10 years. 18 films. For Marvel fans, Avengers: Infinity War has been a looong time coming. We’ve had to endure unnecessary sequels (did we really get anything out of Thor 2? Iron Man 3?), the fact that DC did a female-led movie first (I’ll never forgive Marvel boss Kevin Feige for not giving Black Widow her own standalone film years ago) and countless shirtless scenes (okay wait that is a good thing). But folks: we here. The main event. The big showdown.
So, is it any good?
In a word: yes. Avengers: Infinity War is extremely good. But let me clear this up right now: there hasn’t been a single Marvel Cinematic Universe flick that I’ve hated. Sure, there’s some I love more than others – hello, Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and Doctor Strange – but even the ones I didn’t completely froth on, I still enjoyed. I didn’t sit there squirming in my seat sighing or falling asleep. I just think all 18 films are a lotta fun. So I’m probably Feige’s dream audience member at this point.
The tricky part is hype. I myself was worried that I was so overly excited to see this movie that it would fall flat under the heft weight of expectation. I deliberately only watched one (1) trailer and avoided any online chatter that may result in spoilers because I wanted to sit there with my popcorn and bloody well enjoy it. And I did. The movie opens with action and ends with action. It doesn’t waste any time – you get the feeling that directors Joe and Anthony Russo cut a lot out of this movie, because how could you not shoot hours and hours of footage with a cast like this?
But the result is that not a single frame of Avengers: Infinity War feels like wasted time. Though the various heroes are united against their common enemy, Thanos (Josh Brolin), a purple chap from the planet Titan who has dreams of wiping out half the world’s population for some reason, they’re scattered across Earth and space as they work to stop him collecting all six Infinity Stones and achieving complete power.
Each group’s storyline works seamlessly with the other – there were no moments where I thought “did we really need this scene?”, which has happened in several other more indulgent Marvel flicks. I mean, Avengers: Infinity War is so tight on time they don’t even have any gratuitous shirtless scenes, which is probably my one criticism of the movie. I’m sorry, but I come for the plotline and stay for the pecs. Don’t @ me.
But as I said earlier, Avengers: Infinity War is action-packed. There’s NO TIME FOR NIPPLES. There is a universe to protect, goddammit, and these heroic men and women will stop at nothing to fight for what is right. The battle scenes are truly epic – it’s so fun to see different powers / fighting styles all coming together on this scale.
Without spoiling any plot points that you haven’t already seen in the trailer, I will say that two of my favourite characters in Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) being on-screen was an absolute delight. We got more of Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) which was fun since he’s only had one major movie part so far. There’s even the return of fan faves like Black Panther‘s M’Baku (Winston Duke) and Shuri (Leticia Wright), Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) and Guardians of the Galaxy 2‘s Mantis (Pom Klementieff).
But it never seems like too much. Where I felt Captain America: Civil War was a bit insane like that and it felt forced (“Here’s Ant-Man!” “Brb, just going to recruit Spider-Man!”), the 20,000 characters in this movie make sense, and all contribute to the plot.
My one gripe in Avengers: Infinity War (apart from the lack of people named Chris being topless) comes with Thanos. I don’t find him scary or terrifying – the opening sequence certainly establishes his brute strength but I’m still a little clueless as to his motivations. He talks a lot about wiping out half of humanity once he gets his big purple mitts on all six Infinity Stones, but why? Is he just batshit? I don’t feel like it’s explained enough – and as someone who admittedly just sees the movies and doesn’t read the comics, it might need to be spelled out a bit more.
I know I’ve been talking like a Marvel cast member and saying a lot of words without actually revealing anything juicy at all about Avengers: Infinity War, but what do you want me to tell you? That everybody dies? I’m not going to do that, because #ThanosDemandsYourSilence etc. So just take my advice and go away right now and see it for yourself.
