Avengers: Infinity War (massive spoilers!)

[Eternal_Freedom]

I was expecting a decent Marvel film that pulled in a lot of threads and was at least entertaining for the length, and this definitely delivered. I can't comment about the differences between film/comic because I never read the comics.

So as someone who sees this as the culmination of the MCU so far...I think it did a damn fine job.

[Vendetta]

The film was always going to be different to the comic.

In the comic the earth heroes are mostly there to add bigness to a story which is mostly about Thanos, the Silver Surfer, Nebula, and Adam Warlock.

(At a guess, Gamora is going to play Warlock's part in part 2)

[Lost Soal]

I already mentioned the possibility that he's a telepath (based on his voiceover to his fake death in Knowhere), but then he couldn't just pluck the information he wanted from the minds of Loki and Gamora either.

That wasn't telepathy, that was just him speaking from outside the illusion.

Really good film overall, I'm guessing a large chunk of the second film has already been filmed since while I did my best to avoid all info on this one scene I did see often was Hulk charging into battle with the rest, which obviously never happened.

[Vendetta]

All the second film is done. The Hulk being in the battle in Wakanda in the trailer is what we might call "a lie", presumably to disguise the direction they've gone in the story with him.

[PREDATOR490]

Just seen it and I will be seeing it again as part of another group which I am happy to do. This was a really good film and performed way above expectations given how much weight it had to carry.

I did feel like it was struggling a little bit with the amount of characters so they split off and disappear routinely at different points. However, that was mostly unnoticed.

The movie has some serious issues with breaking SoD with the scale of the conflict and consequences vs. the actual conflict and performance.

The fighting on Earth in Wakanda is awful. This was poorly thought out as you have an interstellar army resorting to sending melee monsters to fight against Wakanda infantry with spears. Even Asgard had turrets and aerial fighters but somehow the absurdly advanced Wakanda that would fit in with Star Wars level technology, decided that spears and personal energy shields are all they get. The Earth fighting in Wakanda was a mess and I feel like it was essentially just a gratuitous mess so they could get in more of the Avengers cast to do something easy with a big showy battle.

Story Wise - This film has a lot of convenience for the "rule of cool" and things happening that REALLY should not.

Overall, I feel like Thor and Hulk seriously under performed and the story got really fuzzy on benching them.

This film generated a serious WTF from me when Thor can survive being in space without protection then doubles down by having him manually restart a forge surrounding a Neutron Star followed by triple down with tanking the blast from that Neutron Star. That is some serious character wank bullshit on a whole different level.

The other issue that I feel was VERY poorly forgotten was that Strange is a fucking beast with his abilities but he leaves Earth with Stark and Co.
Doctor Strange is not the only wizard on the planet, the OTHER Sanctum Guardian is left behind and should / would have been showing up to help defend Wakanda but he basically fucks off. A single wizard would massively shift the fight in Wakanda but this just seems to be completely forgotten or ignored.
This is the same guy that was part of the exposition dump of the Infinity Stones / Thanos being a super bad that will fuck the universe and they need to rally everything to stop it.
Dumping Banner in New York with a "Strange is gone so I need to defend the Sanctum, bye" was really forced and he is never seen again.
Good job defending Earth or your Sanctum while a massive fight happens in Wakanda to protect on of those Infinity Stones which will exterminate life in the universe.

[Shannon]

The fighting on Earth in Wakanda is awful. This was poorly thought out as you have an interstellar army resorting to sending melee monsters to fight against Wakanda infantry with spears. Even Asgard had turrets and aerial fighters but somehow the absurdly advanced Wakanda that would fit in with Star Wars level technology, decided that spears and personal energy shields are all they get. The Earth fighting in Wakanda was a mess and I feel like it was essentially just a gratuitous mess so they could get in more of the Avengers cast to do something easy with a big showy battle.

Yeah, like I said in my earlier post, the Wakandan shield can handle massive objects falling from orbit but not, apparently, a massed suicidal charge. Thanos's minions weren't worried about wasting lives pushing through but at the same time they had the big war-wheel things that could've just pushed on through and broken the Wakandan lines.

Until T'Challa opened that section of the shield, whatever made it through was being picked off at some distance by Wakandan ranged weapons, so there should not have been a problem redeploying to cover the bottleneck and using their shield wall to blunt the creatures' advance while setting up a killing zone. I'm trying hard not to call this massive incompetence on T'Challa's part (and hell, Cap and Rhodey are trained soldiers) only because of their desperate need to keep the alien force concentrated on that area, but it's hard to excuse such a needless loss of life on the part of the defenders.

[JI_Joe84]

Just got in from seeing it myself. I kind of started to snooze when they wanted to open the shield "so we don't get flanked" after seeing the ship or whatever it was drop into the shield and bounce I thought how is this supposed to lead into a massive battle? They have a impenetrable wall! Ohhh wait sudden incompetence, yeah that's how. Yeahh I'm out at that point.
Spidies death really got to me, others not so much.

[Vendetta]

Until T'Challa opened that section of the shield, whatever made it through was being picked off at some distance by Wakandan ranged weapons, so there should not have been a problem redeploying to cover the bottleneck and using their shield wall to blunt the creatures' advance while setting up a killing zone. I'm trying hard not to call this massive incompetence on T'Challa's part (and hell, Cap and Rhodey are trained soldiers) only because of their desperate need to keep the alien force concentrated on that area, but it's hard to excuse such a needless loss of life on the part of the defenders.

"Everyone run at each other in a disorganised mess" is Hollywood battle tactic #3.

Even if we assume they needed to open the shield because maybe it can't be at full strength everywhere and they would actually have risked being enveloped it would have been better for the Wakandans to keep their formations and march properly towards the enemy. There's enough space inside the shield that they couldn't effectively kettle the beasts as they came in without advancing and could be enveloped again, so once they did open up they needed to close around the breach but it should have been an organised march, you give up all the advantage of shields and spears if you're a disorganised rabble.

Like they show discipline and formation until the exact moment it would have been most beneficial, then "I dunno everyone sprint this way I guess".

[Steve]

I think the issue is that disciplined combat tactics, to Hollywood directors, rarely seem as "cool", since they usually reduce the arena for badass fights with cool moves. The Bucky-Rocket spin attack for instance.

[Vendetta]

All they need to do is wait to do that stuff until after the formation gets scattered somehow (like by the war wheels). All the time they show "disorganised running" could be "beasties crashing into a shieldwall" which is higher tension because it shows the normies in the battle in peril but hanging on.

[NecronLord]

Yeah, like I said in my earlier post, the Wakandan shield can handle massive objects falling from orbit but not, apparently, a massed suicidal charge. Thanos's minions weren't worried about wasting lives pushing through but at the same time they had the big war-wheel things that could've just pushed on through and broken the Wakandan lines.

The Black Order needed to get in immediately to get the stone before it was destroyed. They sent the wheel-tanks in as soon as they could be disembarked, but those could not be deployed as quick as opening the pens for the Outriders and letting them run out.

Same reason the allies sent in paratroopers long before they sent in armour on D-Day.

As to the shield being good against things dropped from orbit but not as resistant against ground attack, that's a common enough trope. You have seen it before and not questioned it.

Until T'Challa opened that section of the shield, whatever made it through was being picked off at some distance by Wakandan ranged weapons, so there should not have been a problem redeploying to cover the bottleneck and using their shield wall to blunt the creatures' advance while setting up a killing zone. I'm trying hard not to call this massive incompetence on T'Challa's part (and hell, Cap and Rhodey are trained soldiers) only because of their desperate need to keep the alien force concentrated on that area, but it's hard to excuse such a needless loss of life on the part of the defenders.

To be fair to them, the Wakandans have never had to fight an equivalent technology force before; they haven't done war since before the advent of artillery as a major force. We in the real world did a lot of bleeding before we figured out close-drill and infantry charge are both obsolete. Of course, a few mortars from the Black Order would have absolutely wrecked them and left thousands of wakandans dying from shrapnel, but combined arms isn't something that movies do well.

[Gaidin]

To be fair to them, the Wakandans have never had to fight an equivalent technology force before; they haven't done war since before the advent of artillery as a major force. We in the real world did a lot of bleeding before we figured out close-drill and infantry charge are both obsolete. Of course, a few mortars from the Black Order would have absolutely wrecked them and left thousands of wakandans dying from shrapnel, but combined arms isn't something that movies do well.

Here's my question on that. They opened a small portion of the shield because they noticed the force starting to flank in numbers and encourage them to come through where they were. Now, we can observe the Wakandans also broke rank and say that was a bad idea of course. The interesting thing here is it's hard to fight in ranks when the thing right next to you is Veronica or Black Panther or Captain America which have their own hilariously unique fighting styles and they're all three holding a spot down near the hole in the shield. But that's neither here nor there.

But with just a small portion of the shield open how useful would artillery be without the bad guys dropping it on their own force? Is it just me would they only be able to drop it on the shield until it fell overall and then they would themselves be able to charge and then the ranks would be useful?

[NecronLord]

Outriders are not people, they don't have morale. Witness how they charge THOR GOD OF THUNDER and don't slow down or reconsider that life choice. They have blood to spare. Send in the Outriders *and* drop artillery on them. There are always more Outriders.

Google suggests that Outriders are usually terminated after a successful battle. They're not soldiers, they're bullets.

[KraytKing]

I generally liked it, but there were a lot of moments where suspension of disbelief was seriously challenged. Like Iron Man's new suit. "It's nano-tech" is such a cheap way to just say "it can do whatever we want now." I always liked his first suit most, back when the mass before and after he put it on seemed to line up.

The Wakanda battle was pretty disappointing. I was also bothered by the Wakandans breaking ranks. The entire time, I was just imagining how effective a NATO taskforce with a couple dozen tanks and some proper artillery would have been. In fact, that would have been about perfect: the tanks and artillery is chewing them up, until the wheel things come, at which point all the infantrymen next to the tanks are in a huge melee, giving all the superheroes their chance. And the tanks are still firing away the whole time.

I was quite surprised by the ending. I honestly expected not a single character to die. I was finally able to lay my disillusionment with Hollywood aside, at least until this morning, when I remembered they could resurrect characters at will.

[Q99]

Another by-the-numbers superhero movie with a bog standard ending that ends just like every other superhero movie: With half the universe dead.

Random thoughts

4. Why didn't strange simply teleport near the dark dimension and let Thanos and Dormammu duke it out? Can Thanos even teleport between dimensions?

Probably because Strange tried it in one of the 14 million scenarios he examined. He triaged the situation and knew they had to give Thanos the stones (and that Stark had to live, I'm guessing) for whatever long game he's playing to work.

Besides, at that point Thanos had enough of the gems where even Dormamu would be given pause. And with the Reality/Space stones I'm guessing he could have returned if he wanted.

I DO kind of like how Thanos couldn't really use the gems at will unless he really gave an effort, which almost led to him losing on Titan. His subconscious thanatos/self-loathing at work I'm guessing.

That's why I think he couldn't effortlessly harness the stones' power until he had all of them - deep down he didn't want to. ESPECIALLY not after getting the Soul Stone.

I think it's not that so much as, well, they're tools to be *used*, not passive power buffs (save maybe the Power).

[Shannon]

The Black Order needed to get in immediately to get the stone before it was destroyed. They sent the wheel-tanks in as soon as they could be disembarked, but those could not be deployed as quick as opening the pens for the Outriders and letting them run out.

Same reason the allies sent in paratroopers long before they sent in armour on D-Day.

Fair point. I had forgotten about the need to capture the stone before it was destroyed.

As to the shield being good against things dropped from orbit but not as resistant against ground attack, that's a common enough trope. You have seen it before and not questioned it.

A better analogy might be the Gungan shield in TPM (although the Gungans held their formation and used their personal shields). It withstood a tank barrage but battle droids could cross through it at ground level. I wonder if there is something about shield mechanics that makes them weaker when interacting with the ground? The shield was also light and sound permeable at that point (witness the conversation between the Children of Thanos and the Avengers - yes, I know the story required it but I'm talking in-universe). Still, the shield was terribly damaging to whatever tried to force its way through.

[Kane Starkiller]

I can't say I didn't have fun watching the movie and Thanos is certainly a more interesting character than I expected a giant purple space alien to be but these Marvel movies seem to be splitting at the seams as far as sense of scale and internal logic go.

One second Thanos is trading punches with Iron Man and Spider Man, the next moment he is ripping apart a planet hundreds of thousands of kilometers away just so he can throw chunks of it at Iron Man who is right in front of him, the chunks miss and it's back to fistfighting...Wha..? Why doesn't he simply disintegrate all of them?

Vision is supposed to be the culmination of Ultron's quest to create a perfect host body for himself and it was absolutely imperative he doesn't succeed in transferring his consciousnes to it. Here he gets stabbed in the back alley by some no name dipshit and then Black Widow and Captain America have to jump in and literally fistfight the assailants.

Didn't Thor evolve beyond the need for weapons in his last movie? Wasn't that the big lesson? That he doesn't need a weapon because he himself is the god of thunder and not the god of hammers? But now he is apparently a god of big axes. As an aside if that axe ended up harmlessly bouncing off of Tanos' chest I wouldn't be the least bit surprised since at that point I had no idea who is supposed to be more powerful than whom nor what the hell the rules of the movie were.

How many times have we seen a giant battle scene involving thousands of disposable grunts in these Avenger movies? This movie was 10 years in the making. For the love of God can't you come up with something more original and memorable in the final battle.

[Shannon]

I think it's not that so much as, well, they're tools to be *used*, not passive power buffs (save maybe the Power).

The power stone appears to passively buff the wielder (as it did with Ronan) but can also be utilised more actively, both as Thanos did and as the Celestials did, as shown by the Collector.

[Shannon]

Vision is supposed to be the culmination of Ultron's quest to create a perfect host body for himself and it was absolutely imperative he doesn't succeed in transferring his consciousnes to it. Here he gets stabbed in the back alley by some no name dipshit and then Black Widow and Captain America have to jump in and literally fistfight the assailants.

After he was stabbed, Vision told Wanda that the "no-name dipshit's" weapon prevented him from phasing, thereby doing massive internal damage that he never recovered from.

[Gaidin]

Didn't Thor evolve beyond the need for weapons in his last movie? Wasn't that the big lesson? That he doesn't need a weapon because he himself is the god of thunder and not the god of hammers? But now he is apparently a god of big axes. As an aside if that axe ended up harmlessly bouncing off of Tanos' chest I wouldn't be the least bit surprised since at that point I had no idea who is supposed to be more powerful than whom nor what the hell the rules of the movie were.

Thor doesn't need weapons to channel Thunder. The weapon is literally something that even with the six infinity stones could still, as a weapon, be used against Thanos. He was severely wounded by Thor, and it was only after he activated the gauntlet that he was healed.

[Knife]

It was a good movie, though I'm a bit miffed. I would have preferred knowing it was half a movie, or at least half a story, before going in.

[Rogue 9]

It was a good movie, though I'm a bit miffed. I would have preferred knowing it was half a movie, or at least half a story, before going in.

It's been promoted as Part 1 for at least a year at this point.

[Knife]

It was a good movie, though I'm a bit miffed. I would have preferred knowing it was half a movie, or at least half a story, before going in.

It's been promoted as Part 1 for at least a year at this point.

Hmmm, never heard that.

[CaptainChewbacca]

It was a good movie on its own and a good first part of a story. A true 'Empire Strikes Back' moment.

[Gaidin]

I think the two key Infinity Stones for the future are the Time Stone and the Spirit Stone. Why? Thanks to both Doctor Strange and Gamora. They will affect both the plot and Thanos' behavior. Hell, one has already affected Thanos' behavior. He could've wrecked a lot of fights with four infinity stones but he let Doctor Strange go toe to toe with him instead. So there.

Killing someone you love takes something from you. Also she might stay with you as a price. More on that later.

The key for Avengers 4 is the Time Stone. While Star-Lord and Tony Stark were fast-debating how to handle Thanos when he came to Titan Doctor Strange was meditating on the future. Many, many futures. A few million futures. There was one in which they were victorious. One out of millions. Do that math. In the end he willingly surrendured the Time Stone. When? He surrendured it when Tony Stark's life was fully in threat by Thanos. What does that say? Tony Stark's skills, either as Iron Man or as an Engineer, are key to solving this problem. Thanos stood by his word, a key characterization people might not care about. When he killed half of humanity, Tony Stark remained alive.

That was an impressive gamble by Doctor Strange. But it says two things. Round one was a loss from the beginning. And Tony Stark was one of the characters that was necessary to win Round Two.

Now we come to the Spirit Stone. To acquire the Spirit Stone, Thanos had to kill someone he loves(present tense). He threw Gamora off the cliff. Quite a shock to Gamora, and probably many watching the movie unless they were paying attention to the differences in characterization between comic and movie. He got the Spirit Stone.

She stayed with him. Or at least, her spirit stayed with the Spirit Stone.

At the end of it all:

Thanos: Daughter.
Spirit Gamora: Did you do it?
Thanos: Yes?
Spirit Gamora: What did it cost?
Thanos: ...Everything.

I don't think you just cancel this out in half a movie with all of the Avengers. This is the perfect Guardians of the Galaxy 3 plot we are looking at here. Figuring out how to pull Gamora out of the Spirit Stone.

And those are my thoughts for the future plots of the Infinity Stones.