Avengers: Endgame

Review is spoiler-ridden (complete with a small spoiler for Dark Knight Rises).  And also high-pitched and squeaky in parts.

Friend C didn't like Infinity War, but she admitted that might have been because she felt there wasn't enough Steve Rogers.  Similarly, I'm not sure how much of my ambivalence to Endgame is because I didn't like what they did with Thor who is my favourite.

In my Infinity War review, I said that Thor was running on fumes and I hoped someone would be there to catch him when he fell.  And there wasn't, and there was much to like about how they handled it:

1) that it wasn't that Korg et al. weren't trying, it was that they just weren't capable of providing the support Thor needed, 

2) that scene where Thor snaps and chops Thanos's head off even though he knows it will accomplish nothing, because he is beyond doing anything but that

3) the scene with Frigga, because of course he's worried that he's not worthy anymore, and of course she realises that something terrible has happened, probably to her, and immediately stops him from telling her what happened and then he has to let her go to her death despite knowing that it's going to happen and !!!

So what am I not happy about with regard to Thor?  Mostly the idea that someone who is over-eating to cope with what appears to be a major case of depression (because the thing we know to be his literal worst nightmare [thank you Age of Ultron] has happened to him) is a figure of fun because "hur hur he fat now".  In defence of how they handled it, at least one person at work thought I was being too harsh on them and they weren't treating him as a figure of fun.

Secondly, how they handled his fat.  "OMG, Thor is so out of shape now, he looks like ... people who play rugby at international level".  I mean, he's solid, but his "out of shape"/fat-suit is better than most of us will look at any point.  Are they trying to give people complexes?

I think that the thing I really don't like is that the arc of Thor's story in his films is "that with great power comes great responsibility" and this film ends with him rejecting his responsibilities, and yes, it probably is the after-effects of everything, and would be justifiable, but after 3 films of character growth going one way, it feels like a huge step back.  (I know, I know, in Taika we trust.)

All that being said, the film still made me cry, for reasons I will go into later, so it still got to me.

The plot was very much an excuse plot, in the traditional style, but they did a good job of giving everyone something to do, especially if you consider the two films as one unit.

Because there's so much going on, a few people are going to get some short shrift in this review.  For instance, Hulk (where they seem to have solved the 'Bruce doesn't want to Hulk out but the audience is waiting for it' problem), and Rhodey, which upsets me because Rhodey never gets enough love.  Also Nebula, who is the unwitting cause of disaster, in a way that plays into how we first saw her and all the other terrible things Thanos has done.  (Thanos isn't getting much either but listen, my Infinity War review was mostly raving about Thanos and Josh Brolin so ...  Although he is very good in the scene at the start where Thanos doesn't care if he lives or dies because he's already won.).

With those apologies out of the way, let me start with the parts of the film I will spend too many words on.

1 - Hawkeye and Black Widow (or, in short, keyboard smash, the superhero film).  I mean, I'm absolutely convinced that Nat knew where he was all along and spent half her time making sure he was a step and a half ahead of Rhodey, because she feels she owes him for trusting her.  Then the moment they come up with a possible way of going back, Hawkeye is the first to volunteer, then he sees the kids and you're like "no, don't talk to them, don't touch them, you will break the space time continuum, and ruin your chances at happiness forever."  And then he gets time-snapped back just before he can, and it's worse, somehow it's worse.  

And then they get sent to Vormir.  And it's horrible.  Whoever would have got sent there, it would be horrible.  But with some of the others you could at least go "fine."  Thor, the position he's in, fine.  Cap - fine.  Iron Man - fine.  But not these two.  Not when the thing that has to happen to get the soul stone has to happen and they're best friends and no!

Can I reiterate that I was at "no!" the minute I realised they had been sent to Vormir.

And I did not retreat from "no!" at any point. 

It was done perfectly.  Every bit from the moment they realised that for this plan to work, one of them needed to die onwards.  The fact that both their first thoughts were not "how do I save myself", but "how do I make sure it's me that ends up at the bottom of the rock".  That they both tried to lie to the other one about that being their main thought to try to prevent the other one from being guilty and that neither of them convinced the other one for even a nano-second.

The fight, and the way it called back to Avengers Assemble, and the utter trust between them because they were fighting damn hard to make the other one be the one to survive and then that moment where Nat said, "let me make this choice" (or thereabouts).  She is a most-excellent godparent (I also have the problem that I was brought up to believe that in that situation, that's what the godparent is supposed to do, and I discovered that ... I have been socialised differently to other people).

And oh, Nat and Hawkeye and !!!!

2 - Steve Rogers - okay, so the thing I find really interesting about Steve Rogers in the film actually has very little to do with Steve Rogers, but I am fascinated by the response to his choice, and how similar it is to the reaction people had to Bruce Wayne's choice at the end of Dark Knight Rises.  The films are getting to the question of "how much can we expect from our heroes?", and where is the line between "with great power comes great responsibility" and a hero's right to some kind of life outside superheroism.  Then there's this interesting disconnect between an online generation who are supposed to be all "look after yourself, self-care is important," but not extending that to this sort of character, and obviously, this is fiction, but ooh, that's interesting to me.

Plus, it's not like he and Peggy hiding in backrooms and knitting in the altered past.  (I was reasonably sure that the film itself hinted at a lack of hiding, and I think Black Widow confirmed it.)  [Insert rant about audiences having no whatever-the-film-equivalent-of-reading-comprehension-is]

Cap was also involved in one of the scenes that made it clear that Marvel have written themselves some very nice loopholes if they need to reset, which is sensible.

I think he told Bucky what he was up to before he left, there is no other way of reading that scene.

3 - Gamorra - Talking about Vormir *and* giving themselves loopholes.  On the other hand, ack, a Gamorra who hasn't had a chance to become the Gamorra we know and love having to cope with that crew who, you know, love her and miss her and will, accidentally because they are morons, remind her that she is not the Gamorra they know and love at least 3 times a day.  In between her and the adventures of Drax and a recovering Pirate Angel Baby I am looking forward to Guardians of the Galaxy 3.

4 - Doctor Strange - okay so I have to admit I was mean about Benedict Cumberbatch's American accent as Doctor Strange, coming as it does via Cornwall.  I shouldn't have been, because while the accent still has its Truro moments, he nailed the rest of it.  Because there's this moment when you realise the reason why he was running through so many versions of time to find the least worst one in Infinity War wasn't to find one where they all lived but to find one where Thanos was defeated and the least of them died.  And it makes sense, *for him as a character* and builds on his film, because Strange really is no kill in that, even against villain's minion number 3.  (Also, it was interesting that all of the sorcerers only use magic for shields and general defence when they get spirited back at the end).

Which all leads to *that* moment where Doc Strange looks at Tony and Tony looks at him and they both know that this is the least worst way, and Tony knows that Doc Strange would not have suggested it had there been any other way, and Doc Strange also knows that Tony would rather be the dead one rather than Peter.  I'm wondering if that's the unspoken agreement, had the "remains dead" person been Thor, for instance, I'm not sure Tony would have agreed, and I'm not sure that that Doc Strange would have asked.  I think there is something about Peter's youth, and civillian status.

Of course, that all leads me to person 5 - Iron Man.  I have my usual reservations, mostly that they keep telling rather than showing how great Tony Stark is.  Like the bit with "oh, he's so brave risking his future with his wife and daughter," somehow missing that Scott Lang is willing to risk it too and he has a lovely daughter also.  Or, "he's so clever," when he's building on stuff that Hank Pym, Janet van Dyne and Bruce Banner have done.

It makes sense that it's him though, because he's the one that we started the journey with.

It wasn't actually Tony's death that made me cry, because, let's be honest, the way Tony Stark is, his story was never going to end any other way.

No, the bits that got me were that scene where all our heroes are arrayed and all the villains are arrayed on the other side, and there is a blasted plain and ... I read that comic.  Not that exact comic no, but how many of the comics I grew up with had that as their end fight.  I was keeping it together until T-Challa stepped through one of the sorcerers's portals and then I was gone.  Because the Avengers assembled and the Earth is defended and I am hopeless.

Then I tidied myself up until Happy asked Morgan what she wanted and she said a burger.  And oh Morgan, you have a superhero by your side in Happy, one of the best, superpowers be damned.

Separately, because, as much this wave of films had to finish with Iron Man, because we started with him, none of this would have been possible if the first Iron Man film hadn't been so good.  It might be hard to believe but no one believed that these films would ever grow into the all-devouring mega-phenomenon they have become.  So thanks, Jon Favreau, on behalf of me now, me a couple of years ago when I really did need the escapism, and 13 year old me who would have been bowled over to see her comics on the big screen.