Tuesday, April 30, 2019

Avengers: Endgame Movie Review

Avengers: Endgame (2019)
Rent Avengers: Endgame on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely (written by), Stan Lee and Jack Kirby (based on the Marvel comics by). Jim Starlin (comic book)
Directed by: Anthony Russo, Joe Russo
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsowrth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Don Cheadle, Paul Rudd, Benedict Cumberbatch, Chadwick Boseman, Brie Larson, Tom Holland, Karen Gillan, Zoe Saldana, Evangeline Lilly, Tessa Thompson, Rene Russo, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Tom Hiddleston, Danai Gurira, Benedict Wong, Pm Klementieff, Dave Bautista, Letitia Wright, John Slattery, Tilda Swinton, Jon Favreau, Hayley Atwell, Natalie Portman, Marisa Tomei, Taika Waititi, Angela Bassett, Michael Douglas, Michelle Pfeiifer, William Hurt, Cobie Smulders, Linda Cardellini, Frank Grillo, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Gwyneth Paltrow, Robert Redford, Josh Brolin, Chriss Pratt, Samuel L. Jackson
Rated: PG-13
Watch the trailer

Plot
After the devastating events of Avengers: Infinity War (2018), the universe is in ruins. With the help of remaining allies, the Avengers assemble once more in order to undo Thanos's actions and restore order to the universe.

Verdict
This is the culmination of a lot of stories, years, and movies. It's hard not to gauge this with and against the twenty one movie franchise that led to this moment. That itself is a feat. This movie is a full three hours, though it never felt slow. If any part dragged it would be the penultimate battle which features nearly all the Marvel characters. That battle is a lot of spectacle, but this movie managed to put a lot of characters on the screen and give them meaningful roles. Before that battle this had scenes that were emotional and funny, scenes that tied the entire franchise together. The fact that I wondered if the entire franchise was planning this moment all along is an accomplishment. While I like Infinity War more due to the high stakes, this movie isn't without severe consequences.
Watch it.

Review
The long awaited sequel to Infinity War (read my review) is here. What I liked about Infinity War were the very real stakes. Half of all the super heroes were gone. How would this movie handle that? Would it just revert it with another snap or would these consequences linger? The question of what happens next compelled to watch this, and I admit I was excited.

This nears the end of Phase 3 for Marvel movies, with  Spider-Man: Far from Home being the final movie before Phase 4 begins.

Phase 1 began with Iron Man (2008), culminating with Marvel's The Avengers (2012). Phase 3 began with Captain America: Civil War (2016).
Back in Infinity War, Thanos snapped half the world into dust.
It's a movie you have to watch almost by the very nature of what it is. A culmination of the Thanos plot arc and twenty one Marvel movies. It made over $350 million domestically and $1 billion after just the first weekend. The Marvel movies are nowhere close to stopping. You don't need to watch twenty-one films to prep for this, but you need to have seen Infinity War.
Captain America
I won't spoil anything. I will clearly and obviously separate my general review from the spoiler section at the end of this post. While I will reference specific scenes from the movie, they won't reveal anything that betrays the story, and I will be completely omitting a lot of plot points.

This opens with a quick reminder that Thanos disappeared half of every living creature in the universe. The world is obviously in disarray and the remaining Avengers are looking for Thanos. Suffice to say what follows is surprising, but the question still remains how do they undo the Thanos snap?
War Machine & Hawkeye
They've got a crazy plan, what other kind of plan could topple Thanos? We get some recruitment scenes to assemble a team for this plan. There's a lot of humor to this with Thor and Rocket being a lot of the comic relief. This really continues the almost silly Thor we saw in Ragnarok (read my review), and I like that. We have enough noble, stoic super heroes.

Endgame revisits the prior movies in a way. I don't know if this was planned from the start or it's just sleight of hand. I don't know the other movies will enough to tell, but it works for the story and to tie the franchise together.

Plans never go as expected and this is no exception, but we and the characters get a brief moment of victory, but it's completely blown up. This movie has a huge battle. My issue with these big battles in Marvel movies is that you know this is a franchise and the main characters have to be back for more movies. You assume, and rightly so the bad guys lose. That's why I liked Infinity War, the bad guy accomplished his goal.
Black Widow, Nebula, Iron Man
This battle veers to slightly indulgent. The movie never drags, but if any part does it's the battle as it feels like it takes up the second half of the movie. It's a slower tempo than the first half. There's a fair amount of saved at the last second and we see nearly the full roster of Marvel movie characters. There was a lot of clapping in my theater each time a character first appeared on screen as backup.
They all contribute in meaningful ways, though their unique abilities weren't as well utilized as in Captain America: Civil War (read my review).

This movie certainly has some consequences that makes me intrigued by what the future holds for the Marvel universe. Marvel can do some really cool things that would continue to extend the universe.

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