A Dichotomy of the Mind
Sometimes you look in the mirror and see the positives. You see all of your accomplishments, your experiences, friends, and family and you feel good. You feel good about yourself and what you've done in your life. You're thankful for what you have and you look forward to the future. Then there are times when you look in the same mirror and see the same reflection but you can't see anything good at all. All you see are your failures, everything you're dissatisfied with in terms of your body and where you are in life. Some days you see one side of yourself and some days you see the other side. But its the same image.
This is a paradox of life, one that's very real. One thing can exist in two different states in your mind at the same time. This is how I feel about AVENGERS: ENDGAME.
Welcome to Part Two of my review of Avengers: Endgame. In part one I discussed what I enjoyed about the film and one way in which I see the film. Below are my feelings about the film also, as it exists in a different state. This will be decidedly negative but hopefully not in a derogatory way. This is the second half of the dual state in which this film exists in my head. Read on if you're intrigued. If you already have enough negativity in your life and don't need any more, please stop reading now or just scroll to the bottom for the final verdict.
And remember, these are just one person's opinions and nothing absolute or concrete. The great thing about all of these Marvel Studios films is that each one can be argued as to why it's good or why it's bad. Each film has its supporters and detractors. That even the worst of the MCU films are still far and away better than most of the competition out there is an incredible statement too. And at the end of twenty-two films, whether our preferences are polar opposites of each other, we can all agree that we love the MCU.
On The Other Hand...
MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
So we're clear, I am well aware of how ridiculous my hopes for this movie are and how unlikely it is that this movie will deliver on my personal wants. I'm not that delusional and I am not expecting any of my hopes to be fulfilled. I actually went into this film a blank slate. If anything, my only real hope was that they didn't kill Thanos in the first ten minutes and the rest of the movie became the Avengers trying to reverse the snap. You won't believe this but I had been saying this exact hope for months prior to the film's release.
Well, crap... that's EXACTLY what happened. Ughh... speaking of expectations and that being exactly what happens...
Everyone expected time travel. EVERYONE! And that's exactly what they do. And yes they undo the snap. Time travel is a common theme in comics, especially Marvel comics. The Avengers and X-Men almost always have some story going on involving time displacement at any given moment. Time travel in this movie feels like something right out of the comic books so it's not a bad thing at all that they do it in the movie. It actually makes this film feel like a Marvel comics event, even resembling the comic story Age of Ultron (the comic, not the movie) in many ways (for the record, that story is not one I enjoy).
But, when time travel is introduced into a story it immediately erases any gravity or stakes of the heroes losing or permanence of any event in the previous films and the films going forward. It's different if the time traveling mechanism is a one-time use or in the possession of an insanely beyond powerful cosmic being. But Ant-Man and Wasp will always be able to access the Quantum Realm and therefore time-travel will always be an option. The heroes losing or someone dying becomes pointless. This is just a general observation about the consequences of introducing time-travel into a narrative. And the way it's set up in this film, the prime timeline will never be effected adversely by the use of time travel. So there's no reason for them not to abuse the crap out of it. Sure, other realities are being effected but that's not their immediate problem nor did they seem to care when they removed and killed people from the time stream.
Time travel is an easy solution to fix all of the problems. The X-Men films already did it twice with X-Men: Days of Future Past and then again with last year's Deadpool 2. With the fun and goofy nature of some of the time travel sequences in Endgame, it almost seems like the filmmakers just took the post credits stinger from Deadpool 2 and stretched it out over two hours. The major difference here is with the X-Men they were literally erasing all the mistakes from the franchise. In Endgame they're erasing the greatest thing that's ever happened to the entire MCU. Now we can watch Infinity War and at the end, instead of a gut-wrenching feeling, we can say, "oh, they all get brought back. It's not a big deal. Even Gamora and Loki get a chance." The power of last year's Infinity War is completely undermined now.
The fact that Marvel chose such an "easy out" and widely expected plot device to execute this final film is disappointing. Marvel is usually aware of these expectations, ahead of its audiences, and smarter in its writing. And now Marvel Studios can undo anything they want that has already happened and any bad things that happen going forward can be easily undone as well. There are no stakes anymore or lasting effects. Black Widow, dead? Nah, let's just go back to a previous point in time and pluck her out of the time stream into our current time. That's how Gamora's back. Loki, dead? Nah, he's got the Cosmic Cube now.
The filmmakers used time traveling to replay the MCU's greatest hits too. I talked about one way I viewed this in part one. Here's the other way I see it. The "hit parading" appears narcissistic and self-indulgent. Hey, look at all the actors that have graced our movies! And some of these sequences were lazily written too, replaying same old events from previous films, even replaying events from Infinity War with the same music and dialog. And apparently you need to return only the Infinity Stones and Mjolnir to their proper time and place but not Thanos, Nebula, Gamora, the Black Order, or literally the millions of lives from Thanos' troops. Yeah, that won't cause a divergent timeline at all. What about the shenanigans of a Tesseract wielding Loki in 2012? Or what about when Korath finds an unconscious Peter Quill on Morag, steps over him to get the Power Stone first, and gives it to Ronan before the Guardians of the Galaxy are even formed? I'll talk about some more examples of this lazy writing further down too.
And Thanos. I didn't care for how they treated him at the beginning of the film. It was quick, anti-climactic, and not well thought out. With the Infinity Gauntlet he too could've viewed any and all futures in which his work could be undone (just as Doctor Strange did) and taken measures to ensure those options be taken off the table. And, by removing the stones from existence, wouldn't that destroy existence, you know, being as they're the elements that the universe sprang from? Anyway, when Thanos came back at the end of the movie I was mostly happy with it. I'm glad we finally got armored Thanos instead of "white-trash" Thanos in his wife-beater. He did make a profound statement, that as long as there are those who remember what once was, what could be won't have a chance. It says a lot about the times we're living in today. I wonder if Marvel will continue with Thanos' prophecy in the films, that by undoing the snap the Avengers have set in motion an even worse universal calamity for the future. I guess we'll see.
For as amazing as the Russo Brothers and writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely are, they kinda suck with power levels. Characters power levels are fluctuating all over the place. Example: Thanos with the full Infinity Gauntlet was no match for Thor and Stormbreaker in Infinity War. Yet Thanos without the Infinity Gauntlet was able to handle both Thor and Stormbreaker without nary a problem in Endgame. Conversely Thanos handled Scarlet Witch easily with the Gauntlet in Infinity War but now is nearly defeated by her in Endgame even though he was just shown as being perfectly capable of handling Stormbreaker which is stronger than the Infinity Gauntlet. If you recall Scarlet Witch was nearly killed by Proxima Midnight in the previous film too and now she's stronger than Thanos. That, and I guess there is no difference in Thanos' power with or without the Gauntlet. These are just a few examples of this power inconsistency of which there are more.
Thanos had to go the Nidavelir to the dwarves, who fashion the most powerful weapons in existence, to create a gauntlet powerful enough to wield the Infinity Stones. And Tony Stark can just make one? So, I thought it had to be a powerful gauntlet to wield the stones? What gives? The previous film made a big deal about the difficulty in acquiring tech and powerful weapons. Here Tony just instantly comes up with everything they need.
The filmmakers are also experts at sidelining mega powerful characters such as Vision in the previous films and Captain Marvel and Hulk in this film. Had Captain Marvel been with the Avengers the entire time in this movie everything would've been fine. Hulk gets sidelined by being half-dead at the final fight, virtually unable to fight, yet still being able to hold up all of Avengers Mansion by himself. This segues into a bigger personal gripe with the film.
Hulk does virtually no fighting at all. And he doesn't redeem himself in battle. Where was the epic rematch between Hulk and Thanos?! My overall feelings toward Hulk's cowardice in Infinity War was contingent on him being redeemed in Endgame. Him bringing everybody back via a "reverse snap" doesn't do it for me. He needed to redeem himself in a very Hulk-like way i.e. smashing the hell out of something. "Professor" Hulk is one of my favorite stories in the Hulk's comics, but I never dreamed of how unfulfilling Professor Hulk would actually be on screen. In my opinion the Hulk hasn't been treated well since the first Avengers movie. Hulk, now more than ever, needs another movie where he's allowed to cut loose fighting.
Thor went from being a show-stealer in the last film to a punchline/joke in this film. I know Chris Hemsworth is desperate to be the "favorite" Avenger among fans. I get it, but I don't like it at the cost of being just another funny character among the countless other funny characters in these movies. And while I really enjoyed revisiting Thor: The Dark World it presents another problem: a majority of Dark World's plot was the difficulty in extracting the Ether from Jane. Only Malekith could remove the Ether from Jane Foster, not Odin or the Asgardians. How the hell did Rocket's little "cosmic syringe" get the Ether out when his tech is arguably inferior to the Asgardians?
My last question about inconsistent power levels for this review is this: How is Cap still alive after receiving a full force punch from Thanos to the head? Thanos beat down the Hulk and All-Father Thor plus all the other Asgardians in Infinity War with his bare hands and without the Infinity Stones. Thanos' punch can lay out the Hulk but not Cap? And how is Cap able to harness Thor's lightning? Mjolnir was just a tool for focusing Thor's inherent lightning powers. Cap shouldn't be able to do that. This movie is from the same guys who did the Captain America films so obviously Cap is going to be treated far better than most, but this is going a little too far.
What did Black Widow sacrifice to get the Soul Stone? Or Hawkeye had he jumped? They have to sacrifice the thing they love most, right? A soul for a soul. This was a huge plot point in Infinity War. A self sacrifice doesn't make sense to me. You mean they love themselves the most? One of them would've had to willingly sacrifice someone else, yes? That's a worse choice than offering yourself and that's why the Soul Stone is so difficult to acquire. If it just had to be a soul why didn't Thanos toss Nebula over the side in the last film or any old warrior under his command? And it doesn't appear like Hawkeye willingly lets Black Widow drop. She rips her hand out of his grip. It's not sacrificing your soul that gets you the Soul Stone. Right?
And how did Captain America get the Soul Stone back to Vormir anyway? Or the Power Stone back to Morag? Or the Ether back to Asgard and back inside Jane Foster? I mean, sure, it happens off screen and there's probably a great explanation for all of it. But it still seems a far stretch of the imagination that just Cap could return all six stones back to where they were without any of the Guardians' help.
Also, this movie drove home that the Guardians of the Galaxy are basically useless. Nebula and Rocket are really the only exceptions. Drax, Groot, Star-Lord, and Mantis contribute nothing. I guess that's supposed to be the point? That's the great cosmic joke?
No Adam Warlock. This is perhaps Warlock's most iconic story and he's not in it. This is like adapting a Harry Potter book but leaving Hermione out completely. I knew Adam Warlock wasn't going to be in the film so it wasn't a shock, but still. Warlock is Thanos' primary antagonist and he doesn't even get a mention. Jim Starlin, months before the film came out, was still hoping that Warlock would be in the film. So, what's the point of even bringing Adam Warlock to the screen ever? This is like having Red Skull fight everybody but Cap and be defeated before Cap even arrives.
With the Infinity Gauntlet they could've done so many amazing things in addition to the snap but no. Thanos could've resurrected all of the dead villains from the previous films and had a massive brawl with the heroes. It would've been a great way to adapt that amazing sequence from the Infinity Gauntlet comic where the heroes attack Thanos' citadel. There's no flashback of Xandar's destruction either, further rendering everything the Guardians fought for in the first Guardians film a mere throwaway line. And apparently there are no other heroes in the galaxy save for Earth. Really? I thought we were supposed to be a part of a bigger universe according to Nick Fury. I guess that doesn't extend beyond Earth and the Guardians. This just leads to questions that will need to be addressed later when new cosmic or Earth-bound heroes arrive: "Where were you when Thanos nearly destroyed everything?"
I'm sad they killed Thanos. I knew it was very likely going to happen and that most audience members wanted him dead. But that's all the more reason not to do it. Thanos even has a line in the movie, "You couldn't live with your failure..." or something like that. Wouldn't it have been the perfect punishment to force Thanos to live with his failure? As arguably the best villain the MCU has created, killing him is a waste. Imagine an even worse threat down the road and the Avengers having no choice but to go to Thanos for help? Man, that would've been so cool. And lastly there's not even a tiny glimpse of Mistress Death (at least a hint of her as it would've explained why, given infinite options with the gauntlet, Thanos still chose annihilation over an alternative). And as long as Captain Marvel is around there's no need to fear Thanos anymore.
This movie again drives home the feeling that the filmmakers were throwing the source material out the window and not even trying to adapt the comic stories anymore. The movies are their own entities, I understand that. The MCU has become its own narrative, free from the constraints of the comics. I get all of that and am fine with that. But that's just giving Marvel Studios a pass on changing things when they adapt the comics. What makes adapting the Harry Potter books or the Game Of Thrones books any different than adapting comic books? Basically this movie definitively drove home a new mindset for MCU films. From now on I'm not going to wonder what my favorite comics will look like on screen, but rather what, if anything, will be faithful to the comics when going forward. The cosmic material especially suffers the most changes versus other material.
In short, Endgame is a terrible adaptation of the Infinity Gauntlet, but a good finale for the MCU.
Okay, I think I'm done ranting now, which is exactly what this is. Maybe I'm way off base and these imagined "problems" I have will disappear after repeat viewings. Either way I can't change the movie. Maybe I'm missing things too that will clear up these questions and maybe through discussions with others I'll be swayed in different directions. Who knows? These are just my opinions and nothing concrete, remember that.
THE VERDICT
Avengers: Endgame exists in two separate states in my mind. On one hand I think it's a fine finale to the MCU and a very enjoyable film. It is fully in service of the films and not necessarily the comic books (and I knew going in that it wouldn't be anything like the comics). If this movie gets anything right it is the characters and their relationships with one another. Seeing the movie like this I feel it is pretty good. And if you somehow managed to get through the above quagmire of thoughts, rants, and ravings then you know the other way I perceive this film: predictable, narcissistic, haphazardly assembled, a terrible treatment of the source material, and kinda lazy.
Even so, Marvel Studios should be commended for this unprecedented achievement in major motion picture storytelling. Even if some like myself feel the movie is passable at best, it is a mind-boggling achievement that this film works at all. That it managed to take ten years and twenty-one films and bring it all together and to a satisfying close is beyond remarkable. As such I feel inclined to give this movie a major pass on those shortcomings I've imagined it has. And that's the beauty of the Marvel Studios films. Each film has its supporters and detractors. Each film can be argued in favor of or against. And after all of it is said and done we can all agree that this current era of comic book/super hero filmmaking is the greatest era for the genre.
Overall Ranking: 6 out of 10
For more of my thoughts and reviews on the MCU and all things super hero cinema, check out the posts below. And as always drop us a line on what you think in the comments below!
THE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE (MCU)
THE DC EXTENDED UNIVERSE (DCEU)
Fox-Marvel, Sony-Marvel, and other stuff too!
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