‘Avengers: Endgame’ Was a Bad Movie. Change My Mind.

 

Endgame was released about ten years ago (er, in April), but I didn’t watch it until this week. I don’t really see movies in theaters anymore, partly because the nearest theater is a 45-minute drive from my house. Also, it’s so damn expensive for tickets, and I can’t pause the big screen when I need to go to the bathroom. Anyway, I don’t think it was that great of a movie.

Obviously, this post is going to have some spoilers in it, but if you haven’t seen the movie yet, then tough. I mean, it did come out like ten years ago.

OK, so, there was time travel. Time travel is stupid. It never makes sense. The screenwriters tried to get around this by making jokes about Back to the Future. All that did was confuse things even more. I thought that Smart Hulk said you can’t change the past because you’re already your past self’s future. But then the Ancient One told Bruce Banner that if he changed the past it would create alternate realities. So Bruce’s brilliant plan was to return the stones back to the exact moments they’d been taken out of the timeline so that the timeline would stay the same. But then 2012-Loki stole the Space Stone (the “Tesseract”) due to 2023 Tony Stark losing hold of it when Angry Hulk knocked him over. And that definitely didn’t happen in the old timeline, obviously.

So then Tony and Captain America time-jumped from 2012 to 1970 (by the way, without any explanation of how they could do that without the platform thing that they used in 2023 to enter the quantum realm), and stole the Tesseract from Tony’s father Howard (and maybe Loki was sitting on a bench in the background when Tony hugged Howard). So that created a third reality, right? Or no? Because Cap returned the Tesseract to 1970 later. But there’s still the 2012 divergence when Loki escapes.

Speaking of Steve Rogers, after returning the stones throughout time (and space) he goes and marries Peggy Carter in what looks like the 1950s or early ’60s. So that really is a third reality, since in the original timeline Peggy married someone else and had children, believing that Steve was dead. (In one of the scenes from an earlier movie when Cap visits Peggy in a nursing home, she has a picture on her bedside table of a family.)

So, anyway, the time travel stuff is a mess. Oh, yeah, 2023-Nebula kills 2014-Nebula. How does that work? There’s a fourth reality. Oh! And Iron Man dusts 2014-Thanos along with his entire army. So there’s a fifth reality (a good one; Thanos never dusts half of all living beings in that timeline). Oh, I forgot that 2023-Cap fought 2012-Cap and told him that Bucky was still alive. That had to have opened up a sixth reality.

But enough about the time travel. Here are some of my other gripes:

What happened to 2014-Gamora? She switches sides with the help of 2023-Nebula, Starlord kisses her, and she kicks him in the nuts. That’s it. We don’t see her again. She’s out there, somewhere, in 2023, having time jumped past her own death. (A seventh reality/timeline, by the way — 2018-Gamora is killed by Thanos in order to get the Soul Stone.) She’s not present with the other Guardians at Tony’s funeral.

Speaking of Tony’s funeral, who was that random guy standing by himself?

OK: Captain Marvel. Uh. Dud. I did not see that movie, but boy does Brie Larson suck the energy out of every scene she’s in. She has anti-charisma. She’s the anti-Robert Downey Jr. Anyway, apparently she’s superpowered and whatnot. She can fly and travel between planets in outer space without a spaceship. So, you know, she might be useful to take along on the time-travel mission. Nah. Let’s not even bother to contact her before we risk the very fabric of reality. It’s not like there was any great pressing need to go now. They’d already killed Thanos. They could have waited for her to come back to Earth.

In fact, she did show up, totally out of the blue, for the final battle. And, if you follow the timeline, you’ll realize that the final battle in 2023 is like, 20 minutes after they start their time travel mission. They’re only “gone” for like 10 seconds! They all leave 2023 at the same time to various times and then no matter how long it takes them to complete their mission, they all come back at the same time. So, for instance, Ant-Man comes back earlier with the Mind Stone (Loki’s scepter), and Tony and Cap take an extra day or two to recover the Space Stone, and they all return at the same moment, right after they all left initially. Again, like ten seconds later. They come back and they’re sad that Natasha sacrificed herself on Vormir, and then Smart Hulk brings back all the dusted people from 2018, but to 2023 not retroactively to 2018, because they don’t want to create an alternate reality (because they’re super concerned about that for some reason all of a sudden). And then 2014 Gamora brings Thanos through the time hole and the battle begins. Maybe it’s more than 20 minutes. At the very least, it’s the same day. Boom! Captain Marvel is there. Why didn’t they wait for her in the first place?

OK, so then there’s the big battle. I have no idea why Howard the Duck is there, but I guess he has to be to fulfill Dr. Strange’s prophecy. (????) Whatever, that’s just an Easter (Duck) Egg. Apparently Ant-Man can now be giant man for extended periods of time without falling asleep? Cool.

One of the most annoying scenes in Avengers: Infinity War was when the alien woman told Scarlet Witch that she would die alone and then Black Widow and Black Warrior Lady show up and say “She’s not alone!” Ooooh. Womyn power. This was described by one of the movie’s executive producers in a bonus feature about the Battle of Wakanda as “one of the most powerful moments in the movie.” Well, it wasn’t. It was stupid. So they decided to double-down on stupid in Endgame when Spider-Man hands off the gauntlet to Captain Marvel and says, “I don’t know how you’re going to get through them” (the alien army), and then all the women show up and say, “don’t worry, she’s not alone.” So stupid. So forced, so fake, so agenda-driven. Like, absolutely dumb level.

What else? Thor’s like, oh, I can’t be king anymore because I’m a drunk. I know, I’ll make Valkyrie the Queen, since it’s not like she’s a drunk or anything. 🤦‍♂️

Why is Peter Parker going back to high school? He just missed the past five years. Was his buddy also dusted that’s why he’s also still in high school? (I guess these questions are probably answered in Far From Home, but I haven’t seen it yet.)

Was Wong dusted? Because the Avengers probably could have used some magicians on their mission, too. But they don’t seem to have had any association with them 2018-2023.

Tony solves time travel in about 15 minutes. Gee, that’s convenient. 🙄

It comes back to time travel being stupid.

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  1. Judge Mental Member
    Judge Mental
    @JudgeMental

    They all come back at the same time regardless of when they left because their time-travel GPS’s were all set to the same return time.  It didn’t matter when they left, only when they arrived.  I mean, duh.

    • #1
  2. EB Thatcher
    EB
    @EB

    Time travel never makes sense.  You just have to accept it and go with the flow.  It’s not like it’s real, it’s just a movie.

    • #2
  3. The Great Adventure! Inactive
    The Great Adventure!
    @TheGreatAdventure

    I suppose one would have to actually… I dunno… maybe watch a superhero movie in order to critique it.  I don’t see the point in watching superhero movies and therefore don’t watch movies anymore since that’s the only thing Hollywood seems to make.

    • #3
  4. Jim Chase Member
    Jim Chase
    @JimChase

    Max Ledoux: Speaking of Tony’s funeral, who was that random guy standing by himself? 

    One of the most googled items after the movie.  It’s the kid from Tennessee in Iron Man 3.

    I’m not even going to try to convince you it was a “good” movie.

    But did I enjoy it?  Yes, I did. 

    • #4
  5. Miffed White Male Member
    Miffed White Male
    @MiffedWhiteMale

    Dude, it’s a comic book movie.

    But you’re absolutely right about Brie Larson (generally) and the grrrllll power scene (in particular).

     

    • #5
  6. Miffed White Male Member
    Miffed White Male
    @MiffedWhiteMale

    So let me get this straight.

    The movie is about a guy who destroys half of the life in the universe by snapping his fingers after he puts on a  glove that he made and attached five magic stones to.

    But the part that really bothers you is the time travel inconsistencies.

    • #6
  7. Judge Mental Member
    Judge Mental
    @JudgeMental

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    The movie is about a guy who destroys half of the life in the universe by snapping his fingers after he puts on a glove that he made and attached five magic stones to.

     

    That’s just completely ridiculous.  It’s six stones.

    • #7
  8. Gossamer Cat Coolidge
    Gossamer Cat
    @GossamerCat

    Have to agree with Max here.  I really wanted to like it.  After I saw it for the first time, I came away saying:  I have to say I did not like that movie at all.  Why, for the same reasons.  I thought the time travel solution was a muddled cop out and disliked the all-too-obvious PC elements.  Captain Marvel was pointless to the story except in a deus ex machina way at key moments when they needed an intervention.  I agree completely about Brie Larson having anti-charisma.  If they want that character to go anywhere, they need to get someone new. 

    I went again with a friend who hadn’t yet seen it to see whether I was just in a bad mood.  Some of the confusing things made a little more sense (if you didn’t pay attention to every line in the 3.5 hour movie you likely missed a critical explanation that tried to make sense of all the time travel rules and regulations).  But I really didn’t like it any better than the first time.  I didn’t feel it did justice to the characters that built the Marvel Movie Franchise:  Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk and Thor.  It made them old and tired.  I didn’t mind that they started out the movie that way, but I didn’t want them to end that way, particularly Thor. 

    When it was available on Amazon Prime, I briefly considered watching it again to see whether I may have been in a bad mood both previous times, but then decided not to waste any more money on it.  

    • #8
  9. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Judge Mental (View Comment):

    They all come back at the same time regardless of when they left because their time-travel GPS’s were all set to the same return time. It didn’t matter when they left, only when they arrived. I mean, duh.

    Yeah, I got that. That wasn’t the part that didn’t make sense. ;-)

    EB (View Comment):

    Time travel never makes sense. You just have to accept it and go with the flow. It’s not like it’s real, it’s just a movie.

    What was so great about the first Iron Man movie was that it was kind of believable. It was somewhat possible.

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    So let me get this straight.

    The movie is about a guy who destroys half of the life in the universe by snapping his fingers after he puts on a glove that he made and attached five magic stones to.

    But the part that really bothers you is the time travel inconsistencies.

    This type of argument never works for me. Just because something is fictional, doesn’t mean it shouldn’t make sense within the confines of its own fictional universe. 

    • #9
  10. Bryan G. Stephens Thatcher
    Bryan G. Stephens
    @BryanGStephens

    I enjoyed it.

    Since it is a comic book movie, I don’t worry too much about the impossible physics. Iron Man the movie was sort of real? Please. His landing in the desert would have killed him. Hit by a tank shell? Dead. Ran into an F22? Dead. 

    And Thanos, being a poor man’s Darkseid, is a Kirby-esque character. Kirby. If you want things to make sense, you are barking up the wrong tree. 

    It was a nice capstone to a 10 year run of movies I have mostly liked, and put to a great end my favorite Marvel hero of all time (even before the movies). 

    It was not a great movie. It was a fun one. 

    If you did not like it, I cannot change your mind. Tastes have nothing to do with reason. 

    • #10
  11. James Lileks Contributor
    James Lileks
    @jameslileks

    I was underwhelmed by the penultimate movie – too MUCH, too quippy, too many fights with no injuries. I decided to watch “Endgame” like a miniseries, in four sittings, and enjoyed it much more than I expected. Didn’t worry about the time-travel stuff. Final battle was not interminable. Wisconsin Thor was amusing. 

    Steve Rogers’ final “Avengers . . . assemble” got me much more than I would have thought. 

    I’ll take the whole MCU Iron / Cap / Avengers story over Star Wars any day, because the latter just kept squandering everything. 

    • #11
  12. ctlaw Coolidge
    ctlaw
    @ctlaw

    At the end of Infinity War, half of humanity was wiped out. Earth was probably a very un-fun place right after that. Probably a lot more people died of disease, malnutrition, war…

    1. did the snap bring back those who died in the interim?
    2. the planetary economy had presumably restabilized to support the lower number of people. How can it now handle a doubling of the population plus or minus?
    • #12
  13. Ed G. Member
    Ed G.
    @EdG

    Time travel debate aside, I think part of the problem is that endings are hard. First there is the audience not really wanting their immersion in this universe with these characters to end – especially when it’s all been done so well. Second, we’re watching because of the drama, excitement, adventure, and growth – downshifting to a different gear is just… different than what we’re used to. Third, there were dozens of characters and stories developed over dozens of movies – most of the characters became flattened out of necessity just to fit them all in when we had gotten used to experiencing them with some depth. 

    • #13
  14. OldPhil Coolidge
    OldPhil
    @OldPhil

    The Great Adventure! (View Comment):

    I suppose one would have to actually… I dunno… maybe watch a superhero movie in order to critique it. I don’t see the point in watching superhero movies and therefore don’t watch movies anymore since that’s the only thing Hollywood seems to make.

    Yeah, we’ve been to about 4 movies in the last 2 years. Not interested in cartoons or superheroes.

    • #14
  15. Miffed White Male Member
    Miffed White Male
    @MiffedWhiteMale

    OldPhil (View Comment):

    The Great Adventure! (View Comment):

    I suppose one would have to actually… I dunno… maybe watch a superhero movie in order to critique it. I don’t see the point in watching superhero movies and therefore don’t watch movies anymore since that’s the only thing Hollywood seems to make.

    Yeah, we’ve been to about 4 movies in the last 2 years. Not interested in cartoons or superheroes.

    And yet here you both are commenting on a thread about it.  

    It’s like the people who sniff that they don’t even own a TV when people are talking about a popular show.

    But at least you’re not a Vegan.

     

     

    • #15
  16. EB Thatcher
    EB
    @EB

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):
    It’s like the people who sniff that they don’t even own a TV when people are talking about a popular show.

    I have a friend like this who otherwise is a lovely woman.  But if several of us are commenting on a show, she’ll say virtuously, “I just don’t watch TV.”

    Well, we don’t watch everything on TV (which would be impossible.) But out of all the streaming available, about 10% is stuff that appeals to us.  So we watch TV.  And 10% of what’s available today is actually really more than we can watch, given that we do have lives.

    • #16
  17. The Great Adventure! Inactive
    The Great Adventure!
    @TheGreatAdventure

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    OldPhil (View Comment):

    The Great Adventure! (View Comment):

    I suppose one would have to actually… I dunno… maybe watch a superhero movie in order to critique it. I don’t see the point in watching superhero movies and therefore don’t watch movies anymore since that’s the only thing Hollywood seems to make.

    Yeah, we’ve been to about 4 movies in the last 2 years. Not interested in cartoons or superheroes.

    And yet here you both are commenting on a thread about it.

    It’s like the people who sniff that they don’t even own a TV when people are talking about a popular show.

    But at least you’re not a Vegan.

     

     

    Or a Crossfitter

    • #17
  18. Ed G. Member
    Ed G.
    @EdG

    I did enjoy the movie. I didn’t dwell on either the time travel or bit of intersectional pandering. Considering the near aging out of some of the actors (not to mention any  contract issues) and considering that this was the penultimate story, I think they wrapped up in a satisfying enough way. 

    Max, was there something you would have liked to happen differently?

    • #18
  19. TBA Coolidge
    TBA
    @RobtGilsdorf

    • #19
  20. Judge Mental Member
    Judge Mental
    @JudgeMental

    Time travel is simple.  You can’t go back in time and kill Hitler, because you didn’t go back in time and kill Hitler.  Unless of course it was in the bunker immediately before he ended up in the ditch on fire.

    • #20
  21. Bryan G. Stephens Thatcher
    Bryan G. Stephens
    @BryanGStephens

    Judge Mental (View Comment):

    Time travel is simple. You can’t go back in time and kill Hitler, because you didn’t go back in time and kill Hitler. Unless of course it was in the bunker immediately before he ended up in the ditch on fire.

    What if you go back and put in place a clone who otherwise acts just like Hitler?

    Actually,  they had a good answer,  which is that it causes separate universes. The Russo brothers official statement is that Steve got old in an alternative time line and when Peggy died, he came back.

    • #21
  22. Valiuth Member
    Valiuth
    @Valiuth

    James Lileks (View Comment):

    I was underwhelmed by the penultimate movie – too MUCH, too quippy, too many fights with no injuries. I decided to watch “Endgame” like a miniseries, in four sittings, and enjoyed it much more than I expected. Didn’t worry about the time-travel stuff. Final battle was not interminable. Wisconsin Thor was amusing.

    Steve Rogers’ final “Avengers . . . assemble” got me much more than I would have thought.

    I’ll take the whole MCU Iron / Cap / Avengers story over Star Wars any day, because the latter just kept squandering everything.

    I thought Infinity War was a better movie than Endgame mostly because despite its vast cast it actually kept a rather tight focus on Thanos. While Endgame had a bit of the indulgent victory lap feel to it. As Basel Exposition reminded us in Austin Powers 2 it is best not to worry about how time travel works. 

    And I sadly agree, Star Wars has been a slow motion fumble, which will apparently be handed off to the two idiots that wrote the last two season of Game of Thrones. Basically guaranteeing further disappointment. While the MCU has been a rip roaring success pumping out solid entertaining movies that promised a big pay of and which in the end managed to stick their landing. The MCU is the full comic book experience in movie form. Periodic adventures of individual heroes with seasonal teamups and crossovers, culminating in a giant sized special edition story. And now that Disney bought Fox Studios I will finally get me some Fantastic Four. I’m as happy as a nerd can be. 

    • #22
  23. Valiuth Member
    Valiuth
    @Valiuth

    Bryan G. Stephens (View Comment):

    Judge Mental (View Comment):

    Time travel is simple. You can’t go back in time and kill Hitler, because you didn’t go back in time and kill Hitler. Unless of course it was in the bunker immediately before he ended up in the ditch on fire.

    What if you go back and put in place a clone who otherwise acts just like Hitler?

    Actually, they had a good answer, which is that it causes separate universes. The Russo brothers official statement is that Steve got old in an alternative time line and when Peggy died, he came back.

    The multiverse theory solves all paradox issues, because you are never really altering any time line. You are simply selecting the one you like. Of course with the multiverse theory, you don’t actually need to return any of the items.  

    • #23
  24. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    ctlaw (View Comment):

    At the end of Infinity War, half of humanity was wiped out. Earth was probably a very un-fun place right after that. Probably a lot more people died of disease, malnutrition, war…

    1. did the snap bring back those who died in the interim?
    2. the planetary economy had presumably restabilized to support the lower number of people. How can it now handle a doubling of the population plus or minus?

    Also, at the beginning of Endgame, Cap is participating in a support group for people having a hard time with the loss of loved ones. In a cameo, the movie’s co-director Joe Russo is a gay man in the group saying “I went on a date last night.” He says his date cried during the salad and he cried over dessert. So let’s assume both of these men lost their partners in the snap. “But I’m seeing him again tomorrow,” he says. Cap says, we all lost people but we have to move on. Obviously, in the five year span, people moved on and got remarried and, like Tony and Pepper, had children. Now their old spouses have suddenly returned. 

    • #24
  25. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Judge Mental (View Comment):

    Time travel is simple. You can’t go back in time and kill Hitler, because you didn’t go back in time and kill Hitler. Unless of course it was in the bunker immediately before he ended up in the ditch on fire.

    See, this is my view of time. If time travel is possible, then you can’t change what happened in the past because you already did what ever it was that you did in the past even if you haven’t gotten there yet in your own future. 

     

    • #25
  26. ctlaw Coolidge
    ctlaw
    @ctlaw

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):
    Now their old spouses have suddenly returned.

    So after the Endgame snap, Larry King’s alimony load doubles…

    • #26
  27. Gossamer Cat Coolidge
    Gossamer Cat
    @GossamerCat

    Valiuth (View Comment):

    Bryan G. Stephens (View Comment):

    Judge Mental (View Comment):

    Time travel is simple. You can’t go back in time and kill Hitler, because you didn’t go back in time and kill Hitler. Unless of course it was in the bunker immediately before he ended up in the ditch on fire.

    What if you go back and put in place a clone who otherwise acts just like Hitler?

    Actually, they had a good answer, which is that it causes separate universes. The Russo brothers official statement is that Steve got old in an alternative time line and when Peggy died, he came back.

    The multiverse theory solves all paradox issues, because you are never really altering any time line. You are simply selecting the one you like. Of course with the multiverse theory, you don’t actually need to return any of the items.

    Which I think was one of the main failings of the movie.  There was no tension because there were no consequences if you got anything wrong, you just started a new time line.  Which is why I found it boring.

    • #27
  28. OldPhil Coolidge
    OldPhil
    @OldPhil

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    OldPhil (View Comment):

    The Great Adventure! (View Comment):

    I suppose one would have to actually… I dunno… maybe watch a superhero movie in order to critique it. I don’t see the point in watching superhero movies and therefore don’t watch movies anymore since that’s the only thing Hollywood seems to make.

    Yeah, we’ve been to about 4 movies in the last 2 years. Not interested in cartoons or superheroes.

    And yet here you both are commenting on a thread about it.

    It’s like the people who sniff that they don’t even own a TV when people are talking about a popular show.

    But at least you’re not a Vegan.

     

     

    Thanks for filling us in on the rules for commenting on Ricochet.

    • #28
  29. Miffed White Male Member
    Miffed White Male
    @MiffedWhiteMale

    OldPhil (View Comment):

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    OldPhil (View Comment):

    The Great Adventure! (View Comment):

    I suppose one would have to actually… I dunno… maybe watch a superhero movie in order to critique it. I don’t see the point in watching superhero movies and therefore don’t watch movies anymore since that’s the only thing Hollywood seems to make.

    Yeah, we’ve been to about 4 movies in the last 2 years. Not interested in cartoons or superheroes.

    And yet here you both are commenting on a thread about it.

    It’s like the people who sniff that they don’t even own a TV when people are talking about a popular show.

    But at least you’re not a Vegan.

     

     

    Thanks for filling us in on the rules for commenting on Ricochet.

    Not a “rule”, just interesting that you’re “not interested in cartoons or superheroes”, but still had enough interest to read the post, all of the comments, and then take the time to put up a comment letting us all know about how much you’re not interested.

    You know what I do when I’m not interested in  something?  I don’t read about it or comment on it.  I also don’t waste my time telling the people who are interested in the topic how uninteresting it is.

    I guess I’m funny that way.

     

    • #29
  30. OldPhil Coolidge
    OldPhil
    @OldPhil

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    OldPhil (View Comment):

    Miffed White Male (View Comment):

    OldPhil (View Comment):

    The Great Adventure! (View Comment):

    I suppose one would have to actually… I dunno… maybe watch a superhero movie in order to critique it. I don’t see the point in watching superhero movies and therefore don’t watch movies anymore since that’s the only thing Hollywood seems to make.

    Yeah, we’ve been to about 4 movies in the last 2 years. Not interested in cartoons or superheroes.

    And yet here you both are commenting on a thread about it.

    It’s like the people who sniff that they don’t even own a TV when people are talking about a popular show.

    But at least you’re not a Vegan.

     

     

    Thanks for filling us in on the rules for commenting on Ricochet.

    Not a “rule”, just interesting that you’re “not interested in cartoons or superheroes”, but still had enough interest to read the post, all of the comments, and then take the time to put up a comment letting us all know about how much you’re not interested.

    You know what I do when I’m not interested in something? I don’t read about it or comment on it. I also don’t waste my time telling the people who are interested in the topic how uninteresting it is.

    I guess I’m funny that way.

     

    You are spending a lot of time on something you don’t like (I heard that somewhere…).

    • #30
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