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| Avengers: Endgame (2019) |
Goddamn, did those trailers keep things vague. How many pieces of footage have been officially released, and everyone still had wildly different interpretations of the order of events and theories on how to solve the devastation of the Infinity War? I'll say this here: you think you know how this movie's going to go? You don't know shit. That's right, I didn't censor that one. I want you to know how serious I am about that. Now, you may have accurately guessed bits and pieces of it, but you're still largely wrong. I know I was. The strange thing about me saying that is the movie doesn't really take all that many twists and turns. Once the story well and truly begins, it's basically that. There are curveballs and bombshells, certainly, but none that deterred the Avengers from their goal overall, all things considered anyway. The movie is three hours long and it never bored me. Let that sink in. There was a point where I looked at my watch, thinking we were about halfway through. It was a third. There's a lot going on, and, admittedly, the opening scenes do feel a little front-loaded, but I don't hold that against the movie. It does the most it can with the time it has and that's commendable. You can see how strained I'm being trying to not spoil this thing, right? It's killing me. I want to be able to talk about specifics and how certain characters were handled and how the story affected certain people in certain ways, but I can't. I mean, I can, but I won't, because you deserve to go into this movie with as little information as I did.
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| Jeremy Renner as Hawkeye |
I will give away little pieces of information about certain characters, but I feel these are all things that are made abundantly clear from the trailers, so it's safe to talk about these. First of all, the movie gives a great deal of focus to the original 6 Avengers from the first Avengers movie. That shouldn't be a surprise, and that certainly isn't to say the other remaining characters don't get a focus, because they do. They just know who to give the screentime to when, and for a majority of the movie, it's the original 6. Cap gets far more of a focus than he got in Infinity War, but, again, I feel like that was a given. This is also the best Hawkeye's ever been. Given the story, that should be obvious, since big things have happened, but I do feel like it's been building up to this since the start, much like a lot of things in this movie, for that matter. One last thing I'll say about the characters is that if you're going into this movie expecting to see a whole lot of Thanos, don't hold your breath. His movie was Infinity War; Endgame focuses on the Avengers. Again, that isn't to say Thanos gets nothing to do, or he's not still a powerful threat, because both of those are true. He still does a lot and he's still the biggest villain the Avengers have ever gone up against; his role is just a little different this time around.
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| Josh Brolin as Thanos |
I usually don't talk about performances beyond an actor's first appearance, since the acting has been fairly consistent across the entire MCU, but I need to make a special case here, since this is an important chapter in this story. And, let me tell you, absolutely everyone is firing on full cylinders here. Downey, Evans, Hemsworth, Johansson, Renner, Rudd, Gillan, Cheadle, Ruffalo, Cooper, all of the above give their best performances in the MCU to date. We get to see a lot of these characters in situations they've never been in before, and it's always perfectly handled. One of the things I especially love is how they show the impact events have on people. How each character deals with the aftermath of the Decimation is important, and it was all well thought out and well performed. You can tell that an awful lot of thought and consideration was put into the script here, not just the story but the dialogue. When people talk, it feels natural. When people are at odds with each other, it feels deserved. I've mentioned this several times in the past, but the MCU is first-and-foremost character driven rather than plot driven, and nowhere is that more obvious and called for than in this movie. I will say that people going into this who might not be as familiar with the MCU as others may not get as much out of it, but they'll still enjoy themselves. I would normally mark a movie down for this, since it's not as accessible, but this movie was never shy about what it wanted to be. This is the final chapter to the saga that Marvel has been telling for 11 years. There are going to be references. There are going to be things that happen that do so because of something that happened in a previous movie. The great part about this is that it's never gratuitous or self-obsessed. Everything still happens for a reason, however fan-servicey it may be, and this balance is one of the most impressive things about this movie.
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| Paul Rudd as Ant-Man |
The visuals are stunning also. That might seem like a weird way to begin the final paragraph, but I'm really just doing a quick recap of everything else I physically can talk about. Yeah, this is a good looking movie, and it goes beyond the characters and what they do. The way the movie is shot, the landscapes, the lighting, the mo-cap, the powers, the f***ing lighting, it's all superb. The soundtrack is also used really effectively, and it knows exactly when to use a familiar motif to bring out the fanboy in me. Uh... what else, what else... Okay, I know I have another half a paragraph to fill, but I can't do it. I can't talk any more about this movie. It's just too good, and I don't want to risk ruining anything for you. Seriously, this movie had it all. I was laughing, I was gasping, I was clutching my seat, I was tearing up, I was giddy... I was giddy. The movie had me jumping in my seat on occasions. The action scenes are absolutely amazing. Much like Infinity War, they know exactly how much to show of each character and which pairings, powers and match-ups we want to see and it's all amazing. Bits of it had me giggling like a little kid, bits of it had me sombre and truly feeling for the characters. And the best part of it all? It achieves all of this without disrespecting its audience. It would have been easy to retcon absolutely everything from Infinity War and call it a day. But they don't. There are stakes. Things matter. Things are different because this movie happened, and in big ways. The Marvel Cinematic Universe as you know it is no more. Moving forward? Who knows what we'll get. As for the story of the Infinity Stones, that 22 chapter tale has come to an end in the only way it could have. In the way that Marvel have clearly been building towards for 11 years. They kept saying they had a plan all this time. Guess what? They had a f***ing plan all this f***ing time. Take notes: this is how you build a legacy.
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| Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark and Chris Evans as Captain America |
Avengers: Endgame (2019) is everything you think it will be and nothing you think it will be. A movie with this level of ambition really shouldn't pay off. It shouldn't have worked. Everything and everyone who worked on this movie made it work. This movie is absolutely deserving of the highest rating I can offer it. I cannot wait to sit down in a few months' time and watch all 22 chapters in this epic story all over again. This is the defining cinematic achievement of our generation, and I'm thrilled to be able to say they absolutely, definitively stuck the landing. That final chapter was easily the best. 10/10.
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