The most definitive overarching issue with the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been the lack of stakes. Over the course of the saga’s previous 18 movies, MCU heroes have faced numerous world-ending threats, eking out victories by the skin of their teeth, only to have their worlds essentially return to normal in time for the next installment. The approach worked early, on a film-by-film basis, but when viewed as part of a 10-year narrative, it’s tended to weaken the broader franchise. There can be no drama without true risk, and in the MCU, audiences have learned that none of their favorites are ever really in harm’s way.
Directors Joe and Anthony Russo seem acutely aware of this issue with their latest entry, the massive, multi-film team-up Avengers: Infinity War. The long-awaited face-off between the Avengers and Thanos (Josh Brolin), the MCU’s ultimate big bad, is massively entertaining, deftly incorporating dozens of characters across multiple storylines with a kinetic flair. Its devotion to banter and one-liners makes it one of the funniest movies in the studio’s history, but it’s also a film where very bad things happen to good people. After years of movies where even the most mediocre heroes appeared to be invulnerable and indomitable, it’s an arresting jolt — and exactly the film the franchise needed.
After years of teasing Thanos’ upcoming arrival, Avengers: Infinity War wastes no time with stage-setting. It opens with Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Loki (Tom Hiddleston) on the ship last seen at the end of Thor: Ragnorak, facing off against the big purple villain. Thanos is after a powerful crystal called an Infinity Stone, and he suspects Loki has one in the Tesseract — the glowing cube that served as a key plot device six years ago in The Avengers.
There are six Infinity Stones, the film explains: powerful crystals that originated in the Big Bang, and that represent aspects of existence and have related elemental powers. Some are spread across the universe, but half of them are on Earth, where they’ve played significant roles in past MCU movies. Thanos is trying to collect all of them, slotting them into a massive golden glove. If he acquires them all, he says, he’ll have the power to wipe out half the universe with a snap of his fingers.
It pays off years of emotional investment in ways that are often heart-wrenching.
The film tracks Thanos’ quest as he moves from stone to stone, while various superhero factions attempt to stop him. Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), Spider-Man (Tom Holland), and Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) are attacked by several of Thanos’ henchman, who are eager to get the green Time Stone that Strange protects within the mystic Eye of Agamotto. Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) and Vision (Paul Bettany), who have gone into hiding to nurture their burgeoning romantic relationship, are attacked by minions seeking the Mind Stone that’s integrated within Vision’s brain. Along the way, the Guardians of the Galaxy team up with various heroes, a bearded Captain America (Chris Evans) comes out of hiding, and Black Panther’s home of Wakanda becomes ground zero for a central conflict. Nearly every character in the MCU is roped into the war, with Thanos swiftly establishing himself as an unprecedented threat on multiple fronts.
With so many characters in play, writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely (Captain America: Civil War) are faced with a remarkable challenge: giving every character a place in the story, without letting anyone other than Thanos dominate the larger narrative. The story crosscuts between four or five major story threads, much like Game of Thrones, Westworld, and other complicated serial narratives. It’s a testament to Markus and McFeely’s work that the film never feels crowded, even though it’s juggling such a massive number of movie stars. In fact, the film is able to give many characters their own meaningful story arcs throughout the film, with Tony Stark, Star-Lord (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), and the Vision / Scarlet Witch love story given particular focus. The result is a film that often feels surprisingly earnest and emotional. It pays off the emotional investment movie audiences have been making in these characters for years, sometimes in genuinely heart-wrenching ways.
The most outlandish-looking Marvel villain is also its most complex and layered one
Even with all of that, this film belongs to Josh Brolin’s Thanos. The prospect of a giant purple computer-generated bad guy has prompted some skepticism, but in context, the character is wonderfully effective. The visual effects undeniably capture the nuances of Brolin’s facial tics and mannerisms, allowing the actor to shine through all the CGI wizardry. It’s a good thing that it works so well, because Thanos is not the cardboard cutout villain that some previous Marvel bad guys have been. His master plan involves destroying half the universe, but in his own mind, his motivations are noble. He thinks he’s the hero of his story, and while nobody is going to agree with his tactics, his backstory does give his overall reasoning a perverse sort of logic. At several key moments in the film, Thanos nearly becomes a sympathetic character — even while he is doing truly horrific, unforgivable things. The biggest surprise of all may be that the most outlandish-looking Marvel villain is also its most complex and layered one, which simply wouldn’t be possible without the film’s synthesis of script, direction, performance, and visual effects.
The film’s sparkling sense of humor balances the weight of Thanos’ actions. Marvel’s films have always had a flair for comedy, but Infinity War turns the dial up further, maximizing the levity found in movies like Thor: Ragnarok and Guardians of the Galaxy. Pitting Star-Lord’s hyper-insecurity against Thor’s arrogant hyper-masculinity provides for some of the funniest moments in the entire MCU.
Doctor Strange and Tony Stark also play as comedic foils for each other, sparring over what might as well be the title for Most Arrogant Superhero On Earth. In a film that mixes so many different elements, it would be easy for many of these characters’ essential traits to fall by the wayside. But the Russo brothers don’t just preserve the characters’ innate sensibility. They’re actually able to incorporate the filmmaking sensibilities of the different franchises into their own tapestry. Sequences with Star-Lord, Rocket (Bradley Cooper), and Groot (Vin Diesel) feel like they’re from one of James Gunn’s Guardians films; Thor seems like he’s walked right off the set of Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok. The movie is a Marvel mixtape, combining the very best of everything that’s come before, but recontextualizing the individual parts to tell its own unique story.
The massive scale of the undertaking does have periodic downsides. The action sequences are mostly effective, but at times, there are so many characters being flung around like CG rag dolls that it can be hard to gauge what is happening to whom, in which order. And while every character does get a laugh, a heroic choice, or some other moment to shine, fans will no doubt be frustrated if their particular favorite hero isn’t foregrounded as much as other characters are. That’s simply the nature of the beast, however — it was inevitably going to happen with a project of this size. The fact that those concerns are fleeting, however, is a testament to what a massive storytelling achievement Infinity War is.
Audiences will be aghast at just how far The Avengers have fallen
The film can’t spread around its camera time in equal measure, but it does give all the characters an equal shot at despair. A decade of films have led up to Thanos, and Avengers: Infinity War delivers on that threat with a film that upends the entire fabric of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. No character is safe from the far-reaching implications of his actions, and it’s impressive to see just how dark Marvel is willing to go for this story. Even the biggest fan favorites are truly vulnerable, and the movie reinforces that idea — relentlessly, at times — as it sprints toward its final stunning moments. By the time the credits roll, audiences will no doubt be aghast at just how far the Avengers have fallen.
One problem, though, is that Infinity War leans so excessively toward darkness that it’s impossible to believe the studio won’t take back many of the things that happen onscreen. This is still the Disney-run Marvel universe, after all, and the popularity of some of its flagship characters all but guarantees that, no matter what happens during Avengers: Infinity War, much of it won’t be permanent. (In fact, in its final act, the film seems to tip its hand toward a Hail Mary solution that’s likely to come into play in the still-untitled Infinity War sequel.) But that’s the most minor of complaints. This is a comic book universe, after all, and the fact that Infinity War is able to embrace this darkness in the first place is a wonder. The only real crime is that audiences will have to wait until 2019 to see the conclusion.
Avengers: Infinity War opens on April 27th.
Avengers: Infinity War feels like a Marvel movie on bath salts. Trying to describe any part of it alone will make you sound like you’ve lost your mind; trying to describe it all kind of makes it sound like it’s lost its mind. And it’s all the more confounding for how closely it mirrors its decade of movie predecessors only to end up shattering that mirror: Infinity War moves, sounds, and acts like a typical Marvel movie, but then unmasks itself as a creature distinctly its own.
Throughout Marvel Studios’ 10-year cinematic history, we’ve seen the world saved multiple times, from threats ranging from a chunk of Earth poised to crash down and wipe us out like the dinosaurs in Avengers: Age of Ultron to the unkillable goddess of death in Thor: Ragnarok.
You don’t have to squint too hard to see that all these villains and their endgames (take control of the planet and/or the universe), as well as our heroes’ efforts to stop them, have started to look essentially the same.
“We don’t trade lives,” Captain America (Chris Evans) tells his compatriots in Avengers: Infinity War, essentially summing up Marvel’s ethos over the past 18 movies: Leave no men, women, children, or any other life form behind.
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Directed by the Russo brothers, the architects behind Captain America: Civil War and Captain America: Winter Soldier, Infinity War slyly betrays Cap, presenting his and the Avengers’ worldviews as naive and privileged. Instead, it dares to ask what happens if saving the day means taking real, tangible losses — a concept so foreign that it comes in the form of an intergalactic purple titan named Thanos (Josh Brolin).
It’s a testament to Marvel and the Russos’ daring that Thanos is actually one of the less surprising things about Infinity War. For the past six years, we’ve been told that he’s on a collision course with Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, setting us up for the chaos that ensues in this long-heralded culmination. What I didn’t fully realize is just what that chaos would look like, and that Marvel had the guts to, mostly, pull it off.
Infinity War is more of a Thanos movie than an Avengers movie
The most difficult task facing Infinity War is addressing all of the characters, motivations, subplots, and relationships that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has built up over the years without making it feel like an expository avalanche careening down a mountain to bury the audience below.
For example: Gamora (Zoe Saldana) and Nebula (Karen Gillan) are adopted daughters of Thanos, the villain of Infinity War and the big bad lurking in the shadows of Marvel’s movies since 2012’s Avengers. Gamora and Nebula hate each other and hate Thanos, who tortured them by pitting them against each other; he also killed the family of Gamora’s Guardians of the Galaxy teammate Drax (Dave Bautista).
Gamora, Drax, and the other Guardians aren’t technically Avengers, but that’s just because they operate in Marvel’s cosmic universe, which we found out in Thor: Ragnarok is connected to Thor’s Asgard, a recently destroyed world populated by Norse gods and goddesses.
That intricate web of characters and motivations barely scratches the surface of four of Marvel’s recent movies; there are 18 total, not including Infinity War.
The Russo brothers’ solution to this dilemma is to turn a movie nominally about the Avengers into a movie about Thanos, played by Brolin decked out in lumpy mounds of purple CGI.
The special effects needed to turn Brolin into Thanos distract in the villain’s softer moments, as when he explains how exactly he came to be the Mad Titan. We’re told that, ages ago, Thanos’s home planet was bountiful but resources were finite. To alleviate the stress on the planet, Thanos had the idea to reduce it by half, eliminating life in order to preserve it.
Not satisfied with culling his own planet, Thanos has continued on a mission to eliminate half the life in the universe, and needs the Infinity Stones to do so. And it just so happens that our Avengers are the only thing standing in his way.
Thanos’s story allows Saldana to shine, as she rounds out Gamora with more humanity and purpose than the Guardians movies have allowed her. That she’s acting opposite a computer-enhanced Brolin in a majority of her scenes is even more impressive.
But giving Thanos such an expansive history comes at a price.
Most of the Marvel superheroes appearing in Infinity War, particularly Black Panther and Captain America, are compressed, concentrated versions of themselves. T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) is given five or so lines to be majestic in his defense of Wakanda; Cap gets a few more minutes to be noble and inspiring. Spider-Man (Tom Holland) is around to remind us that he’s young.
Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) and Vision (Paul Bettany) have scenes together to tell you they’re in love. Characters like Drax, Mantis (Pom Klementieff), Falcon (Anthony Mackie), Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), Shuri (Letitia Wright), Okoye (Danai Gurira), Rocket (Bradley Cooper), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and, of course, Groot (Vin Diesel) have a few one-liners.
Instead of showing us why these characters are so beloved, the Russo brothers employ a Marvel shorthand of sorts, relying on past movies to do most of the work. And that’s not an unreasonable instinct: Captain America’s first onscreen return in Civil War is awe-inspiring in large part because he’s the Captain America who’s lived in the Marvel Cinematic Universe for the past seven years.
The same kind of chills happen when the “Wakanda” theme plays in Infinity War — a testament to the power of Ryan Coogler’s massive film. For devotees of the MCU, there’s plenty to read into between the lines of Infinity War, but only if you know where to look.
Not all of the film’s heroes are underutilized, though. Tony Stark’s (Robert Downey Jr.) fear of a galactic threat, established over the past few films featuring him, is fully realized in Thanos, and Downey sinks his teeth into Stark’s vulnerability and apprehension. Stark has to not only defeat this villain but also reconcile that mission with the fact that Thanos’s plan is horrifyingly adjacent to Stark’s dream of a universe so safe that Avengers are rendered obsolete.
Benedict Cumberbatch’s Doctor Strange and Chris Hemsworth’s Thor are apt counters to Stark. Cumberbatch’s Strange is coolly stubborn, calculating in ways that Stark isn’t. And Hemsworth, after flexing his knack for comedy in 2017’s Ragnarok, taps into that same humor but laces it with jagged grief and anger informed by having seen Thanos’s wrath firsthand.
It would have been stellar to see all of Marvel’s superheroes allowed these little pockets of storytelling in between the Thanos action, but there’s already not enough room in Infinity War’s two hours and 40 minutes. I don’t envy the difficult decisions the Russos had to make about the heroes and storylines to spotlight, but I’m also not convinced that giving us a Thanos origin story and relying on that Marvel superhero shorthand to fill in the gaps was the most efficient way.
Perhaps the easiest way to reconcile this is to understand that Infinity War doesn’t want to have multiple profound heroes, but rather have one profound thing happen to all of its heroes.
Avengers: Infinity War is the most comic book movie that Marvel has ever created
The best and worst thing about Infinity War is that it’s a comic book movie.
Comic book artists aren’t bound by visual effects budgets, so they’re allowed to give us priceless imaginations on paper: new worlds on every page, mystifying beings, dazzling spacecraft, spellbinding powers, and megaton fights. Infinity War is the closest iteration of this limitless power that we’ve seen onscreen.
Midway through, I lost count of the planets and galaxies visited, each one terrifyingly beautiful in its own way. There’s a breath-stopping visit to a deserted ghost city of a planet, so evocative you can almost smell the sulfur in the air and feel the temperature drop when it comes on the screen.
And the faces of Thanos’s Black Order, his cabal of henchmen, are fearsome and distinct, offering both scintillating powers and copious nightmare fuel. Their fights with the Avengers are the film’s highlights, and a couple of them truly feel like significant threats to Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.
The problem with flexing this sort of expansive world building is that it requires so much jumping around the universe that the film feels like it’s spinning plates. That results in the compression I mentioned earlier, the feeling that some characters are around simply to remind you they exist. But it also, frustratingly, kneecaps what should be the MCU’s grandest fight scene, Infinity War’s invasion of Wakanda.
It’s the largest-scale onscreen fight I can recall since the Battle of Helm’s Deep in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Our heroes, in a valiant last stand, are the only thing that stands between Thanos and universal destruction. And his generals have unleashed thousands of intergalactic hounds — what look to be a cross between snapping turtles and WWE wrestlers — upon Wakanda. Cap and Black Panther teaming up to hold the line is a strange mix of joy and stress. Seeing Okoye and Black Widow’s combat expertise in tandem is breathtaking. Same with Scarlet Witch unleashing her full powers.
Unfortunately, though, because there are multiple storylines going on at one time, we jump from Wakanda to outer space and another faction of Avengers doing their part to save the universe, or get thrust into Thor’s side quest to find a weapon strong enough to kill Thanos.
It’s frustrating that it’s so difficult to fully appreciate the fantastic work that went into orchestrating these massive spectacles when we’re constantly being jostled from place to place. Midway through, all these different settings and all these jumps begin to feel exhausting.
The same thing can happen in comic books. Some story arcs are better than others. And sometimes you’ll have to read through them all — even the most boring ones — to get the full crossover experience and make sure you didn’t miss anything.
But also as in comic books, there’s one absolute bombshell of a moment that grabs you by the neck and drives you back into the story. Infinity War boasts the most breathtaking, audacious moment in superhero movie history, one that rocketed through my brain and tore apart everything I thought I knew about the past 10 years of Marvel moviemaking. For the first time in a while, I can’t wait to see what happens next.
VIVA – "Parah sih ini mah," seorang teman di samping saya geleng-geleng kepala sesaat, setelah post-credit scene film A vengers : Infinity War selesai diputar. Seruannya nyaris tak terdengar di antara tepuk tangan dan hingar bingar reaksi para tamu undangan yang hadir dalam acara Pers Screening Avengers: Infinity War di XXI Kota Kasablanka, Selasa malam, 24 April 2018. Avengers: Infinity War akhirnya resmi meluncur di Indonesia pada hari ini, Rabu 25 April 2018. Luar biasa, karena Indonesia menjadi satu dari sedikit negara saja yang memutar film ini dua hari lebih awal dari perilisan di mayoritas negara lainnya. Avengers: Infinity War , bahkan baru menggelar World Premiere yang dilanjutkan dengan screening terbatas di Los Angeles, pada Senin malam waktu setempat, 23 April 2018. Di sanalah, para pemain dan kru juga baru pertama kali menonton film ini.
Menjadi puncak dari timeline cerita Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) selama 10 tahun, Avengers: Infinity War benar-benar memberi suguhan yang terbaik bagi semua pecinta karakter superhero di studio ini. Avengers: Infinity War bisa dibilang memenuhi, bahkan mungkin melebihi apa yang fans Marvel harapkan. Bukan hal mudah untuk mengumpulkan puluhan superhero ke dalam satu film yang sama dengan durasi hanya 149 menit saja. Tetapi, Russo bersaudara, sang sutradara, tampaknya tak punya masalah dalam hal ini. Film berjalan dengan jahitan plot yang halus, tanpa harus menonjolkan satu superhero di antara superhero lainnya. Namun, seperti yang pernah Joe Russo katakan, ada dua karakter yang memang punya peran penting. Selain Thanos si penjahat utama, ada juga Thor. Rasanya, aman bagi saya menyebutkan superhero dari Asgard itu, sebab Russo sudah mengonfirmasinya, seperti dikutip dari Screen Rant, Maret lalu. "Aku rasa, kalian akan melihat Thor punya bagian yang sangat menarik di film ini. Dia belum pernah menjadi sentral di film-film Avengers sebelumnya, tetapi di sini, dia punya peran yang sangat penting. Jadi, aku akan bilang (yang punya jatah waktu banyak) adalah Thanos dan Thor," begitu kata Joe. Tetapi, bukan berarti yang lain tak penting. Jika Anda menontonnya nanti, mungkin setuju, karena semua orang bermain dengan porsi yang nyaris sama. Saya sendiri bingung, jika harus menyebutkan siapa superhero yang paling sedikit muncul di film ini. Itulah salah satu keunggulan MCU, dibanding para kompetitornya. Karakter masing-masing superhero berhasil dibangun kuat satu per satu selama 10 tahun. Hasilnya, ada keterikatan emosional yang sangat terasa, tak hanya di antara para karakternya, tetapi juga dengan kita, para penontonnya. Berikutnya, Thanos>>>
The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s latest highly anticipated entry, “Avengers: Infinity War,” had its world premiere Monday night in Los Angeles and critics’ early reactions are already rolling in.
With full reviews embargoed until Tuesday at 3 p.m., film fans were quick to share their thoughts on what’s been touted as the culmination of all the past Marvel films.
See some of the first reactions below:
Rodrigo Perez of The Playlist writes that the film is “stress-inducing, full of dread, darker than usual, yet, funny as hell and super entertaining….Blockbuster noise? Yes, but with emotional stakes attached.”
Does it have issues? Sure, it’s a punch fest, yeah, but I thoroughly enjoyed it, especially the dynamics of all these disparate teamups. Let’s see a Thor and Rocket Racoon buddy comedy spin-off. pic.twitter.com/jfjNxTWZYj — Rodrigo Perez 🎬📺🎥 (@YrOnlyHope) April 24, 2018
ScreenRant’s Molly Freeman highlighted Thor’s powers and Iron Man’s suit as some of the best action moments and shouted out Captain America.
I saw #AvengersInfinityWar earlier tonight and I can say that it delivers. There's a lot of really fun character interactions, some cool action moments (Thor's powers, Iron Man's suit), and a few powerful emotional beats. Most of the humor is 👌🏻 Also Captain America is 💥 pic.twitter.com/WoZNPDpGXk — Molly Freeman (@mollyrockit) April 24, 2018
Tasha Robinson of The Verge wrote that “Infinity War” is “basically ‘Captain America: Civil War’ times 20…People who were bored will be 20 times as bored here.”
AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR is basically CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR times 20, except with less hero-on-hero fighting. I think people who loved the airport fight in CIVIL WAR like I did will go nuts for this film, and people who were bored will be 20 times as bored here. #InfinityWar — Tasha Robinson (@TashaRobinson) April 24, 2018
ScreenCrush’s Matt Singer wrote called the film “a movie version of a massive comic-book crossover, for better (fun character interactions) and worse (it’s pretty much all Infinity Stone shenanigans).”
AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR: A movie version of a massive comic-book crossover, for better (fun character interactions) and worse (it's pretty much all Infinity Stone shenanigans). YMMV. #avengersinfinitywar — Matt Singer (@mattsinger) April 24, 2018
IGN Comics’ Joshua Yehl wrote that “Infinity War” “never lets up. I sat in my chair stunned as the credits rolled, speechless and sobbing.”
#AvengersInfinityWar pretty much had me laughing, screaming, or crying the entire way through. It never lets up. I sat in my chair stunned as the credits rolled, speechless and sobbing. — Joshua Yehl (@JoshuaYehl) April 24, 2018
See more reactions below.
AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR has like ten legit "chill down the spine" great moments. But it's for sure the first half of a two part movie and I left a little unsatisfied/frustrated, maybe by design … at least that's how I feel right now three hours later. — Mike Ryan (@mikeryan) April 24, 2018
Wow! Marvel dropped all the rules, fists out and what a tornado!! #AvengersInfinityWar was a blast and Thanos just dethroned Killmonger as the champion of villains. — Kristian Harloff (@KristianHarloff) April 24, 2018
#AvengersInfinityWar is my second fave @Marvel movie after #BlackPanther. The superhero interplay is hilarious and surprising at every turn. The action is monumental. And there are actual stakes this time around. Kevin Feige is not f-cking around with this one. — Nigel M. Smith (@nigelmfs) April 24, 2018
AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR is very weighty and juggles most of its characters with consideration. It’s the closest thing to a Paul Thomas Anderson movie you’ll find in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I Am Shook! #Marvel #AvengersInfinityWar pic.twitter.com/YgntkXFIkv — Rudie Obias (@RudieObias) April 24, 2018
Buy a ticket for a second viewing of #AvengersInfinityWar now. The movie delivers, it's huge, and no one in your theater is going to be able to sit quietly through this one. Expect the unexpected. pic.twitter.com/8eobaAYrSF — Jill Pantozzi ♿ (@JillPantozzi) April 24, 2018
#AvengersInfinityWar: Despite some truly thrilling moments, feels like less than the sum of its parts. A definite step down after that epic run of GotGV2 / Spidey / Thor 3 / Black Panther, but what else did I expect? — Angie J. Han (@ajhan) April 24, 2018
After 10 years of investment in this series & these characters, boy does #AvengersInfinityWar knock you on your ass. Humor, sky high stakes & a truly overwhelming amount of emotion in it. Russos did a great job spreading screen time for the ensemble but my MVPs – The Guardians. — Perri Nemiroff (@PNemiroff) April 24, 2018
Jaw on ground. You are not ready for 'Avengers: Infinity War'. All you have to know is AVOID ALL SPOILERS! Seriously. Go in knowing as little as possible. The @Russo_Brothers did the impossible. Wow. pic.twitter.com/noKZ5cQWdc — Steven Weintraub (@colliderfrosty) April 24, 2018
