Because we are behind the times at our house, when Avengers was coming out last summer, we had people telling us- Oh, you need to see Captain America before Avengers. Last night, right before we watched it, J asked to make sure we’d seen Thor, as he felt that was the most important prerequisite. We had. We’d also seen the Ed Norton Hulk (I loved Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner), and the firstIronMan.
Honestly, I don’t really think we really needed to see any of them. They added something, but the movie stood on its own just fine.