Re: Avengers: Endgame (April 26th, 2019)
Saw it yesterday in IMAX. I enjoyed it for the most part. It was a decent end to this long, 11 year story. The opening with Hawkeye and his family was great. Loved fat, alcholic Thor, especially seeing him "suit up" in action. I liked the cultured Hulk-Banner, especially that diner scene with the kids wanting selfies with him. Paul Rudd is always great as Ant-Man in all these movies. I think Steve Rogers was awesome, I've been waiting for that Mjolnir moment since 2012. There were a lot of funny bits throughout, loved the "America's ass" scene. Basically, all the elements that have been strong in the previous movies were just as strong here.
I thought they did Thanos dirty though. None of these Marvel movies have any stakes or consequences, and what the heroes were allowed to do just really demonstrates that. The quantum travel, the magical stones, it's just too ridiculous for me. I started checking out when Thanos and his army is going up against Cap and the Avengers with all these flying CGI characters and colorful effects and ****. I thought last year's Phantom Menace battle on Wakanda was bad? This was even worse. I just don't like that nonsensical kind of action where everyone is running and flying around like it's one big video game. It doesn't do anything for me. To have a beaten, battered, and bloodied Captain America standing there among the ruins then suddenly have all these heroes, gods, aliens, and horses flying around just doesn't feel right. Characters like Captain America and Spider-Man, etc. don't really belong in this craziness. It's just too much. Hawkeye and Black Widow, relatively grounded characters, going to this magical world where they compete with each other on who can commit suicide first so they can get the special yellow stone is just absurd to me. I can't suspend my disbelief with this kind of stuff anymore. It's not fun, it's just stupid. There's a point where Thanos is blasting rockets at the Avengers Headquarters, Ant-Man and the other heroes take
an explosion to the face, and they just all get out of it completely unscathed. It's the same problem I had with Batman v Superman. A cgi Batman running around while a magical creature like Doomsday is jumping around shooting lasers out of his mouth just feels wrong.
Time travel stuff was BS, not even going to think about it. I don't like how Tony Stark can just pull all of these things out of his ass for any situation. Last year, I was told that only a giant space Dwarf and the power of a star could make magical things like Thor's axe or Thanos' gauntlet, and yet, Tony Stark can make a similar device to house these super powerful weapons in a lab somewhere?
It's ludicrous. It's comic books. It's stupid.
I really liked seeing the different perspectives from the other movies. You know, that whole Back to the Future Part II feel to the whole thing. I loved seeing Tony and Ant-Man sneak around Stark Tower and see the aftermath of the Avengers capturing Loki. Just seeing that other perspective, almost like it was behind the scenes of the first movie. Thought the call back to the Winter Soldier elevator scene with Captain America was awesome. I'm always a sucker when it comes to a character fighting a version of themselves, so seeing Captain America vs. Captain America was perfect for me.
Things I absolutely hated were Captain Marvel (everything about her and her over powered moments), the scene where one of the Russo brothers was talking about missing his husband and going out on dates with other dudes and the Ragnarok rock guys playing video games. Then having Steve Rogers get all selfish at the end and turning into Joe Biden before handing off the shield wasn't that great to me. I just thought it was lame. I also didn't like how they made Hulk a *****. I like the idea of Banner and Hulk merging, but c'mon, why didn't he atleast get a moment against Thanos at the end? Captain America, Iron Man and Thor all got their little licks in, but Hulk just did nothing. He's a ****ing rage monster, that's what people love about him, and they've just really reduced him to this pathetic, passive character. I almost shed a tear (not really) when it took everything for him to want to "smash" and rolling his eyes at his 2012 self smashing things up. I kept waiting for him to eventually lose it after all the **** that was happening to him (he seemed like he wanted to mess Thor up when Thor grabbed his arm), but nope, nothing. I liked that they had him bring back everyone, the gamma thing made sense, but man, between this year and last year with dopey Banner in the Hulkbuster suit, Hulk hasn't been done justice.
Overall, I thought it was a good send off to the franchise. I was happy there weren't any mid or after credit scenes and I thought the actor signatures and character icons of Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Black Widow and Hawkeye were classy.
