I just saw End Game today and what a show it was. After my friends cancelled three times I decided to break out on my own and watch an early morning 10am showing in Dolby at AMC. The seats were very comfortable, and they reclined, perfect and much needed saying since this movie is clocking in over three hours. This movie is the movie that ends most of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Chances are you might have missed a couple of the Marvel movies before you saw this one. You definitely need to see Avengers, Avengers Age of Ultron, and Avengers Infinity War before you see this movie. Now before we get into the nitty-gritty, stop reading this if you don't want spoilers.
Okay, a brief synopsis. So half of the population has been wiped out by Thanos. Ant-Man gets out of his quantum realm with the help of a rat [funny, nice touch]. He comes to the present time-line only to find out that a lot of people are dead, including himself. He teams up with the Avengers and they come up with the idea of a time machine. It's actually Ant-Man's idea.
Captain Marvel brings Stark [Iron Man] back to Earth and Stark helps them develop the time machine. Time travel is always messy and it definitely doesn't make sense in this movie, but hey, who am I to argue? It's very cliche, and its a super old science fiction trope that doesn't hold up well in this day and age, going back to 1820-The Time Machine by HG Wells. Great idea for 1820 not so much for 2019. But I digress.
Anyways, they branch off into small groups and fetch the infinity stones from the past, so they can bring it to the present, use the infinity gantlet to bring everyone back. There's a scene I like that reminds me of the comics where Steve Rodgers [Captain America] is a double agent. He grabs the stones and tasseract from the bad guys who are from Hydra, evil Nazi's. Cap says, "There's been a change in plans. I'll take care of the goods." Then he whispers to the bad guys,"hail Hydra." I liked how they sneeked that in there.
Thor is fat and depressed. Natasha [Scarlett] feels that her only purpose is to bring everyone back with the Avengers. Brie Larson is snarky, just like in Captain Marvel. Nebula takes on a more serious active role, helping the Avengers go back in time to grab the stones, only to be kidnapped and then her doppelganger from the past comes to the present and messes everything up-you got all that? One thing that should be noted is that the jokes are few and far between. This is a much more serious Avengers team. Rather than their typical snarky smart ass selves they portray in the other movies.
Okay, so this movie is sort of all over the place and the first 2 hours and 45 minutes are just them going back and forth for the infinity stones. Then Thanos from the past comes to the future to do what he did in the present-again! Why, because this is fate, he says. But we're not stupid, we know that the script is written that way so that he can get his ass kicked-again. Actually Thanos dies in the first thirty minutes of the movie. Thor chops his head off, the blood splashing across Nebula's face. "I aimed for the head." Nice bit of gore there.
The last twenty-thirty minutes is straight-up superhero fanfare. Hulk uses the infinity gauntlet to bring back everyone, bringing them on a huge battlefield against Thano's army, that he brought from another time-line thanks to evil Nebula from the past time-line. Captain Marvel destroys Thanos' ship in one fell swoop. Thanos is desperately trying to get the infinity gauntlet [which has all the stones] but Stark quickly puts on the glove.
Thanos [putting on the guantlet]: I am inevitable.
Stark [who somehow had the rings with a makeshift Iron Man suit guantlet]: I am Iron Man.
It doesn't seem like a powerful line but it is. And it was his last line of the film, and the franchise, because Stark ended up dying after he used the gauntlet. Apparently humans aren't strong enough to wield the power of the infinity stones. Even after Thanos used it, he was old and dying on a planet somewhere, his energy wasted from the stones. When Hulk used it, he burned up his arm and upper body, and he's the strongest one out of all of them.
The fighting was great. Especially Cap. Thor is about to get sliced by his own blade by Thanos. Then out of nowhere Thor's hammer flies into Thanos' skull-its Captain America's doing.
Thor: I knew it!
Cap wields Thor's hammer like a god. Like Achilles from the Iliad. He's swinging the hammer in his left hand and holding his shield up in his right, like a true warrior. Not only that but he's commanding lightning strikes with the hammer as well. That was my favorite moment of the film, it was great to see that not only is he worthy of Thor's hammer, but he can use it just as well as Thor too. The female heroes had their moment in the sun too. They're protecting the infinity stones as Spiderman says, "Uhh, be careful, you might need some help." "We have plenty of help right here," the female Wakanda warrior says as the women beat and bash their way through enemies.
The end is what this movie is truly about. "End Game". Thor joins the Guardians of the Galaxy. Stark dies. Natasha sacrifices herself so the team can get the soul stone, a very sad and tragic death. That one was a real tearjerker. Hawkeye gets his family back. Captain America goes back in time and stays there with his sweetheart, becoming in the present an old man.
At the end of the movie where we see Cap dancing with his sweetheart back in the 40's I had a sort of epiphany that the whole point of superheroes is for people to do normal things like that-have a simple and loving life. The thing I realized is that you don't need superheroes to enjoy that kind of stuff, you don't need all the action and the rigamarole, the twenty-two movie fanfare. If the Marvel movies had more of that and less of all the other stuff, it would've been a much more thoughtful experience. More acting, less fighting. Maybe that could become the new norm for superhero movies? I wish.
With all that being said, "Avengers assemble!"
Check out my reviews for all the other Marvel movies I've seen.
Antman and the Wasp https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2018/07/antman-and-wasp.html
Avengers Age of Ultron https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2015/05/avengers-age-of-ultron-thoughts.html
Avengers Infinity War https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2018/05/avengers-infinity-war.html
Guardians of the Galaxy 2 https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2017/05/guardians-of-galaxy-2.html
Spiderman Into the Spiderverse https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2019/01/spiderman-into-spiderverse.html
Deadpool 2 https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2018/06/dead-pool-2.html
Thor Ragnorak https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2017/12/thor-ragnarok.html
Doctor Strange https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2016/11/time-will-tell-how-much-i-love-you.html
Deadpool I https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/search?q=deadpool
Venom https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2018/10/venom.html
No comments:
Post a Comment