Avengers Endgame spoiler thread

Unfortunately, we know that due to Agents of SHIELD, that's not how it works. In Agents of SHIELD Season 5, the agents are forced to travel into the future, where the Earth was destroyed, and then go back to the past in order to prevent that destruction (and someone from the future, Deke, actually goes with them). If what you are saying is true, then they wouldn't have been able to change the past (their present) at all and the world is doomed no matter what, but they do prevent the world's destruction and, despite what Deke himself thinks, Deke isn't erased, indicating that they created a new timeline where the Earth isn't destroyed, while Deke himself comes from the other "Earth was destroyed" timeline.

In Season 6, they are currently facing the consequences of their actions, but everything so far indicates that they changed the past/present, so that's entirely possible.

I go with the small changes vs big changes theory.

So, you remove the infinity stone: Big change happens, split timeline which will be doomed because of it.

You bring it back exactly were you took it: Now it is a small change and the timeline rejoins the original timeline again.

You f... up along the way and made more changes then just removing a stone for a few seconds: Now it is a split timeline, but at least it isn't doomed because you nicely brought the stone back.

And regarding the "doomed? Really?" question: Take the infinity stones out, and neither Quicksilver nor Scarlet Witch or Captain Marvel have any powers, and Vision never exists either. Doctor Strange can never use the timestone to fight dormamu. Peter Quill can never use the power stone to destroy Ronan. As much damage as they do, they have been also quite useful once in a while.

The fridging stone can f... off though.

Edited by Swanpride on May 26th 2019 at 10:59:51 AM

Also, the Ancient One was clearly talking about the Time Stone's use as a weapon, especially against Dormammu. She probably could see far enough into the future to know that Strange would need the Time Stone to defeat Dormammu, so didn't want to give it up.

Re: Agents of Shield:

They're not using the Quantum Realm, though, right? Different methods of time travel can have different rules about how they work.

Like, in the comics, most methods of time travel follow the "you just create a split timeline" model, but there's a notable exception for Doctor Doom's time machine, which really does let you change the past of your own world.

If they're going to involve Kang the Conqueror and Iron Lad then they may have to use different time travel rules since the two's stories often rely on Nate and Kang's enmity causing changes to their history/future.

Edited by Tuckerscreator on May 26th 2019 at 11:39:00 AM

They aren't using technology, but that doesn't mean that they are not travelling through the Quantum realm. Honestly, the characters didn't exactly have time to figure out the minutia.

Why bother returning the stones then?

As described in the movie, removing the Stones from the universe will create an alternate timeline, but as long as they're all in place, that won't happen.

Because otherwise you doom the timeline from which they were taken. It is one thing to create an alternate timeline, it is another thing to kill everyone in it in order to rescue your own reality.

You missed the point. I'm asking why return the stones when the timeline resets itself to back to what it originally was, namely the stones having never left.

Okay, for some reason I keep rejecting this explanation yet I can't understand why. I tried picking logical holes in it but can't seem to find any, yet I still feel physically annoyed whenever I try reading it.

Something never clarified by the movie is exactly how they travel to those different time periods. What Scott initially describes is time dilation, a real thing, but how they make the jump to reverse time travel and the alternate universes is not elaborated on. Based on the logic of the movie it seems that the act of traveling to the time period is what creates the new universe, rather than all being the same universe everyone is traveling to (2012, 2013, 2014, 1970), otherwise snagging the tesseract in the 70's would have interfered with their activities in 2012.

Of course, The Ancient One's talk of dooming their universe if it's not returned doesn't really hold up if they can travel to any place any time, meaning if it is one alternate universe it exists independent of time and space to the main universe and it doesn't necessarily continue on anyway once they leave (they could return the stones a thousand years later in the main universe, since they are using time travel to a fixed point in time). If they create a new universe in the act of time traveling, then it would be functionally impossible to return the stones because time traveling creates a new universe (similar to the Back to the Future II dilemma, they can't change what happened in the relative future because the timeline had been changed so they have to intercept Biff in the past).

Time travel is already a wonky thing to figure out, but add in alternate universes and it become nigh impossible to be consistent.

The way the Ancient One describes it, there is no natural reset. The alternate doomed timeline is made, and continues to exist parallel to one’s own unless you restore what you initially changed. That’s why Cap had to return the Stones and Mjolnir.

Changing the past doesn’t change the time traveler’s future, but it does change everyone else’s in that past.

Edited by Tuckerscreator on May 27th 2019 at 12:40:53 PM

I explained it to you. You mess with time, the timeline changes, maybe to the better, maybe to the worst, and if you remove the infinity stones, it will doom earth in the timeline you went to. The only solution is to bring the stone back, so that the timeline will reset itself to what it was beforehand or at least to a future in which earth has a fighting chance.

I mean, for all we know the split timelines they created are all BETTER than the one they life. Especially the one which doesn't have Thanos anymore.

Your explanation isn't what I was confused about. This is.

Raven Wilder states that in his theory, that by simply leaving the timeline they entered, the timeline resets itself, never mentioning that they return the stone first and specifically said Avengers, not Steve only, thus implying that returning the stones weren't necessary.

They were sent into the future using a Monolith, but we have no idea how the Monoliths work, only that they are somehow Kree. One Monolith sent people across space to a planet called Maveth, one Monolith sent people through time, and when three Monoliths were blown up, they created a rip in space to a fear dimension. So...not sure how any of that works, actually.

As the Ancient One describes it, removing the Infinity Stones is the exception to how the time travel rules normally work. If you remove an Infinity Stone from the universe, it creates a branching timeline, but as long as all the Infinity Stones remain present, no alternate timelines will be created.

The problem is, if the act of traveling back in time always creates an alternate universe, then it's impossible for Steve to return the Infinity Stones to the universes they were taken from. When he uses the Pym particles to travel to those alternate universes, he'd actually be creating whole new alternate universes. Those new universes would get the Stones back, but the original alternate universes they created would still be without them.

Edited by RavenWilder on May 27th 2019 at 1:14:21 AM

Nobody is saying that the "act of traveling back in time" creates an alternate timeline. They are saying changing the past creates an alternate timeline. And yes, Steve can definitely return the Stones, almost immediately after they were taken. Even to timelines that were changed, like Loki's escape timeline or Thanos's disappearance timeline.

There is one thing that doesn't work with your theory of time (the "everything gets wiped clean" theory): 2014 Gamora. 2014 Gamora is still in the regular universe after everything is over, including after Steve puts back the Stones. In your theory, if the Stones were returned, then there wouldn't be any alternate timelines...except we still have 2014 Gamora in this timeline, so yes, there are alternate timelines. 2014 Gamora didn't suddenly transport back to her own timeline and forget everything, she's still in this 2024 timeline.

Edited by alliterator on May 27th 2019 at 1:17:44 AM

Isn't the simple act of being in the past changing the past?

And, no, under my theory, everything in the past gets changed back as soon as the time travelers leave. Once 2014 Gamora is in the future, she's no longer part of the past, and so is unaffected.

That depends on what you mean by "change." Is change simply anything that happens, i.e. disturbing the very air itself? Or is it changing actual events, like by allowing Loki to escape via the Tesseract.

I mean, I think it's pretty clear that it's the second one. Going back to the past and doing nothing isn't really "changing" anything.

That means that there are suddenly two 2014 Gamoras, which makes no sense. Again: your concept of time travel is basically that "the universe has a reset button" which basically means that time travel is useless. If nothing you do could affect anything, you could travel back in time and kill millions of people and then, merely by traveling back to the present, erase all of that. It's silly.

The real reason your time travel theory doesn't work is that it prevents all narrative tension and also prevents any future time travel stories from working at all.

Sure, but it is possible that if you set things right so that what happens in the timestream is identical with what happened in your timestream again, the realities might join together as one again. You know, to keep things clean.

Edited by Swanpride on May 27th 2019 at 1:31:08 AM

That might mean then that 2014 Nebula would’ve been unable to summon 2014 Thanos from her timeline. That timeline didn’t reset upon the Avengers returning. It remained an accessible alternate future.

The time GPS Tony created is how Steve can return to the exact timelines to return the stones

How does it work? Tony made it, that’s how it works

Forever liveblogging the Avengers

Yes. Time travelers change the past when (and, technically speaking, only when, except for with San Dimas Time) they arrive in the the new time period: the mere fact that one exists where they hadn’t before is already a change to the timestream, regardless.

It is thus at that point where any temporal affects should trigger: in this case, the creation of a new time line. But in, say, a system of time travel where there’s just one timeline that can be changed, to an outside observer the entire timestream should change from the moment the time traveler arrives.

Edited by KnownUnknown on May 27th 2019 at 8:57:14 AM

"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.

Tuckerscreator posted this dialogue snippet last page, which has gone completely overlooked in this conversation.

• The Infinity Gems create the flow of time. They create time.
• Remove a Gem and the flow splits. This is what creates a timeline branch: the very special MacGuffin that creates time has been removed, making time go wonky.
• Returning the Gem at the instant it was taken erases the timeline branch. Erases it. It doesn't make the timeline branch better or in some way prevent doom to that branch. It erases the branch. The timeline never branched because the Gem is returned.

This dialogue's pretty clear about how this works. The only thing that creates timeline branches is the removal of an Infinity Gem, and the return of that Gem prevents that timeline branch from ever being made. Because the Gems were returned, there are no alternate timelines.

That is how time travel works per Avengers: Endgame.

Edited by TobiasDrake on May 27th 2019 at 10:53:10 AM

My Tumblr. Currently liveblogging Haruhi Suzumiya and revisiting Danganronpa V3.

That assumes that small changes (like, disturbing the air itself) would split the timeline, but that's not how it works. Hell, the Hulk says that when they return the Stones to their original position, the timelines should merge again into one and the Ancient One doesn't disagree. Which means that the mere act of traveling back in time doesn't change things. It's only, you know, big changes that split the timeline.

Except it's not just removing an Infinity Stone that splits the timeline, that's just the example she uses. Otherwise, again, 2014 Gamora would disappear alongside the rest of 2014 Thanos and his army, because they returned the Stone. If you say "but she's in the present," that shouldn't matter — the timeline should reset itself. The entire ending battle should be completely erased and Tony should still be alive, because Thanos never would have gone into the future.

The only way the ending battle and 2014 Gamora works is that they come from a split timeline now.

Edited by alliterator on May 27th 2019 at 9:56:17 AM