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| 3 | %% NOTE TO EDITORS:Fridge pages are Administrivia/SpoilersOff. NO EXCEPTIONS. |
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| 5 | %% CharacterizationTags (e.g. "past!Tony" or "present!Nebula") are considered fanfiction jargon and are forbidden on this wiki. Don't use them, please. |
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| 9 | FridgeLogic for ''Film/AvengersEndgame''. |
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| 11 | !'''Fridge pages are Administrivia/SpoilersOff. Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned!''' |
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| 13 | [[foldercontrol]] |
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| 15 | [[folder:Fridge Brilliance]] |
| 16 | * The title of "Endgame" makes a lot of sense. It refers to a scenario in chess when very few pieces are left to play with on the board, often one side against a lone King. Also, there's a double meaning. The title is ''Endgame'' and not ''End''. Because there will be more movies after this and more Avengers stuff later. This is simply playacting about endings. It's simply making a game of ending the series and not actually ending it or to quote Marvel Comics' house philosophy since TheSeventies, it's not changed, it's the illusion of change. This also fits with the Russo Brothers saying that the title would be a spoiler - the title "Endgame" spoils that, in Infinity War, most of the pieces on the chessboard were cleared off. |
| 17 | * Tony's situation is a CallBack to ''Film/IronMan1'': stuck in an impossible situation and having to think of a way out. For bonus points, he's in practically the same attire, too. |
| 18 | ** Adding on to this: Barely escaped a bad situation, severe torso injury, kept alive by the only other person he was trapped with, rescued by a member of the United States Air Force, brought home to a teary-eyed Pepper who believed him to be dead. BookEnds, indeed. |
| 19 | * Everything about Steve leading the support group post-snap. When he can no longer use his skills as a fighter to help save people, he steps up and does what he can to continue helping those who survived even though it's not something he's had previous experience in. Additionally, despite the fact he grew up in a time when gay people were heavily frowned upon and marginalised by society, he's clearly not bothered about one of the support group members being gay and doesn't see the losses he suffered as less than anyone else and does his best to offer counsel. Either Steve was ahead of his time when it came to his open-minded attitude towards LGBT people or he's adjusted well to modern attitudes. It's the fact that he doesn't stop trying to help people however he can that makes him worthy of lifting Mjolnir, not just his skills as a fighter alone. |
| 20 | * Early on in the movie, when what remains of the team are planning their assault on Thanos, everyone is preparing for a difficult battle, only for Carol to point out that, last time, they didn't have her. When asked where she's been this whole time, she responds that there are a lot of planets out there, and none of them had the Avengers. When you think about that line, it adds a lot of depth to the place earth and humanity have in the MCU. In comparison to alien species with Galaxy-spanning empires, mad conquerors who wipe out entire worlds, all wielding technology that makes what we can muster look like it came from the stone age, just what is it that Earth and Humanity bring to the table that makes them a thorn in the side of the likes of Thanos? Who was it that united a bunch of misfits into a force that was able to bring down the likes of Ronan the Accuser and Ego the Living Planet? Who was it that found the strength to oppose the Supreme Intelligence of the Kree? What does humanity have that's thwarted the plans of [[OmnicidalManiac Omnicidal Maniacs]] and literal gods? The answer...humanity has people who, when all seems lost, stand up...people who spread hope and determination like a virus...people who call others to be more than the sum of their parts...humanity has ''heroes.'' |
| 21 | * During the prep for the Time Heist, Rhodey suggests going back to when Thanos was a baby and killing him then but the idea is quickly dismissed by Professor Hulk as unethical. However there's several deeper reasons not to try something like this: |
| 22 | ** Thanos by himself was incredibly durable and difficult to take down even without all of the Stones, so an entire ''race'' of people like him including his parents (assuming Thanos was living on his homeworld of Titan) that would likely defend an attempt to kill their child? Of course Professor Hulk isn't keen on trying that. |
| 23 | ** Given their depleted manpower (especially not having Captain Marvel and Thor still dealing with his demons), the Avengers getting into a conflict with the people of Titan who have been shown to be technologically advanced as well as incredibly strong wouldn't end well. |
| 24 | ** The Avengers don't know how old Thanos is so they have no reference point/birthdate to go back to, as well as almost very little intel of his early childhood and they don't have the luxury of guessing given their limited supply of Pym Particles. |
| 25 | * How did Captain Marvel find the ''Benatar'', adrift in the vastness of space? A ship like that more than likely has a transponder/homing beacon, either installed at some point by the Guardians or already implemented. Rocket more than likely gave her the means to track it when she arrived on Earth looking for Fury. |
| 26 | * When Rocket tells the remaining Avengers, "You'd better not throw up on my ship," it's easy to assume he just wanted to avoid the hassle of having to clean up the mess, but there's also a deeper meaning. The lingering smell of his family is probably still in the ship at that point, and even though that would be relatively little comfort, it probably meant a lot to him. Having to deal with the acrid smell of vomit and/or the chemicals needed to clean it up would erase the last bit of his family he has left. |
| 27 | * Near the beginning, [[TwoFaced the entire left half of Thanos's body is scorched and burnt, the right being unscathed. One-half is intact]]. The other debilitated. Just like his plans of a balanced universe. Thanos's philosophies have now been made fully manifest, like scars that will last for the entire rest of his life. |
| 28 | ** The concept of balance is reflected in Thanos' character in general: His massive spaceship has a central hub and two wings, he has an even number of enforcers (6) that also happen to be divided into 2 genders (Ebony Maw, Cull Obsidian, and Corvus Glaive are male. Proxima Midnight, Gamora, and Nebula are female). In the alternative timeline, there are also two "pairings"/further layer of relationship among his enforcers and two singles - the married couple Corvus Glaive and Proxima Midnight, and the sisters Gamora and Nebula, leaving Ebony Maw and Cull Obsidian unaffiliated. Finally, his weapon of choice is a sword with blades on both ends.[[note]] Also in [[Film/AvengersInfinityWar the previous film]], he gives young Gamora a weapon that has blades on both ends and demonstrates how balanced they are.[[/note]] |
| 29 | * 2018 Thanos destroys the Infinity Stones to avoid "temptation". Later, when his past self learns of "his" future accomplishment but also of the Avengers' ongoing attempts to undo it, he's immediately tempted to undergo an even more grandiose scheme. Indeed, the Thanos we loved/hated in ''Infinity War'' knew himself a little too well. |
| 30 | * Thanos and Tony's last words. |
| 31 | ** "I am inevitable" is 2014 Thanos'. It is what he thinks he is and he holds himself up in a high position because of this, showing incredible egotism. Despite his 2018 self's seemingly-sympathetic reasoning in ''Infinity War'', 2014 Thanos reveals his true colors in ''Endgame'' as a selfish, maniacal nihilist, concluding that because the universe will never be grateful for what he intended in his original plan, he would be better off making a completely clean slate of a universe warped to his own designs. He's wrong, he isn’t inevitable because it wasn’t a guarantee that in the end, he’ll prevail. |
| 32 | ** "I am Iron Man" is Tony's. It's a point of pride like Thanos', but unlike Thanos, who is exaggerating himself, he is right and it is who he is. This is what he built himself to be, and it is something no one can take away from him. Note that the ''song'' "Iron Man" is about a man who traveled through time to witness an apocalypse, then goes back and ''causes'' it. Stark witnessed an apocalypse and traveled through time to ''undo'' it. |
| 33 | * There's a deep significance behind both times Tony says "I am Iron Man", especially when one considers [[{{Irony}} he's not wearing his Iron Man helmet in either scenario]]. First, they both strongly represent that Iron Man isn't defined by the mask, but by the man behind it. Second, it shows that Tony is only human (the first time he did it at the conference was done with [[{{Pride}} reluctance]] at admitting it, as opposed to this time where he does it [[HumbleHero knowing his vulnerability to the Infinity Stones will kill him]], but accepting it all the same). |
| 34 | * Fridge Heartwarming: In a sense, Tony's lifestyle then (in the first ''Film/IronMan1'') and now in this movie {{foil}} each other, making for a lovely [[BookEnds book end]] to his adventure. Both homes are next to a body of water, and both are inhabited by Miss Potts, to a varying extent. But the Stark mansion reflected Tony's pride, arrogance, [[RuleOfSymbolism above-it-all detachment]], and was only good for enforcing the bachelor life. His lake home, on the other hand, reflects his [[HumbleHero humility]], selflessness, [[RuleOfSymbolism how down to earth he's become]], and embodies the simple joy of married life and family. But both contain the high-tech tools necessary to fuel his inventive genius. No matter where he goes or what he does, he is Iron Man. |
| 35 | ** Tony's gift for Pepper. In the first movie, his birthday gift to her was for her to go buy herself something nice. After the 5 year time skip in this movie, his anniversary present to her is a custom-made 'Rescue' suit ''he made himself''. He's gone from keeping his relationship with Pepper impersonal and distant to something special. |
| 36 | * Given all the damage she has bounced back from in previous movies, it seems odd that past Nebula is killed by a single relatively small blast. Yet if one considers how it was present Nebula that did it, and Nebula knows her own body better than anyone, then she would know exactly where and how to fire a shot that could kill her. Moreover, the past Nebula seems to have come from before the events from ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy2014'', which means she hadn't failed to retrieve the Power Stone and taken so much damage that Thanos would replace more of her body with cybernetics. |
| 37 | * How did Doctor Strange know just when and where to send TheCavalry? Well, knowing everything was basically his whole role in this and previous films -- he knew because it was part of the one perfect timeline he saw with the Eye of Agamotto. |
| 38 | ** Also, you know that little funny moment where Strange asks Wong if that was everyone? This turns into FridgeHorror when you realize that Strange needs to make sure that everyone is actually there, exactly like in the perfect timeline, or else they might lose. Particularly since he knows how easily a battle can turn on something tiny--a rat happening to climb over the keyboard--and one participant could easily make all the difference in the world. |
| 39 | * Considering how you can’t override the consciousness of your past self like in ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'', it’s likely that while there is an elderly Steve Rogers present, there might also be another Steve Rogers who is still physically young due to the ice. |
| 40 | * Tony and Cap's accusations towards each other in ''Film/TheAvengers2012'' are both proven wrong. |
| 41 | ** "The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You’re not the guy to make the sacrifice play" is Cap's insult to Tony. In this film, he fights to bring back those who were lost by the snap and is, ultimately, the one to make the HeroicSacrifice stop Thanos once and for all. |
| 42 | ** "You’re a laboratory experiment, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle" is Tony's accusations thrown towards Cap. Here, he debunks this by lifting Mjölnir with his pureness. Keep in mind, the serum played no part in this, as Mjölnir's worthiness enchantment is entirely dependent on the character of the prospective wielder. Even back when he was that ninety-pound, scrawny, asthmatic kid from Brooklyn, he would've been able to lift it. |
| 43 | *** [[AlternativeCharacterInterpretation Or,]] Cap ''became'' worthy through the character development he's made through the series, and Tony grew into the person who ''would'' make the necessary sacrifice. Both, at least partly, through the influence of the other. |
| 44 | * Tony is easily the second most paranoid and CrazyPrepared person in the MCU, beaten only by Nick Fury. It makes perfect sense that he'd equip the second Infinity Gauntlet with some sort of countermeasure that would allow him to quickly and easily strip the Stones from it if the wrong person, i.e., Thanos, is wearing it -- which proves vital for his HeroicSacrifice. |
| 45 | * Alternate ''Guardians'' timeline: |
| 46 | ** By destroying a past version of Thanos and his Black Order before the events of ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy2014'', the Avengers have removed his threat from another universe -- there is now another timeline outside of the main one where Thanos no longer exists to put all the Stones together and perform the Snap, not to mention all the other species/peoples whom he'd slaughtered in recent years, such as Xandar and the remnant Asgardians. |
| 47 | ** By the same token, regardless of whatever becomes of the Orb of Morag, the Guardians are unlikely to come together, and Quill will probably never lay his hands on the Power Stone. This means Ego won't ever seek him out, and his plans for universal unification will also, ahem, [[{{Pun}} peter]] out. Alternatively, Steve could just allow Quill to get ahold of the Orb and let history run its course from there. |
| 48 | ** When he first returns to Earth, Tony bitterly remarks that they're called the "Avengers" rather than the "Pre-vengers" because they're always doing what needs to be done ''after'' the fact. By killing the alternate Thanos and his forces, Tony in a way becomes a pre-venger to the alternate timeline Thanos came from. |
| 49 | * Relatively small one, but there's a perfect explanation for Captain Marvel's post-time-skip haircut in ''Endgame''. Back in her own movie, in the middle of a fight with a Skrull, Carol has to blow her hair out of her face. This may be a simple annoyance for most people, but for fighters, having to fuss with your hair can cause distraction or cost reaction time that could cost you a battle. Long hair can also be grabbed and pulled by an in-close enemy (admittedly, there are probably very few people who could get in close and hurt her, but it's not inconceivable). After 20+ years away from Earth, she probably dealt with that issue enough to try a more practical cut. |
| 50 | * Doctor Strange foresaw Tony's death. |
| 51 | ** Before he was killed during the Snap in ''Infinity War'', Strange solemnly tells Tony that "there was no other way" to ensure Thanos' defeat. He is not talking about the Snap itself, but Tony's HeroicSacrifice. |
| 52 | ** He tells Tony a bit earlier in ''Infinity War'' that he won't hesitate to sacrifice Tony and Peter if it comes down to it. Ultimately the plan does come down to sacrificing both Peter and Tony. The former as part of the snappening when he gives Thanos the Time Stone and the latter five years later when he has to sacrifice himself to kill Thanos. |
| 53 | ** Further enforced by Strange's next two interactions with Tony -- the first, he tells Stark that if what needs to happen is said out loud, it won't happen; and the second comes just as Tony is about to use the Stones and expecting it cost him his life, when he looks over to Strange for confirmation that this is the one outcome when Thanos is defeated. |
| 54 | ** On a more mundane level, Strange also knew that surrendering the Time Stone to Thanos without more than a token fight was the ''only'' thing that would ever ''convince the Ancient One'' to hand it over to the Avengers in the past. So, his last pre-Snap words to Tony also encompass his own passive forfeiture of the Time Stone: had he fought to the last, all of Bruce's words to Strange's mentor would've been futile. |
| 55 | ** Somewhat HeartwarmingInHindsight, Strange likely also bargains for Tony's life for two additional reasons: first, he saw that Tony would start a family with Pepper after the Snap, therefore giving him something for him to live for before his sacrifice. Second, dying at Thanos's hands, in despair at failure, or dying by protecting his Avengers teammates, his new family, (including a surrogate son in Peter Parker, whom he just got back), and the world, surrounded by loved ones? Strange chose the latter to be as humane as he could be given the situation. |
| 56 | ** Strange's design is almost directly drawn from the teachings of the Ancient One... "You cannot beat a river into submission. You have to surrender to its current and use its power as your own... Your intellect has taken you far in life, but it will take you no further. Surrender, Stephen. Silence your ego and your power will rise." Tony has to do exactly this to defeat Thanos. |
| 57 | ** It's entirely in keeping with how Strange prevailed in his solo movie as well. "Don't destroy your enemy; render his murderous actions impotent with untold numbers of undone deaths.' |
| 58 | * After using the Stark-tech "Infinity Gauntlet" once, Hulk gets seriously burned and unable to do much in the actual climax, because Hulk ''needs his rage'' to trigger his RequiredSecondaryPowers like his HealingFactor. Similarly, Professor Hulk seems smaller next to the other actors than Savage Hulk, and this is especially noticeable in the 2012 sequences where you can see both Hulks near each other (Savage Hulk seems OneHeadTaller than Professor Hulk). Bruce may have successfully merged himself and Hulk, but it comes at the cost of some of Savage Hulk's raw, rage-fueled power. Both have their basis in the comics: the Hulk's universe-shattering power in the source material can only be tapped into when Bruce not only stops trying to fight for control over his body, but relinquishes it entirely to let the Hulk run mad. |
| 59 | * Thunderbolt Ross attends the funeral of Tony and doesn't seem to have a problem with the fugitives in attendance. Could it be he recognizes they saved the world again after 5 years of the Snap, or was it gratitude for another reason? His daughter Betty was confirmed to have been lost due to the Snap and they brought everyone lost back. There's also the possibility that the Sokovia Accords were repealed after the Snap. Since apparently Thanos's name is well-known on Earth, it's ''extremely'' likely that the governments of the world (the surviving ones, at least) enacted official inquiries into just exactly ''what'' caused the Snap, and what everyone's role in the event was. Since the disintegration of the Avengers could be directly traced to the Sokovia Accords, and the very nature of the New York and Wakanda incursions would not have allowed the UN to coordinate a response in time, it's almost certain that the Accords were indeed repealed for being pointless before (indeed, for having caused much more harm than good), and being utterly meaningless in a post-Snap world. |
| 60 | ** Another possibility is simply that he's surrounded by a large number of powerful, experienced warriors, none of whom regard him positively, and all of whom would react ''violently'' to any arrest attempt on any member of their team. Ross may be a jerk, but he's not a total moron. |
| 61 | * Thanos's speech about what it's like to lose comes back as an IronicEcho for himself this time around. |
| 62 | ** "To feel so desperately that you're right, yet to fail nonetheless." Thanos believes only ''he'' is in the right, and has to kill half the universe, but fails due to the Avengers. |
| 63 | ** "It's frightening, turns the legs to jelly." When Thanos is defeated, all he can do is stare at his dusting army in horror, before finally taking a seat as he waits to die. |
| 64 | ** "Dread it. Run from it. Destiny arrives all the same." In the end despite everything he did, Thanos met his ultimate fate. To be defeated by the heroes at the end of the story. |
| 65 | * Why is the Ancient One surprised that Doctor Strange gave Thanos the Time Stone, despite knowing about him? She is unable to see events that happen after her death, as mentioned in her final conversation with Strange. This probably also heavily factors into why Strange went with this plan. Many of his failed timelines likely included Thanos killing Strange; whatever happened past that point, Strange would not know. Surrendering the Stone opened up timelines where he could see past that battle. All he needed to do then was narrow it down to timelines where "Strange dies in the Snap but is returned to life" and parse through those for a victory. Indeed, narrowing his search down to ones where he's Snapped and later un-dusted is probably why he only had to look at millions of timelines, rather than ''billions''. It'd only be a ''very'' small fraction of possible futures in which the un-snapping took place. |
| 66 | ** Speaking of the Ancient One, she tells Banner that Strange is busy doing surgery in another part of the city when the Chitauri assault is in progress. This may help explain why, in a world increasingly-filled with superheroes and inexplicable threats, Strange was nevertheless so very skeptical when he first heard about Pangborn's mysterious recovery from spinal damage: he ''missed out'' on his chance to witness just how fantastic the conflict had been, because he was too wrapped up in performing surgery to hear about the event until it was over! By the time he was done operating, the smoke had cleared, [=SHIELD=] was hauling away all the Chitauri corpses in unmarked freezer trucks, and the "Superheroes in New York? Give me a break!" skeptics were snarkily poo-pooing the notion of Norse gods, green ogres, or resurrected whuppers-of-Nazis beating back monsters from portals in the sky. |
| 67 | * There are certain character parallels between ''Infinity War'' and ''Endgame'', that sometimes act as foreshadowing for what's to come. For example, Black Widow and Gamora are noted to be counterparts to each other -- one girl on a team full of guys, dark pasts where they were raised by morally dubious people, etc. Meanwhile, Hawkeye-as-Ronin, when asked by a member of the Yakuza why he's killing them all, gives a reply that's along the lines of "half of the universe got Thanos. You get me," effectively comparing himself to Thanos. If you keep these parallels in mind when you watch Clint and Natasha go to Vormir, then it becomes obvious which one is going to be the [[HumanSacrifice Human Sacrifice]] and which one will leave with the Soul Stone. |
| 68 | * Mjölnir: |
| 69 | ** It's possible Steve, who was sober at the party due to his inability to be drunk, realized that Thor had just told Tony that he could rule over Asgard if he can lift the hammer. The hammer then budges when Steve tries to lift it because he actually ''can'' lift it...but he doesn't lift it all the way because he doesn't want to take Asgard away over a drunken bet. This would also explain his incredibly lame reaction after he fails: Cap is a bad liar, and is trying to claim that he can't lift it. |
| 70 | ** Moreover, Steve has never been one to show off, or to rob his comrades of their pride. He doesn't want to make Tony, Bruce, or anyone else who'd just ''failed'' to lift the hammer feel diminished or embarrassed by their lack of worthiness, so he lets them believe that ''nobody'' who isn't Asgardian royalty could have done so. |
| 71 | ** Another possibility is that part of Worthiness is self-confidence; Steve "I'm just a kid from Brooklyn" didn't really believe he could at the party. Now, there's no other choice, so he puts aside any doubts and simply does what he needs to do. |
| 72 | ** Cap being able to lift the hammer also establishes him as the only candidate (after Thor left Earth) to return it (and the Infinity Stones) to its proper place on the timeline. |
| 73 | * ''Sanctuary II'' and Captain Marvel: |
| 74 | ** Why does ''Sanctuary II'' stop firing on the heroes and focus on Carol instead? Well, as previous films have established, major players in the cosmic MCU seem to know about each other even if they have very little interaction. Thanos and the Asgardians know about each other, the Asgardians knew the Collector, and Carol seems to have known about Thanos. Given that Carol has spent the 28 years between her solo debut film and the present flying around the universe helping those in need, in particular having saved the Skrulls from extinction, it's not a stretch to assume that as a result Thanos knew about her. |
| 75 | ** Thanos's mooks aboard ''Sanctuary II'' probably detected her energy signature entering Earth's atmosphere and heading right at them sooner than the heroes did. Even if they didn't know her, they realized that they were in such great danger that they decided to fire at her [[YouHaveFailedMe risking the consequences]] of disobeying the [[BadBoss Mad Titan himself]]. |
| 76 | ** The guns were probably locked-on to fire at large energy signatures (Wanda, Thor, and other heavy-hitters at the time) automatically, and once they stopped going on the offensive to take cover was when the ship locked on to Captain Marvel, another powerhouse entering the battlefield. |
| 77 | ** Ronan is already Thanos's associate at the time ''Sanctuary II'' came from, so Ronan may have told Thanos and his associates about ''his'' fleet's one-sided encounter with Carol Danvers in 1995. |
| 78 | * Infinity Gauntlet: |
| 79 | ** It might seem strange that Hulk is being hurt by the Infinity Stones when using the Stark Tech gauntlet while Thanos was simply infused with their power and was fine. This could be because Tony doesn't know how to build something to handle that much or that kind of energy. The Infinity Gauntlet was specifically designed for the task, and the dwarves have a lot of experience designing weapons and artifacts for gods. |
| 80 | ** Additionally, in ''Infinity War'' Thanos took his time setting each Stone into the Gauntlet, and adapted to the power increase every with every new addition. Banner took on the full Gauntlet all at once, and his, ahem, bulk as Professor Hulk is noticeably smaller than the original Hulk's, so the immense power surge burned him up immediately. At the same time, 2014 Thanos put on the full Gauntlet twice, and both times he was stunned for much longer than he was in ''IW'', and didn't adapt, either. Tony, meanwhile, was likely protected from the worst of the backlash by the Iron Man suit, at least until his own Snap. |
| 81 | *** Considering that the power lines are visible on Tony's neck, it's highly unlikely that the suit took the brunt of the initial backlash. However, consider the other candidates who have wielded and used the full gauntlet, it makes sense why Tony doesn't feel the pain from putting on the full gauntlet. As pointed out above, ''Infinity War'' Thanos put the stones one by one and adjusted to the increasing power, only getting the backlash from the snap. Hulk never felt any real pain before thanks to his healing factor, and even Professor Hulk is likely to have some pain resistance as well, which is why he was surprised that putting on the gauntlet hurt him. Tony on the other hand, has been dealing with physical pain for most of last 11 real-life years / 15 in-universe years. In his first movie alone, he's had shrapnel embedded into his chest, nearly killing him, and it got worse in every subsequent movie as he [[Film/IronMan2 dealt with palladium poisoning]], [[Film/TheAvengers2012 fell from space]], [[Film/IronMan3 got blasted by missiles outside his suit]], [[Film/AvengersInfinityWar got a chunk of a moon dropped on him and then stabbed by his own blade]]. It's no wonder why he takes the initial power surge quite well. To quote Doctor Strange, "Pain's an old friend." Also, if you look closely, the stones are actually setting in one by one. |
| 82 | ** If they brought back the empty gauntlet from Thanos's garden, Tony would have had five years to study it and recreate the design needed as close as possible. |
| 83 | ** It could also be possible that [[BizarreAlienBiology Thanos simply is more resistant to gamma radiation]], as Hulk says the radiation the stones emitted were gamma rays. The Hulk, while being about as bulky and gamma radiation resistant as Thanos, still is a human and, thus, still vulnerable to too much gamma radiation. |
| 84 | ** Being made from Stark Tech nanomachines, it would make sense that Tony could easily transfer the stones from Thanos's hand to his without Thanos knowing about it. When did this happen? If you listen closely, mechanical sounds are heard during the brief moment Tony has his hands on the Infinity Gauntlet. Tony also glances at his hand while it happens to be sure that it works before Thanos pushes him aside. |
| 85 | * Tony and Steve's fates: |
| 86 | ** [[HourglassPlot The final fates of Tony Stark and Steve Rogers are the opposite of what their journeys and beliefs were]]. Tony Stark has a family that he would like to spend time with more often, and advises Steve to settle down for once in his life. Steve Rogers, on the other hand, is MarriedToTheJob since [[FishOutOfTemporalWater he has no family to go back to]] (except for Bucky), and criticizes Tony for not being "the guy to make the [[HeroicSacrifice sacrifice play]]". By the end of ''Endgame'', Tony sacrifices his own life to stop Thanos for good while Steve returns to the past, taking Tony's advice to retire and settle down with the person he loves. |
| 87 | ** Note that both Tony and Steve have been subjected to nigh-unendurable amounts of energy that wracks their bodies: Steve, when he received the serum that first made him Captain America, and Tony, when he performed the final Snap and ended his life as Iron Man. Their respective sufferings serve as BookEnds to the entire Infinity Stones story arc. Not only that, but Thor and Banner ''also'' willingly suffer their own painful energy-overloads in the course of the two Thanos films: Thor, to channel the power required to forge Stormbreaker, and Banner, to perform the Unsnappening. |
| 88 | ** Another aspect of their HourglassPlot: their entire arc is coming full circle. Tony was a selfish man who started out dying. Steve was a selfless man who started in the 1940s. Tony's story ends with him dying from the Infinity Gauntlet, only this time he's [[HeroicSacrifice far less selfish than he was in that Afghanistan cave]]. Steve's story ends with him back in the 1940s with Peggy because, thanks to Tony's advice, he decided to think about himself for once and [[EarnYourHappyEnding be with the woman he loves]]. |
| 89 | * Tony running the time-travel simulation, just to prove that it's not possible (and then discovering that ''it totally is possible!'') Once an idea gets in Tony Stark's genius brain, he can't just let it go, he has to follow up on it. He did it tinkering with his engines, he did it designing weapons, he did it making the Iron Man armors. It almost makes you wonder if Steve or Natasha knew that all they had to do was put this idea in Tony's head, and sooner or later he'd make it a reality, even if he didn't want to. |
| 90 | * Nebula claims that Gamora was going to end up with either Peter Quill or "the tree" -- was [[ShipperOnDeck she secretly shipping Drax and Mantis]] while [[{{Tsundere}} discreetly claiming Rocket for herself?]] Especially when you realize how much they have in common -- having been turned inside out and filled with cybernetics, and secretly having a lot of pain to deal with, just in different ways. |
| 91 | * Steve and Bucky's parting words to each other mirror those from when they said goodbye during World War II, a time when they knew they would not be seeing each other again for a long time. This implies Bucky knew what Steve was going to do (live another life with Peggy) and they had in fact already discussed it. This also explains why he's not surprised and is the one to point out where the elderly Steve is. |
| 92 | ** Alternatively, Bucky might just have known Steve well enough to guess what he might do. |
| 93 | * The BookEnds of Tony announcing that he is Iron Man came at points that would forever change the world at large: his press conference that would basically out him as a superhero (and increase the presence of superpowered individuals in the world, according to Vision), and the unsnapping, or Blip, which would resurrect everyone lost in the first snap (Decimation)... and ultimately end Tony's life. His first... and last act as Iron Man. |
| 94 | * The Soul Stone can only appear when you sacrifice that which you love. Why, then, would Clint receive the Stone, when he was doing his very best ''not'' to let Natasha die? Red Skull specifically said that one must "lose that which they love". No mention of personally killing anyone which allows for a broader interpretation. Natasha sacrificed herself, thus causing Clint to lose her and gain the Stone. |
| 95 | * Thor's rather depressive state much throughout ''Endgame'' proved to be somewhat divisive with viewers, but makes sense when you consider that the events of ''Film/ThorRagnarok'' and ''Infinity War'' literally happened back-to-back for him. In short order: Thor has had to cope with the death of his father Odin; learning that Asgard was built on Odin and Hela being bloody conquerors; Hela cutting out his eye and destroying Mjölnir and taking over Asgard for her own; having to allow Asgard to be destroyed to protect his people; having to witness half the Asgardians under his watch get massacred by Thanos; watching Loki, the last of his family, and Heimdall, one of his best friends, get killed before his eyes; and finally, Thanos erasing half of existence across the entire universe because Thor failed to ''aim for his head.'' |
| 96 | ** Indeed, when Thor recounts his losses to Rocket in ''Infinity War'', he notes that his desire for revenge cleared his head and became a huge motivator. After he accomplishes his revenge by chopping Thanos' head off, there is nothing left to keep him from completely falling apart. |
| 97 | *** It doesn't help that Thor's revenge against Thanos was partially unfulfilled because he killed a half dead, willing to die target. |
| 98 | ** Since an Asgardian's alcohol tolerance is much higher than that of humans (especially when it's strong enough to render humans plastered after one shot), Thor must've been drinking absurd amounts of alcohol to such an extent that Thor downs several kegs of beer in a month just to get buzzed. Thor tried to drown himself in alcohol just to forget the horrible events that had happened to his life. |
| 99 | * The elderly Steve Rogers at the end tells Sam he doesn't want to talk about who he married. For the audience, it's obviously done so the ending scene will reveal he went back to Peggy in the 1940s. But in-universe it seems weird that elderly Steve doesn't want to talk about his wife. Why not? Well, because Peggy developed Alzheimer's, and her death would still be recent. Elderly Steve doesn't want to talk about it because he's still grieving over her death! |
| 100 | ** Alternatively, he's playing coy about it to mess with Sam. Another one of his "on your left" moments. Or he figures Sam would rib him about it. |
| 101 | ** ''Alternatively'' alternatively, [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall he's also talking to us, the viewer.]] Why? Because he's been (co-)front and center for years and wants to maintain at least a ''little'' bit of privacy, especially when it comes to [[EarnYourHappyEnding his happiness.]] |
| 102 | * A minor one compared to the other entries here, but Thor's unfamiliarity with Earth customs very likely contributed to his transformation into an alcoholic slob. As he could no longer return to Asgard, he likely just asked someone what they do when they're feeling down, and they just happened to answer ''Fortnite''. He's still playing it in 2023, so there's a good chance he doesn't even know other games exist. Although to be fair, in a post-snap world it seems unlikely that there would be many more games being produced, so ''Fortnite'' could still be one of the newer games even five years later -- it's implied that things like sporting events don't really happen anymore, so obviously recreation is a much lower priority now. |
| 103 | * In ''Infinity War'', Thor says weapons like Stormbreaker have the power to drive anyone not powerful enough mad. Stormbreaker doesn't drive Thanos mad when he uses it to try to kill Thor not only because he's exceptionally powerful, but because he's already the Mad Titan. |
| 104 | * Now how exactly did Tony get all of the Infinity Stones from Thanos's Gauntlet without him noticing? The Gauntlet Tony built is based on the same technology as his nano-suit, allowing it to reshape itself as needed by moving parts around. Tony's suit interfaced with the Gauntlet and had it move the Stones onto him instead. |
| 105 | * Tony steals the Stones from Thanos and integrates them into his own suit. When they all set into place in his arm, you can see all of them clearly except for the Time Stone. Tony's time has finally come to an end. |
| 106 | * Why would Steve give the shield to Sam? Because he knows his friends so well. Bucky was pretty happy living at peace in Wakanda, and as T'Challa commented in ''Infinity War'', "This one has seen enough of war." After all the darkness of his past, Bucky just wanted to rest and be done with heroing. Sam however was working with Cap during the two years of exile. He took up the CallToAdventure and never looked back to fight with his friend as the Falcon. And if that's the case, then it would make sense that Steve would pass the mantle to the one who would carry the shield with passion. |
| 107 | ** Sam also has another similarity to Steve: when he was done fighting, Sam became a counselor attempting to help others get over their trauma but doesn't hesitate to rejoin the fight when it's time. After the Snap, Steve does the same. It's entirely possible that just as Sam was inspired by Steve, Steve was inspired by Sam. This leads in turn to Sam being inspired by Steve as the new Captain America; Steve took up Sam's legacy, then Sam took up his. |
| 108 | * Doctor Strange tells Tony that if he were to inform him about the future he saw, it wouldn't come to pass. Same thing happens to 2014 Thanos. He sees his future of acquiring the Infinity Stones in Nebula's memory drive, then proceeds to do everything in his power to expedite the process, and he failed. He was no longer inevitable. |
| 109 | ** Presumably, one of the other 14,000,604 timelines that ''didn't'' work out is one in which Strange told Tony what he had to do earlier than the last one. |
| 110 | ** Another thought would be that by telling Tony, the man would - out of an admittedly justifiable desire to not let his daughter grow up without a father - try to find a way to get around his sacrifice, resulting in Thanos eventually coming out on top, since it has previously been established that Thanos cannot be taken down by brute force alone. |
| 111 | ** Alternatively, Tony might pass the word on how Thanos is defeated, resulting in the other heroes - especially the nobler ones and the ones with ''personal'' grudges against Thanos (Thor, Wanda, etc.) - attempting to be the one to sacrifice themselves so that the others might live, resulting in Thanos triumphing because they either lack the ability to strip the stones from the Nano Gauntlet, or the large-scale replication of Clint and Natasha's Vormir situation creates enough chaos in the Avengers' ranks that he can retake the stones. |
| 112 | ** Alternatively, maybe in a timeline where Tony knew about the HeroicSacrifice in advance the nerves from knowing that it was coming caused him to screw it up and try it earlier than he would have, and Thanos still succeeded. |
| 113 | ** It's also worth noting that Strange didn't necessarily see ''every'' possible future. There may well be other timelines where the heroes succeeded, and Strange just (understandably) stopped after 14 million because that was the first, he'd seen where they were able to win. |
| 114 | * Thanos succeeded in ''Infinity War'' because of his willingness to sacrifice everything, including his beloved daughter and all of his loyal forces, whereas the heroes failed partially due to their unwillingness to "trade lives" as Steve put it. Five years later, the surviving Avengers are resolved to do [[ArcWords "Whatever it takes"]] to bring back the people they lost to Thanos. Natasha sacrifices herself to obtain the Soul Stone, (with Clint willing to do the same), and Tony is willing to give up a HappilyMarried life with his family, and then ultimately his life, sacrifices that lead to them finally succeeding. |
| 115 | * 2014 Thanos seems to be a lot more arrogant and less sympathetic than the one in ''Infinity War''. This seems odd, until you consider that ''Infinity War'' Thanos had to sacrifice Gamora to get the Soul Stone. This sacrifice may have humbled the Mad Titan, reminding him that he can still feel pain and loss. 2014 Thanos hasn't quite gotten there yet, so he is still as arrogant as ever. Not to mention the trauma of seeing himself dying and learning his efforts were about to be erased. |
| 116 | * Meta example: This was Creator/StanLee's final MCU cameo, so the fact that it's accompanied by the words "'Nuff Said!" is fitting. |
| 117 | * Captain Marvel in the climax: |
| 118 | ** Carol can take multiple hits from Thanos, who had been able to overpower the likes of Thor and Hulk at various points in time, and she also takes multiple shots from the ''Sanctuary II'' without pausing, yet one blast from the Power Stone is enough to put her out of commission long enough for Tony to be forced to pull a HeroicSacrifice to prevent the worst from happening. Initially, this can come off as a too-convenient shot to maintain drama, until one remembers where Carol's powers come from: the Tesseract, a.k.a. the Space Stone. It's been made clear multiple times that an Infinity Stone can defeat another Infinity Stone, so it makes perfect sense that a point-blank blast from the Power Stone would put Carol down for a while. |
| 119 | ** A much simpler explanation: She was hit with the Power Stone, an artifact which in ''[=GotG=]'' was said to be capable of one-shotting the population of the entire planet "like wheat in a field". Considering she isn't seen for the rest of the battle, that punch may well have sent her into orbit. |
| 120 | * The trashed-up, messy, and outright dystopian view of the world after the Snap isn't just the result of depression; it's also the result of supply-lines, bureaucracy, and infrastructure across the world all being crippled by the loss of life. This exposes a major vulnerability to Thanos's original goal and proves yet one more way he was disastrously misguided: the world is an even more dangerous place now because society is severely wounded, and while some things are on the up-and-up, the average Joe Schmoe is at just as much risk of dying from deprivation as he was before, if not more so, if the supply lines he depended on were destroyed. This is why other planets are in such terrible shape that Captain Marvel is kept busy away from Earth, and why criminal syndicates were even more likely to raise Clint's homicidal ire: unless support system members (like the remaining Avengers themselves) survived in large enough numbers to continue helping people, the deprivations of natural disasters and predatory exploitation by criminals will hit devastated communities even harder. Imagine if FEMA lost so many staff they couldn't respond to a hurricane properly, or if the Cartel and Yakuza Clint targeted were in an area where cops had taken an uneven number of losses. |
| 121 | ** It's even worse because it was immediate and unexpected; imagine all of the lives lost while a surgeon was in the middle of an operation, FEMA workers in the middle of a rescue, police officers in the middle of an arrest, firefighters in the middle of saving a building, etc. Not only were supply lines and infrastructure across the globe completely devastated on every level, but it happened in pretty much the worst way possible. |
| 122 | * Bruce couldn't bring Nat back from the dead while undoing the snap. Two possible explanations exist other than the "Soul Stone sacrifices cannot be returned". |
| 123 | ** If the theory that the Soul Stone stores the soul of whoever was sacrificed is true, he couldn't bring her back because she was still alive, just in a different form inside the Stone. |
| 124 | ** She died in another timeline, and as far as we know, the Stone's powers are limited to whichever timeline they're used in. |
| 125 | * Doubles with FridgeHorror: Bruce could only bring back, despite his best effort, people dusted away from the first snap. An untold amount of people died because of the later consequences, such the Universe turning into a messy dystopia requiring the Avengers to work 24/7 to keep everything working and Captain Marvel, Nebula and Rocket roaming planet to planet bringing relief: they're not going to be back. |
| 126 | ** Another way of looking at it is that he didn't think to bring back anyone who had died by proxy of the Snap or thought that the undusting was too risky as is to try it. |
| 127 | ** Also worth considering: in what condition would those who died in the secondary wave be in? Those that were dusted from the Snap were fully restored, but people who have died of regular (non-supernatural) injuries and illnesses would likely come back still bearing their fatal injuries, only for most of them to die again. Maybe a few lucky survivors who were attended to in time would endure a long, arduous recovery at best. If Bruce did not have the presence of mind to specify that they return to the conditions they were in before the Snap, the results would be horrifying and heartbreaking for a massive number of people, and even that may not be enough to bring them back to their full former selves. |
| 128 | * It makes strategic sense for Thor to be insistent that Steve uses Mjölnir rather than Stormbreaker, and not just because of size. Mjölnir explicitly grants its wielder "the power of Thor". [[ShapedLikeItself Thor already has the power of Thor]], so if anyone else is capable of wielding it, it's better for them to do so, so there can be twice as much power of Thor. Moreover, Stormbreaker is a two-handed ax, and Cap can't use it as effectively while wielding his shield - also, Stormbreaker enhances the power/abilities of its user, something Thor has far more of than Steve does (even in his current shape) and so would get better mileage out of it. |
| 129 | * When Scott asks if either Cap or Black Widow have studied quantum mechanics, Natasha says "only enough to make conversation." Which would make sense if she was trying to have something to talk to Bruce about and get him to notice her. |
| 130 | ** She was also introduced undercover spying on Tony, who'd created a new form of power. |
| 131 | * Likely a coincidence but having there is another reason why the sound of Tony's hammer striking the Mark 1 helmet was chosen to be the post-credits "scene" aside from being the MCU's progenitor. In the scene itself, he struck the helmet ''11'' times, one for each year from ''Film/IronMan1'' (2008) to ''Film/AvengersEndgame'' (2019). When it plays in the post-credits of ''Endgame'', he strikes the helmet ''3'' times, one for each phase in the MCU itself. |
| 132 | * Thor's character arc is now an exact mirror of Valkyrie's in ''Film/ThorRagnarok''. |
| 133 | ** When we first meet Valkyrie, she's a [[DrowningMySorrows depressive alcoholic]] willing to just passively let something horrible continue, declaring she wants nothing to do with her past. Gradually, she realizes that her people need her, faces her greatest fear in Hela, and boldly reclaims her Asgardian identity. |
| 134 | ** Thor is put outside of his comfort zone and must learn to be a leader. Now, Thor's depression and trauma has made him all but renounce his role as king, compelling Valkyrie to take charge and look over her people in their greatest crisis yet. By literally revisiting the past and finally getting closure with his mother, Thor strikes a balance between doing right by his people and himself, realizing that the king's role doesn't suit him either. In the end, he [[OfferedTheCrown appoints Valkyrie his successor]] and goes off with the Guardians of the Galaxy to realize just where in the universe he belongs. |
| 135 | * While Asgard was ostensibly a planet, [[SingleBiomePlanet most of what we see]] [[FantasyCounterpartCulture resembles Northern Europe]]. While rabbits are native to Europe, raccoons are North American. No wonder the Asgardians call Rocket a "rabbit", that's the only context they have for his type of mammal. "Badger", "fox", or "weasel" could work better, actually, but they'd indeed have little or no familiarity with raccoons. Although, who knows? Maybe the kind of rabbits they had in Asgard walked around on their back legs a lot. |
| 136 | * Back in ''Infinity War'', Doctor Strange said if he had to choose between saving Tony and/or Peter, or protecting the Time Stone, he would let them die to protect it. While we find out later he handed it over because the only way to defeat Thanos was by having him do the Snap and then Tony sacrificing himself to undo it, it makes Tony's actions in a way a form of irony. Tony was willing to put his wife and daughter above getting the Stones back, but in the end put the importance of using them to stop Thanos ahead of them. In effect, they both ended up going the opposite of what they claimed to defeat Thanos. |
| 137 | * It seems like FridgeLogic that the two Avengers who are sent to Vormir to get the Soul Stone just so happened to be the two members who cared very much for each other that they are both willing to sacrifice themselves so the other could live. Remember that Doctor Strange said that he had seen over 14 million possible variations of the outcomes. A large number of these variations are most likely the cases where the surviving Avengers send the ''wrong'' team to Vormir and not Clint and Natasha, which resulted in failure to get the Soul Stone and thus they can't undo the snap. The timeline we've seen in the film is the ''only'' one where they got it right, as well as everything else that comes after that so they finally achieve victory. |
| 138 | ** Alternatively, Natasha and Clint were effectively "fated" to go to Vormir: |
| 139 | *** The biggest group in the Time Heist is Cap, Tony, Scott, and Hulk, because they're going after the three stones in New York. Scott and Tony have to work together to get the Tesseract out of SHIELD's hands. Cap gas to con the STRIKE team into handing over the Scepter. And Hulk is probably the only one they felt had any hope of taking the Eye of Agamotto away from a Sorcerer Supreme who didn't want to part with it. |
| 140 | *** Nebula has to go to Morag, since she knows how to fly and navigate a spaceship. Rhodey goes with her because you don't want to send anyone solo. |
| 141 | *** Thor has to go to Asgard, since he knows the layout and events of that day so they can slink in and get the Reality Stone. Rocket has to go with, since he's probably the guy who made the doohickey to extract the Aether from Jane. |
| 142 | *** That leaves only two Avengers to go to Vormir: Nat and Clint. |
| 143 | * In ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'', Tony is lying on his back when Cap slams the shield down. Tony uses his arms to cover his face horizontally, allowing the more experienced Cap to hit the Arc reactor in Tony's chest, neutralizing him. In ''Endgame'', Tony is in a similar situation, but blocks ''vertically'', allowing him to defend both his chest and his face at the same time. In all things, Tony is TaughtByExperience. |
| 144 | * Pepper outright encourages Tony to aid the Avengers in undoing the Snap. This is despite her wanting him to quit, even leading up to their temporary breakup in ''Civil War''. Why the change? |
| 145 | ** She, unlike Tony, was on Earth when the Snap occurred, and not knowing this was all happening universally. She had a first-hand civilian view of the terror that erupted through society at the time. |
| 146 | ** She also has had five years to think on the context of what Tony, and by extension, the rest of the Avengers have gone through and wanted to prevent and protect the world from. |
| 147 | ** She likely knows about Peter's influence on Tony, and now having a daughter herself, is putting herself in Tony's shoes, therefore would want to gain her daughter back if the situation were reversed. |
| 148 | ** As much as she doesn't want her daughter to grow up without a father, she ''really'' doesn't want her daughter to grow up knowing that ''the bad guys win''. |
| 149 | *** Why would Pepper even consider using the armor? Because it's a GodzillaThreshold. With all the threats that the earth has faced, with the Snap being the most devastating, she's wiling to use it if she would need to use it to protect her daughter. |
| 150 | * Tony has a photo of himself and Peter. Peter is usually at some point, depicted as being a photographer for the ''Daily Bugle''. It's a subtle reference. |
| 151 | * In a sense, 2014 Thanos received karma for what his 2018 self did to Vision. How? Let's go over the numbers: |
| 152 | ** Vision originally died on his own terms, sacrificing himself by allowing Wanda to destroy the Mind Stone, dying with the satisfied thought that he'd be saving the woman he loved. But thanks to the Time Stone, Thanos reversed his fate and gave poor Vision an alternate death, where he dies with his Mind Stone ripped out of his head by Thanos and knowing he somehow failed to save Wanda and humanity as a whole. |
| 153 | ** The original Thanos initially died on his own terms, killed by the Avengers, but knowing he'd already created a "thankful Universe" and was content to know his work was done. After the Time Heist that accidentally brings Past Thanos to the future, Tony bestows the same fate to the Mad Titan: he dies an alternate death, turning to dust with the knowledge he somehow failed to triumph in his conquest. |
| 154 | * Why wasn't Vision rebuilt in some form since in the Timeskip? Because Shuri (likely the only other person smart enough to do the job) got dusted and her lab where she was building him was attacked and damaged by Corvus Glaive. Also, they'd lost the Mind Stone base used to create him, and his forehead was ripped open by Thanos. Wakanda would have been more focused on helping out in the aftermath of the Snap rather than rebuilding him when they didn't know how to do so. [[Series/WandaVision This was the perfect opportunity for Tyler Hayward to come in and take his body for the purpose of weaponizing it]]. |
| 155 | * Professor Hulk is chosen to perform the initial Snap to restore all the people over Thor. The thing is; Thor's smart, but not GeniusBruiser level smart like Thanos. It's apparently better odds to be powerful mentally and physically, and Banner's new fusion is just that. |
| 156 | ** Also Thor had been drinking throughout the entire movie and he decided to talk to his mother rather than follow the plan to get his stone back. Trusting a probably drunk man who has already shown to be currently unable to follow instructions with an object that could break the universe is not a great idea. |
| 157 | ** Plus, the Hulk can regenerate. So it's possible that he can recover from the damage caused by the Infinity Glove. |
| 158 | * There are an awful lot of Sorcerers in the final battle against Thanos, more than we're led to believe exist in ''Film/DoctorStrange2016''. But this is post-Snap... how many people were left without a purpose in life? Teachers without students, doctors without patients, sports fans without sports... how many people went looking for something new to give their lives meaning, and found Kamar-Taj? And unlike Pangborn, who took his miracle and walked away, these people would understand exactly ''why'' the world needs more Sorcerers. |
| 159 | * When Bruce tells the Ancient One that Strange ''gave'' the Time Stone to Thanos, she's shocked, stating he was supposed to be the best. Bruce states that maybe Strange made a mistake, and the Ancient One melancholically replies "Or maybe I did." Made a mistake thinking Strange could be her successor? No. Made a mistake not trusting Strange's chosen allies. If the Ancient One trusts Strange to succeed her as Sorcerer Supreme, then she should trust the people ''he'' trusts. |
| 160 | * While Clint compares himself to Thanos as Ronin, he is actually more like Ronan. Ronin and Ronan sound phonetically the same. As Ronin, Clint is essentially doing what Ronan was doing, killing those he accused of being guilty. By associating himself with Thanos, Clint is playing Ronan's role. |
| 161 | * Tony defeats Thanos by swiping the stones off the glove while Thanos isn't looking and then responding to Thanos' boast with his own. [[Film/IronMan3 A cheap trick and a cheesy one-liner]], [[Film/IronMan1 the last act of defiance of the great Tony Stark.]] |
| 162 | * Thanos's armor is being used as a scarecrow in the beginning because that's what it is. At that point, Thanos is a shell of his former self and not a threat because he had just used the Infinity Gauntlet to destroy the Infinity Stones, crippling himself. At that point, the armor is just a symbol or a front for the terror he used to bring, not for the power he doesn't have anymore. Like a scarecrow, Thanos brings terror to anyone who sees or hears about him but he is actually not a threat anymore. |
| 163 | * Some fans note that in this film, 2014 Thanos seemed more durable and able to deal more punishment than in ''Infinity War'', despite having the Infinity Gauntlet. However, when one sees how the Gauntlet burned both Hulk and Iron Man simply by being ''worn'', then the implications set in; Thanos was physically weakened by the damage, but being significantly more powerful than either of them, it was less visible. He also wasn't wearing his armor at the time, which may have also contributed to the extra damage racking up. |
| 164 | ** This also explains why he didn't use the Gauntlet's powers to just nuke the heroes when given the chance; he didn't want to burn himself out before he could finish the Gauntlet and perform the snap. |
| 165 | * Thanos was able to break Cap's shield by whacking it, even though it was made of vibranium. Vibranium came from a ''meteor''. It's not hard to believe that some other planets or asteroids have their own vibranium deposits. And since Thanos has a massive galaxy-wide empire, finding said resource wouldn't be too hard, and considering how he manhandled Black Panther he probably didn't have any trouble ''getting'' said metal either. Moreover, Vibranium is the strongest metal ''on Earth''. There could be stronger metals out there in space that can easily break Vibranium, and Thanos' sword is made from said metal. |
| 166 | * Why is Steve finally retiring? Because part of his will to fight is that he knows he can't go back in time and be in a relationship with Peggy. However, once time travel is possible and he sees Peggy in the past, he knows it's possible to finally stop fighting and settle down with the woman he loves. |
| 167 | * A simple one, but Thanos's motives required him to sacrifice everything and everyone near to him because he felt it was his destiny. He is defeated by Tony choosing to sacrifice himself to save everyone and everything but himself, not because it was destiny itself, but because it was ultimately what he felt was more important. |
| 168 | * When Tony swipes the Infinity Stones from Thanos and performs his HeroicSacrifice, he doesn't do anything more than dust Thanos and his army. Why is this significant? Because this is the same CrazyPrepared, ProperlyParanoid man who, even at the beginning of the movie, was yelling at the remaining Avengers that he was right and they really did need a suit of armor around the world to protect the Earth. That was AFTER his exact plan for that reality, Ultron, went south hard. Yet when he gets probably the biggest chance to implement some grandiose, grand-standing plan and altering the world with the Infinity Stones to protect it, he doesn't take it. Even Banner when he unsnapped everybody tried to extend the scope of his snap to include bringing back Natasha. But here, Tony only does what it takes to end the fight and ensure that Thanos never succeeds. Why? Well, in addition to likely having more faith in the Avengers to protect the Earth on their own considering they were able to bring a LITERAL ARMY against Thanos's, he also probably saw a bit of himself in Thanos. Thanos had a plan that sounded insane, but that he himself believed was right and saw through to the end. Tony's character came full circle and he accepted that he might be well-intentioned with any plans he could cook up, but just like Ultron, could turn out to be failures, and he knew he wouldn't be around to right any wrongs this time. He dropped the last of his ego and arrogance and only did what he needed to do, and nothing more. He was finally letting go of his paranoia and pride and trusting in the team like Steve said all those years ago. |
| 169 | ** Perhaps that is why his "I am Iron Man" line was spoken so slowly. He's both dealing with the sudden power surge in his body and also contemplating whether he should do more than just snap Thanos and his army out of existence. |
| 170 | * The song "It's Been a Long, Long Time" isn't just symbolic of Steve and Peggy's joy in being able to finally be together and live out their lives in peace, it's reflective of the feelings of ''everyone in the galaxy'' after the people who Thanos snapped got restored. Lines like "Never thought that you would be/Standing here so close to me" and "Haven't felt like this, my dear/since can't remember when" really reflect how so many people must have felt, after five years of grief, hopelessness, and desperately trying to move forward, and suddenly seeing the people they loved and lost in front of them again. It's not just a love song for Steve and Peggy in this movie, it's one for the whole universe. |
| 171 | ** It's also quite fitting in that the song was first created after the events of World War II, and gained prominence among audiences as a way to welcome war-torn soldiers home. After a lifetime's worth of being a soldier, Steve gets what he always deserved: a happy home with the woman he loves in his arms. |
| 172 | * Rocket randomly talking to Scott Lang and petting him like an animal may just be CatharsisFactor at work, as Rocket has lived among Earthlings for 5 years, where unlike being around just Peter Quill, there's ''an entire civilization'' mistaking him for a furry little animal until he opens his mouth. |
| 173 | * Natasha's HeroicSacrifice is also actually that of a MamaBear moment for her. She physically can't have children, but her closest friend, Clint, does, and his kids even refer to her as "Aunt Nat." This is the closest that she believes that she'll get to having children so she makes the ultimate sacrifice to get them back. |
| 174 | * Dr. Strange not telling Tony whether or not they're in the winning timeline until the last moments makes sense because if he did confirm that they would win, then Tony (and most likely the other heroes) would be confident enough to let their guards down and allow Thanos to turn the tables on them. Moreover, if he told Tony right then and there that the condition of their victory meant one person had to die, then Tony (and the other heroes) would most likely hesitate to allow one of their own to make a HeroicSacrifice and allow Thanos to turn the tables on them (as had already happened between Clint and Natasha when retrieving the Soul Stone). In a meta way, Dr. Strange not telling the ending to Tony is the equivalent of him not spoiling the ending of the movie. |
| 175 | * During all of the TV Spots, the flashbacks to ''Infinity War'' were solely in black-and-white, except for the red parts which retain their color. At first, this seems to pay tribute to how the casualties turned to dust (monochrome), which is metaphorical for blood being spilled (red). However, after the movie, it becomes obvious that the dusted heroes aren't the only thing these spots are paying tribute to -- these were in tribute to the ''actual'' casualties of the two movies: Iron Man, who has red armor; Black Widow, who has red hair; and the Vision, who has red skin. |
| 176 | * Captain America's story began before the end of World War II, as he hunted the Tesseract and, to save the world, left Peggy Carter, missing out on a dance with her. His story ended after the end of World War II, as he put the Tesseract back in its rightful place and, after saving the world, rejoined Peggy Carter, finally getting that dance. |
| 177 | * While the implications raised of the Time Heist's fallout by fans (Steve pretending to be part of Hydra, Gamora not being around to form the [=GotG=]) are concerning, there's something that hasn't been mentioned: the events of Steve's final time trip. Put things back in the 1970s, fix the Hydra and Loki problems in 2012 using the scepter[[note]]Loki would've been vulnerable after the Hulk[[/note]], head to the alternate 2014 timeline to help form the [=GoTG=] with the help of Captain Marvel to handle Ronan and Ego and go to 2013 Asgard to return Mjølnir before heading back to the 1940s. |
| 178 | ** Some people have interpreted that Cap saying "Hail Hydra" might've just screwed over Sitwell and the other sleeper agents ahead of time. Hypothetically, one of them could go up to their timeline's Cap, says "Hail Hydra", and now they're met with suspicion and [[NiceJobFixingItVillain possibly expose themselves.]] Alternately, their HYDRA superiors chew them out for leaving the tower without the scepter, hear their excuse, realize that Cap played Sitwell's group for suckers, and commence snatching whatever they can from SHIELD and ''running'' because they assume their whole infiltration has been uncovered. |
| 179 | * In ''Film/AntMan1,'' Darren Cross taunts Scott Lang, "Did you think you could stop the future with a heist?!" In this movie, [[LiteralMetaphor Scott's plan is exactly that.]] |
| 180 | * Why does Professor Hulk need to wear glasses? Well, because he's so massive any normal typeface is going to be too small for his eyes to pick up on, so he probably needs those glasses to properly read. |
| 181 | ** Bruce has always needed glasses, though not to the extent that he wears them all the time. So an alternate reason is becoming the Hulk did nothing to help whatever minor vision problem he had. |
| 182 | * It has been pointed that none of the TV series were affected by the snap. Not even ''Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.'', who has always been all about exploring the fallout of the events of the films. And yet, it made perfect sense that they didn't. Adding the snap into a TV series would have been in bad taste: it means erasing half of the cast by an unknown OutsideContextProblem, and whatever they had achieved would have been AllForNothing. And, unlike ''Film/AntManAndTheWasp'', we wouldn't see one of the survivors having a part in turning things back to normal: the cast would re-appear some years later by an "Outside Context Solution", also beyond the control of the heroes of the series. And that will not do. Spectators can understand that, say, Daredevil, Luke Cage, Jessica Jones and Iron Fist do not get drafted for the war in Wakanda or summoned for the final fight against Thanos because reasons (as they take place in unrelated films), but will expect that they ''are'' allowed to solve the problems that show up in their own series. |
| 183 | * How brilliant was it that ''[[Creator/KarenGillan Nebula]]'' was one of the people who knew [[Series/DoctorWho the real way time-travel worked]]? |
| 184 | * Tony doesn't just snap away Thanos and his army, but also the wreck of the ''Sanctuary II''. He's learned from [[Film/SpiderManHomecoming Toomes and his gang]]. There was nothing for anyone like Toomes or Hydra to scavenge after the battle. |
| 185 | * In ''Infinity War'' Steve proudly proclaims that "we don't trade lives", even when it's just Vision against half of all life in the Universe. This decision becomes catastrophic when the Avengers and Wanda try to keep Vision alive and delay destroying the Mind Stone until the last possible moment, by which point Thanos already has the means of undoing it. After everyone had spend five years dealing with their loss, Steve in ''Endgame'' now proclaims that the goal is to win "whatever it takes", and indeed it took two people willingly sacrificing their lives to achieve the final victory. |
| 186 | * 2012 Thor's being able to use Mjølnir as a MagicalDefibrillator to save Tony may seem like a convenient plot device, but might be a reference to not only the mythological Thor who had the power to heal, but also to the comics where Thor assumes the identity of Donald Blake and works as a ''doctor''. It also was foreshadowed in the first ''Film/{{Thor}}'' film when Odin said that Mjølnir had the power to build as well as destroy, so Thor might have accidentally repaired Tony's Arc Reactor which then "restarted" Tony's heart. |
| 187 | * Much has been said about the HourglassPlot between Natasha and Clint, but she's also traded places with Steve. |
| 188 | ** Most obviously, she's succeeded him as leader of the Avengers, and is dealing with an inconsolable depression she must keep under wraps because she has to take charge and bring hope to a world that desperately needs it. For bonus points, her best friend has ''also'' turned into a barely-recognizable killing machine. As in the climax of ''The Winter Soldier'', her self-sacrificing faith in said friend saves the world and sets him on the path to become the good man he used to be once again. |
| 189 | ** She's also become the resident [[TheParagon Paragon]]. Natasha rallies the Avengers behind Carol's radical idea to steal back the Stones. Then she is the first to believe in Scott's even more radical suggestion of using time travel. It's her faith in Bruce's mind and Clint's morals that reunites the team. Despite Nat's sarcastic comment to Steve about giving a Big Hope Speech, she's the only original Avenger still working as a superhero, gathering allies, and encouraging people to act according to their best selves. Ultimately, her sheer selfless heroism gives them that one in fourteen million shot to save the universe, for the sake of her memory. |
| 190 | ** Her final moments mirror Steve's last words to Peggy in ''The First Avenger'': like Steve in the ''Valkyrie'', Natasha knows that a HeroicSuicide is the only option to save countless lives. She goes out listening to the voice of the person she loves deeply, calling on the loved one to have faith that it will be alright, close to tears but never flinching in the vow she made: "Whatever it takes." |
| 191 | * Tony continues to be TaughtByExperience: |
| 192 | ** When he fought Thanos the first time, he ran out of nanomachines. This time, when they're going for the Snap 2.0, he makes an energy shield. Which is lighter, doesn't need nanomachines (just an emitter), can be strengthened by adding more power, ''and'' it doesn't impede visibility. |
| 193 | ** Last time the plan failed because they failed to get the Gauntlet off Thanos. This time, Tony just takes the Stones off the Gauntlet. Heck, he may have been inspired when Thanos removed the Power Stone to fight Carol. |
| 194 | * Thanos tells the OG 3 "You couldn't live with your own failure. Where did that bring you? Back to me." It both applies to them (since they are trying to undo the Snap), but also to him as well: ''He'' came to ''them'', because ''he'' couldn't deal with the fact that his future self wasn't seen as a hero for the largest act of mass murder in history. He's ''projecting''. |
| 195 | * In ''Infinity War'', Thanos is nearly killed because he left Thor and Eitri alive. In this movie, he removes the Power Stone from the Gauntlet to punch Carol, which gives ''Tony'' the idea to steal all of the Stones. Once again, he's HoistByHisOwnPetard. |
| 196 | ** This also continues the DeathByIrony theme for Team Thanos from the previous film. Also, Nebula symbolically and literally kills who she used to be to save the sister she spent most of her life hating, the sister she kept trying to beat and kill. Oh, and they're only in the situation because Thanos -- who doesn't lie -- decides to send 2014 Nebula as a Trojan Horse, a form of deception. Which is what gets him killed too. Bonus points because Nebula has been TheUnfavorite, and the ''one'' time he treats her nicely, it turns out to be bad for both of them. |
| 197 | ** 2014 Thanos treats his Nebula somewhat better in this film. This is because he's seen Present Nebula's memories when he captures her. He may have seen her actions throughout the ''Guardians of the Galaxy'' and ''Infinity War'' films. This motivated him to prevent her and likely Gamora from betraying him shortly. |
| 198 | ** Gamora was able to redeem Nebula in the ''Guardians'' films. Now, Nebula is doing the same for her sister's past self. |
| 199 | * Considering how Thanos is capable to use the right-handed Infinity Gauntlet in combat and in an attempt to use the snap, whilst in ''Infinity War'' it's a left-handed Gauntlet, plays into the theme of balance. If Thanos has an equal amount of men and women in the Black Order and has a double-sided sword as examples to represent balance, it would make sense that he's ambidextrous, as it is an example of balance. |
| 200 | ** Notice also his double-bladed sword. Not only does it resemble Gamora's knife, but it, too, is perfectly balanced, which even allows it to be used like a boomerang. |
| 201 | * Bruce's line when doing the time-travel test runs with Scott Lang becomes Fridge Funny upon [[RewatchBonus rewatch]]: "I don't wanna lose Tiny here in the 1950s." Come the end of the film, he does just that when Steve Rogers becomes "tiny". |
| 202 | * Nebula continues to wear Yondu's Ravager colors even 9 years after getting them, and Rocket's outfit incorporates the same red as well. So it makes sense that the Ravagers show up at the final battle, to avenge their dead and support what's left of clan Udonta in the form of the Guardians. |
| 203 | * While it makes thematic sense for Thanos to be the last one in his army to turn to dust, it also makes logical sense. He is by far the most durable person being dusted (WordOfGod has mentioned this, and that Thanos's skin is so tough that even Strange's portals wouldn't have been able to cut into him much), so his body resists it longer than any of the others. This also ties back to how Spider-Man took longer than others to turn to dust in ''Infinity War'' (he being probably the most physically durable of the heroes who got dusted). |
| 204 | ** Additionally, it's possible that Tony intentionally made him last as a PayEvilUntoEvil moment. |
| 205 | * The Soul Stone is the explanation for how Steve got to have his life with Peggy without depriving that dimension's Cap of the same. The dimension he went to was a life granted to him when he returned the Soul Stone, since it was confirmed he went to return it. The catch? He still couldn't resurrect Natasha. There's something poetic in the idea of that coming from the Red Skull, of all people. And he probably smirked a little when Cap got what he wanted the most, but still at the cost of a friend's life. |
| 206 | * In ''Infinity War'', the good guys battled Thanos on his ruined home planet, where he originally planned to do the Snap, and try to take the Gauntlet away from him. He wins, gets away through a portal, and Snaps. In ''Endgame'', the Avengers snap to undo the damage future Thanos caused at their base, then he shows up through a portal to take their Gauntlet away, and he battles them in their ruined home. Oh, and they lost in ''Infinity War'' because they were apart, and win in this movie because they are together. Perfectly balanced. |
| 207 | * When discussing the Time Heist, why didn't the heroes suggest trying to get all six Infinity Stones at once from Thanos in the time period immediately after the Snap in the Garden before he would make them self-destruct a few days later? Using all six at once may have ravaged his body, but the possibility of him using the individual stones is still there. If the ambush in his house failed, nothing is stopping him from repeating what happened in Wakanda and snuffing out the last chance of undoing the Snap. That, and we wouldn't have a movie. |
| 208 | * The original six Avengers each have thematic ties to the Infinity Stones in the end: |
| 209 | ** Thor is in '''space''' with the [=GoTG=]. |
| 210 | ** Bruce has his '''power''' back by merging with the Hulk. |
| 211 | ** Steve went back in '''time''' to return the stones and live a normal life with Peggy. |
| 212 | ** Tony is no longer in this '''reality''' due to his HeroicSacrifice. |
| 213 | ** Natasha sacrificed her '''soul''' for victory. |
| 214 | ** Hawkeye's '''mind''' is free of his grief-stricken obsession with slaughtering criminals, because he has his family back. |
| 215 | * Thanos' line to Tony Stark about how "They will remember him." in ''Infinity War'' becomes a giant hint of foreshadowing of the latter's fate in ''Endgame''. |
| 216 | * Look closely during Natasha and Steve's conversation before Scott shows up, and you'll notice that Natasha has cut her peanut butter sandwich diagonally. This could be a coincidence, or it could be a habit she picked up to [[Film/CaptainMarvel2019 keep Nick Fury away from her lunch]]. |
| 217 | * The Asgardians calling Rocket a "rabbit" might be more than just a BrickJoke. Raccoons are native to America, while Asgardians originated in Europe, so they would have pretty much no experience with raccoons. It would make sense for them to call Rocket a rabbit, since it's a quadrupedal mammal native to Europe. |
| 218 | * ''Infinity War's'' fridge page points out that Thanos one started acting in the open when Odin, Hela, and Ego had been killed, (basically the most powerful known entities that could have stopped him or posed a threat). But what about Captain Marvel? Remember that the first stones Thanos gathers were the power stone and a week later, the space stone, in that order. Also, Ronan had worked for Thanos, and may have informed the Mad Titan about her. Now, come ''Endgame'', Thanos can sucker-punch Carol with the unrestrained power stone to knock her out. Thanos intentionally chose those stones because one allows him to stand up to Carol in a physical fight, and the other allows him to escape instantly if that didn't work. |
| 219 | * While Nebula and Rhodey follow Star-Lord to the Power Stone, the latter questions and former confirms that Quill is an idiot. Keep in mind though, that Nebula saw Quill royally screw up years earlier in ''Infinity War''. Of course her feelings wouldn't have changed, given the aftermath she's seen. |
| 220 | * Cap can survive taking hits, and dishing out hits from Thanos during the final battle, despite the massive strength differences while wielding Mjölnir. But keep in mind, the hammer grants the full power of Thor, which includes the durability, endurance, and strength. |
| 221 | * Twice now a piece of Stark tech has subverted an Infinity Stone-related artifact. First when Tony’s arc reactor stopped him from being brainwashed by Loki’s scepter, and second when the infinity stones are swapped to Tony's armor, which adapts to form a new gauntlet and defeat Thanos. |
| 222 | * Thanos is a father who sacrifices his children and family to attain his goals to take life away from the universe. By contrast, Tony is a father, and Natasha is a mother, (of sorts) who sacrifice themselves to protect their friends and children, and give life back to the universe. |
| 223 | * Thanos snapped after realizing that the universe would not be grateful for his culling, from viewing Nebula's memories. But, why would he equate the Avengers for the attitudes of the entire universe? Because he likely also viewed her memories of the five year interval, during which she and the Avengers had been helping out other worse devastated worlds across the universe, and seen that their "lack of gratitude," wasn't just limited to the Avengers. And he could have just either fast forwarded through her memories, stopping here and there to verify, or simply viewed them all, after all thanks to reverse engineering Pym particles, he now had a time machine as well. |
| 224 | * Of all the people who comfort Tony in his final moments, they are Pepper, Peter, and Rhodey. While this is clearly because they were significant characters in his story arc, it is also interesting to note that, at the time of this scene, they are wearing suits of armor ''he'' made for ''them''. This also doubles as Fridge Heartwarming because, as one commentator put it, "He couldn't put 'a suit of armor around the world' so instead he put suits around his." |
| 225 | * It is ironic that the fate 2018 Thanos brings to Loki in ''Infinity War'' is the same he receives in ''Endgame'': to be killed off in the beginning of the movie by a blow to the neck with little further discussion later on. For bonus points, while Loki dies alongside his kingdom -- friends and family he grew up with -- thanks to the actions of Loki and other Asgardians, such as Heimdall sending Hulk to Earth, 2018 Thanos dies alone simply because there was no-one left to mourn him: Hulk's arrival set off a chain of events that led to the deaths of the entire Black Order. |
| 226 | * The fact that most of the surviving Avengers are only eating cheap, easy-to-make food such as sandwiches, salads, and tacos makes sense from an economical standpoint: given half the population is gone, any meals that involve complex instruction and ingredients aren't likely to be made when there's not as many mouths to feed, nor are there as many people who can make and/or appreciate it. |
| 227 | ** Also, it makes sense because the Avengers have probably lost their sense of taste from the tragedy they faced, especially Nat, which is a symptom of depression. |
| 228 | * The original Infinity Gauntlet had a ''sinister'' purpose, and was left-handed.[[note]]Sinister comes from a Latin word meaning "on the left side". [[/note]]. The nano-gauntlet, created to set ''right'' what went wrong, was a right-handed one. |
| 229 | * During the briefing about the Time Heist, the first stone on topic is the Aether/Reality Stone. The Reality Stone (together with the Tesseract/Space Stone) are the ''first'' artifacts to be identified as Infinity Stones, during TheStinger of ''Film/ThorTheDarkWorld''. |
| 230 | * The Thanos that became the film's BigBad came from 2014, the very same year the first ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy2014'' film was released, and was Thanos's first full (and speaking) appearance. |
| 231 | * Pay close attention to the scene where Tony is assembling the Nano Gauntlet while Rocket and Bruce watch, and you might notice Rocket has to squint really hard to get a good look at what's going on. Raccoons and most other nocturnal animals have a reflective layer behind their retinas that basically doubles the effectiveness of each photoreceptor. That's why they can see so well in the dark. However, the two different focal lengths involved mean that it's not possible to perfectly focus on anything no matter what. So even if Rocket's eyes are in otherwise perfect shape, there's a hard limit on his visual acuity, and he's kind of out of luck when trying to see such a small thing clearly when it's several feet away from him. |
| 232 | * Somewhere in between Fridge Brilliance and Horror: Fridge Horror folder mentions many subtle yet very important events that Doctor Strange had no way of manipulating or even foreseeing (a rat that couldn't even have been born until after the Snap randomly running over the quantum tunnel controls, Scott accidentally powering his suit with one of test run vials of Pym Particles, the team sending just right people to Vormir, etc.) that would most probably lead to the Avengers failing had they happened in any other way. The fact that all of those events still happened in just the right way to lead to the one good future may seem like an extreme case of ContrivedCoincidence... and that's exactly what it is! Remember: Strange saw millions of possible futures based on what everyone does or doesn't do, and there are billions, possibly trillions more of those he didn't see. The movie confirms the existence of multiverse, so all of those futures exist at the same time -- meaning that there is a version of events where all of those random and improbable events DO happen in just the right way -- and the movie simply follows this particular timeline. The horror part? For that one single good future (and any of its branches) there are millions of those where the heroes failed -- and it wasn't even their fault, [[{{Unwinnable}} but rather happened due to a single random event they had no control over and which rendered their efforts irrelevant...]] |
| 233 | * The theme of trading lives between ''Infinity War'' and ''Endgame'' is an evolution of the theme of sacrifice from ''The Avengers''. The theme is that some lives have to be sacrificed to win, but not necessarily one's one and that sometimes the greatest sacrifices aren't your own but someone else's. This is especially true if one is the general of an army and less likely to be on the front lines. As general, you have to decide what sacrifices to make. It's safe to say any of the heroes, especially with their character development by ''Infinity War'' are willing to sacrifice themselves for the greater good. However, because they are unwilling to sacrifice another's life, specifically the life of their loved one, while Thanos is, they lose. In ''Endgame'', the heroes are forced to allow someone else they care about to sacrifice their own life to finally win against Thanos. Barton has to let Natasha, with her consent, die and Strange has to trade the life of Tony (as he promised he would if he needed to in ''Infinity War'') by not telling him about the circumstances of the battle so as not to alter them to win. Arguably, Thor allowing Hulk to sacrifice his arm instead of senselessly sacrificing his own life to bring back the snapped for atonement allows the heroes to win against Thanos by allowing Thor, one of the strongest heroes to participate in the battle and slow down Thanos at various points long enough to keep him away from the Iron Gauntlet. |
| 234 | ** Extra brilliance here: The leaders of the Avengers are Tony (who never considered himself a soldier, in fact reacting strongly against that title), and Steve and Thor, who usually commanded small units (for Steve the Commandos and Avengers, for Thor himself, Loki, Sif, and the Warriors Three). They're all used to fighting by themselves or in small groups on the front lines, not making the big picture decisions. Meanwhile, Strange is a ''surgeon.'' He's used to sacrificing a finger to save a hand, a hand to save an arm, etc. |
| 235 | * Why does Vision go largely unmentioned throughout the movie? Because for most of the Avengers, Vision was one of many friends who had died as a result of Thanos' actions. Between their attempts to fight Thanos, the aftereffects of The Snap, and the five years taken to mourn and at least ''try'' to move on with some semblance of life, they had put it behind them- to a degree at least. But why wasn't he mentioned by Wanda, who loved him and was most distraught by his death? Because she was one of the casualties of the Snap, and then one of the people brought back. She didn't have five years of mourning; for her it was at most a couple of minutes between Vision's death and the final battle with Thanos. Even the time between the battle, Tony's funeral, [[Series/WandaVision and eventually going to Westview]] could very well have been too little time for her to mourn and move on, making talking about Vision too much or too directly very uncomfortable for her. |
| 236 | * From ''Film/IronMan1'', Pepper, about to walk out on Tony, tells him, "You're going to kill yourself, Tony, and I'm not going to be a part of it." Well, guess what? In this movie, Tony does end up killing himself to save the universe. But after all those years of growing together, she fights alongside Tony at the end. And [[StayWithMeUntilIDie she does become a part of it.]] |
| 237 | * How fitting is it that the [[BookEnds last scene]] in the Russo Brothers' last MCU film focuses on the characters from their [[Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier first]]? |
| 238 | * Why was Professor Hulk able to effect the SplitPersonalityMerge in the first place? Well, for a long time, Banner considered his anger to be a GodzillaThreshold, only to be brought out in times of pure desperation, especially since ''Film/ThorRagnarok'' showed that it is not particularly easy to shove that genie back into the bottle once unleashed if the Hulk didn't want to give up control. However, in the opening scene of ''Endgame'', when Thanos reveals he destroyed the stones, it is specifically ''Banner'' that utterly loses it, smashing Thanos in the face with the Hulkbuster armor. Having succumbed to his own anger independent of the Hulk's existence may have helped him make peace with the Hulk later on down the line. |
| 239 | * Steve wielding Mjölnir much more effectively than Thor makes perfect sense. Thor, as far as we know, seldom has to fight enemies even close to his own level, and has his ShockAndAwe powers to fall back on. Steve, on the other hand, is an OldSoldier who's spent his life going up against enemies whose abilities are much closer to his own, sometimes even surpassing them, and so has developed a much more efficient and effective fighting style. It's like the difference between UnskilledButStrong and StrongAndSkilled. |
| 240 | ** Also, many of Steve's attacks using Mjölnir are based on combos he did with Thor such as using Mjölnir and his shield to create a shockwave and using Mjölnir to pitch his shield like a baseball like they did in ''Age of Ultron''. |
| 241 | * The notion of a random ''rat'' kick-starting the whole process that undid the Snap and gave Thanos his well-deserved comeuppance seems like a joke. But considering how Thanos had wiped out untold quadrillions of ''non-sapient'' life forms throughout the universe -- organisms that didn't deserve such a fate ''even under Thanos's own philosophy'', since it wasn't ''wildlife'' that was exhausting planets' resources or suffering overpopulation issues -- then it's only fair that one such non-sapient organism should contribute its own small part to taking him down. And of all such organisms, a rat is the ideal animal "Avenger": with the possible exception of the cockroach, no other wild animal on Earth is as dependent upon humans for food and shelter, so no other animal has as clear a motive for undoing the blow that'd nearly shattered human civilization. |
| 242 | * One of the most weird and harder-to-adapt aspects of the Marvel Universe would be their use of ComicBookTime (i.e. why Spider-Man is still in his mid-20s in the modern day when in actuality he should be 72 years old after starting in the sixties as a teenager). In ''Avengers: Endgame'', the characters brought back by Hulk's snap didn't age at all since their demise, and the world progressed without them for 5 years, making them legally 5 years older than they should be (i.e. Peter Parker would now be 21 while being biologically 16). Marvel Studios just found a way to adapt the HARDEST part of their mythology into the MCU! |
| 243 | * When Scott Lang walks down the street after escaping the quantum realm, he wanders past a series of abandoned houses with overgrown weeds. When he talks to the kid on the bike, look past the kid to see a block of houses with well-tended yards, evidently still occupied. It's unlikely that Thanos's snap took whole blocks of families while leaving contiguous blocks unharmed, so what's happened? After the snap, the survivors moved to cluster together, trying to rebuild intact communities. |
| 244 | * The moment ''Infinity War'' ends, Thanos stops being portrayed as anything remotely heroic. This is also around the time he destroyed the Reality Stone. You could say reality has set in or reset because now he can't literally and metaphorically impose his reality now that he isn't the hero of the movie. |
| 245 | * Someone pointed this out on Tumblr, but when the group goes to reverse the snap the first time, Captain America walks into the room calmly and asks Thanos the questions, while Captain Marvel bursts through his hut, puts him in a chokehold, and both physically and literally pressures him to answer the questions Steve's asking. So could you call it a [[StealthPun "good Cap, bad Cap" routine? Anyone?]] |
| 246 | * Note that ''this'' time Earth is invaded by Thanos's alien forces, there's no indication that anyone tried to lob a nuke at the battle zone, even though Earth's people have a ''lot'' more grounds to be terrified of aliens now than they ever had, with the Chitauri. Given the stakes, it probably '''would''' have been justified as a desperation ploy to take Thanos out before he could double up on the first Snap... except that even if someone in authority ''did'' want to order a nuclear strike, every nuclear silo, sub, and air base in the world is probably in a state of lockdown confusion, because of all the dusted military personnel who've just blipped back into existence in the middle of their security grids! Just verifying that the re-appearing people actually are who they claim to be, and not, say, Skrull infiltrators or HYDRA agents in photostatic veils, will take days; no ''way'' will anyone be heeding an order to nuke U.S. territory in the middle of a who's-who-around-here brouhaha like that. |
| 247 | * Before Steve travels back to return the Stones, he tells Sam: “''You’re A Good Man''”. This calls back to what Abraham Erskine told Steve, before he got the Super Soldier Serum: “''Whatever happens tomorrow, you must promise me one thing. You will stay who you are. Not a perfect soldier, but a good man''”. This is why Steve saw Sam as the best choice to be the next Captain America, 'cause while Bucky may be the Perfect Soldier, only a Good Man, like Sam, can be Captain America. |
| 248 | * Pepper Potts as Rescue arriving on the battlefield is a bit puzzling since she wasn't an active superhero, and thus logically no sorcerer would be dispatched to portal here in. However, looking closely she just lands without being seen coming from a portal, so she might just as well have heard on the news that an explosion happened at the Avengers Compound and flew there with the Rescue armor to help Tony. It's just coincidence that she arrives alongside all the other heroes for the big battle. (The same argument could be used for the Wasp, but it's less likely as she was "blipped" out.) |
| 249 | * Back in the Headscratchers for ''Infinity War'', there were numerous complaints about how Thanos's plan of cutting the world's population in half doesn't make any sense because the populations will just grow back to their old size in a few generations. Here, we find out that he'd apparently (sort of) thought of that, and believed that if he could cut the universe's population in half, the survivors would see how much better their lives were, and default to a more sustainable population from that point on. |
| 250 | * The fact that Cassie wasn't Snapped isn't ''just'' a way to age-up her character in preparation for a potential role as a super in her own right, nor is it merely a way to inject some genuine tragic drama into Scott's character-arc, in contrast to his prior comedic role in the MCU. It's also the ''perfect'' way to ensure that Scott - one of the only MCU characters whose story hasn't even ''touched'' on the Thanos/Infinity Stone myth arc before - is genuinely invested in undoing Thanos's evil. Because even though Scott's never been one to nurture grudges, the Snap did the one thing he wouldn't be able to brush off or forgive: it ''made his little girl grieve for him''. Cassie had to live with the belief that her father had been Snapped, all these years. Naturally, he's going to mess up Thanos's "great victory" if he can. |
| 251 | ** Plus, it's because of the Snap that Scott missed out on five crucial years of his daughter's life, and in an unannounced, unexpected way that was a whole lot crueler than simply being thrown back into prison. Of course Scott would want some payback for that. |
| 252 | * Captain Marvel's BigDamnHeroes moment, arriving to take out the ''Sanctuary II'' seems kinda coincidental, right? But then, remember her pager. She probably left it with the Avengers "just in case," before the time skip. Cap or Iron Man most likely activated it, as they were the only ones not incapacitated by the bombing. Alternatively, given the adaptability of his armor, Tony may have integrated it into his suit or the Avenger's base as a default panic button, given how CrazyPrepared he is. |
| 253 | ** It's also likely that once Professor Hulk undid the snap Carol rushed back to Earth to figure out what had happened and was able to arrive before the end of the battle. |
| 254 | * Why was the ''Benatar'' already damaged as Tony and Nebula used it to try to escape Titan? Last we saw, the ship was fine when the Avengers met up with the Guardians. Answer: it was damaged during the nearby fight with Thanos. With the Mad Titan firing energy energy blasts and a literal moon at the planet, it's honestly a miracle that it was even remotely intact. |
| 255 | * Steve Rogers' story began with him fighting a bully far larger than him, ruthlessly beating him down. His final battle in ''Endgame'' ends the same way but he does much better fighting back. |
| 256 | * Pepper is very proficient in using her Rescue armor for somebody with apparently little experience. But keep in mind, Tony's armors and AI have greatly improved over the the years. That's probably what's aiding her. |
| 257 | ** That, and she's married to the guy who invented the very armor she's wearing. She would've picked up a thing or two simply by watching Tony fight, and going by ''Iron Man 3'', it seems that using the armor is fairly simple -- it's being ''allowed'' to use it that's complicated -- and it stands to reason that Tony attempted to give Pepper lessons on using the Iron Man suits so she'd at least know how to wield everything at her disposal. |
| 258 | ** Pepper's opposition to Tony's armor use, let alone him making some for her, was always about fear for someone she loved, what risks he was running, and what strain it put on his psyche. What changed in the interim, to make her ''embrace'' the use of armor, up to and including learning how to fight in it herself? ''They have a daughter to protect now.'' Her suit's not called "Rescue" for nothing. |
| 259 | * ''Fortnite'' is still running in the post-Snap universe. It wouldn't be surprising that the demand for online gaming has remained strong: seeking out other people online and playing games like ''Fortnite'' would provide them with some desperately needed human connection and a semblance of normalcy in a world that has changed for the worse in nearly everyone's case. |
| 260 | * Bruce's arc has been with him not wanting to be used as a weapon, or worry that he and the Hulk are hated for the destruction they cause. How ironic then, that in this movie, not only is Hulk loved by the people, but in conjunction, by donning the new gauntlet and undoing the Snap, he's now a force of creation/restoration instead. |
| 261 | * Bruce/Hulk are foils to Thanos in that both are giant, strong, mutations of their people. Both have elements of self loathing in their lives. However, Bruce eventually opens up, can connect with others, reevaluates his views on himself and finds peace, becoming a hero. Thanos fails to truly connect with others, remains obstinate in his views, even in the face of overwhelming opposition, snaps when he's not vindicated, and comes to failure. |
| 262 | * When Captain Marvel comes in to stop Thanos, he hits her a few times and she clearly takes damage before she gets her hands on the Gauntlet and spreads his fingers apart, then when he makes the move to headbutt her it is a total NoSell. This is because she absorbed the energy from the Gauntlet, as EnergyAbsorption is a power of Captain Marvel's in the comics that wasn't really used in her solo movie. |
| 263 | * Professor Hulk is notably nice to Scott Lang when he's getting to know them, more so than most of the other Avengers. Of ''course'' he would sympathize with Scott: Banner has [[Film/ThorRagnarok direct personal experience]] of how disorienting it is to revive from what ''should'' have been a few hours' absence, only to find you've lost years and have woken up in a world you barely recognize. |
| 264 | * When Wanda battles Thanos, she lands in front of him as he's about to charge at T'Challa and growls, "You took ''everything'' from me!" He responds, bewildered, "I don't even know who you are!" It seems like a ButForMeItWasTuesday moment until you remember this Thanos never got around to the events of ''Infinity War'' and empathized with Wanda's sacrifice of Vision to destroy the Mind Stone (which the 2018 version compared to his sacrifice of Gamora for the Soul Stone). |
| 265 | ** Even more so, this Thanos is from 2014, a year before the events of ''Age of Ultron'' (which were what put Wanda in the public spotlight), so he couldn't known about her like he did about Tony Stark because no-one knew who she was in the timeline he came from. And because Thanos in general deals with bigger things, there's a bit of "I can't even be bothered with knowing you." |
| 266 | ** This moment is so much like the climax of ''Civil War'', when Steve tried to defend Bucky to Tony, saying Bucky didn't have any control over his actions when he killed his parents, but Tony was too lost to rage to be reasoned with. The same thing is now true here for Wanda. When 2014 Thanos says "I don't even know who you are," it doesn't give Wanda pause because the wound of Vision dying at the hands of 2018 Thanos happened just a half hour ago for her. In Wanda's mental state, she might have thought Thanos was mocking her, like Vision's death was [[ButForMeItWasTuesday just another in a long list of kills to his name]]. |
| 267 | ** Wanda makes a beeline for Thanos as soon as the battle begins. For her, it's been less than a half hour since Vision was killed. She's recalling the battle strategy that Steve directed the other Avengers to use against Ultron and his sentry drones: "The rest of us have one job: tear these things apart. ''If you get hurt, hurt them back.'' If you get killed, walk it off." When Ultron hijacked the Quinjet and killed Pietro, Wanda abandoned her post to go finish him off [[AndShowItToYou by ripping out his power core]]. Now, with Thanos having freshly killed Vision, the first thing Wanda does upon getting undusted is go after the alternate version of Thanos and beat the crap out of him. |
| 268 | ** This whole fight is a case of [[HoistByHisOwnPetard Thanos's own decisions backfiring on him]]. Back in ''The Avengers'', Thanos loaned Loki the scepter that carried the Mind Stone for the purpose of conquering Earth. Said scepter was confiscated after Loki's invasion failed and was used by HYDRA in their Sokovia base, where it was used to enhance Wanda's existing magic abilities... to the point of her being able to nearly kill Thanos himself without using the Infinity Stones. |
| 269 | * ''Series/WandaVision'' puts Wanda's rage when she confronts Thanos in a much different light. It wasn't just Vision that Wanda was avenging. Because when Thanos killed Vision, he something even more important from her: her future, her happiness. Her hope. The last three years for Wanda have been nothing but setback after setback. She lost her parents when she was ten. She lost her twin brother in the course of trying to atone for their decision to ally with Ultron. She tried to become a hero despite all that, but when she failed to save some people from Crossbones' suicide bomb (while successfully saving several hundreds more), she got crucified by the media and power-hungry politicians. When she tried to make up for it by helping Steve go after Zemo, she ended up being locked up in the Raft, then forced to go on the run with her new found family. Amidst all this, Vision was her one constant source of happiness. Vision was the one that came back to save her in Sokovia. He was the only one who was really there to help her through her grief after her brother died. He stood by her side even as the events of ''Civil War'' tore the Avengers apart. It was during those "stolen moments" they had between ''Civil War'' and ''Infinity War'' that she got to think of an idealistic future where she and Vision lived happily ever after. Where no one fears her powers, where no one hunts her. So when Wanda confronts Thanos and snarls, "You took ''everything'' from me!" she means it, because everyone else got back the people they lost, but she didn't. Not only was Vision not brought back, but her hope and her happiness died with him too. So unlike last time, where she held off 2018 Thanos with one hand while using the other to destroy the Mind Stone in Vision's forehead, she doesn't hold back at all as she attacks, because she has nothing left to lose. |
| 270 | ** Moreover, consider how Wanda describes the Avengers Compound to Agatha in the flashbacks: "It was the first home Vision and I ever shared.” Wanda isn't just avenging Vision's death at the hands of ''Infinity War'' Thanos. She's avenging the destruction of the place where she and Vision fell in love by the version of Thanos that stands before her. |
| 271 | * Scott's frustration that the Avengers failed to notice that 2012 HYDRA are ObviouslyEvil makes much more sense when you remember that Scott encountered them in 2015, where they were working with Darren Cross to steal his replication of the Pym Particles. Had the Avengers nipped HYDRA in the bud 3 years before, Darren wouldn't have had anyone to sell the particles to, and thus would've made getting them back ''much'' easier. |
| 272 | * In ''Age of Ultron'', Wanda gave every Avenger a vivid nightmare of their worst fears coming to life. In a bitter twist of fate, all of them had to confront the nightmare when it came true, but true to form, thanks to Thanos. They eventually overcome their emotional hurdles when they set out to undo the Snap and face Thanos again. |
| 273 | ** Tony faced the nightmare of seeing everyone he knew around him dying when he failed to stop Thanos, therefore he had to witness almost everyone around him dying and turning to dust before his very eyes. However, he confronts his fear by discovering the only way to pull off the Time Heist safely, which motivates him to lead the Avengers in undoing the Snap and, eventually, give his life to save everyone from Thanos's wrath. Tony's vision also included Cap's shield being broken, which is exactly what Thanos does during the final battle. |
| 274 | ** Steve faced the nightmare of living in a world where there is no longer a war to fight and he is all alone when Thanos snaps away Bucky and Sam, his closest friends and confidantes, and then took away the last opportunity for him to fight for the Snap's undoing by destroying the Infinity Stones, thus leaving him truly alone and without anymore wars to fight. However, he confronts his fear by leading the Avengers in executing the Time Heist, restoring Bucky and Sam, and defeating Thanos in a climactic war to save the entire Universe. Finally, when all is said and done, he can retire to a quiet, peaceful life and pass the shield on to Sam. |
| 275 | ** Thor first faced the nightmare of a burning Asgard in ''Film/ThorRagnarok'', which ended with Asgard destroyed. He then saw more of the nightmare come to fruition in ''Infinity War'', when Thanos killed Loki, the last of his family, and wiped out half of the surviving Asgardians, further dwindling their numbers and leaving him despondent. However, he confronts his fear when he tries to see if he can still wield Mjolnir and learns he is still worthy despite the tragedies he endured. |
| 276 | ** Natasha confronts her nightmare of being little more than a tool to kill and leaving behind no legacy beyond the mission when she chooses to give her life to undo the Snap and save Hawkeye's family. |
| 277 | ** Bruce confronts his nightmare of losing control over the Hulk when he merges with it following his humiliating defeat to Thanos. |
| 278 | * Just the tiny detail of Korg having moss grow on him in his brief scene during ''Endgame'', showing how he has also let himself go and he's joined into Thor's current slovenly lifestyle. |
| 279 | * If one remembers ''Guardians of the Galaxy'', when Thanos used the Power Stone to defeat Carol, he could have easily immolated the planet or at least destroyed most of his opposition and given himself room to snap uninterrupted. However, because Thanos felt he needed to win by doing the Snap, he opened himself up to have the stones stolen by Tony. Thanos' hubris and need to prove himself really were his doom. |
| 280 | ** Either that or he didn't want to blow up the Earth while ''he is still on it'' which will kill him as well, as the Power Stone is shown to hurt even him when touched. As shown in ''Infinity War'', recklessly using the most taxing of the stones will leave him with no strength to snap. |
| 281 | * Bruce Banner is already a NiceGuy in general, but Professor Hulk seems to be even nicer. How can that be if Professor Hulk is just Banner's mind in Hulk's body? Remember; the Hulk isn't just the Mr. Hyde to Banner's Dr. Jeckyll. He's also the representation of Banner's inner child: a sad and scared little boy who's lashing out at others in response to the abuse and trauma he suffered at the hands of his father. By making peace with the Hulk, Banner made peace with his inner child (i.e himself) and, by extension, his trauma. Having finally put the past behind him, Banner is now a more laid-back and sociable person, hence Professor Hulk's even kinder personality. |
| 282 | * Some have feared that Captain America's little "Hail Hydra" moment in the elevator and taking the scepter might have altered the timeline with either Hydra being paranoid of Steve Rogers now, or make them think he's one of them. However, it is entirely possible that, since Loki escaped with everyone knowing this, and Steve's past self fought the current Steve believing he was Loki, with the scepter no less, everyone would probably believe that Loki simply played everyone and got away again. |
| 283 | * Given Tony's history of guilt, he likely took Quill's resurrection into account as he knew how he lost his lover Gamora and how Quill could end up taking the worst of both Hawkeye and Thor and a lesser extent, himself. Regressing to a womanizing bounty hunter at best like his pre Guardian Days, an egotistical celestial wannabe at worst after meeting Ego. He likely sent Nebula to retrieve the Power Stone in hopes of having her be dropped in with Gamora and persuade her to undergo a HeelFaceTurn and giving Quill a glimmer of hope that he can find her and Gamora in the alternate timeline will realize the lengths Quill went for her, not wanting to live in a universe without her. If he's aware of Gamora, that would also explain why she got spared during Tony's own snap. |
| 284 | * 2014 Gamora requires less "convincing" than her future self to betray Thanos. But then keep in mind that she's been raised with Thanos being seen as an unstoppable force. And now she's seen Nebula's memories showing Thanos' future death. Basically, this proved to her that Thanos can be killed, giving her more incentive. |
| 285 | * 2014 Thanos' ultimately fatal decision to travel forward to the future, rather than use the knowledge he'd gained and simply adjust his plans, isn't just a result of his pride. If he's seen Nebula's memories regarding Gamora and the Soul Stone, he knows that '''something''' happens to his favorite daughter involving it. Shortcutting it is his attempt to save Gamora's life. |
| 286 | * In the reunion with Natasha and the remaining Avengers and allies, Captain Marvel said that she's going to be absent for a long time. This can be seen as she being very busy protecting all the alien worlds that doesn't have any superhero. However, ''Series/WandaVision'' reveals that Carol not only lost Nick Fury, Monica Rambeau was also snapped and thus wasn't there when Maria Rambeau died of cancer. She probably have few reasons to return to Earth, and likely wanted to put some distance from the planet. |
| 287 | * The standout instruments aside from the orchestra used in "The Real Hero" are an unplugged electric guitar and theremin, a.k.a. a guitar and synth. The first instruments used for a soundtrack in the MCU were guitars and synths, so Tony's leaving the MCU the same way he came into it. |
| 288 | * 2014 Thanos' death is made all the more [[AlasPoorVillain tragic]] when one realizes its a case of {{Bookends}}. He began his journey from his desolate planet, being ostracized by his people for both his ideals and deformed appearance (as per WordOfGod). Come the end, he dies in the desolate ruins of the Avengers' base, surrounded once again by people who despise him. |
| 289 | * When 2014 Thanos first arrives to the future and orders 2014 Nebula to get the Infinity Stones while he sits and waits, this is yet another sign of his defeat and lack of growth unlike his 2018 counterpart: the latter ''already'' did the whole OrcusOnHisThrone shtick, allowing others to do the work of obtaining all of the Infinity Stones, and not only did that fail, 2018 Thanos lost all of the stones he already had. Only after learning from this did that Thanos decide to go and gather the stones himself and finally succeed in his goals. 2014 Thanos ''never'' had this CharacterDevelopment and does what he always does, even when it has proven to fail, thus sealing his permanent defeat. |
| 290 | * When Professor Hulk snaps everyone back, the team is unsure that it worked, until Clint's wife, Laura, calls him on his cell phone. Why wasn't there anyone at the compound? Because, when the first Snap happened, the teams were out in Wakanda (and on Titan); no-one was hanging around the compound during the fight, they were all at it. |
| 291 | * Many have questioned how 2014 Thanos who had armor and no Gauntlet was able to put up a better fight against the heroes than 2018 Thanos was with no armor and a Gauntlet. But in ''Infinity War'', Thanos mentions that Nebula "very nearly succeeded" in killing him between the end of ''Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2'' and the present. 2018 Thanos was likely still weakened by the wounds Nebula inflicted; in fact, he may have been spurred into direct action by her attack, abandoning his OrcusOnHisThrone techniques in order to get the Stones before he weakened any further. |
| 292 | * Doctor Strange's plan to ensure a win can be thought of as him playing chess with the universe. |
| 293 | ** Doctor Strange looks through the future to see every possible combination of options, and announces that they will only win in one of those 14,000,605. |
| 294 | ** Now, keep in mind, Strange is always thinking about the bigger picture. He knows that even if they succeed in keeping the stones away from Thanos right now - even if Strange were to lock the Time Stone in another dimension that Thanos could never access, and if Wanda were to destroy the Mind Stone in Wakanda - Thanos would still have the four other Infinity Stones. Thanos could simply just rebuild up his army and continue killing half of all life, one planet at a time, just like he has been doing up until this point. '''The stones were always just a shortcut for Thanos.''' In keeping the stones from him, they’ve only slowed down his progress. They’ve done nothing to truly stop him. Strange was not looking to delay Thanos. He’s looking to make sure that he’s '''stopped''', permanently. |
| 295 | ** Strange only sees one way that they can truly win against Thanos, and that is by wiping him out of existence. That is his plan from the start. [[CooperationGambit Strange thus surrenders the Time Stone to Thanos]], assuring everyone that this is the way it must be in order for them to really “win” against him for good. |
| 296 | --->'''Doctor Strange:''' We are in the endgame now. |
| 297 | ** This is where the chess analogy comes into play. In chess, the endgame is the stage of the game when few pieces are left on the board. The line between middlegame and endgame is often not clear, and may occur gradually or with the quick exchange of a few pairs of pieces. Many people have composed endgame studies, endgame positions which are solved by finding a win for White when there is no obvious way to win, or a draw when it seems White must lose. The endgame, however, tends to have different characteristics from the middlegame, and the players have correspondingly different strategic concerns. In particular, pawns become more important as endgames often revolve around attempting to promote a pawn by advancing it to the eighth rank. Usually in the endgame, the stronger side (the one with more material using the standard piece point count system) should try to exchange mid-level pieces (knights, bishops, rooks, and queens), while avoiding the exchange of pawns. This generally makes it easier to convert a material advantage into a won game. The defending side should strive for the opposite. |
| 298 | ** By giving Thanos the Time Stone, Strange knows he is going to be sacrificing some key pieces, and promoting pawns to gain the advantage. Such as: |
| 299 | *** Scott Lang becomes instrumental to their quantum time traveling. |
| 300 | *** Wanda Maximoff doesn’t draw a lot of attention on first glance, but can spring into the fray unexpectedly and can entirely turn the tide of the fight. |
| 301 | *** Nebula sets off a chain reaction that leads to the downfall of the enemy’s key pieces. |
| 302 | *** Carol Danvers has been out of the picture for years but gets called back to the fight when Fury gets snapped. |
| 303 | *** Dozens of little characters who start to play big parts, because the main pieces can’t play them on their own. |
| 304 | ** And even for the final battle, it isn’t just the heroes making a final stand. It is dozens and dozens of little pawns (the armies of Wakanda and Asgard, the Ravagers and the Sorcerers and just about every background fighter the MCU has to offer) who show up as support in the final hour. They all assemble at the King (Steve)’s command. |
| 305 | ** But the promotion of pawns is only one aspect of the "Endgame" strategy. Because this was also the first hint that Doctor Strange would be sacrificing some key pieces in order to assure the win. And the three who had to be sacrificed to see Doctor Strange's strategy pay off ended up being Natasha, Vision, and Tony: Natasha to get the Soul Stone during the Time Heist, Vision to let 2018 Thanos win (so the heroes have to take a temporary loss), and Tony to permanently end 2014 Thanos. |
| 306 | * This movie may have explained why Clint is not worthy of Mjölnir and this is explained by how Clint and Thor are foils in a way. Both Clint and Thor lost family members and close ones to Thanos and murder at least one person because of Thanos's actions. Thor lost his brother, his best friend and half of his people to Thanos before the Snap, and even more of his people after it. Clint lost his whole family to the Snap. As a result of Thanos's actions, Thor becomes depressed and shuts himself away, although partially because he's partly responsible for half of the Universe being taken. Clint in turn, decided to [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge take out his wrath on bad people who got lucky enough to not be dusted by Thanos]]. Clint always had this quality, that's why he isn't worthy. Thor stays fundamentally a good person through and through, which is why he is still worthy. Who they murder and why they do it also seals who is worthy and who isn't. Thor murders Thanos, the man responsible for the ordeal to avenge those Thanos killed. Clint murders criminals who had nothing to do with the ordeal to take out his rage on them. |
| 307 | ** This is further supported in Clint’s own series where while he is ashamed about his past as Ronin, he is not ashamed of who he killed because he believes that they were deserving of it and he believes he was just continuing what he was already doing as a SHIELD agent, finding and hurting targets. |
| 308 | * Hulk says he has to bring everybody back because most of the radiation given off by the new gauntlet is gamma. Back in the first Avengers movie, SHIELD wanted Bruce to locate the Tesseract because it gave off a faint gamma signature. |
| 309 | * A subtle reference to Civil War is when T'Challa says "Clint! Give it to me?" regarding the Gauntlet with the stones in the final battle, and places special inflection on Clint's name. In their only other interaction in the franchise in the airport fight, Clint introduced himself by saying "We don't know each other. I'm Clint". To which T'Challa replied, "I don't care." Guess he cares now. |
| 310 | * In the 2012 sequence when Thor tells Pierce that they are planning to go out to lunch and then back to Asgard is a great reference to TheStinger where all of the Avengers went out for shawarma. |
| 311 | * Right before Steve says "AvengersAssemble", notice that Tony takes special notice of him being worthy and turns his head when every other character is facing ahead. Makes sense, Tony wasn't conscious when Steve first showed that he was worthy and also is the only character who would really get the significance who is also present, as Natasha is dead and Clint is still under the compound and Bruce and Rhodey aren't in the shot. |
| 312 | * The sequence before all the heroes show up to aid Cap leading into when they do, perfectly mirror his inspiring speech at the end of ''Winter Soldier'', outing HYDRA's infiltration of SHIELD. |
| 313 | -->"I know I’m asking a lot (Thanos's entire army is advancing on Earth), but the price of freedom is high. It always has been. And it’s a price I’m willing to pay (Steve tightens his shield strap and prepares to continue fighting). And if I’m the only one, then so be it (the shot of Steve standing alone against Thanos's army). But I’m willing to bet I’m not (everyone comes together to face off against Thanos). |
| 314 | * The Stark-built Infinity Gauntlet is a one-use only weapon, given that Bruce's right arm is fried when he brings back everyone Thanos snapped away. While the improvised nanotech Gauntlet formed from Tony's Iron Man armor kills him in the course of snapping Thanos and his forces out of existence. It's a fitting end for Tony when one remembers his pitch for [[Film/IronMan1 the Jericho missile]], the development of which was a key moment on Tony's journey to becoming Iron Man as it led to his abduction by the Ten Rings, and his construction of the Mark I armor to escape their captivity. |
| 315 | ** "Is it better to be feared, or respected? I say: 'Is it too much to ask for both?'" When Thanos used his Infinity Gauntlet, he was a force to be feared, because he was using the Infinity Stones to wipe out half of all life in the universe. When Tony used his Gauntlet, it was to end Thanos and his army. For this, Tony gained a lot of respect from the public at large and had a massive turnout at his funeral. |
| 316 | ** "''They'' say the best weapon is one you never have to fire. I respectfully disagree; I prefer... the weapon you only need to fire ''once''." Tony could only do one snap with his Gauntlet, but one snap was all he needed. |
| 317 | * Bruce being able to survive the Reverse Snap was foreshadowed all the way back in ''Film/{{The Avengers|2012}}'' during a conversation he had with Tony. |
| 318 | -->'''Tony Stark''': Hey, I've read all about your accident. [[NoOneCouldSurviveThat That much gamma exposure should have killed you.]]\ |
| 319 | '''Bruce Banner''': So you're saying that the Hulk... the other guy... saved my life? That's nice. It's a nice sentiment. Save it for what?\ |
| 320 | '''Tony Stark''': I guess we'll find out. |
| 321 | ** What does Bruce say right before putting on the Gauntlet? "It's like I was made for this." |
| 322 | ** The protocol that Tony uses for defense to the compound right before the Reverse Snap is set to be performed? Naming it Barn Door Protocol is brilliant, when you remember that when Tony was trying to get the Mark 42 to come to him from Tennessee to Florida in ''Film/IronMan3''; at first, not many pieces of the suit were coming, because it was being blocked by the barn doors at Harley Keener's house. So he threw in a little nod to one of his past solo adventures. Though Tony wouldn't know this for sure in the moment, he most likely periodically checked in with Harley after the events of the movie and would have found out through that. |
| 323 | * A very big reason why Thanos wins in every timeline but this one isn't just because of Tony's sacrifice, but because he carried his prophecy through and loses when he changes his vision, as he saw the reaction to him winning which convinced him that his initial prophecy was wrong, while in every other one he believed it was right so he won. |
| 324 | * Scott incorrectly states that ''Film/DieHard'' is a time-travel movie, before realizing his mistake. He was probably thinking of ''Film/TwelveMonkeys'' or ''Film/{{Looper}}'', both of which, like ''Die Hard'', also star Creator/BruceWillis. Alternatively, in terms of thinking that a movie with "Die" in the title was a time travel movie, he may have been thinking of ''Film/EdgeOfTomorrow'', which was also advertised under the title ''Live Die Repeat''. |
| 325 | ** Scott's been in and out of jail or in hiding for much of his adult life, to say nothing of the five years he spent in the Quantum Realm. His sense of time and grasp on pop culture being tenuous is somewhat understandable. |
| 326 | * Scott is holding orange slices when Clint gets back from the time travel test run, a reference to him asking for some after he shrank back to normal size when he went giant in the airport fight in ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'' presumably in case Clint has the same hunger that he had. |
| 327 | * In the TitleCard, the Avengers theme plays but some instruments sound stronger than normal; this is because, to echo Thanos dusting half the universe, half the orchestra is missing. |
| 328 | * Clint is still in the Ronin persona until he and Natasha are presented with the choice of sacrifice, even if he is between the Hawkeye and Ronin personas its only until Nat tases him and begins running which he follows by firing an explosive arrow near her, the first arrow he has fired in the movie so far, that he firmly goes with Hawkeye. |
| 329 | * We see that Thor learned from the previous movie as the very first thing he does during the climactic fight is attempt to go for the head. |
| 330 | * While the scene where Tony sees the picture of him and Peter inspires him to look into cracking time travel because he remembers how painful it was to lose Peter and how he wants to correct his failure of Peter dying, the picture he sees shows them holding an inverted diploma, and this inspires Tony to crack time travel with the model of an inverted Mobius strip. |
| 331 | * Tony letting Nebula win paper football was actually a pretty big deal to her. Whenever Nebula had a contest against Gamora, she would always lose and Thanos would torture her. This made Nebula resent Gamora because she felt that, as her sister, she should have cared enough to let her win sometimes to prevent her suffering. |
| 332 | * The scene where the other founding members are grieving over Natasha's death represents the 5 stages of grief:\ |
| 333 | Denial (Thor) "Why are we acting like she’s dead? We have the stones, right? As long as we have the stones we can bring her back"\ |
| 334 | Anger (Hulk): *throws bench*\ |
| 335 | Bargaining (Steve): Saying her sacrifice will not be for nothing\ |
| 336 | Depression (Tony): Mostly stays silent the whole scene\ |
| 337 | Acceptance (Clint): "We can’t get her back. It can’t be undone. It can’t.... Look, I know that I’m way outside my pay grade here. But she still isn’t here, is she? It can’t be undone." |
| 338 | * Clint switching his move set to the ninja-like Ronin makes sense. Not only does it separate himself from Hawkeye mentally and physically by giving him a vastly different move set, it also helps sell himself as a new vigilante. It makes sense that he doesn't become a gun-toter because not only would it be too similar to his move set as Hawkeye, but there is already a gun-toter in the Punisher and it would be too easy for people to disregard him as just another criminal since guns are common weapons in the modern world, making it again hard to sell himself. It also makes sense that Clint doesn't use a similar repertoire as the Black Widows because doing so would again not sell a new vigilante and doing so would tarnish the Black Widows', specifically Natasha's name. Narrative-wise, it also sets up Ronin an analogue to Thanos because 2014 Thanos would later come wielding a sword as his weapon of choice. |
| 339 | ** This also shows that Clint does know about [[Series/Hawkeye2021 branding]]. |
| 340 | ** Using a sword would also give Clint a literal edge in combat to make up for having less skill in hand to hand combat than a Black Widow. |
| 341 | ** Bit of FridgeHorror here: There's also the visceral feel that you get when you stab or slash someone with a sword, not to mention looking into their eyes as they die. Shooting someone is more remote, less personal. Clint doesn't just want to execute criminals (he could do that with a sniper rifle or his bow), he wants to ''murder'' them. |
| 342 | * The scene where Pepper shows up in her armor for the final battle, with the armor being the gift that that Tony was talking about giving her earlier. The armor happens to be the same color as the dress that Pepper got with Tony's money in ''Film/IronMan1'', showing some nice BookEnds between the first and last gifts that Tony gives to Pepper. |
| 343 | * The only character who reacts positively to Thor's rambling story about the Aether is Scott. Makes sense, Thor's storytelling style evokes Luis's MotorMouth and is a good reminder of his best friend. |
| 344 | * Near the beginning of the movie with Tony and Nebula on the ship, the camera shows the ship in front of a Nebula in space, genius Foreshadowing for there being 2 Nebulas later on. |
| 345 | * Though Tony's vision in ''Age of Ultron'' did feel as though it was foreshadowing his ending in Infinity War, it is just as much foreshadowing for this ending, what with seeing Natasha dead, Cap's shield broken and seeing the team defeated in an area that does in some ways resemble where he was in the vision. |
| 346 | * More meta Fridge, but in a deleted scene, Rocket has a lot of fun with the fact that it took the Avengers hours to take down the Chitauri, saying they're "the suckiest army in the galaxy" and all it takes is just blowing up their mothership. However, it's good this wasn't included because it would 1. contradict The Other believing Earth is not to be taken lightly because they repelled the Chitauri, 2. make Thanos look like an idiot for employing these nincompoops, and 3. make the final battle with the entire Chitauri army lose tension. |
| 347 | * After Bruce performs the Reverse-Snap bringing back everyone, the three characters who surround him and try to help him out are Steve, Tony and Thor with Tony providing extra help in using the icing spray from his suit on Bruce's arm. It's noticeable that the other members of the Time Heist aren't there with Bruce. This helps to be a call back to when Hulk saved Tony after he flew the missile through the portal in ''Film/TheAvengers2012'' and had ran out of power and helped wake him up when they were on the ground with Steve and Thor. Like Tony, Bruce is lying on his back weakened after performing a feat of great heroism. |
| 348 | * While it's not immediately noticeable Thor doesn't look as saddened as the rest of the characters at Tony's funeral and among other things didn't clean himself up that much. ''Film/ThorLoveAndThunder'' placing such a big importance on how if you die in battle as a hero you get into Valhalla possibly explains that Thor thinks that Tony got into Valhalla. |
| 349 | * A visual example is just how similar the shot of Tony when we initially see the stones in his gauntlet to the shot in the first "Iron Man" where he puts on the red gauntlet on the same arm as the gauntlet with the stones and makes the decision to go to Gulmira. |
| 350 | [[/folder]] |
| 351 | |
| 352 | [[folder:FridgeHorror]] |
| 353 | * Assuming that the closing scene in ''Infinity War'' where Thanos speaks to Gamora's soul in the Soul Stone was NOT a figment of his imagination, that means Thanos knowingly destroyed Gamora for a SECOND time when he destroyed the Infinity Stones. |
| 354 | ** Well, he did say that they were "reduced to atoms", so it could be that they still exist, it's just that they are too small to be used by anyone. |
| 355 | * Considering Luis' van got put into storage by the time Scott Lang came out, Luis did not retrieve his van, which could only mean he ''did'' get snapped out of existence. Ditto for Dave and Kurt, because they could've gotten the van as well. |
| 356 | * Assuming Karl Mordo wasn't taken by the Snap, how many Snap-surviving sorcerers (barring Wong, a confirmed survivor) could he have killed during the 5-year gap? All Thanos did was make his work a ''lot'' easier by dusting a good number of sorcerers in the world, and knowing Doctor Strange is dead and there being barely any Avengers, nobody is standing in his way to eliminate nearly all sorcerers during that time. If Mordo DID get taken by the snap, then all Thanos did was delay his crusade for 5 years until everyone who was dusted got brought back. |
| 357 | ** That's assuming he's killing them all, rather than stripping away their magic like he did to Pangborn. |
| 358 | ** Considering the large number of active sorcerers that show up to help at the final battle, either Mordo was dusted or his crusade hasn't gone very far yet. |
| 359 | * Steve returned all the Stones to their proper place in the timelines. That means he had to go to Vormir and possibly meet the Red Skull once again... |
| 360 | ** Worse than that, he had to return the stones shortly after they were taken. Meaning that beyond an encounter with an old foe, to be close enough to do so reliably, and without a precise timeline, he'd need to be close enough to at least hear the events leading up to the acquisition of the Stone. And do nothing. |
| 361 | * The Ancient One states that without any of the Stones a timeline is not able to protect itself from other threats. This makes sense as in the film ''Doctor Strange'' they only won against Dormammu by using the Time Stone. To ensure these other realities are safe, the Stones must be returned. This leaves the main timeline with no Stones though as Thanos destroyed them, and with no Stones no way to protect our reality from future threats like Dormammu. The Soul Stone being destroyed also means that Red Skull has no stone to keep. Hopefully the now-immortal and superpowered stonekeeper has mellowed out enough to remain on Vormir. On the other hand, this does nicely potentially setup new stories in the new cosmic direction of the MCU. |
| 362 | ** It's implied that the main timeline's Stones actually do still exist, just now on an atomic level where they can't be directly used by people anymore, but they still exist enough to allow the universe to function properly. That doesn't help against Dormammu, though. |
| 363 | *** Besides, unless Red Skull has a spaceship of some kind just lying around, I don't think he can actually leave Vormir even if his job is now pointless. Which would actually make sense if the Tesseract wanted him to suffer for eternity like it apparently did. This is Schmidt's own personal Hell, so there's probably not much to worry about there. |
| 364 | * Since ''Film/SpiderManFarFromHome'' takes place after this movie and MJ, Ned, Betty, Liz, Flash, Abe, Cindy, and Sally are still Peter's classmates and not five years older, this means that they all were snapped. Assuming their parents weren't, this means that for five years their parents were grieving for their dead children, and possibly were there to see their children turn to dust. Imagine Adrian getting a prison visit from his wife only for her to tell him what happened to Liz. |
| 365 | ** It appears the Snap took out family lines, since Clint's family (wife, sons, daughter) were dusted/T'Challa and Shuri were dusted (not Okoye), so most likely Adrian or his wife would have been dusted as well. |
| 366 | *** Since Aunt May claims that she dusted away in ''Film/SpiderManFarFromHome'', this may very well be the case. |
| 367 | *** [[VoodooShark Wouldn't Clint have disappeared along with his family, then?]] Additionally, not all of Peter's classmates from ''Homecoming'' appeared again in ''Far From Home''[[note]]especially not Liz, who moved away at the end of ''Homecoming''[[/note]], where Betty Brant's co-anchor reported that he got Snapped, but his brother didn't. |
| 368 | *** In addition to the above, Queen Ramonda was confirmed as spared by WordOfGod, so the Wakandan royal family was ''not'' fully erased. And as a reminder, Aunt May is not Peter's biological relative ([[ComicBook/TroubleMarvelComics Shut up, Mark Millar]]), she married his father's brother. So that wouldn't apply to them even if it were the case. |
| 369 | * If Thanos ended up killing micro-organisms with the snap, imagine all the people suddenly re-developing nasty diseases that had previously just vanished for no reason, and are helpless to stop them? |
| 370 | ** Not too likely. Ordinary plants seem to have been spared - else, we'd have seen trees dusted all over the place in the wake of the Battle of Wakanda - so it's probable that microorganisms just didn't rate inclusion in Thanos's culling. |
| 371 | ** Microbes are non-living organisms so the decimation wouldn't target them. |
| 372 | ** No such thing as "non-living organism", by definition. But there are at least two different possibilities: one, that the culling only affected motile, or sentient, or even only sapient life (hence, Groot goes, since he's sapient, but regular trees aren't, so they don't). Two, the culling affected all life - but. It's ''completely random''. That is, more or less equivalent to a coin flip for every living being - heads, it lives, tails, it goes to dust. It's possible, however unlikely, that all the trees in that particular forest survived (all the grown trees, seeds are also alive, so some might have been dusted). But if so, somewhere in the universe there might be a planet that lost all of its forests... |
| 373 | ** Since Thanos wanted that half of the population to be able to survive, he probably would have accounted for things like that. As in, when performing the Snap, he thought, "Okay, stones, I want half of all '''sapient''' life in the universe to turn to dust and leave it in such a way so that the rest can survive effectively, so no, like, erasing vital bacteria or something like that, okay?" Then again, considering stuff like the helicopter crash from Infinity War's stinger, there might not have been a specific caveat in the wish to not let others die as a result of it. |
| 374 | * Think about how much worries people in our own world go through if they lose track of their kid at a shopping mall or the market, and can't immediately find them. Even if the child turns up right away, the fear that they were kidnapped, got lost, or ran out into traffic can be petrifying. Now, imagine what it'll be like to lose sight of ''any'' loved one, when you '''know''' they could potentially have fallen to ash while your back was turned. It's going to be ''months'' before people like Clint can bear to let their families out of sight without feelings of panic; indeed, it probably took months during the time-skip before many survivors could bear to be parted from their families, for fear the Snap would happen ''again''. |
| 375 | * Some of the people who were Snapped may have been near death from illness or old age. So when the Snap was undone, their loved ones would get them back for only a short time before they died, thus losing them again. A silver lining might be that at least they might have some more closure this time. |
| 376 | * Snapping half the universe (dead or alive) was enough to cripple Thanos and Hulk's arm in the process. 2014 Thanos wanted to use the Stones to not only kill ''all'' life in the universe, but start it anew entirely at his whim, likely not knowing of the insanely high personal risk of doing so. How far would he get before the power kills him? We could've ended up with a completely dead universe. |
| 377 | ** I don't think it quite works that way. As in, Thanos would have destroyed himself creating an entire new universe, yes, but I don't think there would be any issue with him dying while actively shaping it. In fact, he probably wouldn't be directly shaping it at all, the process would likely go: |
| 378 | *** 1. Thanos makes his wish on the Stones saying: "I want this universe destroyed and replaced by a new one where there's a perfect balance of resources and population forever and ever. Also have them worship me as a god, and maybe make that hot Death chick fall in love with me. Can't hurt to try, right?" |
| 379 | *** 2. Thanos snaps, and the power surge kills him, either instantly or he's mortally weakened and inevitably perishes regardless when... |
| 380 | *** 3. The current universe destroys itself and everything else is erased from existence forever. |
| 381 | *** 4. A new Big Bang happens and over multiple eons forms that new universe exactly to Thanos's instructions. He doesn't actually have to be present to oversee it or anything, just letting the natural order form by itself like before, just under his instructions this time. |
| 382 | * All the people who were brought back by the Snap have missed out on five years of the lives of their loved ones; children have grown up, older relatives or friends have died, at least some partners or spouses have probably moved on and met someone else. There's going to be a lot of confusion and heartbreak. This can be even worse if loved ones died as a consequence of the Snap, by unmanned vehicles, lack of available donors, or even ''suicide''. |
| 383 | ** Rocket has now been ''without'' his family for more time than he ever got to spend with them in the first place. He's clearly grateful for their return, but the emotional scars from that long, long period aren't the kind of thing that just disappear. It's likely going to put some serious strain on the relationship between him and his friends going forward. |
| 384 | ** In ''Guardians of the Galaxy'' Rocket mentions he "doesn't have that long a lifespan" indicating his cybernetics don't do anything to increase his life expectancy. Raccoons in captivity can live for around 20 years which means his fellow Guardians have been dusted for a quarter of his natural life and, depending on how long he was active before the first film, Rocket may only have a couple years left before he expires. |
| 385 | ** Speaking of confusion, the legal issues that are going to happen due to about half of everyone literally not existing for five years and laws passed in the wake of the Snap to deal with that issue becoming irrelevant are going to be ''nightmares.'' At least the lawyers are going to make bank trying to figure out ways to rescind wills and property transfers, figure out if life insurance needs to be paid back, marriage licenses.... |
| 386 | *** ''Film/SpiderManFarFromHome'' shows that a blipped person's passport no longer prints their date of birth, so people are clearly trying to figure out a new kind of age-dating system to account for this. Flash apparently uses his ID to get alcohol on the plane until MJ tells the flight attendant that he was blipped and isn't actually 21, so she takes it away from him. So they must have at least a few rules in place already for stuff like that. |
| 387 | *** ''Series/TheFalconAndTheWinterSoldier'' shows the issues with displaced individuals needing to be relocated. |
| 388 | * On the Fridge page for ''Infinity War'', while it is very unlikely any ApocalypseCult started up on Earth, [[ContrivedCoincidence this does not rule out the possibility of other planets' religions having an end of days that resembled the Snap]]. Populations could come back to find their planet completely devastated and/or most of the remaining population dead. |
| 389 | ** Some alien species' natural ''lifespan'' could be less than five years, or five years would be a large chunk. How many would have been brought back with no-one left to remember them. |
| 390 | * It's shown that the entire royal family of Wakanda was snapped. How many other countries had their heads of state snapped away? There easily could have been power vacuums that led to violent revolutions and revolts. Imagine coming back after those five years to find your country in ruin because of this. |
| 391 | ** On the positive side, most ''democratic'' countries have an established hierarchy for succession of power if the head of state dies. It's ''dictatorships'' which would be more likely to succumb to revolutions if their autocratic leaders disintegrate, because a tyrant has good cause to ensure that no one underling can step into his shoes by assassinating him. If a country's got ''that'' kind of ruler, then a Snap-induced regime change may not be a bad thing. |
| 392 | ** Ramonda was actually spared according to WordOfGod (granted, the same Word of God claimed that Shuri and Aunt May were spared, both of which were later revealed as untrue), so she was probably in charge of Wakanda for those five years. The point still stands for any other monarchies that were totally erased, though. |
| 393 | * In the five years since billions of people disappeared, food production probably went down significantly. Same with other products. While Tony's Snap will also bring back cattle, crops, and farmers, it won't bring back all the working infrastructure that has been dismantled or unused for 5 years, particularly tractors and other farming machines as well as container ships, harbors, trucks, airplanes, and other logistics. It will probably take substantial emergency measures of governments, [=NGOs=], and the UN on an international scale to harvest and transport more food to all of the returned people and prevent a famine. |
| 394 | ** Same goes for all other necessities. There would not be enough medicine and other healthcare services. Or enough heated housing to cover a suddenly doubled population in wintertime. |
| 395 | * To prevent the alternate timeline they use to get the Stones back from being distorted, they return the Stones to their previous place. Except they did more to these other timelines than borrow the Stones: |
| 396 | ** Alternate ''Guardians of the Galaxy'' timeline: |
| 397 | *** They knocked out Quill and took Gamora and Nebula out of the timeline, along with Thanos and his forces. |
| 398 | *** This would prevent the formation of the Guardians of the Galaxy. Without Gamora and Quill presumably not getting the Stone as Ronan would have beaten him to it, there would never be a reason for them to form. |
| 399 | *** With the Power Stone returned to its proper place, there wouldn't be anyone to stop Ronan from destroying Xandar and any other planet he deems fit to destroy with it, and even Captain Marvel. |
| 400 | *** And also, with no Nebula and Gamora, the vital role they played in foiling Ego's plans for Peter (and the entire universe) wouldn't be fulfilled. |
| 401 | *** And, without Thanos, the Stones would still be in-play to be used by whomever chooses to seek them out, and who's to say this someone isn't ''far'' worse than Thanos and without his attack to unite them together again, the Avengers are ''not'' in play to prevent it. |
| 402 | ** Alternate ''The Avengers'' timeline: |
| 403 | *** They freed Loki and had no way of tracking him down, which forced them to go back ''earlier'' to get the Space Stone, but nothing says they were able to get him back, which would indicate he never got to undergo his CharacterDevelopment and HeelFaceTurn. |
| 404 | *** Loki disappearing with the Space Stone to go to [[Series/Loki2021 his own show]] would have affected tensions with the secret HYDRA sect within S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers, which would have completely unknown effects on the former's plans or the populace's opinion of Thor. |
| 405 | *** The Space Stone is also now gone with only Loki to either protect it or hand it straight to Thanos. |
| 406 | *** Hydra also now thinks Captain America is on their side. But some communication with higher ups would prove the main timeline Cap's story false. Hydra would then get paranoid that Captain America is onto them and may cause them to try and kill their timeline's Cap before ''Winter Soldier''. |
| 407 | *** Cap knows that Bucky is alive; if he does any investigating into the possibility that "Loki" was telling the truth, that too will probably get Hydra's attention. |
| 408 | *** [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking The need to find Loki and get Tony to the hospital probably kept the Avengers from going out for shawarma.]] |
| 409 | *** All of these will probably be explored in the ''Loki'' Creator/DisneyPlus show, which was confirmed to be set in this timeline. |
| 410 | ** "Steve reunited with young Peggy Carter" timeline: |
| 411 | *** Steve is the only one to know that his alternate self is still frozen somewhere in the Arctic and likely won't do anything to save him for the next seven decades. |
| 412 | *** Steve also knows that his best friend's alternate self is still the Winter Soldier, and is still killing people for HYDRA. If he does nothing to intervene, he's compounding his previous error in not admitting it was Bucky who'd killed the Starks; if he does seek to break alternate-Bucky's conditioning, his efforts could go badly and end up getting a version of his closest friend killed. |
| 413 | *** As shown on a photo prime timeline old Peggy keeps by her side as she's bedridden in ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'', she had at least two children with her husband (who may or may not be [[Series/AgentCarter SSR agent Daniel Sousa]]). With her alternate timeline self marrying prime timeline Steve, they won't exist in said timeline. She may have children with Steve, but those won't be the same. |
| 414 | *** There's an extra bit of fridge horror. Peggy died before Cap did, since she dies of old age by ''Civil War''. So steve had to grieve over her passing a second time (third time if you count when he awoke in the present and thought everyone he knew was dead). For extra horror, he probably had to avoid her in her last few days coz Young Steve keeps visiting her, and he didn't want to run into himself. And for further horror, with Peggy suffering from dementia or Alzheimers, having two Steves had to make her condition worse. As people with either of these react very badly to changes in their surroundings and routine. Having a 2nd, younger Steve just appear had to make her condition way worse. |
| 415 | *** When Cap brings back the shield and gives it to Sam, it leaves the Peggy-Steve timeline shieldless. Unless somebody does ''another'' time-jump to return it, Past-Steve is going to have a ''much'' harder time fighting off the Chitauri invasion, Ultron and Hydra once he unthaws. The famous elevator fight, for example, would be much harder to walk away from if he didn't have his quasi-magical shield to shatter his restraints, slice the elevator cables, and to help absorb the impact of his 50-foot fall. |
| 416 | ** According to ''Loki'', at least some of these timelines get pruned by the TVA. |
| 417 | * The one thing that set the ''Endgame'' comeback in motion was the rat running along the exact buttons and switches needed to bring Scott back from the Quantum Realm. Couple this with the fact that Dr. Strange states that there was only ''one'' future timeline where they win, it's safe to assume there's countless timelines where the rat wasn't there, Scott is trapped forever in the Quantum Realm and the Snap remained in effect. |
| 418 | ** Imagine the thousands of timelines in which that rat got eaten by some random predator before it could get into the storage facility... |
| 419 | ** One can [[WildMassGuessing assume]] that the timeline would play out in a specific way if someone doesn't interfere. |
| 420 | ** For all we know, in some of the timelines, the rat could’ve been a victim of the Snap. |
| 421 | *** Rats don't actually live long enough for that particular one to have been a Snap victim. But if ''any one'' of its ''ancestors'' had been, there'd be no rat to release Scott ... and, given how short rats' generations are, we're talking about a '''lot''' of ancestors, which means a lot of possible futures with no rat. |
| 422 | ** There's no reason it has to be that ''specific'' rat, or even on that specific day. There's no reason another rat couldn't have stepped on the right button a year later and kicked off the exact same series of events. |
| 423 | *** Or earlier, for that matter. Although, in those timelines where Ratty took too long, the Quantum Van's batteries probably ran out before Scott could be freed at all. |
| 424 | * If Zemo ever learned that not only the Avengers have reunited to save the world but now Tony Stark, the man whose weapons destroyed his country several times has been canonized to a saint for his noble sacrifice. Meanwhile his fellow Sokovians gain next to nothing except returning to a world where they are still without a country, and worst of all he is denied his death in the Snap by Thanos' hand. Without a doubt he is going to snap and likely become a threat again in Phase 4. |
| 425 | ** That last bit is confirmed. He is indeed returning in ''Series/TheFalconAndTheWinterSoldier'', so we'll just have to see how all of this affected his outlook and motivations. |
| 426 | * Of all the reinforcement Strange summons, the Nova Corps are absent. Has the Nova Empire been conquered by the Kree post Snap after the destruction of Xandar? |
| 427 | ** According to WordOfGod, they actually ''were'' there, including [[ComicBook/{{Nova}} Richard Rider]] himself among them, we just didn't see them. Time will tell how exactly they were affected by the decimation of Xandar, but they're apparently still around in some form. This actually leads to extra Fridge Horror, though: if Richard is part of the Nova Corps now, that means Rhomman Dey is dead, and possibly his family as well. |
| 428 | * The ending is sweet and all, but the elderly Steve Rogers will die in a few years (or months) given he'd now be around ninety. |
| 429 | ** Then again, we aren't sure how the Super-Soldier Serum will affect that. In the comics Fury, Widow and Bucky all took the serum specifically to slow their aging, so Steve might still have a bit left in him. |
| 430 | * As mentioned in previous entries, bringing back all people to the post-snap world (a worldwide population growth of 100%, literally overnight, in a world that was already in the brink of collapse) will cause all sorts of problems, including famine and scarcity. But why did they do it this way? Why not simply roll everything back 5 years? Because, if they do so, Tony Stark would lose his family and daughter. Which is a good point, but it is also ProtagonistCenteredMorality. "We don't trade lives... but some lives are more tradable than others". |
| 431 | ** "Rolling back" time would not work. |
| 432 | *** Just jumping back would most likely, similar to the quantum-time-trivel only create a separate timeline, not fixing the current one. |
| 433 | *** Furthermore, it is not protagonist-centered-morality. It is pretty much impossible that Tony was the only one who had children since the Snap. Thereby wiping out the last five years would have wiped out hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of small children who would not have been born without the Snap simply on virtue of their parents only meeting afterward, only deciding to start a family after the snap, and so on. |
| 434 | *** Lastly, even assuming that it was actually possible to roll things back 5 years, Strange looked through millions of possibly timelines with the one depicted in Endgame being the only one that actually resulted in Thanos being defeated. Therefore any timeline where they did roll things back ended up with Thanos still being victorious, thereby either achieving nothing or making things even worse. |
| 435 | *** Also, wasn't the guy willing to sacrifice his daughter's life to get the power to do "greater good" the ''villain'' here? |
| 436 | ** That is assuming that, as we've speculated that Hulk can use the gauntlet so someone doesn't [[TeleFrag reform into a car that happens to be parked where they vanished]], he didn't do something about that. |
| 437 | ** Also that there's a reason the Eye of Agamotto and the Time Stone is kept under heavy guard; from Doctor Strange's movie, it can only go back a few hours before it starts glitching, hence the TimeStandsStill effect in the climax of that one. Combined with how longer-term time travel creates alternate universes, and it becomes a non-issue; certainly enough to raise an eyebrow, but Tony is still the person who says that and then immediately makes sure that time travel is ''possible.'' |
| 438 | ** [[https://www.reddit.com/r/marvelstudios/comments/bp084n/hi_reddit_im_kevin_feige_amaa/enp3dlc/?context=1 An AMA from Kevin Feige]] says Hulk put a conscious effort to revive people in a safe place. |
| 439 | * Nat says that 50% of ALL life was killed. So imagine playing with your dog and it suddenly vanishes. |
| 440 | ** Also, imagine what the snap looked like to pets themselves. A dog could have just been playing with its owner, who is just suddenly GONE and they will have no understanding of why. |
| 441 | *** And, if your owner(s) vanished as you were playing with them indoors, no understanding of how to ''get out of the house'' before you die of thirst and starvation. |
| 442 | ** Steve talking about the whales in San Francisco harbor is even sadder when you realize that half the pod got dusted. |
| 443 | ** It also highlights just how mad Thanos the Mad Titan is: Dusting half of all living beings because there were "too many mouths to feed" achieves absolutely nothing when you're also dusting half the food supply at the same time. |
| 444 | * This is effectively the fourth time that Rhodey has been trapped in a small confined space and rendered helpless. The first and second times were in ''Iron Man 2'' and ''3'', when the villains either took control of his suit, or locked him inside it. Then it happens in ''Civil War,'' when Vision shot him down in "dead stick." Finally, in this morning he's trapped underground in the wreckage of Avengers HQ after Thanos bombs it with ''Sanctuary II'', with the rising water threatening to drown him. It's a miracle that the poor man hasn't developed claustrophobia at this rate. |
| 445 | * Many people think Thor's behavior in the first half of this movie is just the result of the events in ''Infinity War''. It's not uncommon to see them forget that ''Thor: Ragnarok'' and ''Infinity War'' took place within days of each other. Meaning Thor was still fresh from losing his father, his hammer, his eye and his home. Following that, half of the Asgardian survivors are slaughtered by Thanos and his cronies, him losing Loki and then failing to kill Thanos when he should have and the snap occurring, resulting in half of all life in the universe getting wiped out. His life went from bad to worse in a matter of days, and it added to the toll of his guilt in addition to not killing Thanos when he had the chance to. |
| 446 | * The aftermath of the snap on populated worlds is horrific enough but think about the worlds Thanos conquered where he already massacred half of the population. Those world's populations are suffering another culling because of Thanos which cuts their population down to a quarter of its original size. Think of how traumatized the survivors would be if they lived through both events. Watching a madman from another world invade your world and massacre half of your entire planet then watching in horror as half of the survivors of the massacre from only a few decades or so ago crumble to dust with no explanation. |
| 447 | ** Particularly those who had literally just been culled. The Asgardians were manually culled and then half of the survivors were dusted less than a day later. For planets it had been decades since the manual culling, the population would have recovered. |
| 448 | * As noted on Headscratchers page, Ant-Man can still freely use his suit despite all of the available Pym Particles being used to power the quantum tunnel. Most likely explanation for this is that the tunnel uses way more Particles than the suit (since it works by shrinking the user to subatomic levels, which is what the suit does up to eleven), meaning that one vial with exactly enough Particles for one time jump would be able to power the suit for long... meaning that, had Scott not accidentally used said vial, the suit would be useless for the rest of the movie, which, even assuming that Time Heist would still be successful, would ultimately leave him with no way to save Rhodey, Rocket and Banner from the flooded ruins of Avengers Compound, and might even cost the Avengers the battle. All because of one accidental button press. |
| 449 | * Without the Pyms, Scott, or even the Wombats to care for them, Hank Pym's ant colonies will surely have died out by now: either expired from thirst, starved, exterminated by whomever else moved into the Pyms' vacant house after the Snap, or wiped out from warring against one another when the ant-control systems that kept them at peace finally ran down. Add Ant-thony, Ant-tonio Banderas, and Ulysses S. Gr-ant to the roll of MCU heroes whose families were doubly decimated thanks to Thanos. |
| 450 | ** Those three ants all died in their respective movies already, though. Not to mention ants are hardy survivors, even if there aren't any humans to care for them, they'd probably just head back to nature and start a new colony with whichever ants are left. And if the queen was dusted, they'll just appoint a new one like what happens in nature. |
| 451 | * Since the Quantum Realm's time is pretty wonky, just how ''long'' was poor Janet stranded there from her perspective to age into her early sixties? She very well felt like she could've been trapped in there for over two-hundred years or more. |
| 452 | * If one looks closely during Stark's funeral, Quill briefly looks around at the other mourners before bowing his head. Strange never told anyone that Stark's sacrifice was the only way for the Avengers to win. From Quill's perspective, Thanos getting away with the Time Stone and everyone going to Earth for a big battle against him practically happened within minutes of each other. For all Quill knows, Stark was married and had a daughter prior to their meeting. Quill must be thinking that Stark's death wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t botched the plan. [[NiceJobBreakingItHero A woman lost her husband and a daughter lost her father because of him]]. |
| 453 | * Poor Clint spent the intervening five years post-Snap on a one-man vigilante rampage, hunting down and outright ''murdering'' criminals for the "crime" of having survived the catastrophe his family didn't. How many other people who'd lost everyone they cared about had a similar breakdown, blaming the Snap's survivors merely for ''being'' survivors: for maybe, ''just maybe'', being the exact person who got to live while their loved one died? How many of those other anguished souls launched a similarly-deadly crusade to Barton's? And how many of ''those'', didn't limit their grief-maddened vendetta against the unSnapped to criminals? There may well have been a wave of spree-killings and serial murders in the Snap's wake, adding ''still more'' to the body-count. [[Series/TheFalconAndTheWinterSoldier Flag-Smashers, perhaps]]. |
| 454 | * In the film, Tony states that they (the team) are the "Avengers", not the "Pre-vengers" because they do the avenging after the fact. In other words, at least on a meta sense, in trying to pre-venge or prevent the fact (the snap) back in [[Film/AvengersInfinityWar the first skirmish with Thanos]], the Avengers were always doomed to fail. |
| 455 | ** To take it even further, [[Film/AvengersAgeOfUltron Tony's attempts to prevent this very catastrophe are what almost caused another one.]] The Avengers literally cannot do anything other than avenging the fact after it happens! This turns into FridgeBrilliance when, as it was stated somewhere in that folder, Tony becomes a Pre-venger for the alternate 2014 timeline by snapping away 2014 Thanos. |
| 456 | * Everyone being Snapped back to where they came back from is great, but what about everyone who was on a plane, or a boat? Hopefully, they got returned to their vehicle, but if not.... |
| 457 | ** [[https://www.cracked.com/article_28492_unanswered-movie-questions-that-have-answers.html Word Of God says they got back safely.]] |
| 458 | * Considering what we found out about how users of the Eye of Agamotto cannot see past their deaths from the Ancient One herself, Dr. Strange may have ruled out multiple outcomes that might have resulted in Thanos being stopped before the snap, all because he got dusted before he could witness the outcome. That means there's a possibility that one or more of those outcomes ruled out had an outcome where Thanos was stopped before he could perform the snap that didn't result in multiple deaths, including Tony's, all because Strange chose the one where he lived and witnessed the outcome. |
| 459 | * The fact Peter Parker has no memory of what occurred to him after being "dusted" and acts confused as to what's going on leads to three possibilities all to varying degrees of horror regarding the Snap's postmortem effects on dead people in this universe. |
| 460 | ** 1. Undoing the Snap resulted in LaserGuidedAmnesia on what the afterlife is like |
| 461 | ** 2. Those who fell victim to the Snap are BarredFromTheAfterlife |
| 462 | *** Or perhaps He knows whose death is final and whose isn't, and only gives the afterlife to those who are dead for good |
| 463 | *** A moot point, since we do see places like Valhalla and (earlier on) the Ancestral Plane. |
| 464 | ** 3. There is NO AFTERLIFE (for certain people anyway) in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and they undergo CessationOfExistence |
| 465 | * Tying in with the FridgeBrilliance about Doctor Strange's willingness to sacrifice chess pieces as part of his plan to end Thanos, he said to Tony, "I will ''not'' hesitate to let [Tony or Spider-Man] die." And he meant it: Spider-Man got dusted, and Tony had to die. After Doctor Strange defeated Dormammu by getting himself killed over and over in a time loop until Dormammu agreed to bargain, he clearly developed an understanding of sacrificing lives for the greater good. He was willing to kill himself over and over to keep Dormammu from harming Earth. Unlike those who tried to keep Vision alive, Strange is perfectly willing to trade lives (some temporarily, some permanently) to stop Thanos. |
| 466 | * It’s a very good thing that the Avengers came up with the Time Heist or Clint would have continued being Ronin for possibly the rest of his life. |
| 467 | * Considering how many things had to work out just right for Thanos to be defeated, as listed above (the rat being in the right place at the right time, Nat and Clint being the ones to go to Vormir, Captain Marvel arriving right on time, etc, etc), it's terrifying to think just how many universes there are where some tiny little thing didn't happen exactly the same way, and the Earth, or the whole universe, paid the price. |
| 468 | * An Infinity Gauntlet erased away half of living beings in the universe, and another one brought them back years later. Thanos and a chunk of his army got fisted by an Infinity Gauntlet, meaning that it is possible, in theory, to bring back 2014 Thanos the same way that Professor Hulk brought back half of the universe. While it's unlikely to happen the exact same way, given that the Infinity Stones were returned, who's to say some future threat can't resurrect Thanos by some other means? |
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