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Avengers: Endgame, 2019
In the aftermath of the events of Infinity War, the surviving members are trying to cope with their losses. Shocked when Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) reappears from the Quantum Realm, the Avengers realize that they might have a chance to get their loved ones back after all.
Okay, fine. FINE! I've used the words "exhausted" and "fatigue" to describe my feelings about most of the Marvel movies I've seen in the last 5 years or so. After enjoying most of the movies, I hit a turning point where the excessive runtimes and just overall sameness of the films had worn down my enjoyment. But to give full credit where credit is due, I enjoyed this movie quite a bit and thought it was a fitting bookend to what had come before it.
I was not optimistic when I was initially eyeing up the 3 hour run time. But I think that why the film largely worked for me is that it divides its story and its cast in clever ways. The first half of the movie is overtly styled as a heist. The Avengers must jump back to different points in their own pasts to capture the infinity stones before Thanos can get his hands on them. This works well on two levels. On the first level, it's just fun to see the way that the characters interact with their earlier selves and the events from their past. The second reason it works well is because it divides up the team into smaller groups so that we have more time to spend with each of them. This format allows for more small moments of reflection and personal interaction, such as when Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) quest to a distant realm where they must parse out their feelings on destiny and duty and self-worth and redemption.
The film is also very short on the kind of bloated, "what is even happening?!" CGI-laden action that I've come to find borderline insufferable. Even the final showdown, which looked like it was headed that way, managed to pull itself more into small moments and personal stakes. The action is highly centered on character decisions, and most of those are centered on difficult choices.
My favorite subplot in the whole Marvel universe up to this point has been the fractured-then-repaired friendship between Bucky (Sebastian Stan) and Captain America (Chris Evans). But I thought that the overall theme of this film---loss in its many forms--was really well done. Every character, at some point in the film, is forced to look at the losses they have suffered. For some of them, like Hawkeye, those losses can in theory be reversed. For Captain America, the loss is the love he left in the past. For Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and later the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), the loss is one that is irreversible. For Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr), the loss is what he risks if he ventures back into battle. And I really felt like it just works. It is coherent in a way that I've not really felt in one of these films in a long time, and it's impressive because of the way that it encompasses such a sprawl of characters.
Generally speaking, I felt like the choices made in this film (a handful of eye-rolling "comic relief" moments notwithstanding) were god ones. Very little wasted time. And just the right amount of sentiment for its characters. I really liked the touch of the actors' signatures over the roles that they played.
Avengers: Endgame, 2019
In the aftermath of the events of Infinity War, the surviving members are trying to cope with their losses. Shocked when Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) reappears from the Quantum Realm, the Avengers realize that they might have a chance to get their loved ones back after all.
Okay, fine. FINE! I've used the words "exhausted" and "fatigue" to describe my feelings about most of the Marvel movies I've seen in the last 5 years or so. After enjoying most of the movies, I hit a turning point where the excessive runtimes and just overall sameness of the films had worn down my enjoyment. But to give full credit where credit is due, I enjoyed this movie quite a bit and thought it was a fitting bookend to what had come before it.
I was not optimistic when I was initially eyeing up the 3 hour run time. But I think that why the film largely worked for me is that it divides its story and its cast in clever ways. The first half of the movie is overtly styled as a heist. The Avengers must jump back to different points in their own pasts to capture the infinity stones before Thanos can get his hands on them. This works well on two levels. On the first level, it's just fun to see the way that the characters interact with their earlier selves and the events from their past. The second reason it works well is because it divides up the team into smaller groups so that we have more time to spend with each of them. This format allows for more small moments of reflection and personal interaction, such as when Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) quest to a distant realm where they must parse out their feelings on destiny and duty and self-worth and redemption.
The film is also very short on the kind of bloated, "what is even happening?!" CGI-laden action that I've come to find borderline insufferable. Even the final showdown, which looked like it was headed that way, managed to pull itself more into small moments and personal stakes. The action is highly centered on character decisions, and most of those are centered on difficult choices.
My favorite subplot in the whole Marvel universe up to this point has been the fractured-then-repaired friendship between Bucky (Sebastian Stan) and Captain America (Chris Evans). But I thought that the overall theme of this film---loss in its many forms--was really well done. Every character, at some point in the film, is forced to look at the losses they have suffered. For some of them, like Hawkeye, those losses can in theory be reversed. For Captain America, the loss is the love he left in the past. For Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and later the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), the loss is one that is irreversible. For Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr), the loss is what he risks if he ventures back into battle. And I really felt like it just works. It is coherent in a way that I've not really felt in one of these films in a long time, and it's impressive because of the way that it encompasses such a sprawl of characters.
Generally speaking, I felt like the choices made in this film (a handful of eye-rolling "comic relief" moments notwithstanding) were god ones. Very little wasted time. And just the right amount of sentiment for its characters. I really liked the touch of the actors' signatures over the roles that they played.