Very late in Avengers: Infinity War, deep into this big apocalyptic battle with Thanos, one hero turns to another and says, "We're in the end game now."
It's a heavy moment, weighed down by the trauma of everything that's happened so far and everything we know is still to come. It underlines just how apocalyptically massive the stakes are here – how grave the danger is, and how great the cost of fighting it off to live another day.
It's also a lie.
Infinity War isn't the end game of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It's not even the end game of the Infinity War. Infinity War, it turns out, is the first half of a two-parter, with the second half to come next year in an as-yet-untitled sequel.
I say all this because Infinity War's very structure makes it feel like the less than the sum of its parts. It's full of stuff – there are something like two dozen major characters here, hopping back and forth across half a dozen worlds. But it's tough to tell, at this point in time, what any of it amounts to, or how satisfying any of this will end up being.
Without giving too much away, the entirety of Infinity War is concerned, in some way or another, with Thanos' plot to collect all the Infinity Stones and gain ultimate power, and our heroes' best efforts to stop him.
Given the sheer amount of elements in play here, it's probably no shock that Infinity War feels, at times, more like a logistical puzzle than an organic narrative. You can occasionally feel the filmmakers straining for reasons to send this character to that planet, where they'll meet up with that other character to hatch a plan to solve a problem currently unfolding on some other distant location with some other characters.
Infinity War knows damn well that the whole point of an Avengers movie is the opportunity to see all your faves hang out.
In those moments, Thanos makes for a pretty good excuse to bring together the Avengers (and the Guardians, and other assorted do-gooders), or split them up again. As an actual character, though, Thanos leaves something to be desired. Infinity War hints at surprising depths for its biggest of big bads, but never quite gets around to completing the full picture. At least not in this movie.
But hey, you're probably not seeing this movie for Thanos anyway. Infinity War knows damn well that the whole point of an Avengers movie is the opportunity to see all your faves hang out, to finally get definitive answers to questions like what Star-Lord might make of Thor, or how Doctor Strange's magic might complement Iron Man's know-how in battle.
It delivers plenty of those moments, including a few that literally made this reviewer applaud. There are lots of laughs (practically everyone in the MCU is good for some one-liners) and even a few bittersweet moments.
As you might expect from a film that promises to bring together franchises as disparate as Guardians of the Galaxy and Black Panther, Infinity War lacks the individual styles and focused themes that have made its most recent entries feel so unique. Here, the special-ness comes from the pleasure of seeing all these larger-than-life personalities smashed together into one supersized adventure.
Some characters do get more to do than others, and some actors do make more of their roles than others. Standouts include Chris Hemsworth, who brings a ragged edge to the funnier Thor we saw in Ragnarok, and Tom Holland, who proves capable of expressing an entire monologue's worth of feelings with a change in facial expression.
Those championing certain other characters (I won't say which ones, for fear of spoilers) may be disappointed to see that their faves aren't nearly as involved in Infinity War as they might have hoped. Others may be happy to see their faves get the spotlight, and sad to see how their stories end here.
But, hey, don't stress about it too much. There's always Avengers 4.
