Avengers: Endgame (2019)
The Marvel Cinematic Universe finally puts a cap, of sorts, to the various phases it had built up since 2008’s Iron Man, allowing for a natural conclusion to a few story arcs, while also passing the torch to a whole generation of heroes who’ve come up in the twenty-one films that preceded it, especially from where we had left off to the first half of this story in Avengers: Infinity War. Many questions resulted from that epic, leaving the state of the MCU in a shambles, prompting rampant speculation among all of the various fan circles as to how things would right itself in the dramatic conclusion.
So, does it deliver? The short answer is, “Yes.” As to the hows and whys of its success, I’ll just encourage those who’ve read this far to stray away from your screen at this point and go see the film for yourself before you learn too much, which would be quite anticlimactic. Also, if you haven’t seen the bulk of the prior twenty-one entries, you might want to see as many of those as you can too because the film will likely not make a lick of sense to anyone who isn’t initiated and completely on board to what the MCU has to offer.
**Although I don’t engage in typical spoilers, here’s your last chance to depart before I tell you a few plot details.**
Endgame starts in a world following “The Snap” delivered by Thanos that extinguished half of all life within the galaxy in an instant, without a trace, in his effort to bring what he feels is a much-needed balance and tranquility caused by overcrowding interests. After a brief intro, we fast forward five years to find a world that has had trouble moving on from the loss of their many loved ones, especially the surviving Avengers (conveniently, all the characters that comprised of the first core team are among them), who feel a particular sense of guilt for not being able to save the billions they were sworn to protect. However, a new idea develops to find a way to reverse the situation through a risky and highly improbable gambit in which the Avengers must try to traverse time and space to collect, yet again, all of the Infinity Stones and bring back all of those who vanished without losing the good things that have happened since that fateful day.
Obviously, there’s much, much more to this story than I’m letting on, but I will refrain, partially for those who didn’t heed my warning, and partially because, once the nature of the gambit is revealed to restore the galaxy to its rightful condition, I would spend several paragraphs trying to explain a plot-line that I’m not sure I have even half a grasp on.
Although the outcome of their mission will likely not completely surprise the vast majority of viewers going into the film, there are still quite a few unexpected developments along the way. Starting off with the slow and downbeat first act, there is a somber tone that sometimes feels like it’s going to envelop the entire film, muted in its humor (though it is there are choice moments, particularly in the comical (and sometimes comically tragic) ways that the surviving heroes have changed in the interim), and staving off big action set-pieces to the middle and climax of the run time.
The directors, Joe and Anthony Russo, do a remarkable job in keeping all of the moving parts together, even though, by the end, there’s so much to take in that it might be impossible for big moments to truly sink in until you recollect them in your mind after the credits start to roll. All of the check-boxes you might be expecting are there: tragedy, pathos, comedy, triumph, visual effects, satisfying fan-service moments, and one of the biggest superhero spectacles ever put to screen. Key characters get their chances to shine, with some, as you might expect, getting their last hurrah to put closure to the fact that, unlike their print counterparts, the actors that portray these characters can’t do it forever, no matter how much the technology allows them to de-age them decades.
Speaking of de-aging, the only significant detraction to my own experience in watching Avengers: Endgame is the copious amounts of “uncanny valley” moments involved in the less than seamless effort to either make a character appear much younger, different (as in the case of Hulk), or to try to convince us that all of the actors they’ve put together on the screen at once are actually there without the generous help of some very powerful computer processing to make it happen.
Some may make something of the run time, but, given all of the bases that the Russos have to cover to wrap things up and put the finest ribbon on it, it really doesn’t feel stretched out beyond rationale. There is more breathing room to let moments sink in, and while that may result in a film that is a bit heavy to make for a quick repeat viewing when someone is in the mood for adrenaline-pumping MCU action, there’s a beauty in letting things play out with beats that don’t always feel in a rush to get to the next plot point. Marvel knows that it’s for the characters we’ve come to know and enjoy that we’ll be putting our butts in the seats, and they’re there to provide us with all of the feels we expect and demand after over sixty hours of total time spent in this cinematic universe.
The fact that they manage to do this while revisiting some of the scenes, Back to the Future Part II-style, within those many hours is perhaps the greatest trick of all, reminding us of how far things have come, and how much we enjoyed all of those prior entries that built up our anticipation so well. While I tend to prefer the simpler pleasures of Marvel’s solo efforts (especially ones that still feel like standalone films), knowing that this a movie on a massive scale that we couldn’t have even imagined possible when contemplating the humble origins of this series, it’s both exhilarating and a big relief to finally close the chapter on over a decade of characters and their stories before we can start refreshed for new adventures to explore with those we will, if Marvel continues to play its cards right, fall in love with just as much as the ones that came before.
Qwipster’s rating: A
MPAA Rated: PG-13 for sequences of sci-fi violence and action, and some language
Running Time: 181 min.
Cast: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Paul Rudd, Don Cheadle, Karen Gillan, Bradley Cooper, Josh Brolin, Gwyneth Paltrow, Brie Larson, Zoe Saldana, Tessa Thompson, Tom Holland, Tilda Swinton, Elizabeth Olsen, Rene Russo, Chadwick Boseman, Chris Pratt
Small roles and cameos: Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Benedict Cumberbatch, Evangeline Lilly, Robert Redford, John Slattery, Tom Hiddleston, Danai Gurira, Jon Favreau, Benedict Wong, Pom Klementieff, Letitia Wright, Dave Bautista, Hayley Atwell, Natalie Portman, Taika Waititi, Hiroyuki Sanada, Angela Bassett, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Douglas, Michelle Pfeiffer, William Hurt, Cobie Smulders, Winston Duke, Linda Cardellini, Frank Grillo, Vin Diesel, Ken Jeong, Stan Lee
Director: Anthony Russo, Joe Russo
Screenplay: Christopher Markus, Stephen McFeely