Avengers: Infinity War (spoilers ahead)

Yeah, thought of that after I posted. I would say the sacrifice of Gamora. That's when the gravity of his mission really hits him.

 

I just rewatched Dr Strange and there's a piece I forgot about that makes me wonder if it will creep up in the infinity war finale.

Chiwetel Ejiofor's character splits with Dr. Strange after the Hong Kong battle because he is disenchanted with the sorcerers when he sees them going against the laws of nature. The end credits scene shows Ejiofor crippling Benjamin Bratt to stop him from continuing his use of magic for selfish gains. Ejiofor says there are too many sorcerers. I wonder if he is going to pop back up to help fight Thanos who just severely violated nature's laws. Or maybe he'll side with Thanos to stop the restoration of the universe.

 

ESB and the middle Harry Potters had endings. There was at least 1-2 scenes after the main battles in those to reflect on what just happened in the movie and to set up what was about to happen. This didn't have that. People disintegrated, the people left behind looked around in shock and horror, fade to black, credits. ESB had Luke getting a replacement arm and him and Leia watching Lando drive off in the Millennium Falcon to find Han. The middle Harry Potters at least had some big Dumbledore speech, Harry being all moody and shit and getting back on the train to the Dursleys. There was a definite ending to each one of those. This just ends with zero time to really grasp what just happened before the credits roll.

 

The ending was Thanos back on Titan staring at the sunset, exactly as he predicted. Maybe that's why the ending doesn't bother me as much in terms of evaluating the movie. The way I see it, Thanos is the protagonist, in the sense that he is the main character. We see the end of his story arc. Did we need a chat between Vader and the Emperor at the end of Empire Strikes Back? Or a final monologue by Voldemort in a Harry Potter movie?

Also, from a practical standpoint, I think you would need a lot more movie to see the characters even start to deal with the situation and move forward.

Most importantly, if there was never a Return of the Jedi, Empire wouldn't have worked. It was clearly just one piece of the story, but that piece does have an end. It's just a damn dark end, one they made surprisingly emotional through the script and the work of the cast.

The one thing that truly bothered me was Dr. Strange giving up the time stone, but only until I put together his final words with the bit about him exploring all those possible futures. He knew this was the only path that could lead to eventual victory and he took it.

 

If you have a 5 to 10 minute coda though, I think it really blunts the emotional impact of what happens. Like, part of why I like the ending so much is that Thanos snaps his fingers, and then a bunch of people starting disappointing, and then that's pretty much it. You're kind of just left there thinking, "What the fuck?", kind of like the main heroes. Maybe I'm also liking it because the bar is lower for these movies - I'm just psyched it didn't end with, like, Thanos having 3 of the 6 stones, or with a big hero moment that lets us know everything is going to be OK after the next movie.

 

If that's so, Titan sure looks a hell of a lot like Africa.
Don't know why, but it looked to me like Thanos moved to an African mountaintop to watch the sun set on earth.

 

I think it's time to retire Iron Man, or at least RDJ's version of Stark. He's really starting to grate my nerves.

 

You could be right about that. Either way, the ending is Thanos staring out at a sunset, his task complete.

 

I thought it was because I spent a couple of weeks re-watching all of the MCU movies in the lead up to Infinity War, so I got a lot of RDJ in a small amount of time, but I feel the same way.

 

I think Stark will die in Avengers 4. I'd say they could have him retire, but they did that already and it didn't take.

I don't think Rogers has it in him to retire, so I assume they will kill that character off as well.

 

And both have their replacements already in place, right? I only know a little about the comic storylines, but I believe both Bucky and Rhodes take over those roles at some point.

 

Bucky and Falcon have both been Captain America in the comics. Rhodes has been Iron Man. They also had Jane Foster become Thor for a while, but that was a whole other thing.

Rhodes can wear the armor, but he's a drastically different character from Stark.

Sam Wilson was a far more developed character in the comics when he took over as Cap. Bucky is pretty close to where he was in the comics in terms of character development, so maybe that's the way they go. I read some interviews saying they prefer to explore the character as the Winter Soldier, but that could be a diversion just like the change in the titles of Avengers 3 and 4.