Avengers: Endgame [Spoiler free first post - beware after that]

There don't seem to have been any posts in the Marvel thread about Endgame yet, and I think it's big enough to have earned its own.

Overall, a fantastic end to this phase of the Marvel cinematic universe. Not a perfect movie, but I think overall the most satisfying experience since the first Avengers brought the different movies together.

Not that anyone even mildly interested isn't going to see this, but it delivers on the promises of both wrapping up a bunch of existing storylines while respecting what has happened up to this point and leaving space for new plots to emerge.

This is too hard to discuss without spoilers, so from the next post on only proceed if you've seen the film or don't care about spoilers.

[Spoiler buffer]

The time travel felt unearned. I know a conceit of these films right from the beginning has been that Stark is a genius, but going straight from I don't think time travel is possible to oh here's the perfected way to do it wasn't very fulfilling. Would have much preferred something that actually used Scott's abilities and experience. For example they could have had Tony Stark figure out a way to theoretically navigate the quantum realm and then have Scott leading teams of Avengers through it.

The revisiting of previous events was great, and they even called out BTTF to address the similarities. Some of the time travel logic initially left me puzzled, but ultimately their explanations of how it works all match up.

Satisfying ends for Stark and Rogers. Kinda sad for Tony however that while she was involved Captain Marvel didn't grab the glove and use it to dust Thanos herself. Certainly seems like she could have handled it.

Speaking of Captain Marvel - fuck she's overpowered. So much of the battle could have been avoided if Natasha sent up a pager letting her know what they were gonna do.

Pleasantly surprised that they didn't reset the timeline, hope future films respect how fucked up Earth is going to be for decades to come.

Speaking of that, I wonder when Spiderman: Far From Home is gonna take place. From all the trailers up to this point it feels like it's an ordinary world which would suggest it's pre-Infinity War.

My main question is does one have to have seen captain marvel before this one sort of like how ragnaroc set up a lot for the first half?

I haven't seen Captain Marvel yet, and a 30 second rundown of her story from a friend meant I didn't seem to miss anything.

She's super-powered, she's been off planet for the last few years, that about does it.

In the theater now, see you in a few hours.

Spoilers beware.

I just finished watching this and I loved it. The time travel stuff was fun and a very interesting way to go about it. We got a few repeat lines like, "I can do this all day." I expected that line, but I didn't expect, "I am Iron Man"which I said along with RDJ when he said it because you knew that was the next line. Also, I didn't expect Cap's line to be said to himself. There were a couple of other moments like that when you just knew what the next line or action sequence would be. It's not a complaint, I wouldn't have had it any other way. I loved the BTTF references along with the Indiana Jones reference. RDJ gave the best performance. I predicted Tony would die and Cap would "ride off in the sunset, but when it happened, I lost it. I also teared up when all of the Avengers showed up and Cap said, "Avengers assemble", that brought a huge smile to my face. Another thing I predicted, Captain Marvel swoops in and saves the day. Good thing that wasn't the end of the battle. Then they had another SJW 9Disney mandated no doubt) moment where all of the girls team up. Thankfully it was done well. Overall it was a very satisfying ending to this story, it should be interesting how things go forward. Really well done, too bad Star Wars won't get this type of treatment. The battle at the end was absolutely epic! This whole film is epic! Grand slam!

Observations and/or questions.
Black Widow, Vision, Cap and Tony will no longer be Avengers, but presumably Cap lives up to a certain point.

Falcon takes up Captain America mantle. I was hoping it would be Bucky, but I'm satisfied with it, they've been setting that up and Falcon shares Cap's
values.

X-Men will be coming and that should be interesting when and how they do it.

Spider-Man's next movie may be pre- Infinity War.

I hope we get a Dr. Strange sequel.

Thor is out there, so he can return if needed.

Gamora is from the past, so do her and Quill still end up together?

How did Captain Marvel know when and where to find Tony and Nebula?

How did Nebula transmit recordings from the future?

When you receive the soul stone you lose the one you love most, does that mean Hawkeye and Black Widow love each other the most? I'm kind of confused about that.
When Thor showed up I was like, "is anyone going to mention The Big Lebowski?' They did. The Dude abides, the Dude abides. Love it!

I can't think of anything else right now. I see Infinity War and Endgame as one movie so I can't say I like one over the other, but they are very different, yet similar at the same time. Again, very satisfying and very nice wrap up of everything that preceded it. I can't think of any major complaints.

Cap and Peggy.

He got his dance.

My non-spoiler blog review.

https://dickynoo.blogspot.com/2019/04/big-2019-movies-part-6.html

Same computer brain, same mental passwords.

Just like your future self would be able to get into your own e-mail.

Hmm....CC said all the spoiler stuff I was gonna.

I'll think of something....

No, but you have to see Ant-Man & The Wasp.

That’s the other thing I liked, Ant-Man’s involvement. The title of the movie could have been Avengers:Time Heist.

A comment I saw on YouTube was they thought Thor was going to dump Tony’s ashes off the cliff.

Oh!
At Tony's funeral, there was this teenage boy there that I didn't recognize, and the whole drive home, it was driving me crazy.
One of the Easter egg videos from one of my movie shows revealed it, he was the little boy from Iron Man 3!
They really did tie everything together!

No, I tried to let it go, I can't let it go....

*Long sigh*
No.
Disney didn't pull this out of their ass.
A-Force is a thing in the comics.
This was planting the seeds for A-Force.
I loved it.
Everyone else on Earth loved it.
Well, normal humans with goodness in their hearts, not so much misogynist Youtubers.
Stop listening to those guys.
Stop it.
No!
Bad!

Look, I didn’t hate it and after watching reviews on YouTube, they pointed it out that it was AForce. Also, they had a similar moments in IW. I accept it. RLM might have some complaints, but I’ve been thinking about this movie all day and I’m not going to complain, I love this movie.

Or two phones with the same SIM card.

How it should end:

Thanos is on his phone calling infinity glove tech support because his toddler got a hold of the glove and snapped the universe population down to 2. Of course the hold time is infinity because no one is in to answer the phone because they are all dust.

Wow, a lot to process.

On the whole, really enjoyed it and found the conclusion pretty satisfying.

I was mostly wrong in my predictions about the film: Infinity War is not totally undone (which means the Earth, recovering from a crisis of 3 billion people disappearing, is thrown into another as those 3 billion show back up), they did not preserve the timeline a la BTTF2, Tony died/Steve lived not the other way around, Vision did not return, and Clint didn't die. Thor did get his shot to Thanos' head, but it was not in the finale.

If you're not a fairly well-versed MCU fan going in, this film is going to be completely incomprehensible to you.

So, so, so, so much fan service and so many callbacks to earlier films. So many cameos (Alexander Pierce, Brock Rumlow, Howard Stark, Jarvis, Hank Pym, Peggy Carter, Jane Foster, The Ancient One, Frigga, Loki,...) The movie constantly rewards fans.

What didn't I like? Quite a few things as it turns out...

1. The time travel aspect of the story makes no sense. Even if the stones are returned to the instant they were taken, the chronology is hopelessly broken. If the Thanos from several years ago dies in the present, how can the timeline stay intact?

2. Losing half the population would've been devastating. San Francisco would not have recovered enough in 5 years for a well-manicured memorial park to exist. The humanitarian impact would've been absolutely horrific.

3. Likewise, the return of several billion people is going to be a catastrophe. It's too big a stretch to say everybody's back so it's all good. If human society even can recover from this, it will take decades. Everything should not be fixed in time for Peter Parker's class trip to Europe.

4. Tech hand-waving and accompanying technobabble were excessive. Okay, comic book movie so perhaps inevitable, but felt like really lazy screenwriting in places.

5. As cool as the final battle was, I'm just gonna say it: it felt like something we've seen before, and, while it had some great moments, I felt kinda underwhelmed by it.

6. Professor Hulk and Depression Beard Fat Thor were fun, but I wanted to see them at their greatest in the finale.

What did I love?

The humor.

The cameos and callbacks.

The Stan Lee cameo!

Cap vs. Cap. "America's ass."

Elevator scene. "Hail Hydra."

Rene Russo and her scene with Thor.

The sheer number of characters returning in that final battle. Every one of them got a cheer in my theater.

Tony's and Natasha's demises. Both felt right and provided the proper emotional impact. Sad that all six original Avengers didn't make the final battle, though.

Most awesome moment: Cap wields Mjolnir.

Steve getting a life with Peggy buttoned it perfectly. I knew as soon as Steve didn't return from time traveling that's what had happened.

3+ hour runtime wasn't a problem. The film held me all the way through.

So, a perfect ending for the Avengers films even if a far from perfect film.

I loved it and plan on seeing it again.

It's hard to score this movie since one's enjoyment of it depends on what one brings to it from earlier films. By itself, I'll give it a 7.5. As an MCU fan, I give it a 9.

Going to see it in a couple hours.

Are there end credits? If so how many? and where? In the middle of the credits or at the end or both?

Thanks.

There are no mid/post credits scenes. There is a sound at the very end, but not worth staying for IMHO.

The sound is

Okay, the time travel does sorta make sense.

It's that every incursion creates a parallel universe, so changing what happens doesn't affect their present. And slightly younger Thanos from the parallel timeline coming to the "prime" present does not cause continuity problems.

All fine and good but...

They let Loki loose with the tesseract in that one timeline. Sucks to be them, I guess.

And how can Cap return the stones to those timelines after they've already diverged from the "prime" one?

Think of the people as 2-D slices of a 3-D bologna, and the stones as pimentos.
Thanos, his minions, good-Nebula, and bad-Gamora can time copy, but the stones are a constant through all timelines, and have to be put back.

As for Avengers-1 Loki with the tessract, 1.) I think no matter where he runs or hides, prime-Thanos gets him 2.) the finer details will probably be revealed in his Disney+ show.

What I want to see going forward is no more Avengers movies, it’s too perfect of an ending. Then do Guardians 3 with Thor, then go forward with sequels and then X-Men.

Once this comes out on streaming services or torrents, I'm looking forward to watching basically the same Avengers movie they've been making since 2012.

Avenger 5: A-Force, Avengers 6: Secret Wars.
But just call them A-Force and Secret wars.