iron bombing, they are more then are slow enough, strafing, every anti tank weapon, artillery fire, slow once again, warship guns. That works until someone mods the software to let our anti ship weapons fly at any altitude they want, though I'd be in favor of team Maverick blowing them all to hell before that happens or the Russians or Chinese can show up with some of their more amusing stand off weapons.

The world has a lot of IR guided anti ship weapons which will have no problems homing. Unless those things are going to break the sound barrier, and mount an actual armament, I'm not seeing the problem. Its hunting season on a mechanical air whales, no bag limit!

Hm. I honestly hadn't thought of ground-attack munitions (such as Maverick) as being able to handle this situation gracefully. If they can, that changes everything.

The US has 12,000 AMRAAM missiles alone meanwhile, really think the mobilized world can't deal with thousands of flying aliens on basically surf boards that demonstrated no capability that would even let them survive attack helicopters?

They can; the problem is that if the alien invasion force is large enough, at some point it becomes a losing proposition to have to expend a guided missile to shoot down every individual one of them, or accept that they have high air mobility and can outmaneuver us at will.

Against ten thousand guys with hoverboards and ray guns that are basically no better than rifles, we're OK. Against a million such guys, we might have a problem just deploying enough people with guns in the right places to stop them because they can fly wherever they want.

[Although this could be resolved by, essentially, duplicating WWII light flak in more modern terms; I'm picturing Phalanx-onna-truck or something similar]

This justifies killing millions out of hand in a plan that might not even work how? I mean fuck, blowup the building the portal generator is on top of, and see if it falling to the ground in a giant pile of debris has an effect first. Or launch a damn nuke into the portal FIRST and wipe out the invasion force on the other side!

The Council of Vague seems to have made this decision in relative ignorance of conditions on the ground. Maybe part of their problem is that their intelligence reports aren't coming in accurately in real time. "Swarms of flying aliens with ray guns and giant flying monsters are pouring out of a portal in New York, and the available military responses nearby are kinda limited, oh and they seem to be giving the Incredible Hulk some trouble" is what they know. They don't necessarily know that the portal is being generated by a device atop the Stark building, or anything else.

So they make a stupid, ill-conceived decision because they're not really military specialists. Honestly, I wish I knew who the hell they were supposed to be; that would be useful information. Hopefully the next Cap movie will clear things up a bit.

I'd forgive the battle a lot more though, if not for how protracted and shitty the movie was leading up to it. It seemed clear that they really just wanted to make another Ironman movie, but had all this useless baggage tacked on depriving the movie of any focus. Too many of the Avengers were too weak to be even remotely relevant to the storyline they had that ends with useless mook-airwhale attack. This no doubt is why the writers realize that oh god this battle doesn't work at all as a battle, we need to give these guys some piss minor stuff to do. I love hawkeye on the rooftop being all clever picking off the enemy one at a time. If he had a machine gun he could have killed thirty times as many as they wizzed by like idiots. They could have spun some situation where say, the stealth of a bow compared to a gun or Ironman's palm blast whatevers mattered because the enemy was lethally powerful, but na... why think, the audience is dumb as a brick anyway.

Hawkeye was supposed to basically be up there as a spotter and observer to help keep an eye on the overall tactical situation. That would have been helpful. Frankly that would have been a lot more helpful than what he actually did, which was to randomly fire his bow and arrow at things.

The scene with Loki and the exploding arrow was stupid but satisfying on a visceral level, though.

[Iroscato]

Hawkeye was keeping an eye on things - there was a moment where he told Stark that the hover thingies 'can't bank worth a damn', and advised him to lead them into tight corners and spaces. It's not much, but then the fight scene had 5 other characters to focus on, three of which include a literal god, a one-man army and a creature of immense and unstoppable rage. He may well have been giving regular updates to the team, it's just that we don't see it as much.
Plus he did some ground-level fighting back-to-back with Black Widow.

[Simon_Jester]

The thing is, there are three Avengers who fight on roughly human scale. There's Cap, Black Widow, and Hawkeye.

Now, Cap gets little moments to shine throughout the movie- he gets to display his courage, his sense of right and wrong, his tactical savvy, and his willingness to go toe to toe with things that have him outgunned. He jumps into the middle of a fight between Iron Man and Thor, he picks a fight with Loki that he can't really win but refuses to give up on, he directs people effectively in combat. His moral sense helps him shake Iron Man into becoming more effective by encouraging him to grow as a person*, to abandon his narcissism and take risks for others' sake.

Black Widow also gets moments to shine throughout the movie- she's the spy, she figures out enemy secret plans and positions herself to defeat them. She fights competently and in a way that plays up her "indirect but deadly" style. She out-tricks a literal god of trickery.

Now, Hawkeye only gets to be one of the good guys, with actual personality, for about 1/2 to 1/3 of the movie. So it really did fall on the developers to give him serious opportunity to shine during that time. The problem is, all they could really come up with was "bow and arrow stunts" and that one scene of spotting. If they'd done more with Hawkeye's role as observer/sniper, as the man in the high perch overwatching the battle (something he's done before in similar situations), who understands and monitors what is going on and can keep track of the situation precisely because he is NOT constantly distracted by mixing it up with enemies at close range... I think that really would have helped present him as a character.

[Sea Skimmer]

Hm. I honestly hadn't thought of ground-attack munitions (such as Maverick) as being able to handle this situation gracefully. If they can, that changes everything.

Maverick has combat helicopter kills, SLAM is outright Harpoon you can fly with a joystick, or lock on via IR tracking, many similar weapons exist in the world. Both would be highly capable in this role, everything else has to get close but it will still work. AAW is hard for modern weapons when the target can climb at 20,000fps, sustain high gee turns and go mach 2 at 50,000ft. Gets kind of easy when the enemy only has the apparent speed-height performance of a helicopter, and even that's being generous to the air whales, and yet is very large.

They can; the problem is that if the alien invasion force is large enough, at some point it becomes a losing proposition to have to expend a guided missile to shoot down every individual one of them, or accept that they have high air mobility and can outmaneuver us at will.

Against ten thousand guys with hoverboards and ray guns that are basically no better than rifles, we're OK. Against a million such guys, we might have a problem just deploying enough people with guns in the right places to stop them because they can fly wherever they want.

And it would still be better to nuke them while they fly around in the open, or at least smaller towns, then killing a small number in the middle of NYC out of hand, with no idea what this might mean. They would easily just be starting a nuclear war instead of an idiot invasion. Just because an enemy can travel between dimensions with apparently a device they can't freely replicate and move, doesn't mean we need be completely screw against them in a war. Afterall that universe earth has its own random supertech. It is though pretty reasonable to assume anyone who can threaten us at all will be able to build nuclear bombs themselves. Being 1940s tech and such in base engineering.

The Council of Vague seems to have made this decision in relative ignorance of conditions on the ground. Maybe part of their problem is that their intelligence reports aren't coming in accurately in real time. "Swarms of flying aliens with ray guns and giant flying monsters are pouring out of a portal in New York, and the available military responses nearby are kinda limited, oh and they seem to be giving the Incredible Hulk some trouble" is what they know. They don't necessarily know that the portal is being generated by a device atop the Stark building, or anything else.

Not knowing what was going on at all makes the whole thing dumber, not more justified. All the more so since they explicitly had two F-35s apparently hot loaded with live nuclear missiles, and a number of Alpha Jets and other F-35s they could launch to take a look.

Oh and bonus that the Helicarrier has nuclear missiles on board, besides the whole superhero super valuable prisoner thing to the point of having a huge compartment dedicated to being a hulk prison, but no functional security or apparent armament at all when attacked.

[Simon_Jester]

Oh and bonus that the Helicarrier has nuclear missiles on board, besides the whole superhero super valuable prisoner thing to the point of having a huge compartment dedicated to being a hulk prison, but no functional security or apparent armament at all when attacked.

Two weaknesses involved there.

One, it turned out to be really easy to sabotage once someone got into reasonably close range without being stopped. This is kind of inherent to the way it works, because it has huge-ass ducted turbofans or whatever bolted to the sides. Notwithstanding Hawkeye's bow and arrow gimmicks, anyone with a rocket launcher could probably wreck the thing if they could get into launch range. While airborne, it's a lot more fragile than an oceangoing aircraft carrier, and one suspects that it operates the way it does more so as to be highly mobile and deployable. If they want to ride out serious attacks they'd kind of have to land and stop relying on those huge, vulnerable engines.

Two, the lack of effective security inside the helicarrier. The ease of sabotage and the way it disrupted the helicarrier's ability to respond quickly to a surprise attack got... effectively one helicopter-load of commandoes aboard. These commandoes had, for all practical purposes, about three missions that we actually see- attacking the helicarrier's bridge, preventing anyone from repairing the damaged engine(s), and freeing Loki. Freeing Loki was probably the easiest of those, but that's still more stuff than thirty or so (tops) commandoes should be able to accomplish.

Unless Hawkeye had another VTOL or two full of troops, you're right that this is a weird thing. SHIELD's helicarrier can't really have been intended as a ship-to-ship asset given SHIELD's role at responding to high-tech threats, alien invasions, and bizarre terrorist attacks. So in addition to their firepower (which is for responding to the first two), they'd almost have to have a serious force of commandos aboard in their own right (for responding to the third).

One thing... the 'hulk prison' seems to have been almost a way to avoid imprisoning the Hulk on the carrier: a cell you could chuck Banner in, and if he turns into the Hulk maybe you can contain him... but if you can't contain him, you just drop him, boom, done. So you don't need the kind of... frankly I can't imagine what sort of security would be useful against the Incredible Hulk in close quarters.

[Civil War Man]

She out-tricks a literal god of trickery.

Did she, though? The first thing she does upon finding out that Loki wanted to unleash the Hulk was to get in Banner's face about it. Incredibly dumb on its face, since not only is it not Banner's fault that he's an unwilling pawn of other people, but it's never a good idea to be openly antagonistic towards someone who reacts to stress by destroying entire city blocks. She ratcheted up the tension in an already delicate situation, putting Banner in a fragile enough emotional state that Hawkeye's attack (which she didn't know about) was enough to trigger an incident.

So, she discovered that Loki was planning to unleash the Hulk, but not how, and was a major factor in putting Banner in a state where someone else could cause him to change. Who exactly tricked who? Because it seems to me that Loki only fed her just enough information to get her to do exactly what he wanted.

[Joviwan]

Yeah, any reading of that scene where BW somehow came out ahead of Loki is just... not an accurate reading.

[Crazedwraith]

To my mind, the scene seems to show BW coming off better of the chat, with Loki coming off as genuinely letting information he didn't mean to slip. Now you can think that Loki was just playing a role to the hilt and that works to but I don't think the film really underlines that as point its trying to make.

Now Widow didn't effectively use the information she got that effectively and Loki's plan was still a success. But, her intervention with that intervention did calm things down and did stop Banner Hulking out right there and then when he grabbed the staff, instead he only hulked out later when they were actually under attack.

It's a subtle difference but if they'd kept arguing and didn't realise Loki had the conflicted spell on the staff, Banner could have Hulked out right tere and then in the same room as the other Avengers and could have conceivably done a lot more damage, especially to the unarmoured Stark.

So yeah, I don't think Widow got played as such she certainly didn't scupper Loki's plans.

[Civil War Man]

To my mind, the scene seems to show BW coming off better of the chat, with Loki coming off as genuinely letting information he didn't mean to slip. Now you can think that Loki was just playing a role to the hilt and that works to but I don't think the film really underlines that as point its trying to make.

Now Widow didn't effectively use the information she got that effectively and Loki's plan was still a success. But, her intervention with that intervention did calm things down and did stop Banner Hulking out right there and then when he grabbed the staff, instead he only hulked out later when they were actually under attack.

It's a subtle difference but if they'd kept arguing and didn't realise Loki had the conflicted spell on the staff, Banner could have Hulked out right tere and then in the same room as the other Avengers and could have conceivably done a lot more damage, especially to the unarmoured Stark.

So yeah, I don't think Widow got played as such she certainly didn't scupper Loki's plans.

Her involvement didn't calm things down at all. If anything, she escalated the situation. Captain America is the one who defused the situation by talking Banner down. It was Nick Fury and Black Widow who almost made him Hulk out right at that moment.

From the script Spoiler

At that moment, Thor and Natasha walk into the lab. Natasha keeps her eyes right on Banner. Banner looks at her, PISSED.

BANNER
Did you know about this?

NATASHA
You wanna think about removing yourself from this environment, doctor?

BANNER
I was in Calcutta, I was pretty well removed.

NATASHA
Loki's manipulating you.

BANNER
And you've been doing what exactly?

NATASHA
You didn't come here because I bat my eyelashes at you.

BANNER
Yes, and I'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy.

Spoiler

NICK FURY
Agent Romanoff, would you escort Dr. Banner back to his...

BANNER
Where? You rented my room.

NICK FURY
The cell was just in case...

BANNER
In case you needed to kill me, but you can't! I know! I tried!
(a beat) I got low. I didn't see an end, so I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out! So I moved on. I focused on helping other people. I was good, until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk!

Banner slowly gets upset as he looks at Romanoff, who gets unnerved.

BANNER
You wanna know my secret, Agent Romanoff? You wanna know how I stay calm?

BLACK WIDOW and Fury have their hands down to grab their guns.

STEVE
Doctor Banner... put down the scepter.

BANNER LOOKS DOWN AND IS SHOCKED TO SEE HE'S HOLDING LOKI'S SCEPTER. The computer beeps. They all turn to it.

TONY
Got it.

Banner puts down the scepter and walks over to the computer.

BANNER
Sorry, kids. You don't get to see my little party trick after all.

[Crazedwraith]

Whoops. yeah, You're right. I just checked the scene and she doesn't really make much difference either way in the conversation. There's a bit of conversation between the two bits you quoted. With everyone getting on each other about well everything. I wouldn't say BW's suspicions were really driving Banner to hulk out more than generalised distrust of Fury and SHIELD. If Loki did it deliberately well I don't see it gained him much.

[TithonusSyndrome]

Loki did eventually get a one-way ticket back to Asgard, which as of the end of Thor 2 seems to have worked out more than nicely for him. Maybe that was his entire game; half-ass the invasion of earth just so Thanos or whoever would finance his trip to Midgard, and then from there hook up with Thor and go after what he really desired. It's contrived,but not especially so as far as comic book schemes go.

[Napoleon the Clown]

It would be a horrible plan, though. He was told outright that fucking things up would end very badly for him, no matter where he ran to. His god-complex might make him dismiss the idea that they'd be able to go through with it, though...

[TithonusSyndrome]

I'm sure he figures he'd be able to pull another one over Thanos once he was safe in Asgard. I don't know from beans about how Asgard stacks up against whatever Thanos has in the comics, but in the films Asgard doesn't seem to live in fear of him.

[Batman]

There's also nothing in the movies indicating Asgard knows of him.

[Simon_Jester]

She out-tricks a literal god of trickery.

Did she, though? The first thing she does upon finding out that Loki wanted to unleash the Hulk was to get in Banner's face about it. Incredibly dumb on its face... She ratcheted up the tension in an already delicate situation...

So, she discovered that Loki was planning to unleash the Hulk, but not how, and was a major factor in putting Banner in a state where someone else could cause him to change. Who exactly tricked who? Because it seems to me that Loki only fed her just enough information to get her to do exactly what he wanted.

Hm. That's credible, though it would require a level of deliberate trickery even Loki might have trouble with.

My take on it is:

1) Black Widow did in fact get information out of Loki that Loki didn't actually want her to have. Loki looks genuinely taken aback at the end there, when Black Widow suddenly goes from "you're a monster" to "hey I just realized something, thanks bye!"
2) However, even though Black Widow found out Loki's plan, which Loki was originally planning not to reveal, it was still a good plan, one that had a good chance of working even if SHIELD knew it was coming, because...
3) SHIELD's got a tremendous, pre-existing tendency to distrust and disrespect Banner, which we saw in Calcutta, the way Black Widow lied to Banner about it being 'just them' in the conversation when in fact she had a small army of goons parked outside.

Basically, (3) was the reason Loki's plan wasn't fatally compromised by (1). Even though SHIELD knew Loki wanted the Hulk to freak out and attack them, they reacted by doing things that antagonized Banner and if anything made the crisis more likely to happen.

[Scrib]

Now, Hawkeye only gets to be one of the good guys, with actual personality, for about 1/2 to 1/3 of the movie. So it really did fall on the developers to give him serious opportunity to shine during that time. The problem is, all they could really come up with was "bow and arrow stunts" and that one scene of spotting. If they'd done more with Hawkeye's role as observer/sniper, as the man in the high perch overwatching the battle (something he's done before in similar situations), who understands and monitors what is going on and can keep track of the situation precisely because he is NOT constantly distracted by mixing it up with enemies at close range... I think that really would have helped present him as a character.

Of all the Avengers it seems as if Hawkeye is the one that's most fucked. Black Widow will get a movie where she gets fleshed out eventually, if only because it'd be a bit awkward to continue to let the female superhero market languish when you have such a visible figure. Hawkeye? Honestly the best thing that might have happened to Jeremy Renner is having his character tied to Johannson's.

[Civil War Man]

Whoops. yeah, You're right. I just checked the scene and she doesn't really make much difference either way in the conversation. There's a bit of conversation between the two bits you quoted. With everyone getting on each other about well everything. I wouldn't say BW's suspicions were really driving Banner to hulk out more than generalised distrust of Fury and SHIELD. If Loki did it deliberately well I don't see it gained him much.

I snipped the rest of the conversation because it didn't involve Banner directly, but yeah. She obviously wasn't the only reason he almost turned into the Hulk at that moment, but she aggravated the situation. Banner obviously didn't like SHIELD in general, but seemed to particularly dislike her. His distrust of SHIELD is definitely understandable, considering his history with authoritarian government employees who are obsessed with turning dangerous technologies into weapons. Nick Fury and Black Widow just represent everything he hates about those organizations, with Black Widow having the added bonus of being the person originally sent to drag him into the stressful environment. Assuming that Loki didn't already know about the bad blood between them (since they didn't meet until after Hawkeye was brainwashed), he'd probably still do it because one of the best ways to get Banner angry is to get everyone else paranoid about his condition and get them convinced that he's ready to fly off the handle at any moment. Then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. I mean, that trick would probably work on most people, not just the ones who turn into giant green rage monsters.

My take on it is:

1) Black Widow did in fact get information out of Loki that Loki didn't actually want her to have. Loki looks genuinely taken aback at the end there, when Black Widow suddenly goes from "you're a monster" to "hey I just realized something, thanks bye!"
2) However, even though Black Widow found out Loki's plan, which Loki was originally planning not to reveal, it was still a good plan, one that had a good chance of working even if SHIELD knew it was coming, because...
3) SHIELD's got a tremendous, pre-existing tendency to distrust and disrespect Banner, which we saw in Calcutta, the way Black Widow lied to Banner about it being 'just them' in the conversation when in fact she had a small army of goons parked outside.

Basically, (3) was the reason Loki's plan wasn't fatally compromised by (1). Even though SHIELD knew Loki wanted the Hulk to freak out and attack them, they reacted by doing things that antagonized Banner and if anything made the crisis more likely to happen.

What makes it suspicious for me is that Black Widow was only able to uncover information that prompted her to make the bad decision. She only figured out "unleash the Hulk" but no other important information like how or when. It just struck me as more likely that Loki let that little bit of information slip and let everyone's uneasiness about Banner's mental state take care of the rest.

Also, keep in mind that Loki even says that Hawkeye told him everything about her. In context, he was referring to the skeletons in her closet, but the briefing would logically have also included her skill set, like her ability to pull bits of important information out of seemingly innocuous comments.

[Simon_Jester]

I snipped the rest of the conversation because it didn't involve Banner directly, but yeah. She obviously wasn't the only reason he almost turned into the Hulk at that moment, but she aggravated the situation. Banner obviously didn't like SHIELD in general, but seemed to particularly dislike her. His distrust of SHIELD is definitely understandable, considering his history with authoritarian government employees who are obsessed with turning dangerous technologies into weapons. Nick Fury and Black Widow just represent everything he hates about those organizations, with Black Widow having the added bonus of being the person originally sent to drag him into the stressful environment.

And who lied to him about the house they met in NOT being surrounded by a horde of commandos.

What makes it suspicious for me is that Black Widow was only able to uncover information that prompted her to make the bad decision. She only figured out "unleash the Hulk" but no other important information like how or when. It just struck me as more likely that Loki let that little bit of information slip and let everyone's uneasiness about Banner's mental state take care of the rest.

I suppose it's possible, since Loki knows a fair amount about the Hulk and SHIELD's attitude toward the Hulk. On the other hand, Loki basically had no direct control over events elsewhere on the helicarrier (except maybe to subtly influence people through the staff). So he may not even have had a plan for when or how to unleash the Hulk, because he had no ability to control how that would happen, except maybe "wait for an opportunity to manipulate Banner via the staff."

Also, keep in mind that Loki even says that Hawkeye told him everything about her. In context, he was referring to the skeletons in her closet, but the briefing would logically have also included her skill set, like her ability to pull bits of important information out of seemingly innocuous comments.

True.

On the other hand, his remark doesn't seem that controlled or careful. Loki does say things that are sort of 'careless firing back,' especially when he feels insulted: "No, YOU'RE the monster!"

And he seems genuinely taken aback at Black Widow's reaction. If there were more cinematographic evidence- say, a brief cut to Loki grinning evilly afterwards- it would totally reverse the scene and I would fully agree with you.

[Joviwan]

I find it more sensible and satisfying to assume that the movie doesn't feel it's necessary to spoon feed us every one of Loki's machinations, instead leaving them up for people to infer on their own. It makes Loki himself a great actor and appear very slightly more clever than the rest of his weird plan indicates.

[Civil War Man]

And who lied to him about the house they met in NOT being surrounded by a horde of commandos.

Of course, though I counted that under the "represent everything he hates about those organizations."

I suppose it's possible, since Loki knows a fair amount about the Hulk and SHIELD's attitude toward the Hulk. On the other hand, Loki basically had no direct control over events elsewhere on the helicarrier (except maybe to subtly influence people through the staff). So he may not even have had a plan for when or how to unleash the Hulk, because he had no ability to control how that would happen, except maybe "wait for an opportunity to manipulate Banner via the staff."

The plan for how and when probably included Hawkeye's attack. I mentioned how one of the best ways to get Banner angry is to get everyone around him thinking that he's barely keeping a lid on the Hulk. One of the few methods that is even more effective is to put Banner or someone he cares about in actual physical danger (which, again, is a tactic that would work on just about anybody).

On the other hand, his remark doesn't seem that controlled or careful. Loki does say things that are sort of 'careless firing back,' especially when he feels insulted: "No, YOU'RE the monster!"

And he seems genuinely taken aback at Black Widow's reaction. If there were more cinematographic evidence- say, a brief cut to Loki grinning evilly afterwards- it would totally reverse the scene and I would fully agree with you.

Loki is pretty good at faking sincerity, but to be honest, my first impression of that scene was that it looked more like he was thinking "Huh? What are you talking about?" than "Curses! You've discovered my plan!"

Though there was that brief cut to Loki grinning evilly afterwards. He just started grinning when he heard the roars of the Hulk coming through the bulkhead.

[Simon_Jester]

I find it more sensible and satisfying to assume that the movie doesn't feel it's necessary to spoon feed us every one of Loki's machinations, instead leaving them up for people to infer on their own. It makes Loki himself a great actor and appear very slightly more clever than the rest of his weird plan indicates.

Fair.

I honestly think, though, that it at least leaves the scene ambiguous. You can infer that Loki wanted Black Widow to think/know that he was planning on the Hulk getting loose. But it isn't really... quite provable.

The plan for how and when probably included Hawkeye's attack. I mentioned how one of the best ways to get Banner angry is to get everyone around him thinking that he's barely keeping a lid on the Hulk. One of the few methods that is even more effective is to put Banner or someone he cares about in actual physical danger (which, again, is a tactic that would work on just about anybody).

Hm. Good point.

Loki is pretty good at faking sincerity, but to be honest, my first impression of that scene was that it looked more like he was thinking "Huh? What are you talking about?" than "Curses! You've discovered my plan!"

Hm. That's actually a third possibility- that Black Widow is simply wrong and Loki's plans in no way revolved around the Hulk.

I guess it's hard for me to tell, because Loki's a complex character. Sometimes he is very, very manipulative and cunning. At other times, he can chew a fair amount of scenery and make imprudent decisions based on his emotions. So it's believable to me that he can switch back and forth between manipulator and manipulated.

Though there was that brief cut to Loki grinning evilly afterwards. He just started grinning when he heard the roars of the Hulk coming through the bulkhead.

Wait... did he grin at any time between Black Widow leaving and the Hulk roaring? Because when the Hulk actually gets free, his commandos have already boarded the helicarrier, and he's got plenty of reasons to grin now that his enemies' problems have been compounded by the Big Green Meanie on the loose.

[Napoleon the Clown]

Loki's a manipulative dick, but he's also exceedingly arrogant. His ego is at least as big as Jupiter, probably bigger. If things don't go the way he expects, he kind of loses it.

Far as his reaction to BW figuring out his plan for the Hulk, one could theorize that he was more taken aback at her suddenly acting like she was unphased by what he said to her. Her figuring out his plans for getting the Hulk to come out and play ultimately made zero difference to him. One way or another, The Other Guy was gonna be unleashed without them wanting him to be. Maybe the timing would be different, but hey. And they left him in that cell, which meas Bruce was allowed to roam free. BW figuring out why he got himself captured didn't change that part at all. Maybe if the attack hadn't happened so soon after they could have put Bruce in there for safe keeping, if he (and The Other Guy) would allow it. Maybe not. But ultimately, BW figuring out the plan didn't change a damn thing.

Actually, thinking about it, I'm inclined to say Loki would probably be more taken aback by someone seeming to shrug off his manipulations more than figuring out his plan for the Hulk. He takes genuine pleasure in making people dance on strings, and he considers humans to be pathetic creatures, so the idea that one could bluff him is utterly alien. He'd find it as baffling and surprising as if a five year old became a chess Grand Champion.