It feels like there are so many serious topics of conversation these days. Let's take a break for frivolity! I confess that I love Marvel superhero films. I'm not a big comic book fan, but when I watch these movies in a theatre, I get a feeling that could be described as a cross between the feeling you get at a public sporting event, like a hockey game, and the feeling you get after an exhilarating day of skiing. They are just plain fun. I saw the new Avengers movie yesterday, and it was exactly that -- pure, don't-have-to-think-too-hard escapist enjoyment. The only thing I was disappointed about was that there was no Loki. Thor was fab, though -- much funnier than in previous films.

For those of you who, like me, have the cultural taste of a 14-year-old boy, who do you root for: Thor or Loki? I like them both, but Thor is the Asgardian equivalent of a golden-boy college football quarterback. He's got to be the good guy, and you know he's going to come out on top. Loki, on the other hand, is the underdog. Who can resist an underdog? He's a villain, but they wrote him as a bit of a woobie, so you can't help but sympathize. Plus, he gets all the best lines.