Since the release of the hotly anticipated “Avengers: Age of Ultron,” there has been an explosion of heated opinions on blogs and social media about the movie, which may or may not have contributed to writer/director Joss Whedon leaving Twitter and removing himself from the conversation.

Superhero flicks have become such a predictable part of the summer movie fabric that most of the discussion about these films doesn’t usually get too deep. It’s usually centered on their fidelity — or lack thereof — to the comics. But with “Age of Ultron,” the sequel to the third-largest-grossing movie of all time, the opinions are angry for different reasons: It doesn’t live up to the hype, it’s typical action-heavy superhero B.S., it’s misogynistic, it’s too dark — the list goes on.

I, for one, think this is a good thing. The movie, regardless of what people think about it, is spurring people to think. How often can you say that of a superhero film? The fact that Whedon’s piece of mainstream action-movie entertainment is being talked about in any terms outside of how real or fake its CGI fight scenes are is encouraging. It’s also not by accident. There’s a lot more going on than most people are giving it credit for.

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As I mentioned in my review, Whedon (and maybe more so Marvel) overstuffed the movie with characters and plot lines that exist to set up the next phase of the shared Marvel universe. But the film is also overflowing with big-picture themes and classic philosophical arguments that will continue to enrich on multiple viewings.

[There are SPOILERS ahead, people. Lots of them. There’s no way to talk about anything meaningful without them!]

At first watch, it’s easy to dwell on the surface-value plot points that are identical to the first “Avengers”: Our heroes fight a mighty madman and his hordes of nameless, faceless minions to save the world again, by destroying something that is falling from the sky.

But the difference in “Age of Ultron” is that the object falling from the sky (a massive, uprooted city) didn’t come from space. It came from Earth. More specifically, like all of the dangers faced in this sequel, it’s a direct result of the Avengers themselves. Tony Stark, crushed and haunted by his awesome responsibility, thinks he’s doing the right thing. But it turns out he is Dr. Frankenstein, and he creates a Monster.

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By the start of the film, the Avengers have essentially evolved into gods. (Thor is already a god but let’s not complicate things for now.) When Hydra leader Baron von Strecker asks his military unit if they can hold them back, one of them stammers, “Well, they’re The Avengers…”

But the line between gods and monsters is razor-thin. The heroes wrestle with the idea that in certain life-or-death situations, they are tasked with choosing which innocents live or die. This kind of unchecked power leads to hubris, and Stark truly believes he’s creating Ultron to bring peace on Earth. It doesn’t matter that he has to hide his plan from his own teammates.

Bruce Banner: You want me to take the scepter behind everyone’s back and use it to bring Ultron to life?

Tony Stark: Yeah, we don’t have time for a city hall debate.

The reality is that when Ultron is “born,” he decides that the only way to have peace on Earth is to eliminate the humans ruining it. And he has huge daddy issues, so he wants to tear Stark and the Avengers apart “from the inside,” as he says, continuing the threat-from-within theme.

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Natasha Romanoff: We have no place in the world …

Speaking of classic themes and monsters, Hulk and Black Widow have a King Kong-Ann Darrow kind of relationship that goes further than the beauty merely soothing the beast. Unlike Kong, she is the one pursuing him, and both of them feel like monsters who can’t live like normal people; Banner cuz Hulk, and Black Widow because of her intentionally obscured dark past.

In previous films, it was alluded to that as a KGB agent, Romanoff killed people for dubious reasons. In “Age of Ultron,” we learn that the ruthlessness she is known for is a result of brainwashing and brutal training at a young age — and that she was sterilized to avoid distractions.

This plot point, also another way in which she relates to Banner (who also cannot have children, cuz gamma rays), has been seized upon by some as proof of the film’s misogyny. It is exacerbated by an ignorant email from Marvel’s CEO and the fact that Black Widow has been left out of many of the Marvel toys, but in the context of the movie, it gives the budding couple a commonality, just like the fact that they both might be less human because they have the instincts of killing machines. It isn’t misogynistic to suggest that the right to choose whether to have children or not is something that someone might find important.

Furthermore, her inability to procreate doesn’t stop her from being a true hero. In addition to singlehandedly keeping Ultron’s physical body from him in daring fashion, the Black Widow also has one of the most heroic moments in the film, risking her personal relationship with Banner by turning him into the Hulk against his wishes to help save innocent people. She then expresses to Cap that she is ready to die to save people. She may not have proved it to herself yet, but she’s proved to the audience that she is worthy of being called a hero.

Lastly, the Hulk/Widow romance becomes the stuff of tragedy with one of the most unlikely and affecting scenes of the movie: Hulk flying away alone, staring blankly out the window to the only future he knows he’ll ever have: One by himself.

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The exploration of what it means to be a hero takes on many forms. Certainly Spider-Man and Batman films have dealt with this idea one way or another, but “Age of Ultron” makes it core to each characters’ story and examines different shades of the question.

Captain America has a commonality with enemies Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, two young people who allowed their government to experiment on them in the hopes that they too would lead a fight for their country. He has empathy for them, even as they fight against The Avengers. (Because Whedon is so gifted at dialogue, this sentiment is delivered in one quippy line to Agent Maria Hill that cuts to the bone.)

It is also a key part of realizing that, no matter how many big action set pieces there are, the central conflict of the movie — and the reason it’s a more contemplative and challenging picture than the first — is man versus himself. And as much as Cap preaches togetherness, their personal philosophies divide our heroes from the beginning.

Steve Rogers: Every time someone times to stop a war before it starts, innocent people die. Every time.

One of the best scenes in the film has Cap and Stark arguing two sides of the same coin while chopping wood on a farm. What is the best way to win a battle? What is the best way to protect the world?

The two have fundamental differences, and while it’s setting up future installments of the series, Whedon keeps the focus on character. Cap holds true to his WWII-era beliefs, while Stark thinks he’s hopelessly naive and incapable of unleashing his “dark side” in a fight. “Maybe you just haven’t seen it yet,” Cap says.

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Later on, Cap’s statement on the subject echoes his own disillusionment with how wrong things have gone and how much havoc his “peace-keeping” team has caused.

Steve Rogers: This isn’t about beating Ultron, it’s about proving we’re not monsters.

And we’re right back where we started.

A second viewing of “Avengers: Age of Ultron” allows the opportunity to see beyond the familiar container that the film is presented in, and understand the layers of questions that are being asked. Like the Greek gods before them, superheroes are our modern myths, so why shouldn’t they examine the same issues of the classic texts in our time? The end credit sequence actually gives this idea a visual corollary, as it shows a giant Hellenistic statue of the Avengers fighting to save the world.

Just because it looks and feels like a traditional superhero movie doesn’t mean that it has to be hollow and empty. You want to talk about contradictions? The film is all about loyalty and togetherness, but at its conclusion, the team is completely torn apart.

“Avengers: Age of Ultron” is actually a smart and soulful exploration of humanity; a humanity that knows it is essentially doomed (as Ultron says we are), but is constantly trying to improve, however futile that action may be.