Saddest Avengers 4 Endgame Realities No One Is Talking About
Less than six months left until Avengers: Endgame graces theaters with its presence. MCU fans have anticipated the brawl with Thanos since his first appearance on screen in the post-credits scene of the first Avengers.
Round one in Infinity War has served to further wet that appetite, especially since the Mad Titan proved himself to be both a formidable and enjoyable villain on screen. In other words, fans are desperately awaiting the arrival of the movie on April 26--but a what cost?
Round 2 with the Mad Titan is approaching, and it’s sure to be good, but once the three hours in the theater are up, that will be the end. Then the ten-year ride we’ve been on with Marvel will be over, and while that doesn’t mean that the movies will stop, it does mean the end of the overall focus of our original Avengers. Tony Stark put it best in Endgame’s trailer:
Part of The Journey Is The End
With the arrival of Avengers: Endgame comes the end of the spotlight being on the original cast. Like we said before, this climax has been ten years in the making, and throughout that time, audiences have come to adore the characters they’ve been treated to on screen. The actors and writers have done such an excellent job of breathing life into them that no one actually wants to see them go forever, but Endgame may be promising just that.
It’s likely that one, if not many of our original Avengers may kick the bucket with this upcoming installment, or may just decide to give up their superhero-ing entirely. They are going up against Thanos one last time, and the stakes have never been higher. It’s either take this second shot and bring back half of all life or face oblivion right along with those Thanos snapped out of existence. An all or nothing bout is sure to bring casualties, and it’ll be sad to see any one of these heroes go. But, of course, “part of the journey is the end.”
No More Thanos
That brings us back around to another topic: Thanos has been a pretty fun villain to watch. His presence has served to gather all of our heroes together in this giant epic in the first place. Sure, his plan to wipe out half the universe may have some holes in it, but most viewers definitely didn’t have that on their mind while they were watching him do Thanos-like things on the big screen, putting the smackdown on anyone in his path.
He met all the criteria for a being a great final boss-level bad guy: he’s three-dimensional, ruthless, and, most of all, intimidating.
Literally, Thanos’ first action while being active on screen is to beat down the Hulk. He doesn’t just go blow for blow with him; he puts the Hulk in the ground, and this is without the use of any of the Infinity Stones. Also, this act comes after we, the audience, get a walk-around scene showcasing the destruction Thanos has brought to Thor’s ship. From the looks of things, Thanos apparently beat down Thor too before doing the same thing to our favorite big, green smasher. Then, as if everything you just saw wasn't enough to tell you that this is a villain who doesn’t play games, he straight-up murders Heimdall with a spear to the chest, then immediately turns around and kills Loki.
He picks the God up by his throat and just chokes him to death with one hand. It’s crazy. Unlike Ultron, Thanos doesn’t follow the whole, “I’m taking unnecessary prisoners” schtick. He establishes right off the bat that if you don’t do want he wants you to do, you just die. It’s that simple. There are no other options. In a film where the audience already believes main characters are on the chopping block, Thanos’ entrance is a pretty powerful way to establish himself as the big bad.
Thanos goes on to combine his intimidation factor with sheer ruthlessness. He’s not letting anything get in the way of his goal, and he makes all the right decisions to prove that. “I can only get the Soul stone if I sacrifice the only daughter I actually care about? ...Okay.” And then he throws Gamora off a cliff. Nothing is standing in his way, not even someone he considered his child. But at the same time, we see that despite the fact that he’s willing to make that decision, it wasn’t an easy one for him to make. It actually affects him, giving him that three-dimensional factor.
Simply put, Thanos turned out to be a great final-boss type villain, which is why it’s sad to think that Endgame will be his last movie. As we all know, the MCU is notorious for killing them off.
Some Characters Won’t Be Revived
Speaking of the people Thanos has laid to rest brings us here. The purpose of the Avengers in Endgame is to find some way to reverse what Thanos did because they screwed up big time by allowing it to happen in the first place. It’ll be hard for them to get any type of hero-ing done when they have that guilt gnawing at them in back of their minds. And, considering the upcoming sequels that have been announced (Spider-Man: Far From Home), it looks like the Avengers do succeed in bringing some of their fallen comrades back to the world of the living.
But sadly, there are some characters that are more than likely just gone or have even been confirmed to be dead at this point. While everyone is focusing on the characters who may be coming back from the snap, there are others who just simply died.
Loki happens to be one of them. We just got done going over what happened to him. But, yes, it seems that this time the God of Tricks’ actually died, seemingly along with Tom Hiddleston’s excellent portrayal of him. The Russo brothers have recently come out and confirmed it. So, as of right now, Thor really doesn’t have any family left.
Added right alongside Loki is Heimdall. The all-seeing and all-hearing Asgardian played by Idris Elba died in a similar manner to Loki, so it would make sense that if the God of Tricks couldn’t escape Thanos’ killing spree, Heimdall probably couldn’t either. The character may not have been as prominent an Asgardian as Thor or Loki, but it’s still sad to know that he isn’t coming back.
Finally, there’s Gamora. Another character who wasn’t taken by Thanos’ snap, Gamora was thrown off of a cliff in order to serve the function of giving Thanos the Soul Stone. Now while her sacrifice has left her as being depicted in the Soul World where the with the heroes who were reduced to dust by the Infinity Gauntlet presumably are, it’s hard to say whether or not she’ll be coming back. In fact, it’s hard to say if any of the Guardians who died will be returning now that James Gunn is out of the picture as their writer and director. With Guardians of the Galaxy 3 currently being on hold indefinitely, it’s looking like there are going to be a few more unexpected characters we’ll have to be saying goodbye to come April.
