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#say what you will about endgame but they at least made loki in the flashback scene look and feel exactly like Avengers!Loki
bedlamsbard · 3 months
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🌟 for The Horizon Line
Oooh, let's do one of the Endgame prologue flashbacks from Chapter 6! Mostly because this is a scene I really like and it's not one that people tend to comment on.
Then
This is one of the chapters that has an alternating "then-now" structure, and it's the first of two (the other one is 16) to flip very quickly. This is the second of three flashback sequences in Horizon that come directly out of the Endgame prologue (a.k.a. the 2018 part of Endgame, not the 2023 part). I do a fair amount of rewriting canon scenes; it's always an interesting experience. I get to know that scene really well and I tend to find out how difficult it is to translate between mediums.
“Oh no,” Rocket said.
Steve stared down at the gauntlet with his expression gone completely blank – not even horror, just a kind of flat incomprehension that any of this was happening. Natasha heard the faint sound she made only after she had made it, a faint stunned gasp like a wounded animal, and even then was wondering who it had come from before she felt the ache in her own throat.
Steve's behavior in this scene and throughout Endgame is really interesting, because especially in the 2018 scenes he's very blank. And Chris Evans is generally pretty expression (so much of Steve's excellent Avengers characterization is carried out through microexpressions rather than what Steve's actually saying), so his blankness in this sequence is interesting. One of the things I have to do when I'm rewriting a canon sequence is basically add in the character interpretation that may or may not be there onscreen.
The Infinity Stones weren’t there. Nothing was there, just empty, blackened hollows where Natasha still remembered the Stones gleaming the last time she had seen Thanos, energy running in multi-colored rivulets up his arm before he had snapped his fingers.
“Where are they?” Steve said, his voice so toneless that it was nearly a statement
The only response was a low groan, until Carol tightened her grip on Thanos’s throat and hissed, “Answer the question.”
“The universe required correction,” Thanos said, his voice coming out in harsh gasps of pain. “After that, the Stones served no purpose beyond temptation.”
“You murdered trillions!” Bruce said, and shoved him with both hands. The Hulkbuster’s strength threw him backwards, making Carol lose her grip and knocking Rhodey out of the way.
Thanos pushed himself up onto his remaining elbow and said, “You should be grateful.”
This sequence is directly out of canon, dialogue and action. Also Thanos's dialogue is a nightmare to write, especially pulling it straight from canon -- I noticed this when I was writing the Thor flashbacks in Morning too. He doesn't have a very natural cadence, and it makes hard to put into prose vs. onscreen.
Bruce lunged for him again, but Loki’s hand closed on his wrist, his heels digging divots into the floor as Bruce strained against him; the Hulkbuster might be able to beat the crap out of the Hulk, but apparently couldn’t move an Asgardian who had decided not to be moved. Loki released Bruce a moment later and put the blade of his polearm under Thanos’s chin. “Be careful,” he said softly, “not to speak of gratitude again.”
The scene diverges here with Loki's involvement. In canon Bruce keeps beating up Thanos until Natasha asks about the Stones.
Note that the Hulkbuster is not at the Hulk's strength, at least going up against an Asgardian.
Natasha walked around Bruce’s massive form so that she could see Thanos, resisting the urge to start screaming and not stop, but there was an unfamiliar tremor in her voice as she forced herself to say, “Where are the Stones?”
Pulling character interpretations from what's onscreen again; Nat's less blank than Steve is. She's also trembling in that scene, which is a detail I like.
“Gone,” Thanos said. From his expression, he had no idea who she was. “Reduced to atoms.”
Does Thanos actually know who Natasha is? Open question, never confirmed one way or another by canon; canon really only identifies that he knows who Tony is and not any of the other Avengers.
“You used them two days ago!” Bruce said.
“I used the Stones to destroy the Stones,” Thanos said, and gestured at the damaged gauntlet, ignoring the way the razor-sharp blade of Loki’s polearm opened a thin line on the underside of his chin. “It nearly killed me, but the work is done. It always will be. I am –”
“If you say ‘inevitable,’ I will cleave your head from your body,” Loki said.
Canon divergence: in canon Thanos finishes his line, here Loki interrupts him.
“We have to tear this place apart,” Rhodey said, his voice shaking. “He has to be lying –”
“My father is many things,” Nebula said. “A liar is not one of them.” She flicked a look at Loki anyway, as if asking for confirmation, and he gave her the tiniest headshake in response. God of lies, Natasha remembered, very distantly; maybe it meant something other than just another title. It didn’t seem very important right now.
Loki and Nebula have an interesting relationship and this hints at some of the places it's been in the past. Loki, walking lie detector.
Thanos looked from one of them to the other, as if seeing Loki for the first time, and made an expression that wasn’t quite a smile. “My daughter,” he said to Nebula, and then, to Loki, “My son.”
Divergence. In canon he says, "Ah. Thank you, daughter. Perhaps I treated you too harshly." Thor kills Thanos immediately after his addresses Nebula in canon.
“My parents were Odin and Frigga of Asgard,” Loki said, soft and dangerous. “I’d think you’d remember it, since a son of Odin was what you decided you wanted more than another child of yours.”
Loki, who just lost his entire family, is having none of this. I don't think all of Loki's backstory with Thanos has come out in any of my Yonderverse writing, but it is revealed in Morning, and I use the same backstory between universes. Loki started as part of the Black Order, one of the Children of Thanos, during a period of time when he wasn't using his own name (Nebula uses his Black Order name in the Horizon 3 flashback), but when Thanos found out that he was Odin's son he decided Loki was more useful as a way to get into the Nine Realms to get the Tesseract (with the later intention of getting the Reality Stone).
This time Thanos’s expression was definitely a smile. “And where did it bring you? Back to me.”
This line is from 2014 Thanos in Endgame, not 2023 Thanos. 2014 Thanos uses it in Yonder 4, too. (I do think Thanos's dialogue is pretty overwrought, but sometimes it works.)
“To kill you,” Loki said bluntly. “I don’t care about the Stones. I don’t have anyone to bring back. You made certain of that before the culling.”
Loki straight-up is just here for the murder because as far as he knows all of Asgard is dead. As is revealed later on in the scene, he has no way of knowing that any of the Asgardians made it off the Statesman and has been operating on the assumption they didn't. He also doesn't really care about the Snap at all because he doesn't have anyone left to lose.
“Wait – wait, Loki, hang on –” Bruce said hastily. “You don’t know that he’s not lying, the Stones have to be here –”
“No,” Nebula said. “All my life, my father has only ever wanted one thing, and having achieved it –”
“They are beyond the reach of any living thing,” Thanos said. “As they should be. The work is done,” he repeated. “And it cannot be undone.”
This is added dialogue for this scene and isn't from the original canon scene, since Thanos is dead by this point in the canonical scene.
“Loki, get out of the way,” Steve said abruptly.
They all turned to look at him, startled; even Loki’s gaze flickered away from Thanos for an instant. Steve stripped his shields off and dropped them to the floor with a clatter as he took a step forwards, his fists clenched.
This is actually my favorite part of this sequence -- Steve planning to beat Thanos to death with his bare hands. I give Steve a lot more sharp edges than I think most writers do and I am here for his violent tendencies, which are pretty consistent throughout the MCU; it's really just Endgame where it's not there, because he's so muted throughout the film. (I read Endgame!Steve as being very, very depressed, though functional, which I think I've talked about somewhere.) It was important to me that it was his bare hands too, which is why he takes off the Wakandan shields for it.
Loki raised his free hand, green-gold glimmering on his fingertips. “No,” he said. “Your right to vengeance is not greater than mine.”
Loki about to get into it with Steve over who has a better right to beat Thanos to death.
“You should be grateful to me, Asgardian,” Thanos said. “Is this not what you wanted? Is kingship not what you claimed when the Chitauri’s claws were at your throat? The rightful king of Asgard, king once more?”
Hints of Loki's backstory with Thanos and the Chitauri here, touching on whatever happened immediately prior to The Avengers and calling back to Loki's conversations with The Other there.
Loki looked back at him and put his head a little to the side, his teeth showing like a wolf’s. “You murdered my brother,” he said. “You slaughtered my people. You scoured Asgard root and stem from the branches of the World Tree and you speak to me of kingship? King of ashes and atoms, shattered bone and spilled blood, spread out across the stars where you hunted us? I would kill you for Thor alone, but the blood-debt you owe my people can never be paid in full.”
"Ashes and atoms" is a callback to what Loki says during the coronation sequence in Chapter 1: "Asgard is ashes and atoms."
“I took only what I was owed,” Thanos said. “You should never have tried to keep the Tesseract from me.”
“I owed you nothing then and I owe you nothing now,” Loki said, “save a death that will be far quicker than those you gave my brother and my people. And when I’m done, may the spirits of all Asgard stand forth to rip you to shreds on your passage through the great void of Ginnungagap.”
Yonderverse Loki gets very formal and traditional about Asgard in a way that most of my other Lokis don't, because his whole thing is that there was literally nothing left, and he has to be all of Asgard and the Asgardian royal family. Without him the Asgardians likely wouldn't have survived as Asgardians and he's extremely cognizant of that in a way that Thor isn't in the main line canon -- probably because Thor has never really had to think very hard about his own identity and what's important to him as an Asgardian, and Loki has. Thor doesn't have to decide whether or not to be an Asgardian and Loki does.
"I owed you nothing then and I owe you nothing now" is an echo of something Loki says to Proxima Midnight in Yonder 5: "I owe the Chitauri nothing and I owe you less."
“‘All’ Asgard?” Thanos echoed him, and smiled, the scarring on the left side of his face making the expression even more dreadful than it might have been normally. “I destroyed only those who came between me and what was rightfully mine. I am not unkind, my son. Those that fled rather than fight a losing battle, I allowed to escape.”
Until now Loki didn't know that the other Asgardians had survived. Endgame never addresses how Thor finds out or what his reaction is, but it's pretty vital for how Yonderverse Loki is, so it has to be on the page.
Loki’s eyes went huge.
“Oh, god, they’re alive,” Bruce said, sounding stunned. “Oh, god – the Asgardians in the escape pods – the Valkyrie and all the others, all the kids –”
Bruce didn't know either, of course -- remember that he was on the Statesman too.
Loki dropped his polearm and lunged forward, twisting his fists in the front of the Titan’s shirt. “Where are they?” he shouted. “Where are my people?”
First sign that Loki might have something to live for other than vengeance because at this point he really didn't believe that he did.
This sequence is interspersed with the Atlanta operation in the present day -- the last operation the Avengers did as a team and the first operation they're doing as a team post-Snap. I actually do write these as they appear in the chapter, which is to say that I alternate between writing the flashback sequence and the present-day sequence, rather than writing all of one and all of the other and then stitching them together. For me, this makes the transitions between past and present really snappy and lets them flow thematically from one to the other -- the next scene after this is Natasha going after what she believes is Clint (Sir Not Appearing In This Story), and reveal of the Hulk-Widow that closes out that scene leads directly into Loki's shock about the surviving Asgardians that opens the next.
One thing I struggle with in rewrites of canon scenes is that very often the ones I'm rewriting are big multi-character scenes where a lot of the characters are simply not doing anything most of the time and this is one of them. Despite being a Natasha POV scene, she really doesn't have any input past the opening, which does stand out to me on reread. She's also not doing anything in the canon scene. (And I'd bet there's a high chance that when they filmed the scene, all of the actors were not there and it's just stitched together because Endgame did a lot of that.) It's one of those places where I can either add in the character having more interaction in that scene, which I do back in the Chapter 3 flashback with Tony's arrival, because Natasha doesn't say anything in that scene in Endgame but does have dialogue in my version or just live with it and hope it doesn't show too much.
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newlanecinema · 1 year
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2023 media diary! week 1: January 1st - 7th
Read
FUNNY YOU SHOULD ASK by Elissa Sussman (up to page 170)
the thing about this is that it's really fun! the journalist/ celebrity dynamic is a treacherous one to walk down because these stories tend to feel like fanfic , but i think what sets sussman apart is that she has a keen understanding of what we find compelling about leading men and why we form parasocial relationships with them, etc.
also gabe parker has been hard to fancast in my head because in the ten years earlier section of the book he has matthew mcconaughey in how to lose a guy in ten days vibes and then 10 years later he has clooney in oceans 11 vibes. the only modern star that i think has either of those energies is austin butler, and i think it would be fun if austin butler goes from (most likely) getting an oscar nomination to starring in a cutesy rom com.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: BEYOND Vol. 1
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: A WORLD WITHOUT LOVE
WEST COAST AVENGERS: BEST COAST
Watched
movies
first watch: koyaanisqatsi, after hours, M3GAN
i need more time to think about all of these. they are very good!
rewatched: bridget jones's diary, chicago, titanic, avengers: endgame
my biggest film bro quality is that i rewatched titanic and chicago for my eternal loves john c. reilly, who should've won an oscar for his cellophane and bill paxton who should've won an oscar for looking so hot with highlights and that little hoop earring.
shows
hawkeye
i started this back in 2021 and just wasnt feeling it cause it made me wish we could have a more faithful adaptation of the matt fraction hawkeye series. anyway, as mentioned earlier in this post i've been reading the thomspon/carelli west coast avengers run and really enjoying it and that was enough to get me to finish the show. its sweet and funny and the steinfeld/pugh dynamic is the most exciting part of marvel's future.
something i will say is that i have a small, external understanding of american sign language and deaf culture because i took ASL as my language in high school and i was part of the american sign language club that went on field trips around town to do be interpreters at school performances/ graduations. i was absolutely thrilled that they successfully brought Echo into the fold and she is so beloved. but something about how her scenes were filmed rubbed me the wrong way. when characters spoke in sign language, they frequently cut away from the actors who were signing in the middle of a sentence. they cut to flashbacks, and different characters, which happens all the time in film and television because it tends to make a conversation between two people more engaging. but it bothered me in these scenes, and my least charitable reading of these moments is that they were trying to make a show with a deaf character that doesnt alienate people who dont understand sign language.
all that being said, i enjoyed it. of the marvel disney plus shows, wandavision is my number one, and then loki and hawkeye are probably tied at second, and then everything else blends together.
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iamnmbr3 · 3 years
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I liked WandaVision and The Falcon and The Winter Soldier but I’m really nervous for Loki. I’m honestly worried that they’ll mess up his character.
I haven’t actually watched WandaVision or The Falcon & The Winter Soldier but yeah same re Loki. I certainly hope the show does him justice but it’s not a great sign that so far most of the scenes in the trailers feel wildly out of character and tonally inappropriate. I’m also concerned because despite the fact that the show isn’t even out yet, I’ve already noticed a ton of seeming plot holes just based on the trailers (I say “seeming” because it is technically possible the show might explain some of them and I want to be fair). 
This has never happened to me before. Even when a movie has a lot of plot issues, you usually can’t tell just based on the trailer. I’ve never watched a trailer and been like “plot hole!” and yet that’s been happening constantly with this, which makes me feel that the writers didn’t really research the character or the world that carefully. Every clip just leaves me scratching my head over questions like:
Why is Loki's hair a different length when he is captured and brought in if this is picking up immediately after Avengers? Why is the stack of papers of everything Loki has ever said so small if he's 1500+ years old? How does Mobius know everything about him if the papers only have Loki's side of the conversation? If Mobius also watched footage of Loki's life, how did he have time to watch it all if Loki is over a thousand years old? Why is Loki being blamed for breaking the timeline but not the Avengers? If he knows everything about him why doesn't Mobius acknowledge the fact that Loki was tortured and mind controlled by Thanos? Why are Loki's speech patterns, body language, demeanor, and apparent mental state so different from how he was in Avengers and TDW even though this show takes place in the same time period? Why does Mobius say Loki has destroyed worlds when that hasn't happened? Why didn’t the TVA arrest any of the Avengers? If the TVA is a serious organization and views Loki as a threat why is Mobius’s humor in the “talky-talky” scene so childish and reminiscent of a bad comedy for middle schoolers? If he's read everything Loki ever said, why does Mobius say Loki likes to lie when the whole reason Thor trusted him in Thor 2011 was because for most of Loki’s 1000+ years of life he wasn’t habitually dishonest? And again how can Loki be accused of affecting time when he stole the space stone (not the time stone!) due to the actions of the Avengers (who DID use the time stone)!? 
And why are there so many apparent inconsistencies and issues just based on the trailer?! l
#even by MCU standards that's a lot of plot holes. the head writer hasn't written for the mcu before and it feels like he didn't really#care about learning about it and just came up with a plot idea and then plugged loki into an existing character slot#without considering any of the context of the larger world or that specific character#the hair thing concerns me the most in some ways because that was something so easy to get right and yet it feels like they just forgot#say what you will about endgame but they at least made loki in the flashback scene look and feel exactly like Avengers!Loki#tv!loki feels like a totally different character#hopefully im wrong tho and based on audience feedback they will tweak the characterization and what scenes they use in the final cut#this show has so much potential and I really want it to be good#Also I don't want to hear any 'wait until it's out yet before you dare to have an opinion!' condescending remarks. nobody is saying that to#people who are excited. can u imagine being all 'why are you so excited. it's just a trailer. u don't know what the show is like. stop being#hyped!' no of course not. because that would be weird. similarly it is ok for people to feel negative emotion based on the trailer#disagreeing with me is totally fine. but sending me harassing notes in my inbox is not(already had to block some people)#everyone is welcome to their opinion as long as they can be respectful about it#and nobody will be more delighted than I if my concerns all turn out to be unfounded#asks#loki tv series#Marvel#MCU#Loki#loki tv series negativity
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It’s insane how Tony stans make everything about his trauma. Both my parents never said they loved me (he at least had a loving mom) so I know how much it hurts. But that doesn’t excuse him treating Steve badly because he was Howard’s friend. Steve didn’t know him when he was a dad, he had no control over how much Howard talked about him. I understand Tony holding some resent, but his stans shit on Steve for backtalking to Tony. Steve was fresh out of the ice in that movie. He recently watched his best friend die, lost the love of his life Peggy, and is in a new century. Howard died 10 yrs ago. Steve had more of a right to be upset and emotional with how Tony was treating him. And I hate they dedicated IM 3 to Tony’s PTSD from New York. Only Tony gets to have it? That just fueled his stans to hate on Steve for “treating their poor ptsd baby rudely in Avengers”
It's funny that they think his trauma validates and justifies everything he does then in the same breath will claim Bucky must have a redemption arc after what he did as the Winter Soldier (even though he was forced to do it and he's a victim) or that Loki deserves to be humiliated and punched because he invaded NYC.
Some characters are allowed to move on from the mistakes they have made, others are forever defined by them.
I hate Stark but I can understand he was a traumatized character and yeah the invasion messed with him, but the thing is it messed with everyone. The difference is he got an entire movie where it was discussed and shown more than once just how much it had affected him. The other characters however never did.
Steve was retrieved from the ice, taken to a cabin (AoS canon here) then told that aliens existed and he was expected to return to the fight in a span of a few weeks. No regard or consideration for his mental health, Fury shows up in the middle of a PTSD episode with a mission. Where are the scenes of him getting used to the present, mourning his past and his life, and Bucky and the Howlies? Oh yeah, in the deleted scenes. And as if that wasn't bad enough he has to put up with this stranger, the son of a man he used to know decades ago, acting all sassy and standoffish and overall insufferable towards him for no freaking reason.
I want to make it clear that trauma isn't a competition and you don't need to invalidate one's trauma to lift another's but Marvel's decision to only focus on one character's pain while ignoring the others is what leads to this: people being mad because Steve wasn't all smiles at Stark even when he was being insufferably rude to him.
What of Steve's pain? Why did we never see any flashbacks to his life, a scene with his parents, we never got to see Sarah! We don't know anything about Steve's past besides he was skinny and sick, Bucky was his friend and he wanted to join the army. For someone who has a whole damn movie based in the 40's they sure didn't explore who he was all that well. And to add insult to injury his 3rd movie wasn't even about him to begin with.
I feel the stans who say that basically repeat what Marvel proved time and time again, that whatever Stark says is the gospel and ultimately ends up being right. What else when he gives a Hydra speech in Endgame talking about "precious freedoms" as if civil rights were frivolous things we should give up every now and then and no one corrects him? Or when he creates Edith and gives the glasses to a kid and the entire movie is about who gets to own those glasses instead of making a point in saying that they shouldn't exist in the first place, that Stark shouldn't have created them?
I get trying to explain and contextualize characters, I do it all the time. But there's that and there's justifying every action they make under "he had ptsd". Look, as rude as this might sound, I don't care. He was an adult, he could have gotten help, he should have worked on that but he didn't.
He had no right to be mad at Steve for Howard's bad parenting or apparent obsession with him, and this take that Steve should have stayed quiet and put up with whatever bullshit Stark would throw at him? Yeah I don't think so.
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FILM | Black Widow [2021, dir. Cate Shortland]
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I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for the character of Black Widow. She was the only female hero – at least in the early days of the MCU’s Avengers films – amongst a sea of men. She kicked ass without super or godly powers, she had a mysterious past before her days with S.H.I.E.L.D. There were a plethora of details that made her interesting. So the fact that it took so long for her receive her own film is blasphemous to begin with. Through the media’s hype before the film’s official release, and the claims made about Black Widow’s place in the MCU, I believe my expectations going into viewing the film were more than they should have been, and that plays a big part in why I am less than pleased with the final result.
Don’t get me wrong, I am still incredibly glad that Black Widow received her own film because you’re damn straight she deserves it, but if you’re going to declare that it will be explaining Budapest, explaining the Red Room and the creation of the Widows, explaining more of Natasha’s past (and if it was not declared as such, it’s still what we as viewers would have wanted after all this time)... Needless to say, I would have preferred an actual origins film instead of whatever this was. It’s placement as a little blip between Civil War and Infinity War, as a “What was Nat up to?” sort of thing, felt ill-placed in the MCU timeline, especially since an epilogue scene puts her amidst the period of Infinity War (as shown with her short blonde hair), and the after-credits scene jumps even further forward in time to post-Endgame. Sure, there were scenes that took place in Budapest during Black Widow, but what happened there previously and any interaction with Clint before she became part of S.H.I.E.L.D. was only briefly (and I mean VERY BRIEFLY) mentioned in a short passing scene. The Red Room and how Natasha became a Widow, still only touched on in mere moments during an opening sequence, nothing more than what we’ve seen in previous Avengers films (i.e. Age of Ultron’s flashback scenes). But her time as part of the KGB? Any interaction with the Winter Soldier? Completely absent. Black Widow, unfortunately, failed in my perspective to do anything other than bring her back together with her old “family” and then, with them, merely going through a bunch of a big budget fight/escape scenes with the bad guys. When I then also read that director Cate Shortland had no experience directing budget action films, I came to the realization that Black Widow did rely a great deal on fantastical visuals to distract from the limited story, and it didn’t even do it that well. Instead of a true glimpse into the past of a most tight-lipped Avenger, we get another bang-bang-shoot-’em-up action movie to add more red to her ledger. Every male Avenger got better story treatment, over a series of films no less, than Natasha in her one and probably only standalone tale. Long story short: sure, they gave Black Widow a film, but they still did her reaaaal dirty.
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Despite its incredible shortcomings, I’m still trying hard to like it. I want to like it, and enjoy what I was given. The humor throughout the film, especially from David Harbor’s Alexei Shostakov (a.k.a. the very obvious comedic relief character), was entertaining; Rachel Weisz has not seemed to age at all and it was great to see her amongst the action as mother figure and badass scientist Melina Vostokoff. But we all know the true shining star of Black Widow other than Scarlett Johansson in her final role as Natasha... was that of Florence Pugh as “baby sister” Yelena Belova. Although I was admittedly fond of Florence before seeing Black Widow, she was quite outstanding as Yelena and her chemistry with Scarlett undeniable; I really did like her in this role. It’s really no surprise that they will be/are making way for her and her character to become a bigger part of future MCU entertainment. I’m not complaining there. AND... although I was hoping for more, I also cannot complain about any “easter eggs” or commentary from Black Widow that connect it to the other films, because that’s truthfully my favorite part of the MCU as a whole – the way that everything is so intricately connected. I can’t help but smile when they make references spanning 13+ years; their dedication to that is really what makes them successful.
Was I disappointed? Yes. I won’t lie. Almost every good scene was shown in the trailers (the film itself just providing more context), and I think there was only one twist I didn’t see coming. But so much, even the details from the film itself, were poorly explained, if explained at all. I shouldn’t have had to research or come across information when reading various items on the internet to clarify as many details that I did. I shouldn’t have had to know information from the comics (which I have not read) to fill in some of the blanks. The MCU even claimed that you would not have to watch their shows in order to understand the films, when in actuality the final end-credit scene makes a helluva lot more sense if you had. Granted, I would watch the shows regardless, I just would have liked to know that I should have watched The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and/or Loki first instead of, say, Googling who the heck Valentina Allegra de Fontaine is.
Black Widow, on IMDb alone – I don’t dare venture further out into the Internet for this one – is flooded with poor reviews, and it really does pain me the amount of truth contained in the few I skimmed. Florence Pugh carried the film; Natasha was a sidekick in her own movie; Taskmaster (who I don’t know enough to say anything about here) was ruined... but the thing that bothers me most, as one reviewer stated perfectly, is that this is “the first MCU film I’ve hated, and I’m shook.”
I wouldn’t go all the way to “hate” per se, as I'll always love Marvel and the cinematic universe it has built, but... Me too, buddy. Me too.
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bestofblackwidow · 3 years
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The "Let me go - it's okay," she told him the last time we saw the Black Widow, it was - to say the least - emotional. "Let me go - it's okay," she said to Hawkeye, plunging to her death on the arid planet Sleeping in Avengers: Endgame for the ultimate sacrifice to save the world. While the deaths in the Marvel Cinematic Universe go on - sorry, Iron Man - there was probably no more heart-stopping moment, since the former SHIELD spy who became Avenger gave her life to recover the Soul Stone.
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Still, it left the MCU in a bind. For years, a Black Widow film had been mooted, right back to 2004 at Lions Gate Entertainment before the rights reverted to Marvel. When Scarlett Johansson first appeared as Natasha Romanoff - the former KGB assassin with a very particular set of skills - in 2010's Iron Man 2, it didn't take long before questions were asked about a solo outing. Marvel Studios conductor Kevin Feige even held discussions with Johansson, who was then only 25. But there was a caveat, he said. "The Avengers comes first."
While others - Thor, Captain America, Black Panther and even Ant-Man - had their moments in the spotlight, the Black Widow was forced to wait. And wait. And wait. Not that Johansson thought that her character demanded the same treatment; if she was going to be in front of a Marvel movie, there had to be a reason. "Is there anything exciting to do creatively, as an actor?" she says. “Will we be able to do something extraordinary and strong? And something that stands on its own? "It's what makes the independent Black Widow an intriguing prospect: an inauguration of Phase 4 of the MCU promises to step back in time before her dramatic death to answer the provocative questions that still hover over her Crucially, the script transports audiences back to the events right after Captain America: Civil War, after that huge internal confrontation of the Avengers.
Without relatives or an organization that employs her, the Black Widow is alone, says Johansson. "It gave us the opportunity to really show her when she's kind of out of her game, you know? Because of that, anything was possible." The actress was there "from the start" at the script meetings, as they began to figure out how to delve into Romanoff's origins. "You are trying to map all of this ... which is extremely stressful," she laughs, "because there are no guidelines."
Fortunately, Johansson was not alone. In another inspired choice for the MCU canon, Feige recruited Australian director Cate Shortland, best known for discreet dramas like Somersault and Lore. While she was surprised, Shortland was encouraged by the creative freedom that Marvel was offering. “They allowed me to be myself and encouraged me to make a movie that I was passionate about,” she says. "We were allowed to have a lot of nuances and make a character-oriented film."
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After several Skype sessions with Johansson, who also receives producer credit, Shortland worked with a Russian researcher to embody Romanoff's dark story: "the red in my ledger", as she told Loki in 2012 in Os Avengers. As she sings in the trailer, "We have to go back to where it all started" - the promising teaser clips of Romanoff as a young man (played by Ever Anderson, daughter of Paul WS Anderson and Milla Jovovich) in a childhood that seems far from idyllic. That's what makes Black Widow a family reunion of the kind that only Marvel would have the courage to conjure. Joining Romanoff is Yelena Belova, a sister-sister and fellow murderer who trained alongside her in the so-called Red Room, the punitive Soviet facility that produced 'Black Widow' spies.
"Their stories intersect," promises Shortland. "They clash." Played by Lady Macbeth's British star Florence Pugh, Belova is more than a physical match for Romanoff. Still, emotionally is where it really matters. "What Yelena does is kind of point to Natasha's pain," says Pugh. “She is part of Natasha's story. And I think that's why we have an opportunity to look at Natasha's story, because Yelena has been knocking on the door and says, 'Hey, let's deal with this pain. ”As Johansson comments, Belova is not just a carbon copy of his own character.
"She is completely alone. She is strong and different. She is so different (from) Natasha." Beside them are Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz) and Alexei Shostakov (David Harbor), two father figures whose own stories intertwine with Natasha and Yelena. "This is the coolest thing with this whole group of people. They all had parts of their past that they regretted," says Pugh. “They’re older. They’ve had more life experience. They know more about the system, about this world they’re all living in.” Harbor, the Emmy Stranger Things nominated star, managed to put an indelible mark on the muscular Shostakov, better known as the Red Guardian super soldier, the Russian equivalent of Captain America. "There is a gangster quality to him," the actor smiles. "And he's covered in tattoos. He's got a beard and those gold teeth. He's crazy." But after years of making bad decisions, he's also full of remorse.
"He's in a bad situation," adds Harbor. "And he needs redemption." Weisz's character, Melina, is another who experienced the rigors of the Red Room, a place that put her in contact with Natasha and Yelena. Marking his first dive at the MCU, Weisz acknowledges that the film addresses the idea of ​​discovering his favorite family. "It's definitely about finding out where you belong and where you came from, and what your background story was, and who you really are, and what matters to you - your ideology, I think." Along the way, Feige made reference to The Kids Are All Right - the 2010 Lisa Cholodenko film about a same-sex couple raising two teenagers. "Which is so weird," laughs Johansson. "You would never expect that from a Marvel movie." no it was the only strange nod to the film. Harbor speaks of Shostakov in terms of Philip Seymour Hoffman's drama teacher in the dramatic black comedy The Savages.
Or even expressing "the pathos of a small town, independent, family-run, weird movie... like Little Miss Sunshine". More understandable cinema references include "things like Logan and Aliens and The Fugitive," says Shortland. "We saw movies like that." Certainly, it's easy to see comparisons between Sigourney Weaver's determined Ripley, from James Cameron's masterpiece Aliens, and Johansson's Romanoff, an Avenger who has no superpowers. "We saw it as a force," says Shortland, "because she always has to dig really deep to get out of shit situations." According to the director, everyone in the production invested in deepening Romanoff - even Scottish composer Lorne Balfe (Pennyworth, His Dark Materials), who replaced Alexandre Desplat's original choice. Balfe looked at the character's origins, says Shortland. “He said, 'I want to put it on the ground, because it has been dug up in the movies in the past. I want to give her that flesh and blood. 'And he created this soundtrack that is really Russian."
However, perhaps the real blow here is to recruit Shortland, the first female director to face the Black Widow (and only the second, following Captain Marvel co-director Anna Boden, to enter the MCU). "This film would not be what it is without Cate Shortland," says Pugh. "I think having her eye, and having her mind with this script, has taken her to a whole different realm." Johansson agrees. "" You can feel it was made from a female perspective ... cooked there. "Although Ray Winstone's casting as Supervisor of the Red Room Dreykov (whose daughter contributed to the abundance of red in Romanoff's book, according to Loki) add more to the psychological battleground that the Black Widow will explore, it also deals with victimization, a very pertinent topic in the current climate. The Red Room itself is where trainees are brutally sterilized. "You will see that these women are hard working and strong, and they are murderers - and yet they still need to discuss how they were abused," says Pugh. "It is an incredibly powerful piece."
Judging by the 2020 Oscars, where Pugh and Johansson had their own private relationship session on the red carpet, the two actors got along very well. "She has a really beautiful career ahead of her ... she's a very special person," says Johansson, excited when Pugh's name is mentioned. More specifically, Pugh may well have more Marvel to chew on, if it is rumored that her character will take on the 'Black Widow' mantle for new adventures. By learning Parkour, kickboxing and knife fighting for role, Pugh can safely cut things physically, though she's reluctant to claim that the Black Widow is just a setup for future outings. "Even though it is obviously where everyone wants to go and want to think - think about what comes next - this film never really seemed to be what he was trying to underline." According to Johansson, however, test the audience who saw the film thinks otherwise. "Her character and her performance are so dear." Now, after more than a year of pandemic-related delays to July 2021), it will not be just a few lucky spectators who will be able to see. Black Widow will even be the first Marvel movie to debut simultaneously on the Disney+ streaming site (with a 'main hit' fee), an understandable move considering the uncertainty that still exists around the world. And in fact, after the success of the Marvel TV shows WandaVision and The Falcon And The Winter Soldier, it doesn't seem like such a strange home. Johansson believes that fans will respond to Black Widow, with this flashback of an earlier part of her life, bringing more poignancy to the Endgame's outcome. "Our goal was for them to be satisfied with this story; that maybe they could have some solution, I think, with the death of this character, in a way. It seemed like people wanted this." Shortland agrees. "We felt that we should honor his death," she says. And the Black Widow will surely honor him.
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villainelle · 3 years
Note
☕ + mcu fandom post endgame?
update: uhh not me realising u said fandom after writing a whole ass essay: this fandom has been so divisive since civil war tbh. i wish people would hold the writers a little bit more accountable for their writing than hating on fans who’s characters have done something they don’t like. it’s like, a lot of the uh things that happen in the mcu that people have a problem with is just a case of really bad writing. (see below hhuuhwhuwe)
prev answer: ahhhhhhhh. okay i have a couple of thoughts. so obvs, post endgame marvel is largely tv shows atm. i think....it’s a transparent business decision and a good one, mind you, for marvel lmao. i think there’s several reasons. for it. first and foremost, obvs the avengers have disbanded so there isn’t a new group to carry future movies. secondly, splitting into several tv shows not only allows marvel to launch its own exclusive streaming platform, but ensures more viewers have to watch the shows for the future movies to make sense, y’know? 
in terms of my opinions about the shows, atm i’m most surprised by wandavision which i didn’t expect to enjoy. i was worried they wouldn’t pull off the humour and sitcoms but they did a great job acc. i think both shows however suffer from pacing issues, particularly in the last episode where they try to tie everything up and it kinda falls apart bc there are too many antagonists — tfatws particularly struggles with it, i mean what the hell was the 180 turn on john walker in the last ep i’m still so ???? about that whole mess. a bit worried for loki but it’s the only tv show that probably doesn’t impact the upcoming movies as in it’s own alternate timeline.
black widow is still such an insult imo. firstly i dont think its the right place to put in the mcu - ideally you’d want the black widow after catws bc that’s when nat leaked all the shield files and her own past, so it makes more sense for her story to be situated into the timeline at that moment. the whole movie feels redundant given the character’s death has already happened, it’s like...it doesn’t really matter what happens bc u know how she dies anyway, and the emotional impact of it is lessened bc of that. the thing is i get why the russos killed natasha — bc mcu!clint has been so destroyed by....everything idek....there would be so little emotional impact with his death. that does not however mean i don’t still hate it lmao. it truly makes me furious that female characters are so outweighed by male characters in the mcu that the russos managed to kill both the only female guardian, and the only female avenger. 
endgame!steve’s arc.....i pretend i do not see it. i really do. i lowkey talked about it on my blog a lot when endgame came out, bc it was sooo regressive in my mind and since the russos set up the rules of time travel to mean things could not be changed without creating an alternate timeline (mind u they broke that anyways.), then what that means for steve is that he had to go back in the past and do nothing for the timeline to continue as it did. (meaning, ignoring his own frozen self, ignoring bucky’s capture by hydra and the soviets, etc, etc). a lot of people hate on aou, and rightfully so in many ways, but that doesn’t change the fact that there were some pretty significant arcs in that movie that people wanna ignore - one of which is that steve has made his peace with being in the present. the avengers are his family, bucky is there as well, peggy has married and has told him to move on, and even his flashback is a kind of horror sequence of pretending “it’s over, we can go home” while people die around him.
for me, i think i miss the early movies so much. the og iron man movie, and catfa and catws, as well as the avengers are my top favourites. i really appreciate those storylines the most bc they exist on their own. once we got into phase 4, and the tv shows, it felt like every movie was an advertisement for the next with the way they threw cameos in. the most obvious being civil war with the spiderman reboot. in fact civil war in general was so redundant when you realise infinity war and endgame are literally gonna be like, “yeah all of that that we just talked about? it no longer stands”, and i mean this both re: the accords, and re: bucky, bc at no point somehow in the following movies do we even get a MENTION of bucky from tony. you’d think with endgame you’d at least have one line. it could have been as simple as tony saying: “we’ll get them back cap, all of them. barnes included.” 
send me a ☕️ and a topic and i’ll talk about how i feel about it
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thorne93 · 4 years
Text
Unforeseen Chasm (Part 29)
Prompt: Two sisters fall for men that are absolute enemies. The love they have could tear all of them apart, or it could bring them together.
Word Count: 4361
Warnings: Language, flashbacks to NY, angst, fear,evasive memory search,mutation take over, fighting,unconscious shannon(OFC)
Note: This is by far the longest thing I’ve ever written (including my novels). It’s a collaboration with the amazing @mrs-dragneel-stark-solo​​. It started as a funny “What if…?” and it evolved and got huge. This took two years to write. We are both proud and happy and we hope you enjoy it. It follows from Thor 1 to Endgame in the MCU. Some of the timelines may be off in order to fit certain people, and some characters may show up earlier or in different ways than they have in the movie. But for the most part, it follows the MCU. It also has a bit of crossover with some other Marvel characters throughout the story.
Masterlist for Unforeseen Chasm
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Two days later, and you were back at the mansion, with most of the X-Men still in the training room. This time, they didn’t separate you and Shannon. Instead, they thought perhaps the powers might affect each other, they also thought if Shannon were nearby you wouldn’t feel as much like a lab rat or science experiment.
Steve and Logan stood on security detail, monitoring your every move. Jean and Charles were studying you. Remy and Scott stood on morale detail, trying to keep your spirits raised if you got discouraged, and to make you feel more comfortable since they were your good friends as well.
“Alright, Jean, whenever you’re ready to start I’ll go,” Shannon said waiting to see how they would approach both yours and her powers today.
Both Gambit and Scott had gotten closer to both of you and had begun taunting you two to see who would burst first.
“Shannon, how does it feel knowing your best friend can never walk in broad daylight again?” Scott had said to her, causing you to get upset that they would start like that. He had done some research on the attack and found a few videos of you attacking her, and who they believed was Loki being taken somewhere.
“Really, Scott? That's how you're gonna start things?” she asked, sounding a little disappointed and hurt. “She’s my best friend and knowing that she can’t go out with me for simple things hurts. It hurts more knowing…” she stopped herself, looking over at you and her heart broke a bit having to remember the events of that day.
For a moment they noticed that she went into a trance. Worried a bit, Scott got closer to see what was going on. Jean was curious as well and had begun walking towards her too, only to be blown back by a strong energy mixed with wind. Jean noticed that Shannon’s eyes had turned milky white and had hints of purple swirls in them. Scott jumped back when he saw her flinch in her trance and red beams came out of her eyes identical to his.
“Hmm, it seems as if she is in her memories are frozen in the time of the attack,” Jean said while dusting off her skirt. “Scott, try to get her to talk about what she’s seeing,” she instructed while looking at her.
“I’ll try my best but it’ll be hard trying to get close and not know how her mutation will react.” He cautiously inched closer.
Meanwhile right nearby, Gambit was trying to get some sort of reaction out of you. “So this Loki fellow, he all that? He really what they say he is?”
Your eyes flashed to his. “I’m not sure. I don’t know what ‘they’ say he is,” you informed.
“Some poor bastard who couldn’t keep his temper in check and only wanted to wreak havoc.” He smirked seeing that he’d started to get some sort of reaction out of you. “Sounds to me like a whiny brat looking for daddy’s attention.” He laughed at his own comment.
“Remy, don’t,” you warned, purple energy sparking on your finger tips. “He isn’t like that. He… he couldn’t help what happened to him.” You gritted your teeth. “It wasn’t like that!” you retorted, your voice raising.
Just then it seemed like Shannon had latched onto your emotion and had begun mixing with her own. The same purple energy that sparked from your fingers had begun to appear around her. She was no longer in a trance but her eyes had yet to change back into her normally dark brown hue. She began advancing towards Scott.
“Jean, I’m not liking any of this… Should I really be getting this close to her?” Scott asked, his voice wavering, and started moving away from her.
”Why are you running, Scott? Scared I’ll hurt you?” Shannon smirked as she kept getting closer. “You’re the first person to realize how much of a threat I could be.” She laughed.
“Shannon, relax, don’t do anything you’ll regret. You know this isn’t how I feel.... We’re good friends…  Remember that,” he had stuttered out.
“Oh, Scott but we are good friends, at least I’d like to believe we are…” She stopped talking. It looked like she was thinking of something. Jean seeing this was going nowhere looked inside her head to see what kept stopping her.
Over where you and Gambit were, you had been circling each other, he kept egging you on and he seemed to find it entertaining to mess with you. “All talk and no play huh, Y/N/N?” He had started charging som cards behind his back. “Is he like that too? Bet he gets annoying being locked up together, you two fight about him not completing his mission?” He asked you a million questions each one getting worse than the last.
“Not another word about him, Remy,” you cautioned through clenched teeth, your fists balling up. The purple energy charged all the way up to your shoulders.
“Alright, that’s quite enough, Gambit,” Charles suddenly interjected from his wheelchair.
Logan stepped up from behind Remy and gently pulled him back, not trusting you or your anger. He saw something in your eyes he hadn’t seen before.
Charles peered at you, and he could tell you weren’t registering anything around you now.  This put him on edge, so he jumped straight into your mind, trying to figure out just exactly what was triggering you, causing the problematic surge.
Was it watching Shannon be mocked or put in distress? Was it feeling trapped due to the amount of people in the room? Was it making you remember the traumatic events of New York? Was it pressing your buttons about being imprisoned? Or was it about the famed man who was your fellow inmate?
Jean had been in Shannon’s mind for a while but had found what had happened in New York. She saw how much pain she had gone through seeing what you had done to her when you kidnapped her and then the fight over a man she barely knew. Jean could see how much the events had affected her and figured it had something to do with this so called Loki… She’d have to speak to Charles about this for the next time you two came in.
—————-----
It was the next morning that Tony and Shannon were in the middle of their morning routine that Tony asked her, “Have you been by to see Professor X, yet?”
Tony was in the bedroom getting dressed when he asked, but Shannon stood in the bathroom, brushing her teeth. A feeling of guilt and dread clenched inside her stomach. Had he found out about breaking you out?
“Uh, yeah,” she answered a little hesitantly.
In a second, Tony was in the bathroom, about to slap on some cologne. “Babe, why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.
“We’ve both been so busy…” she said, averting some of the truth.
“But you’re getting help. That’s amazing. Has he said anything? Have they found out the issue?”
“They’re getting closer,” she informed before swiping on some quick, light makeup for the day.
He wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed her cheek from behind. “That’s so good to hear, dear. I’ve got a board meeting today, and I’m going to introduce that new prototype, so I might be late for dinner.”
“That’s fine,” she assured. “I’ll be busy with work and errands. I’m going to see Charles again today, probably.”
“Sounds good. See you tonight?” he asked, walking backwards and pointing at her.
“Absolutely,” she responded with a grin. She hated lying to him, it nearly made her physically sick, but when it came to this… she knew Tony’s emotions would blind him and he wouldn’t see it the way she did. He would’ve have allowed you to leave, and get the help you needed.
Meanwhile, you were downstairs with Loki, trying to move past the argument you two had.
“Leaving again, are we?” he asked coolly.
You sighed, not looking up at him from where you made yourself a cup of coffee. “Yes, I am… to get help… you know, for the powers that were pushed into me against my will…”
Loki peered over at you, assessing you. By now, he knew you pretty well. The two of you had lived together for nearly two years, if you counted the imprisonment here and on Sanctuary. And he could tell that for once, it was his own insecurities getting in the way. He was concocting all of these terrible ideas and outcomes for you two. He worried you would sell him out. He worried you would strike a deal and never come back to that cell again. He worried that you only stayed close to him on Sanctuary because you were friends before lovers. He worried that now, now that you had a chance to get away, get far away from him -- you might.
But no… Something in the way that you still took care of him, still looked after him, still smiled when seeing him walk in a room let him know that just this once, he was being foolish and talking himself into lies he knew were not true.
“You think it’s really helping?” he asked genuinely.
You heard the change in his voice so you stopped putting sugar in your coffee to give him your full attention. “Yes… I do. As soon as we find out what’s wrong with this dark energy, maybe they can get it out of me, and I’ll be back home to you.”
Loki scoffed lightly. “You can’t really call this a home, can you?”
The tiniest of smiles touched the corner of your lips before you brought one hand up to touch his cheek.
“Home is wherever you are.”
-----------------------------------------------
Shannon had finally finished the gift she had for the two down below. It had taken a while but with the help of all the photos and videos that you had sent of Asgard, she was able to recreate a holographic version of what you two called home and inserted everything from all over the world so you could see wherever you pleased, hoping to make the room a lot less bleak and much more pleasant for both of you.
She made her way to the elevator with everything and the boots to one of Tony’s suits in hopes of getting it installed all on her own. Getting out of the elevator with the equipment, she could hear talking and hoped that they weren’t fighting.
“I hope I’m not interrupting anything but I have a surprise for you two and hope that this will bring some sort of change,” she said to them looking hopeful as she hustled into the room outside of their cell.
Begrudgingly, you pulled away from Loki and cleared your throat. “Not at all, Shannon,“ you assured. “What's up?”
“I’ve finally finished what I had created for you two, that little gift I had been telling you about?” she asked, trying to get you to remember. “Well here it is. It might not look like much right now but once I install it, I bet you’re going to love it!” She pointed to the things on the trolley.
You lightly laughed. “Okay.” Shannon was… whimsical as always. That little gleam of mischief in her eye. Why were you drawn to people that were coy?
“All I need to do is get up to the top of this cell and connect a few wires to the main server and set up these sensors,” she explained as she put on the boots from one of the Iron Man suits, flying onto the top of the cell you ran to see where exactly she would land.
“How exactly will we be able to use this gift of yours?” you asked, wanting to know more about what she was doing.
“Once everything is installed and connected to the server it will work with just a few simple voice commands. I’ll show you when I’m done here.” She quickly got the sensors installed in all four corners of the room a well as one at the very top of the room. “Alright now if you two could please come to the living room, and close your eyes and tell me where exactly you wish you could see?” she asked you two.
You followed her orders, taking Loki’s hand and leading him to the stark white living room with black leather furniture. “I don’t know… Darling, what would you like to see?” you asked, peering up at him.
“I’m not sure… Anything is better than this cell,” he commented.
“Asgard?” you tried, speaking to both him and Shannon.
“If that’s what you both wish to see... Then if you could please close your eyes?” she asked, figuring that’s what you two would choose.
She entered the apartment and headed to the office to turn on the holograms. “Show me Asgard,” was all she said and behind closed eyelids you saw a flash. “You can open your eyes now.”
As soon as your eyes opened, you gasped -- a happy, shocked, thrilled gasp. On the walls that typically only showed gray concrete were splashes golds, greens, and vibrant blues, pinks, and purples. It was the foliage that was surrounding the waterfall you had gone to. It was the first place Loki had let you take his picture. Water fell from the magnificent cliff, making rainbows along the mist of the pond down below. Everywhere you turned it was an oasis.
But not an oasis that you made up or that Shannon pulled from the internet. These were real pictures of Asgard, stitched together. It brought a tear to your eye.
“This is incredible,” Loki commented.
“It truly is. Thank you, Shannon. This is amazing. This is the best gift,” you noted.
“The best gift would’ve been freedom,” Loki mumbled before you elbowed him in the ribs.
--------------------------
Today, the gang was the same. The same X-men, with Steve in there as protection, ready to take you down if need be. They had you and Shannon face each other. They had an inkling of what triggered both of your powers, and they were about to test it.
Charles got inside your mind, while Jean nestled inside Shannon’s, ready to monitor the thought processes as the team tested the triggers out. Before the women had arrived, Charles had given instructions to the X-Men to try and taunt you with New York, failings, and Loki.
“Hey, Y/N/N, good to see you again,” Remy said as he circled you, that charming smirk on his face. “Of course, if you didn’t fail in takin’ over the planet, we could be talkin’ like normal now. Instead of all this cloak and dagger business.”
The first cut was made, reminding you of your failings.
“Who says I failed?” you challenged. “Maybe I wanted to lose,” you retorted.
“Right,” he laughed. “Because sittin’ in a cell with a momma’s boy is so excitin’.”
“The way I hear it, he was given the best weapon in the galaxy, and still couldn’t wield it,” Scott added. “That’s just sad. Wouldn’t you say so, Logan?” he asked, intentionally being a prick, turning to Wolverine with his arms crossed.
“I’d say that’s pretty pathetic,” Logan agreed, a cocky expression painting his face.
Before you knew what was happening, you spun, your energy building up in your hands. The dark purple power was just about to shoot out of your hands but Scott shot you back with his the energy from his eyes, knocking you backwards. As soon as you were standing, Steve and Logan grabbed your arms to keep you from propelling your power towards anyone.
“Stop, please,” Shannon begged, her eyes becoming milky red, purple swirling inside them. Outside, thunder could be heard on what was a clear, bright day only moments before.
“Oh, come on, Shan,” Scott said. “We’re only messing with her. It’s not like she’s in jail for life for it… Oh… Wait…”
“Knock it off, Scott,” Shannon warned again.
“Why? Can’t take the fact that Y/N/N over here nearly killed you for a piece of ass she barely knew?”
With that, lightening began hitting the bunker, making everyone’s eyes look up to inspect the sound.
An almost animalistic sound came from you as they taunted you and her. The mocking of Loki and your relationship was not being tolerated well by you. Not to mention how they were bothering Shannon.
In an instant, the energy that was tingling up your arms nearly tripled, blowing the two men off of you. As soon as you were away from them, you started to go towards Shannon, the action making Steve worry -- but then you stood in front of her, almost as if to protect her. Just as you turned to fight off Scott though, the field between you two became stormy.
A dark cloud of purple energy ignited between you, making you two peer at each other in confusion.
“Just as we had suspected. The thing that triggers both of your powers happens to be whenever something negative is mentioned about the one person you care about,” Jean said pointing towards both women and their current state of emotion. “For you, Y/N, it’s when Loki’s spoken badly about. And for you, Shannon, it’s Y/N. She’s the main cause for the energy to manifest,” she explained and pointed at both of you. “But yours is worn out with increased highs or lows in emotional situations.”
It took you both a moment to realize that the conclusion they had made was true. You being talked to in any negative way caused the energy to spike and make Shannon weaker in strength. You tried not to believe that your dark energy would always be triggered whenever Loki was badmouthed to you.
While both of you were lost in thought, Logan and Steve took the opportunity to separate you so that Shannon couldn't feed off your anger and make her own worse.
“Logan! Let me go, put me down,” Shannon yelled making the room shake and caused the light to flicker a moment.
“Not until you’re far enough away from Y/N that you won’t have your powers go nuts,” he grunted as she made him struggle to move her away. “You know it's for your own damn good,” he sounded resolute having gotten her all the way to the other side of the room.
“I said, Let. Me. Go!” She was getting angrier by the second and her eyes went from a milky red to a bright purple with spots of red. The sky was completely blacked out and the only light was from the lights in the room.  Without realizing it, Shannon had lifted up one of the sharpest objects and had it facing Logan.
He stopped moving but wouldn’t let her go. “Now listen, kid, the only way you’ll get that thing to even touch me is if it goes through you too,” he said with a bit of confidence. Which only seemed to boost her anger even more. She had the object come flying at an incredible speed and she felt his breath hitch.
“You’re so wrong on that one, Logan…” She laughed, the object going through her as if she weren’t there and it stuck out the back of of Logan. “I can make it only hit you, my dear friend.” She smirked as she felt him loosen his grip. She slammed her head into his nose and got out of his grip.
“Shannon, stop this at once!” Charles warned her but she was being controlled by the dark energy inside her.
Steve did the same with you, pulling you as far away from his friend as he could. Not wanting to have you cause anymore trouble for Shannon.
“Steve, please let me go. You know I would never do anything to harm Shannon…” you pleaded feeling useless knowing you were at your weakest point. “I just want to get this dark energy out of me, you have to believe me.” You turned to look at him hoping he could see the sincerity in your eyes.
“I’m sorry but I can’t risk you hurting her again like the last time, and I know you want to get rid of it but it won't be enough until it's gone,” came from him, his voice full of sadness and pity. His response left you feeling defeated.
Hearing Charles warn Shannon, you and Steve look over just as she had walked away from Logan and watched him fall to his knees. Steve acted quickly by running towards her only to get pushed back by a strong wind and have objects pin his feet where he stood.
“Shannon, this isn’t you. Don't let those powers do something you’ll never be able to forgive yourself for,” Steve said, trying to get through to her but nothing seemed to be working.
They could all see that it was taking a toll on her as she began to look pale and although the energy was still strong, there were moments it would flicker. She began losing her balance and the room had begun to tip for her. Not wanting to cause her more damage you had a pillow positioned right where her head fell as she hit the ground. The purple haze had begun to fade but still surrounded her as if to keep her protected.
“I believe it’s time we take her to her old room to let her recover and run some tests on her while doing so,” Charles said, wanting to make sure that she was okay and there was no internal damage. He would also slip into her subconscious to figure out more. “Jean, if you and Scott could take Logan to the infirmary get him checked out?”
“Yes, Professor Xavier,” they both said in unison.
“I’ll need you, Y/N, to head to her old room and prepare the bed for her,” Charles said to you wanting you to do something to help.
“Right away, Charles…” You looked over to Remy. “Wanna walk me to her room?” you asked not feeling safe to walk the halls alone.
“Sure thing, darlin’,” was all he said.
“I’ll pick her up and take her there if you’d like?” Steve offered. “I’d like to stay by her side to make sure she’s okay.” He walked over to Shannon lifting her with ease.
----------------------------
“JARVIS, where is Shannon?” Tony asked when he wrapped up his meeting.
“I believe she has left to go to the Xavier mansion, sir, with Captain Rogers,” he responded.
“Ah, that’s a shame. I was going to go tell the prisoners down below some good news. Thought she might want to be with me, but I guess I can tell her later.”
With that, he quickly left his conference room and stepped into an elevator, descending down, deep down into the basement.
“JARVIS, remind me to tell Shannon the news that Fury has chosen to give them a chance,” he said as he was nearing the floor.
“Sure thing, Mr. Stark, anything else?” the Al asked.
“I’ll let you know if there’s anything else,” he told the Al.
“Hello there you two, how’s the view in here?” Tony joked as he walked into the room but stopped short when he looked to see the once gray concrete walls covered with the view of Paris.
“Hello, Stark. Always lovely to see your face.” Loki smirked seeing the look of confusion on his face. “What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?” Loki laughed at Tony walk around the room looking at the four walls.
“How in God’s name did this get here?!” Tony looked livid not knowing how to react. Why had this been done? How had he not been informed? “How is it possible that you’re looking at the view of Arc de Triomphe?” he asked, wanting to get to the bottom of this.
“Illusion?” Loki stated, his arms behind his back, a cunning grin cutting across is striking face.
“No, uh-uh. Thor told me what you can do. You can’t project images, not like this,” he said, pointing to his side. “There’s no way you’d know what this place is,” he added.
“I’m not sure what to tell you,” Loki said innocently. If Stark didn’t know about it, then clearly Shannon did not fill him in on her generosity. Loki felt it wasn’t his place to expose her.
“JARVIS! Bring me footage of when these images were installed in this room,” he yelled a bit trying to figure out what's going on or how the hell any of these things in the cell came about. Jarvis sent the footage to Tony’s phone. “You know what? I don’t have time for this. But if I find out you’ve escaped or tampered with this cell in any way I’ll --” He stopped, looking at the footage and seeing Shannon come in what looks like two days ago with a bunch of things. His blood boiled seeing her enter the cell and talk to you like it was nothing.
“You’ll what?” Loki mocked. “Keep me down here forever?”
Tony thought for a moment. Cells didn’t bother Loki, and he knew that he was a prisoner for life… He needed to leverage something that would truly hurt him.
“I’ll make it so you never see Y/N again. Separate cells, separate nations. So you better think of a real good alibi.”
As he turned, Loki’s face actually showed shock and worry.
“Did you come down here for something?” Loki asked, the anger and annoyance in his voice not wavering, despite the fear that was now nestled in his chest.
“Doesn’t matter,” Tony called over his shoulder.
Tony told his AI to get one of his faster cars ready for him. To blow off steam, he thought he would help support Shannon while she got these tests and trials ran on her. He quickly jumped into his car, and sped off for upstate New York.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tag List: @essie1876​ @magpiegirl80​ @letsgetfuckingsuperwholocked​ @iamwarrenspeace​ @marvel-imagines-yes-please​ @superwholocked527 @missinstantgratification​ @thejemersoninferno​ @rda1989​ @munlis​ @thefridgeismybestie​​ @bubblyanarocks3​​ @igiveupicantthinkofausername​​ @kaliforniacoastalteens​ @feelmyroarrrr​​ @kaelingoat​ @friendlyneighbourhoodweirdo​​ @damalseer​​ @heyitscam99​​ @yknott81​​ @sorryimacrapwriter​​ @glitterquadricorn​​ @xxqueenofisolationxx @little-dis-kaalista-pythonissama @bittersweetunicorm​​ @alyssaj23​​ @sea040561​​ @princess76179​​ @thisismysecrethappyplace​​ @sarahp879​​ @malfoysqueen14​​ @ellallheart​​ @breezy1415​​ @marvelmayo​​ @random-fluffy-pink-unicorn @cocosierra94 @hardcollectionworldtrash @capsmuscles @marvelloushamilton
@paintballkid711​
Loki: @lostinspace33​​ @ultrarebelheart​​ @lenawiinchester​​ @esoltis280​​ @tngrayson​​ @wangdeasang​​ @harrymewmew @jayfantasyatyourservice​​
UC:
@lokis-high-priestess​
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takaraphoenix · 4 years
Note
For the ask game marvel
Thanks for asking! ^^
Top 5 favourite characters: Tony Stark, Peter Parker, Janet van Dyne, Okoye, Carol Danvers
Other characters you like: Ororo Munroe, Gwen Stacy, Miles Morales, Darcy Lewis, Hope van Dyne
Least favourite characters:MCU!W@nda
Otps: Loki/Tony, Bucky/Tony, Thor/Tony
Notps: Tony/Pepper, Peter/Michelle, MCU!Steve/Tony, Steve/Bucky, Valkyrie/Carol, honestly it’s actually a pretty long list so we’ll leave it at a Top Five
Favourite friendships: TONY AND RHODEY!!! Also Peter and Miles in a “they’re the same age”-setting
Favourite family:THE IRON FAM
Favourite episodes: doesn’t have episodes
Favourite season/book/movie: listen, it may be basic but Avengers. The first one. Like, that was all the MCU was about. Forming that team. It may not be the best movie by various definitions, but it’s my favorite because it sums up what Marvel should be all about for me
Favourite quotes: not really a quote-kinda-gal. Like, there are these often quoted quips and stuff from the MCU but nothing that I’d really say means a lot to me
Best musical moment: an Avengers musical would be awesome :O
Moment that made you fangirl/boy the hardest: That hero shot. In the first Avengers when after all these years, those heroes all came together and we got that shot of them all together
When it really disappointed you: *cough* so often. But the worst offenders are Age of Ultron and Thor Ragnarok. Like. Just. Everything about these two movies. AoU’s only redeeming quality was Vision and Ragnarok just flat-out didn’t have any redeeming qualities.
Saddest moment: WHEN TONY DIED. I CRIED. A LOT ;-;
Most well done character death: If I am allowed to use the deleted scene instead of the one that ended up in the movie, then Tony’s death. Because him dying and everyone kneeling before him was amazing??
Favourite guest star: JARVIS. JARVIS IN THAT ENDGAME
Favourite cast member: Kat Dennings
Character you wish was still alive: ANTHONY EDWARD STARK
One thing you hope really happens: that Captain Marvel makes Carol/Maria canon, because Marvel promised more LGBT rep, with new AND existing characters and if you wanna retcon anyone into being rep, genuinely NONE from the MCU offer it better than the two women who raised a child together, lived together and spent the entire movie being each other’s anchor??
Most shocking twist: that Captain America was wrong in his own movie :D man I was dreading Civil War because if it’s Civil War but Captain America then surely they will give Steve the moral high ground and have Tony be in the wrong - and then they just made Steve the fuck-up and Tony the reasonable one and it still feels like a blessing (though I still think this shouldn’t have been a Captain America movie. It should have been an Avengers movie...)
When did you start watching/reading?: I watched it when Iron Man first came out, but like... casually. I only started caring - and caught up with the ones I was missing - when Avengers came out
Best animal/creature: are... are there animals in this franchise...? Because I just genuinely do not recall any, aside from Valkyrie’s outta-nowhere pegasus in Endgame...
Favourite location: ooof Wakanda probably?
Trope you wish they would stop using: miscommunication and distrust. Like. The Avengers movies were supposed to be about a team, but we didn’t have A SINGLE actual Avengers movie where they were just a team. Every single one had miscommunication, distrust and betrayal among the team and it was tiresome and stupid. There should have been at the very least ONE proper Avengers movie where it’s the Avengers, united as one team, facing a threat together
One thing this show/book/film does better than others: the interwoven universe. I mean, these phases lined up pretty well while so many other franchise attempts fail because they can’t build it up and rush it too much
Funniest moments: the majority of things Tony Stark says :D and also Okoye, just her being a whole mood
Couple you would like to see: I’d be over the moon if, once they introduce the X-Men, T’Challa/Ororo could become canon? Also the further above mentioned Carol/Maria. And when they’re giving Valkyrie a girlfriend next Thor, I really hope it’s gonna be Sif
Actor/Actress you want to join the cast: Freema Agyeman as Ororo Munroe. She’d be the perfect age to be with Chadwick’s T’Challa, she is a gorgeous badass and I really want to see her in it??
Favourite outfit: that Infinity War nanotech Iron Man suit
Favourite item: the Cloak of Levitation
Do you own anything related to this show/book/film?:uuuhm... Huh. No, I actually don’t...
What house/team/group/friendship group/family/race etc would you be in?: I would be a human. Maybe working for Darcy? :D
Most boring plotline: ...Ant-Man and the Wasp, like I genuinely can’t remember what that movie was about, beyond getting Janet out...??
Most laughably bad moment:ooof there were so many, most of them in Ragnarok, really. That movie was one laughably bad moment after the other
Best flashback/flashfoward if any: mh, I don’t know??
Most layered character: Tony Stark, unsurprisingly so considering who you asked xD
Most one dimensional character: the majority of villains
Scariest moment: not really scary
Grossest moment: can’t think of one?
Best looking male: M’Baku
Best looking female: Gamora? Sif? Okoye? Hope? Why would you make a weak-minded lesbian choose
Who you’re crushing on (if any): Hope and Okoye
Favourite cast moment: I don’t really care for these things ^^°
Favourite transportation: flying with the Iron Man suit?
Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise): I don’t know
Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you: I mean there are probably a ton, to be quite frank, and most are linked to the flusterfuck of timetravel Endgame put in there :D
Best promo: I don’t really follow these things; I don’t even watch trailers if I can avoid them
At what point did you fall in love with this show/book: Avengers, that team-shot
IN DEPTH FANDOM QUESTIONS
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bedlamsbard · 2 years
Text
About 1K written today -- tired, as per usual.  Always tired!  Isn’t that fun.  Probably could have like. Done things? Today? Besides class? But I did not, so it is what it is. (I pulled out stuff to make cookies -- or at least the ingredients that have to come to room tempt -- and then did not do that.)
Snippet from Horizon Natasha flashback 2 (Yonderverse version of the beginning of Endgame).
“Bullshit,” Tony repeated. “Where’s Thor really?  What did you do to him?”
Loki put his head a little to the side, like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.  “My brother is dead,” he repeated.  “He was murdered by Thanos, along with most of those of our people who survived the massacre on Asgard, and he died in terror and in agony while the Titan’s Children forced me to watch every moment of it.  And in case you’re not aware, Stark, it takes an Asgardian a very long time to die.”
By now Natasha had heard him tell this story half a dozen times – never with any further details, like he couldn’t bear to think of it past what he had to say – and the sheer anguish of it never got any less.  Thor’s room was across the hall from Steve’s; she had heard Loki waking up screaming for his brother more nights than she cared to count.  All of them had.
But Tony either wouldn’t or couldn’t hear the barely-comprehending horror in Loki’s voice. He fingered the arc reactor that was still stuck to his chest and said, “Was that before or after you gave him the Tesseract?  Or was that a reward for it?”
“Oh, fuck,” Natasha said, and grabbed for Loki at the same time Steve did.  Even Rocket made a lunge for Loki’s legs.
Their hands passed through him with flickers of green-gold light; Loki was already on the other side of the room, his fist cracking off Tony’s jaw.  He went over in a tangle of wheelchair and IV as Pepper shrieked and Rhodey threw himself between the two of them, his hands up. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, Loki, hey!”
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Text
Psycho Analysis: Thanos
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(WARNING! This analysis contains SPOILERS!)
The Infinity Saga was all building up to one thing, hinted at in The Avengers: Thanos. For years fans watched and waited, waiting for the inevitable payoff. But time went on, and Thanos did so little, and the fans got impatient and frustrated. This guy, he was being built up as the ultimate threat in the MCU, and he can’t even get off his ass and do more than cameo in Guardians of the Galaxy? Fans were obviously a bit nervous going into Infinity War, and it’s hard to blame them all things considered; Thanos had done a grand total of nothing across the entire past three phases, he had none of the Infinity Stones, and he sure hadn’t fulfilled his promise to do it himself he made in the stinger of Age of Ultron. What good could this guy possibly be?
Oh boy, you have no idea how good.
Thanos made his grand entrance as a major character by killing Loki and beating the crap out of the Hulk, and then spent the entirety of Infinity War showing us all that maybe it’s better he was dragging his feet for so long, because everyone would have been long dead if he didn’t. What’s more intriguing is how Thanos was such a well-developed and complex villain; perhaps they were just waiting for the right moment, the perfect time when creative freedom and good villain writing could come together to deliver the Thanos that the audience and MCU deserved.
Actor: Josh Brolin, a man you may know from The Goonies or as Deadpool’s best buddy Cable,portrays Thanos, and… honestly? I think this is the first performance I’ve seen in a superhero film in a long time that I genuinely think deserved an Oscar. Brolin just commands the screen and your attention with his voice, and he really sells that the big purple MoCap creation onscreen is a real, physical guy.
Motivation/Goals: Thanos has a very simple motivation: he wishes to wipe out half of all life in the universe, to make things perfectly balanced. It’s a relatively simple evil plan, but one that is grand in scale, as well as one Thanos does not himself see as evil; rather, he sees it as an act of supreme mercy, saving the universe from itself and restoring a level of order to the chaos that is life. It really cements him as a well-intentioned extremist anti-villain: the plan is, from a certain point of view, noble, it has somewhat good intentions behind it…. But at the same time it is flawed, insane, disturbing, and will do far more harm than good in the long run.
Thankfully, the movies don’t pretend that Thanos’ plan is a good, brilliant thing, and instead use his wholeheartyed belief that it is the right thing to do, that this is his burden to carry, to highlight what a broken, depressing man Thanos truly is. So bitter by his failure to save his people, his desire to vndicate his failure in his own eyes drives him to do the nost unthinkable act of genocide in a desperate attempt to prove he was right to a race that is otherwise long dead. It’s tragic, it’s insane, and it’s just a great motivation.
I think it’s worth addressing the two biggest groups of critics of the MCU’s version of Thanos: Those who think his goal is stupid, and those who are mad that he is not more in line with his comic book counterpart. The first group is arguably the more annoying one, because they seem to be unaware of what exactly entails an anti-villain, or even a villain in general. The thing with a villain is that, no matter how cool or sympathetic or interesting they are, you are not supposed to agree with them. You are not supposed to think a villain’s plan is good or intelligent, you are not supposed to say “gee they have a point here,” you are supposed to enjoy them for what they are but you’re not supposed to be on their side. That aside, the fact hs plan is crazy and stupid is arguably the point; he is a man stricken by grief he has internalized for so long he is incapable of seeing the horrendous flaws in his plans. He is the MAD Titan after all. In all honesty, his complete and utter inability to see the faults in his plan only makes him all the more tragic.
The other group… well, to put it nicely, I really don’t feel like the comic version of Thanos’ motivations would translate well to film. To put it more bluntly, I kind of find comic Thanos to have an insanely stupid motivation. He wants to kill half of all life so he can impress a girl (that girl being Death). And people call MCU Thanos’ motivation stupid? In the comics he’s basically just a superpowered dudebro who kills everyone because he gets friendzoned. He’s basically a galactic version of a school shooter, and it’s fine if you think that’s cool, but I frankly find that something that can only work in the very specific circumstances comics can provide, and even then I think there are more intriguing villains with the same motivations… like, you know, Darkseid, the villain comic Thanos rips off.
I will concede the latter at least have more of a leg to stand on, because having a preference in how a character is portrayed is a lot different than not understanding what good writing for a villain is, but lucky for them, the filmmakers decided to have their cake and eat it too and give us a Thanos in Endgame lacking the character development and complexity displayed by Infinity War Thanos, a Thanos so utterly furious that the Avengers are close to thwarting his plan that he childishly lashes out, blames the universe for not appreciating all he did, and deciding he was just going to restart the universe from the ground up in his own image, perfectly balanced. It is kind of nice to see a Thanos a bt more in line with the genocidal tyrant of the comics, but while this one has the more accurate motivation, he does end up coming dangerously close to generic doomsday villain territory.
Personality: The interesting thing with Thanos is how there are technically two of them: the Infinity War Thanos, and the Endgame Thanos who comes from an alternate timeline. Despite the two Thanos having the same basic goal, it is their personalities that truly differ. 
Infinity War Thanos is a deep, rich, and complex character. He does so much that you don’t really see supervillains do: he cries, he feels shock, he displays a range of emotions that is frankly unprecedented in a supervillain. The Russos weren’t kidding when they said Thanos was the protagonist of Infinity War more than anything; he has an arc and gets more development than any single hero in the film does. There are so many great moments to point to – his adopting of Gamora in flashback, his backstory he gives to Strange, and of course crying after sacrificing Gamora – that showcase an amazing level of depth, but there are just as many moments that showcase that even despite that he is an insane, ruthless villain who is deluded into thinking his insane plan is what’s right. He is perfectly balanced, as all things should be.
Endgame Thanos is un fortunately due to his nature a little more flat as a character, and for the most part runs on the goodwill that his future self built up. As mentioned previously, he comes dangerously close to being a generic doomsday villain, but thankfully Josh Brolin manages to make him entertaining in his own right. I think one of the best moments is when he’s watching his future self’s death, and he clearly thinks the “I am inevitable” line is the coolest thing he has ever heard. Even if Endgame Thanos comes off as a bit less impressive as a character, he’s still a pretty good character. And when it comes time to throw down, this Thanos is infinitely more impressive, and there is his aforementioned petty reasoning to reset the universe.
Final Fate: Infinity War Thanos actually manages to make it out of his movie alive, sitting down and watching the sunrise on a “grateful” universe. At the start of Endgame, karma catches up with him, but shockingly, he died believing he won. They never undo the damage while this Thanos is still alive. He goes to his grave believing he has balanced the universe, and there is nothing the Avengers can do to fix it. For five years this holds true. Thanos won.
Endgame Thanos has a much more satisfying fate. After Tony makes the ultimate sacrifice and snaps his fingers, Thanos’ entire army suffers the fate he wanted to give half the universe. In a dark mirror of the final scene of Infinity War, Thanos sits down and bows his head in complete silence as he waits for the inevitable, his entire army crumbling to dust around him. If anything truly makes this Thanos as impressive as the one from the last film, it’s the death; there’s no screaming, no bitter last words, no cliché one-liners about how unfair it is… just silent, crushed defeat and acceptance.
Best Scene: The Infinity War Thanos has so many scenes that could be contenders, from fooling the Guardians on Knowhere, to killing Vision, to his battle on Titan… there’s just so much to pick from. But I think the scene where he sacrifices Gamora really encapsulates everything great about his character, the tragedy, the monstrosity, the fact he is so insane that he really believes what he’s doing is out of love. In that moment he truly is the most tragic, horrifying villain ever to grace the screen.
Endgame Thanos has a bit less interesting going on, but I think I would be remiss to not mention the incredible scene where, during the battle, he spins his blades like those of a helicopter. Yes, you read that right: they referenced Thanoscopter.
Best Quote: Infinity War Thanos is a veritable fountain of quotes. Every other word out of his mouth has become a meme. But frankly, for the sheer horror this line filled me when first viewng, I think I might just have to go with his immortal reply to Thor’s wounding him:
“You should have gone for the head.” *SNAP*
Endgame Thanos of course continues his predecessor’s memetic legacy, with tons of great, quotable lines, especially in his numerous evil speeches to the Avengers near the end of the film. The best might just be this quote, when Thanos decides to shed any veneer of being well-intentioned and dives headfirst into extremism:
"In all my years of conquest, violence, slaughter, it was never personal. But I'll tell you now, what I'm about to do to your stubborn, annoying little planet... I'm gonna enjoy it. Very, very much."
Final Thoughts & Score: Thanos is truly impressive. Somehow, some way, this character was able to exceed years of buildup and expectations despite having so little presence beforehand there were fears that he was going to be the biggest letdown in the MCU. They took one of the cheesiest comic book characters, a ripoff of DC’s greatest villain with a boner for the physical embodiment of the concept of death, polished hi, gave him depth and emotion, and unleashed him onto the world. And what’s more, they gave him focus, they give him tons of quotes, they gave him so many great scenes… they really went above and beyond to make sure no one was let down by the portrayal of Thanos. Hell, even if you didn’t like him as much in Infinity War, they go out of their way to please the other side and show how stupid his plan was in Endgame. We end up getting the best of both worlds with Thanos.
Still, they’re basically two entirely different takes on the same character, and so I’m rating them accordingly. Infinity War’s take on Thanos is easily a 10/10. He’s the MCU’s best, most complex, most well-rounded villain, a truly brilliant culmination of excellent writing and fantastic acting. Josh Brolin brings Thanos to life and injects him with so much personality that it’s really hard to even come close to him in terms of quality; I think the only villains who are really on his level are Ego, Mysterio, and Killmonger. If I do have any gripes with this Thanos, it’s that his fighting style leans far too heavily on the Gauntlet in this film, and he unfortunately ditches his awesome armor right at the start. Those are nitpicks, though; this Thanos is amazing otherwise.
Endgame Thanos, while certainly more imposing and giving a very awesome final battle, kind of loses something considering this is not the Thanos we know and love (to hate), technically speaking; this is an alternate universe Thanos from earlier in the timeline, and even though we know what he’s like, he still comes off as bit underdeveloped. Still, he has enough quotable lines and cool moments that I feel confident in giving him an 8/10. I feel like I can’t rate him any higher because, again, he’s really walking that thin line between a good villain and a generic doomsday villain. At the same time, I can’t rate him any lower, because after all… they referenced Thanoscopter.
Thanos has really set the bar high for future MCU villains, but not only that, he has set the bar high for when the DCEU finally brings in Darkseid. How ironic that the character made to rip him off has now overshadowed him in cinema, and will be the biggest obstacle Darkseid must overcome to be taken seriously as a good character. Of course, DC can win this battle easily by shelving Darkseid for now and just making Mr. Mind the ultimate big bad for the time being; evil space caterpillars that speak with a little radio are always going to be the best villain in any argument.
As for the MCU itself, it should be in safe hands for now. Thanos really showed how polished and complex a villain can be made, and despite tripping up with the mediocre villains in the Phase One holdover Captain Marvel, the MCU was able to deliver a fantastic villain in Far From Home wirth Mysterio, who is easily one of the must fun and entertaining villains in the franchise. I think the MCU going forward has to just be careful not to try and overextend themselves to “top” Thanos, and for the most part it looks like they aren’t trying to do that, with Zemo and Mandarin being the biggest bad guys explicitly confirmed so far. Unless Doctor Doom or Dracula decides to pop in, I think they’re going to be sticking to working on and making entertaining more low-key villains, and frankly I think that’s smart; villains like Thanos need to be used sparingly.
Whatever the future holds for superhero movies, Thanos leaves behind quite a legacy, acting as the perfect capstone to the first decade of major superhero cinema. And what a capstone he is.
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calzonekestis · 5 years
Text
My Endgame thoughts in 3,160 words and 17,025 characters. Under a cut. Spoilers, obviously.
Really. Truly. The whole thing.
Well. I texted a friend as soon as I got out, and I told him “that was a very good movie peppered with lots of shit that I didn’t care for at all.”
I don’t know what I think about it. If it was good or bad. If I like it or not.
If you read spoilers but didn’t see it, and we’re mad, I get that. I was mad too. I wrote most of this last night, and I’ve had to go back and amend it.
Also, please check your Tony vs Steve bs at the door. I like them both to varying degrees. That said I take issue with Steve’s choices and characterization at the end. We’ll get to that.
The Tony fans at least can say their boy saved the universe. They’re going to be mad still, but at least he went out in the best way possible if he had to die. Which he didn’t, but... we’ll get to that too.
The people who will be mad the most? Cap fans. Sharon Carter fans. Black Widow fans. Thor fans. Iron Man fans, probably, won’t be mad so much as sad. Actually, no, mad, because they probably wanted a happy ending for him.
So yeah. Is it “bad” if it makes so many people mad? Or are they just choices they didn’t like? For me, there was a lot of that. There was also a bit of characterization I didn’t like.
I’ll say this though, because the Steve thing that has everyone mad? I’m mad too, but per their time travel rules?
Steve didn’t erase Peggy’s family. They still exist in our timeline. Steve created a new timeline for himself to go live in. We don’t know if he stopped HYDRA and saved Bucky in that one, but I mean, we can assume.
So everyone complaining that he let all that shit happen? No he didn’t. This is an alternate reality he’s living in now.
If we go by what they established about changing the past not affecting the present.
But then we have Joe Biden Steve at the end, so... unless that’s a Joe Biden Steve who went from his timeline back to ours once he grew old. Not a Steve that existed and lived in the past of our current timeline. Then it actually works without contradicting their own time travel rules.
IMO... they ignored/ruined his character arc... but due to their aforementioned time travel rules, Steve going to the past wouldn’t affect that the present that he’s leaving.
So he COULD stop HYDRA, find Bucky, prevent Howard’s death, warn Hank and Janet about the missile.
That would all be an alternate timeline though, and our Bucky would still be the Winter Soldier.
So yeah, they contradict themselves... and completely fuck over Sharon Carter in the process. You know Steve didn’t tell Sam who his wife was, because he didn’t want him to tell Sharon that after kissing her he went back to marry her Aunt thus creating an alternate timeline to live in.
That’s the present being affected by him going back in time. Your time travel rules suck, Marvel.
So the children and family Peggy had? They still exist in our timeline, but not the timeline Steve created. The reality Steve created.
Okay so they don’t explain it, so this is just me trying to make sense of it myself. They say changing the past doesn’t change the present you left from, so unless Bruce was wrong and they’re contradicting their own rules Old Steve can’t have been actually out there all this time.
So I guess even though he didn’t show up in the gear and with the time machine when we see him, he did earlier, and just went to wait by the lake with the shield to be all dramatic? He probably waited to return until his Peggy died, and then he returned at some random point maybe like a day before they planned to send him back. He knew they would be there, so he just waited in his old man clothes.
That’s all I can think of.
So retroactively?
They had Steve kiss his wife’s alternate reality niece. I like Sharon Carter in the comics, I like what little they did with her on film.
They did her so dirty in the MCU, in the comics Peggy is almost a footnote and just part of his backstory. Sharon is Steve’s true love. Whether you ship them or not, they made Peggy out to be a bigger deal than she is in the source material.
I’m not here for pitting women against each other, but... God, the only woman the MCU has done dirtier is Betty Ross. Who should have been there with her dad at the funeral. Acknowledge her existence, Marvel. Yes they’re estranged, but maybe say having her die made Ross stop being such a dickhead and realize what really mattered.
Calling Peggy the love of his life is bullshit. Yeah, he had a date. Had. He never made it, due to being frozen. I don’t agree that they loved each other, tbh. I saw someone say they each had an idealistic, at times unhealthy attachment... but not love. Frankly? That’s not wrong. They liked each other. It never developed into love. Not in the timeline/reality we followed for the past ten years.
If this was their plan all along, then why did they introduce Sharon as a potential love interest?
Peggy is his past, Sharon is his future. The Lana Lang and the Lois Lane, respectively.
They didn’t plan this. It’s clear by how sloppy it is. It’s just so haphazard and insulting to all the characters involved, and yet Evans seems to be on board with it which disappoints but doesn’t surprise me.
Sharon didn’t have much screentime in the MCU, but every moment she had was important to the plot. She was one of the only agents that questioned Pierce’s orders. She held Rumlow at gunpoint even though the odds were against her. She let Steve know where Bucky was. She gave he and Sam back their gear. A lot of her scenes in Civil War got cut, and she got screwed by making it an Avengers movie instead of a proper Cap film.
She also got screwed by fandom. People acted like known like fucking toddlers, all because she was getting in the way of popular ships. Emily Van Camp was terribly harassed online, people calling her Steve’s beard or that it was icky and gross. Evans even said it was icky, which wasn’t that supportive of him... and then...
I liked Peggy in The First Avenger, but Hayley Atwell’s lowkey/high key narcissism is known within fandom circles, how she turned on Emily Van Camp and Sharon as a whole and threw shade at cons and on twitter and such. That left a bad taste in my mouth where I no longer care for the character at this point.
And they complete ignore/regress Cap’s arc of moving on. The fact he’s not the same man who went into the ice which is something even Whedon realized and addressed when he had him snap himself out of his Scarlet Witch!Vision.
The line from TWS they sampled for the trailer about the world changing and none of them can go back?
That was a lie. What’s ridiculous is that is the same exact directors, same exact screenwriters?
“Some people move on, but not us?” Well in that regard he had, so fuck that.
Speaking of regression, Thor’s?
I’m of two minds. He had depression and PTSD, but in my opinion, that’s end result wasn’t what Thor’s end result would be. He probably felt like he failed his people, but Jesus Christ, turning him into the Big Lebowski... fat jokes...
He becomes king, half his people are slaughtered and then and then he just... abandons the rest? To drink and watch his friends play video games? That’s sad. I think Thor would have felt like he failed and be hurting, but still try to do his best for the people who were left and still needed him? Instead of letting Valkyrie do it and the at the end to officially giving her the burden of ruling and fucking off into space?
And then at the end, he *officially* throws the burden of ruling in Valkyrie’s hands. Not that she isn’t capable, but it isn’t and shouldn’t be her responsibility.
“He’s being who he is, not who he’s supposed to be.”
That would be nice if it didn’t invalidate his arc. He didn’t want to be king at the end of Thor: The Dark World either, but at the end of Ragnarok he accepted it and was at peace with it.
Also, he didn’t need the hammer. Ragnarok made that clear. I’m glad Steve took it back with the stones, and I know it was more Thor needing to know if he was still worthy after becoming Big Lebowski... but it wasn’t needed. They just wanted Cap to wield it, and for them to have something else blunt to hit Thanos with.
This is the easiest money Natalie Portman made in her life. I feel bad for my friend who is a big Jane fan, as it’s literally maybe 15 seconds.
Nice to see Pierce, Sitwell, and Rumlow/Crossbones back, even if it’s only for a flashback and they’re all still dead in our reality. Or it would be, if it didn’t make the latter two out to be dumb. I mean, Rumlow isn’t a genius but he’s not just a dumb meathead. He wouldn’t just hand over the tesseract, he’d bring Cap to his superiors to ask “yeah hey what the fuck?”
Also, having Cap say Hail HYDRA is just... gross.
...Alternate timeline/reality Loki has the tesseract. I guess he’s the one the Disney+ series is going to follow. He’s wiped of all his development, though.
Vision is still dead. I guess maybe Shuri will rebuild him? Or it will take place between Civil War and Infinity War
So Guardians 3 is going to be about finding the alternate timeline Gamora who is now stuck in this one, huh? And I guess Thor is now a Guardian, or he’ll leave them between movies?
The alternate Nebula, I’m torn on. I think they could have gotten through to her, and she would be willing to team up with him. and would be willing to team up with them to kill Thanos. She never told him where the Soul Stone was. I mean, that’s why she aligned herself with Ronan. To kill Thanos. She hates Thanos.
Her wanting to make him proud and earn his favor despite what he did to her is heartbreaking on one hand, but the loyalty, when it’s been shown she’ll be disloyal and desert him if someone promises to kill him... idk. Btw.
Nebula should have gotten to kill Thanos. I don’t care that Iron Man started and is their poster boy. I’m sorry Tony fans. She deserved it more than he did.
Something else I’m curious about... was Peter Parker’s entire class killed? Not just Ned, the whole class. MJ, Flash, etc.? Because his entire supporting cast doesn’t seem to have aged at all in the Far From Home previews.
Also you’re telling me that in those five years, May never confronted Tony? Or if she did, we never saw it? Boo.
Oh, another dumb thing. Banner. Hulk. Professor Hulk. We don’t see how Banner made peace with the Hulk and became Professor Hulk, that all happens offscreen which is so cheap. He’s also just annoying throughout the whole film, and treated as comic relief? Also, the uncanny valley was deep this time around.
I’d honestly rather Cap had died as well, rather than the ending he got. Rather, if old man Steve didn’t show up, and there was just a cliffhanger of him being lost in time? Which has precedent in the comics? That would have been great. Instead of the bad characterization.
I’m indifferent to Tony’s death, honestly. He could have retired and raised his daughter. He could have died. I guess it’s cheaper to just kill him off and not worry about paying Downey for cameos they wouldn’t be able to resist.
Okay, the other death. Nat’s. I don’t care for it, but it worked. When I say it worked, I mean her motivations and the fact she at least had some autonomy. It was still fridging. It’s gross. It sucks.. but at least it wasn’t exactly like Gamora’s where she was a victim. I mean, she is a victim. A victim of gross writing, but... I like the character, you’re killing the only female OG Avenger for angst and drama... I would have preferred it was Renner, but her reasons worked even if I didn’t like it. I do think it would have been even just as heartbreaking/tragic though, it Clint had to give up his life for the hope of getting his family back. A devil’s bargain, they’ll be alive, but you won’t be and won’t see them again.
I question the hell is the point of a Black Widow movie now. Why should we care? Don’t get me wrong I like Nat. I have nothing against self contained, one-off adventures... but... it will be a prequel that doesn’t develop the character at all or see her grow and it’ll be inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. It may be enjoyable, but do we need to see it? It’s the Solo situation.
Do we need to see how the character became the character? What purpose does telling her backstory now serve, aside from just making people sad? Do we see how she started so we can appreciate how far she came, though? I can already appreciate that. You don’t need to twist the knife by making her origin her swan song. They can’t bring back our Nat, but who knows. Maybe the next villain will be Kang, and we aren’t done with time travel. Maybe we can have an alternate timeline Nat come into our universe like we did with Gamora.
A timeline where Clint was the one to die. I can deal with that, if they give ScarJo the money. I guess.
SCOTT LANG SAVED THE UNIVERSE. Well, actually. Also, a rat. A rat is responsible for saving the universe. I mean I laughed, but we couldn’t see Scott get himself out? He’s still my boy.
He’s probably my favorite character in the film. Seeing him and Hope reunite in the end battle was nice and made me happy, the way they didn’t miss a beat and got to working together. Him trying to keep it together when he talked about losing her. The end scene with them and Cassie. The fact she called Cap “Cap” and they shared a glance. Sucks for Scott to have missed five years of his daughter’s life, through.
Also, it kinda sucks that along with the people brought back, they couldn’t bring them the likes of Frigga and Quicksilver. Yes, they died, but you can still revive them in the present. You don’t have to make it so they never died. Maybe Quicksilver will Maybe in the WandaVision show, especially now that they won’t have to worry about a competing Fox version. Introduce her ability to warp reality. He was rumored to have been on set, and so I was expecting to see him in a flashback at least. Alas.
SPEAKING OF REVIVING DEAD CHARACTERS THOUGH. Why couldn’t like, Carol, use the gauntlet to revive Tony before they sent the stones back? She could take it. He didn’t need to stay dead, except for the fact... you know... Downey is expensive.
Something I find hilarious?
The kid from Iron Man 3 is at the funeral.
That kid knew nothing about the film whatsoever, except for the biggest spoiler? Cause if they invite HIM back to be at a funeral scene... whose funeral would it be, that he would attend, aside from Tony’s?
Oh, and SamCap. People, calm down.
I like Sam, Sam is worthy of the shield, Bucky’s not quite in a place where he’s ready for it anyway. In the comics Bucky becomes Cap, and then Sam becomes Cap after him. They can reverse the order. Bucky can still become Cap after him. Sebastian still has four movies left in his nine movie deal.
I’m curious about the Disney+ show now though. If it will be retitled, if they announced a fake title ala Serpent Society for Civil War. Although. I have a fear.
I don’t trust Marvel and I can see them killing Sam by the end of the Falcon & Winter Soldier series.
And then Bucky will take up the shield. Mackie’s 40. Idk how much longer he’ll want to be doing this, and he’s said in interviews he had no interest in bringing Cap and would like to see Sebastian take a crack at it, that he likes Falcon being Falcon.
Maybe age isn’t a factor. Bettany’s in his 40’s. Cheadle’s in his fifties. Paul Rudd is an ageless immortal who claims to be fifty. None of those are physically demanding roles though, not to the scale of Cap. The closest would be Chadwick Boseman, who is a year older at 41.
Age aside, I can see them doing it. That’s kinda the shit Marvel would do.
“Yay! We’re so progressive! We’re making Sam Captain America to placate his fans before we kill him! We won’t do that *just* yet in Endgame, we’ll wait to kill the black guy until he’s done helping out this other white guy figure out his place in the world!”
Now I’m gonna be anxious about that for the next year or two.
But so I think the shows are for characters on the shelf movie wise. Idk if when the show is over, we’ll see Mackie as Captain America in Avengers 5. It would be cool, but idk.
I don’t know if they’re even thinking of Avengers 5 at this point, or plotting out things like Guardians and Black Panther and Captain Marvel. And Eternals. And all their new Fox characters.
I guess the new Avengers line up will be Captain Marvel, Black Panther, Ant-Man, Wasp, SamCap, and Spider-Man? Maybe Doctor Strange?
Wanda retires to TV. As does Clint maybe, to train Kate Bishop and/or his daughter. Rhodey and Banner are just around.
Also. Banner and Thunderbolt Ross, at the end. Ross and the Hulk. Both in the same scene. Neither acknowledging each other or having any interaction whatsoever. Odd.
I keep hearing rumors about a Thunderbolts movie tho, from someone who was accurate with all of their Endgame leaks. I wonder if they want Ross to be the Fury of that which is why they’ve kept him around.
Bucky recently led the Thunderbolts but also Zemo is so ingrained in their history and I don’t see them working together at all.
I guess you could bring in Bernthal’s Punisher by that point if you want. Elektra. They won’t do it but they could.
Ghost would be a good fit, tho I don’t wanna see her be forced to kill people again. I can see them forcing her to work of a sentence. If she’s still alive, cause God if she was snapped and went 5 years without the Quantum energy... but yeah.
Bring back The Leader as a villain finally. Crap, I’m plotting a fanfiction.
https://twitter.com/rogerwardell/status/1070465411387404289?s=21
Idk. I just. Am disappointed but not surprised tbh.
Everyone knows I don’t like MCU Clint, but the callback interaction between he and T’Challa with the latter remembering his name was nice I guess. The final battle as a whole was nice I guess.
OH. And the exchange between Dr. Strange and Wong about if he brought everyone, and if he anted more? Probably not the intent, but to me it just seemed like a big “shut up” to everyone wanting the Netflix and Agents of SHIELD characters to cross over.
Also, a final critique?
The whole fake scripts, not giving actors a script thing. I hate it. I know like Mark Ruffalo and Tom Holland are notorious for letting spoilers slip, but I legit believe that a reason why A LOT of the actors got fake scripts was not to prevent spoilers but to prevent any of them going full Ed Norton and throwing a fit about the quality of said script.
Not letting the actors know the context of the scene they are performing is not only disrespectful but it’s broken and what can you expect but performances where they’re legitimately incapable of giving it their all?
That’s all I got for now. I guess.
I know it’s a joke, “I loved everything except for the stuff I didn’t” but seriously? I enjoyed everything except for the stuff I hated. Does that stuff ruin the movie? Do I not like it because I’m petty, or because it’s bad? You can not like something, it doesn’t mean it’s bad... but I think certain choices... were bad. Were very bad.
Was it shit sandwiched with awesome, or awesome sandwiched with shit? Do they balance each other out? Your mileage may vary. I haven’t decided yet.
EDITED: I replied to this in another post, a point by @chujo-hime, but I’ll copy/paste it on here since more people are likely to see this than our conversation.
“There’s no point in doing BuckyCap now that they’ve fridged Natasha”
I can’t fault you for feeling that way, and I don’t entirely disagree. have a theory on how Natasha could return despite them saying it couldn’t be undone.
Do what they did with Gamora. Take a version from an alternate universe/timeline. Maybe one where everything is the same, except that Clint died instead of her.
Whether or not they do this? Doubtful. Unless with the money they’re saving by letting another actor go (ahem) they give it to ScarJo to lure her back.
I mean, they have Kang back now. Next to Ultron, he’s one of The Avengers’ biggest villains. He’s also a time traveler, so there are ways… idk.
I’ve still not fully processed it. Whether Marvel is smart enough or cares to take advantage of their out, they have it. If nothing else, fans can exploit it in Fix-It fics.
ANOTHER EDIT:
Oh, what was the point of Ronin? I don’t mean sad Clint, I mean Ronin, aside from selling more action figures? He wasn’t even Ronin, they made him into The Punisher Lite. Ronin wasn’t Ronin, but I mean Clint hasn’t been Clint imo so...
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jjoelswatch · 5 years
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Avengers: Endgame spoilers under the cut.
I’ll start this by saying that the movie is about a 8.5 or 9 out of 10 for me, personally, and only one thing really hit it down from being a 10/10. I got in to Marvel about nine or ten years ago, and the first Avengers movie really lured me in for life. I’ve met so many friends through these characters. These characters all mean so much to me because the early parts of this decade were probably my hardest (I hope) in dealing with depression and anxiety, and watching and reading and writing through these various characters’ struggles and victories made my own struggles more bearable. And while I know Marvel movies aren’t ending, for the majority of the characters I’ve come to know and love, their stories on film have come to an end. It’s difficult to not be emotional over it or feel passionate one way or another in how their stories have come to a close. Mostly, I’m just really grateful that someone convinced me to watch Iron Man all those years ago, because I think my life and the people I know and care about would all be very, very different.
With all that being said, here are my not-very-sorted thoughts after two viewings of the film.
What I liked:
That cold open. Man. Chilling.
Nebula and Tony playing that little game in the ship. It showcased really well Tony’s parental aspects and also something Nebula desperately needed (no manipulations, no tricks, just bonding time). I wish we got to see more of those two. 
Movie luring you into a false sense of security with Tony and Steve seemingly making amends right after his rescue but then Tony has that mental breakdown and lashes out at Steve. That was raw and painful and so, so good. A quality scene tbh.
Steve leading a survivor’s therapy group. Really trying to live on in Sam’s spirit, I feel.
Steve offering to cook for Natasha.
Scott Lang arriving at the New Avengers compound.
The small, human interactions with Natasha. The scene where she, Tony, and Bruce are lounging around brainstorming and she's like, "if we pick the right time, there's three stones on Earth" and the two smartest Avengers are like :0 whoa she’s right.
On that note, we get to see a vulnerability to Natasha that hasn’t been explored too much. She cries. We learn something about her on Vormir ("Natasha, daughter of Ivan", and then going on to reveal that she never knew her father). We haven't gotten this much personal exploration of her character since Winter Soldier and it was great.
Hulk offering one of his tacos to Scott after he lost his. It was just a small sweet moment.
Testing out time travel. Steve’s deadpan “that’s a baby” really got me.
TIME TRAVEL! When it jumps to that huge ass 2012 text logo my heart of soaring.
Was not expecting that Rumlow and Pierce cameo! That was wild to witness especially because Avengers and Winter Soldier are two very tonally different movies. We get to see the aftermath of Avengers in small, cool ways and it really serves to fill in the gaps. Bonus points for Tony tug-of-warring over the Tesseract with Pierce that was hilarious and reminded me a lot of his demeanor during Iron Man 2 during his hearing with Senator Stern (“You want my property? You can’t have it.”)
Loki mocking Steve and prompting Thor to put the muzzle on him was A+
The nod to the elevator scene (the elevator noise is the exact same as the elevator noise in Winter Soldier; I know this bc I’ve seen the movie 15 times and I’m basically Pavlov’s Dog for CA:TWS). The “hail hydra” moment was awesome, and Steve leaving the elevator with that smirk was so satisfying, but I have questions about that timeline*.
Cap v. Cap. “I can do this all day.”  “--I know!”
“America’s ass”. The Avengers just all 100% being on board to Hit That is the team solidarity we need in these dark times.
The sense of utter dread I felt when past!Thanos caught on to their plan. I’ve never felt dread that way before in a movie, maybe not even with Infinity War.
I really wasn’t expecting Natasha’s death. I love/hate how you know from the moment that Natasha and Clint are going to retrieve the soul stone that one of them isn’t making it back. It’s a weird feeling; I’ve felt the feeling of the audience knowing something the characters don’t before, but never quite like this. Clint and Natasha’s struggle over who was to be sacrificed was painful and emotional. It’s also a really good contrast to the scene with Thanos and Gamora in Infinity War. Clint and Natasha’s struggle was truly born out of love (and how cool is it that we got to see the power of the love of friendship so blatantly and barbarically put on show?; “I owe him a debt.”). I really thought Clint was going to die, but was surprised when it was Natasha. Her death is really painful for me and I wish there was a way she didn’t have to die, but she laid down her life for everyone else’s; it’s an honorable death.** 
The brief moment post-Hulk!snap. The birds singing. Clint’s wife calling him. It brought a tear to my eye.
Thor, Steve, and Tony all standing together again after four years of being apart or, in some cases, resenting one another. I felt whole again. All of them being in agreement that as long as Thanos is alone, they’re all down to kill him. Thor’s eyes lighting up. The three of them walking towards Thanos. They mean business. What a great moment.
Every time Steve’s shield broke apart piece by piece my anxiety increased by 100%. War flashbacks to Tony’s vision from Age of Ultron; the shield was literally broken apart the exact same way.
That shot of Steve being the last man standing against Thanos and his army was beautiful. I want that as a poster.
I’ve never cried tears of relief the way I did than in the moment I heard Sam’s voice and the portals started opening up. I was 100% sure Steve was going to die just before that and I WAS SPARED. The hope/relief I felt in that moment made me cry so much, and I don’t think that’s something I’ve ever experienced before in any form of media, so that’s a unique experience that’s pretty awesome.
THAT. BATTLE.
"Avengers... assemble." Steve Rogers marry me.
STEVE WIELDING THE HAMMER. Thor: I knew it! Me: bitch me too!
Seeing all those badass Marvel women fall in formation with Carol was awesome, though it hurt a lot to not see Natasha among them. She was the first of all of them (the first we were introduced to, at least).
Valkyrie’s Pegasus!
WANDA! “I don’t even know who you are.”  “You will.”  And then Thanos telling his army to rain fire because he literally can’t fend off Wanda. Amazing.
Nebula’s story arc was really well done.
“I am inevitable.” [empty metal snap] "And I...am...Iron Man."
I sincerely was not expecting to be as affected by Tony’s death as I was. I still very much so like Tony, but everyone and their mom knows that I reside very happily in Cap’s camp. But holy shit. I was not expecting for Tony to wield the gauntlet, but that’s an amazing moment from the comic books brought to film and I’m so glad they did. The aftermath was horrifically sad, watching Rhodey, Peter, and Pepper gather round him, plus the other Avengers-- Pepper telling him he can rest now and the camera just lingers on his face. I was trying not to hyperventilate cry in the theater the first time, and still cried like a baby the second time. Iron Man was the first Marvel movie I ever saw and the first Avenger I was really a diehard fan of. Tony Stark wielded the infinity gauntlet and saved everyone. From Infinity War; “I hope they remember you.” They will.
Watching Thanos get dusted was so satisfying.
Everyone gathered at Tony’s funeral.
Sam!Cap
The cast roll with the signatures of the main cast touched me quite a bit. Also it’s kind of a nice send off because it literally feels like they’re signing off on their ending contracts.
Literally so much else, but these are what stood out the most to me.
What I didn’t like:
They didn't have to do that to Thor. Does it make sense that Thor would spiral into an alcoholic depression? Yes, absolutely. Did he have to be the butt of every joke because of it? No, not at all. At times he felt like he was plucked out of an SNL skit. I just wished they would have handled that better instead of having him serve as a comic relief device so that the first hour of the film isn't too depressing. Like, how do you go from Thor’s entrance into Wakanda in Infinity War to...Endgame!Thor? It was easier to watch the second time around, but regardless, I wish there were just less jokes about him.
What was the point of Ronin? We got five minutes of seeing him in the Ronin suit and doing Ronin things for what purpose? I get that he’s suffering with the loss of his family and it’s meant to illustrate how much he’s been damaged by it, but it kind of seemed pointless overall. Otherwise no complaints about Clint.***
Rhodey taking care of Morgan Stark at the end of Tony’s funeral instead of Happy would have been a nice touch. I’m not very bothered by this one tbh, I’m cool with it, but that’s his best friend.
Steve going back in time to be with Peggy. I really don’t like it. It felt like such obvious fanservice to Steve/Peggy fans and it’s just like...let Peggy go. On second viewing it does seem like Bucky knows from the very start what Steve might do, or that they even discussed it beforehand, but I also feel like Bucky would have told him to not be a damn idiot and come back to them. He also literally bounces right after his friend’s funeral, after a conversation about how Hulk really misses Natasha/how he tried to bring her back with the snap, to which Steve says “I do too/I know”...then....peaces out. Also, I’m not going to sit here and say that Age of Ultron did too much for Steve’s character, but we danced this dance before and learned that it’s the Avengers that are Steve’s family and future. And it’s not just in Age of Ultron that this is hammered home; the conflict in Civil War works because the Avengers are his family. Saving Bucky at the expense of losing his found family wouldn’t matter if this wasn’t the case. It feels regressive to attempt to say otherwise in this movie, especially one where some of Steve’s best development was done by the same directors.
Asterisks/Questions Unanswered/Misc.:
* So in this timeline, Steve fought himself. He told his 2012 self that Bucky was still alive, he made himself seem affiliated with Hydra during the elevator scene in order to get the Tesseract. This isn’t the timeline in which the team gets their hands on the Tesseract, so...this universe still exists because they botched it. When Steve goes back in time to return the stones to their proper timelines, it’s returned to the 1970s, not 2012. So what happens to this universe as a result of that fumble? This would be cool to explore.
** When Steve has to return all the infinity stones to their proper places in time, what happens when you seek to return the soul stone instead of take it? Could Natasha have been brought back this way? I have so many questions. Also, I’d be curious to see Steve’s reaction to seeing the Red Skull as the gatekeeper of the soul stone.
On that note, why was there such an emphasis placed on the soul stone in Infinity War? Saying there’s a certain wisdom to it compared to the other infinity stones. What was that weird soft red void Thanos was in with younger Gamora right after the snap? Why wasn’t any of this followed up on in Endgame?
*** What was the point of the Ronin situation if not to incriminate him enough that it would have been right to allow Clint to sacrifice himself on Vormir?
Can you imagine that your significant other got snapped and 5 years go by and you’ve moved on and perhaps fallen in love with someone else...and then your dead wife/husband returns? Awkward. There has to be some sort of reality TV show in the MCU universe that deals with that. I’d watch that.
The Fornite scene with Thor & co. truly establishes a depressing future where all the game developers got snapped and now all we have is Fornite.
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Endgame of Thrones (April Picks)
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Does it even matter what else I watched earlier this month because THIS WEEKEND! If every weekend was like this one I don’t know how I could function. Thankfully Game of Thrones’ Battle of Winterfell and Avengers Endgame were on two different days so my body had some time to process it all. But even preparation couldn’t get me ready for all of the action that occurred. Here come the spoilers!
Spoilers.....
Spoilers....
Spoilers...
I’m serious here they come!
GAME OF THRONES 8x03
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After last week’s episode I was FEARFUL for what would come at the Battle of Winterfell. The impending battle that was foreshadowed since the beginning was inevitable and with several (if not all) of the characters reaching a full character development I grew even more worried for their safety. 8x02 had to be one of my favorite episodes of GOT so far because we had some many characters reuniting and under the same roof with these full circles being made. The top moment for me had to be when Brienne of Tarth became Ser Brienne. Then I immediately started hoping she would survive the next episode. (Thanks writers for making us not be able to just enjoy anything anymore.) 
So, last night as 8x03 began I got ready for the worst, unsure if anyone would survive and after watching I have to say that I am shocked at how many people lived through it. (Which once again makes me very fearful for what lies ahead in the rest of the show. There’s no way all of them will make it, right?) Our main focus has been on the Night King and his oncoming dark night that I was SHOCKED when Arya killed him! I thought we would have to fight him for multiple episodes. Okay, I actually thought he wouldn’t have even been at Winterfell. I believed the theory he was going straight for Kings Landing which actually would have probably been the smarter move. After he was killed I sat there for a moment like: What are the next 3 episodes going to be about? Completely forgetting that Cersei exists. 
But that kill! WOW ARYA! I did not see that coming. I thought Jon would have been more of a contributing factor in the Night King’s death due to him being the product of Fire and Ice, but other than getting lost on his dragon Jon basically spent the episode on the sidelines. I was so happy that Arya got to kill the Night King with one of her oldest tricks. Which of course now makes me upset for her safety. Another full character arc? 
I just wish Bran looked more thankful. But then again he only wears one face now-a-days. As I’ve heard several people mention, I really do hope we learn why the Night King was so obsessed with Bran (who btw I was expecting to have more of a role in the fighting).
There’s so much I want to discuss about this episode but let’s take a moment to remember the fallen: Edd, I knew someone would die protecting Sam and it made sense to be him. Your watch has ended. Lyanna Mormont, I was so worried about her and this crushed me, but she went out like she lived: a badass. Beric Dondarrion, so many times I was like how is he still alive? But it was all for a reason as Melisandre predicted he would help Arya survive. Theon Greyjoy, the complete character arc worried me, but I didn’t think we would lose him this soon. He went out protecting Bran, in the place that was his true home and Bran said he was a good man. What is dead may never die. Jorah Mormont, earlier in the episode as he was one of the first ones on the front lines to charge I didn’t feel confident and was all the more impressed as he made it back time after time. But it all made sense as he had to protect Dany one last time. [Man, as I’m writing all of these out they are starting to become realer and I don’t think I can handle it.] And last but not least, Melisandre, who I was pretty shocked to see at the start of this episode. She came in clutch and the living would not have been able to win without her. Valar Morghulis. 
As everyone predicted the crypts were not the “safest place in Winterfell” as once the Night King emerged the dead started to rise. Once again, I was pretty shocked that we didn’t have more major character deaths down here. I loved the touching scene between Tryion and Sansa as we transitioned between the battlefield and the crypt with no audio except for the music track. Very impactful. 
There is so much more I can say, but these were definitely my first thoughts on the episode. I can’t believe the battle has come and gone and now we have to venture back to Kings Landing. Be safe my friends!
AVENGERS ENDGAME
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Over 10 years in the making and 22 films later Avengers Endgame closed a chapter in Marvel history. Walking into the theater I was not emotionally, mentally or physically (3 hours/no bathroom break) prepared. The night before I had re-watched Infinity Wars (and just like with Game of Thrones) prayed for the safety of these heroes. 
I know it was said before but SPOILERS ARE COMING!
My first thought for defeating Thanos seemed to rely on time travel, but I was surprised to see that it took 5 years in the world after the snap before traveling back to get the infinity stones. I LOVED how much of a role Antman aka Scott Lang played in this role. (Thanks to that rat for hitting the right buttons after 5 years.) This character gave us some more insight into what had been going on for that amount of time and of course brought more humor to the film. (I mean he does deliver one of the best lines that gets repeated by Cap later: “That’s America’s butt.”
Opening with the Hawkeye flashback as he has a typical afternoon with his family and then the snap happens where he loses everyone was so tragic. I was not expecting the movie to start that soon as we usually see the classic Marvel opening. The transformation in his character made so much sense and was really interesting to explore. I liked how we got to see both Hawkeye and Antman included where they were missing for the previous film. 
This movie reminded me why I enjoy the MCU so much with all the references to previous films. The site of the first Avengers film: New York City 2012, brought back so many great memories and made me want to rewatch all of them. I loved how we got some exact flashbacks from the movies and then some added scenes showing more of a transition from one movie to the other. (Example: The Avengers to Winter Soldier and Captain America’s “Hail Hydra” moment in the elevator. Of course, I also enjoyed seeing Loki again as it seems that we did truly lose him.) Also seeing clips of old movies from a different angle was cool, like with Starlord singing at the start of Guardians of the Galaxy. Other time events we had never actually been to before, but were still a great trip with Steve seeing Peggy again and Tony his dad. I personally loved seeing Jarvis. 
One of the biggest moments for me was when Captain America held Thor’s hammer during the final battle. It had been predicted in earlier films (particularly Age of Ultron) that he would be worthy enough to wield Mjölnir and they were right. There’s times where he’s using the hammer and the shield and then he alternates with Thor. So good! 
Just as with the Night King in GOT, Thanos is defeated in this film, but it is not without loss on our side. It starts with Black Widow sacrificing herself for the soul stone. I was really hoping there was some sort of loop hole that would bring her back because of all the time travel stuff and was really shocked when Bruce Banner/Hulk said he tried but wasn’t able to get her back. I had heard rumors of Scarlett Johanssen getting her own Black Widow movie so I am a bit confused unless it is a prequel story. Either way I hope this isn’t the last we’ve seen of this hero. Tony Stark’s death was one that I thought might happen going into the movie, but it did not prepare me for it actually happening. As I was talking about before with the full circle character development, Tony experienced this. He was also the kick off to the MCU, so it made even more sense for this ending. His final sentence: “I am Ironman” still gives me chills. While Captain America didn’t technically “die” and lived out his life with Peggy as he always wanted, it was also a goodbye to his character. It was great to see him pass the shield over to Sam but it will still feel a bit strange to not see Steve next film. 
There’s so much more that I can continue to talk about and I know as soon as I publish this article I will probably think of something else to say, but as you can see I definitely enjoyed this movie and can’t wait to see it again in theaters.
So, I survived the weekend! I hope you did too. Let me know how you feel about all of this! 
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mantra4ia · 5 years
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My Top/Bottom “10″ Moments of Avengers: Endgame [Spoilers Ahead]
In no particular rank…
The Good and the Legendary Moments (I had a hard time limiting it to 10, clearly there are more)
Cap’s “don’t do anything stupid while I’m gone” and Bucky’s reprise “How can I? You’e taking all the stupid with you…I’m gonna miss you.” He knows his friend well enough through all the years that he understands and accepts (and in that second, we do too) that Cap’s not coming back the fast way, that he’s chosen the slow path to the end of the line.
Sam inheriting the Shield from Rogers with Bucky’s blessing, “go to him.” Because Bucky knows that, even though they are the best of friends and fellow supersoldiers, Sam has kept an eye on Steve while Bucky was MIA, and that puts him in a reasonable position to inherit the mantle.
Post-snap “5 years later” we see Steve taking up Sam’s role as a group counselor, our first hint at the transition of roles later to come, capped off with Sam emerging from the portal with a timely “on your left.”
Hawkeye’s opening: the very real, personal, character driven moment in which Clint is with his family, and shortly thereafter the snap is dragged out of retirement kicking and screaming.
Tony’s and Stark’s intellectual interactions which began as animosity and conlcuded as a kind of mutual admiration “is this the one we win? / if I tell you, it won’t happen (almost apologetically because Strange knows what is about to happen and is letting it go forward anyway),” culminating with “I am Iron Man” and thunderous applause.
EVERYTHING having to do with Tony’s daughter Morgan. From her interaction with Jon Favreau aka Happy about cheeseburgers, to finding her dad’s suit mask, to Stark calculating time-travel while doing the dishes, then swearing, then swearing Morgan to secrecy, and most heartrendingly “I love you 3000.” Tony’s father-daughter relationship is one of those key character pieces that elevates this whole film from a Marvel capstone to a best picture.
Steve’s moment watching Peggy even though he never interacts with her, in 70s at the Pymm/Stark research facility. It’s the most poignant foreshadow of his destination to come. He doesn’t make that mistake twice.
Natasha’s character development. Five years later, even as she falls apart spinning her wheels about deep sea tectonic quakes, and she still cuts her peanut butter sandwich corner to corner as if daring “Nick” Fury to unsnap himself and say “no, let me show you how it’s done.” Two great insights into the depth of their familial relationship courtesy of the Captain Marvel film. Also a shout-out Steve’s subsequent offer to cook Nat dinner. Steve and Nat always carry great character moments, all the way back to CA:WS when she was setting him up on dates.
The small moments of battlefield humor that were just enough not to break the moment: Steve calling out to Parker “Hey Queens,” Peter engaging the Spidey suit kill mode and then him curled up in the fetal position, Wong’s deadpan “were you expecting more?” Jesus, just give Wong an entire act in the next Doctor Strange movie and I will be happy. I adore him. PS: what a pleasant surprise the way the Russos put Tilda Swinton in as Sorcerer Supreme opposite Banner. That was just the right character for the exposition on the perils of altered reality.
The overarching theme of premonitions as it deals with crossing through the quantum realm into the past, and the ensuing parallels from what we’ve already seen in the Marvel past. Specifically the ‘premonitions’ that past-Nebula had when future Nebula past through time and how they could access each others memories, which puts the interesting and poetic possibility that Tony’s dreams/visions this whole time (ex: Infinity War’s “[Pepper] we had a kid, it was so real”) were never a direct result of Thanos, but rather his travel through time. The Time Travel element also relates to parallels where Howard Stark meets “Howard Potts” and the potshots at his questionable beard. Tony meets Stark Sr. at the exact right moment when Maria is expecting and they relate to the perils and joys of fatherhood: “there’s no manual for this/ there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for this kid / you did your best”, which sets up Howard’s video journal to Tony and Tony’s post-battle video journal to Morgan as even more powerful together, in the context of each other, then when we saw the original Iron Man films. Endgame brings new depth / meaning to those historic moments.
Honorable mention to Thor who, after the “I aimed for the head” reprise, developed a sense of crippling anxiety and notable weight gain within his depressive reclusiveness, and still managed to suit up and be a hero anyway. While I didn’t necessarily like the fact that Thor dealt with his PTSD through hardcore gaming, I like the direction that the Russo’s steered him after subsequently calling him an “Angel Pirate” in Infinity War. The message, by contrast, that you don’t have to look a certain way, or step into the role that everyone expects of you (King of Asgard), or even have your shit together to be heroic - you just have to step your foot out of the door and face the day - is damn brilliant.
Honorable mention #2: Rocket’s speech to Thor “you’re not the only person to have ever lost someone.” Great BroTP, with tha dash of crossover Whovian.
Honorable trifecta: Steve Rogers wielding the Mjolnir and FINALLY. FIN-A-LLY “Avengers: Assemble!” What great standing ovation moments.
OVERALL: What this film misses in building the tension (it cycles down before it revs up), it makes up for by setting up the small, poignant character moments that show off the emotional talent of these actors in a way that I’ve never seen with this impact before: Infinity War, Black Panther, and Civil War being the runners up.
The Disappointing:
The “Smart Hulk” / Ant Man “little man” gag didn’t work for me. The autographs, the tacos, the test time travel run. It got stale very quickly.
Speaking of Ant Man, by contrast to Tony and Morgan, Scott Lang’s reunion with his daughter after 5 years didn’t hit the emotional note it was meant to. It make sense how they use Lang as perspective of “what’s going on / fish out of water” to drive the aftermath of the snap home and to introduce quantum science. But out of all the characters, I was probably least invested in him.
The female-led gauntlet scrimmage in the final act across the battlefield felt like more of a “set piece” rather than really earned emotion by comparison to Infinity War’s female tag team (Okoye, Nat, and Wanda) against Proxima, where Nat defends Wanda and says “she’s not alone.”
I didn’t like the script choice of killing the complex, Infinity War version of Thanos so quickly (while it was unexpected and paid off big time for a hot second when Thor’s said “I aimed for the head”) and taking on Past-Thanos. For me, it undermined and underdeveloped the villain. I would have wanted a deeper understanding of “The Garden” and flashbacks to Titan or young Gamora, or even more interaction between him and his daughter present-Nebula, before the war-torn Thanos gets the 1-2 chop, but I understand the choice given time constraints of a three hour film.
Hawkeye’s ronin montage: his revenge against criminals in the post-snap era, “why are you here, why did you get to survive and my family didn’t?” could have had the ability to be powerful, especially considering that Natasha has been keeping tabs on him and didn’t intervene until critical mass. But instead, I feel like it was mishandled, too thematic, it takes your out of the moment like a set piece.I loved Natasha’s bond with Clint up to and after the ronin sequence, it took two characters that I was on the fence with and got me emotionally invested in them as a team, I just hated the montage itself.
No Vision? What?! Hardly even a mention in this film except for Wanda’s wrath when she is resurrected and brings that house down on Thanos, but even then Thanos essentially said “who the heck are you and what did I do to make you mad?” completely taking the steam out of Vision’s fall. Hopefully Phase 4 addresses / fixes that.
No Loki resurrection? At the very least, no past-Loki dialogue?! Come on. I thought for a second, when Loki escaped STRIKE custody in the alternate timeline with the tessaract, that maybe the team had created a and untrimmed time branch (I still think they did, because if Rogers returned the Stone to 1970, it doesn’t fix the later botched attempt to steal it, so maybe there’s a branch reality where Loki is alive with witty trickster lines and I’ll cling to it). Then I was fooled again when Mjolnir went flying through the air I thought perhaps that Loki Odinson had returned and was worthy to wield it through his selfless sacrifice (I was only momentarily disappointed / awed to see it was Cap instead). Again, Phase 4, give me some help here!
The fact that Black Widow got no proper funeral sendoff, concluding Natasha’s long history of under-use throughout the entire Infinity Saga. Don’t get me wrong: I understand her soul stone sacrifice, and in a way I understand the people who say, “don’t take that away from her, it’s powerful.” It is. She comes from a manipulative, violent background that made her who she is and good at what she does. Throughout her history, she never had family, which she admits: “Red Skull knew my father’s name, that’s more than I ever did.” So it makes the choice more poignant that she built a family around herself and did whatever it took to keep them safe and united. That said, I wasn’t (until this film) necessarily invested in Black Widow like I am the other Avengers characters, but she’s had some great moments with Clint (I still want to see the Budapest mission, and the Iran extraction that Bucky compromised) and Rogers (Endgame: I’ve been telling everyone to move on, but not us. Winter Soldier: their getaway from Hydra-infested SHIELD) and Fury. Which is why I HATE that her only tribute was a bunch of men standing around lamenting over her (while simultaneously being oblivious to the Nebula swap, seemingly incapable of intelligent script development by McFeely and Markus around those two female characters). It would have at least been fitting if they had more regrets “why didn’t we know her better, we were supposed to be her family”, “why didn’t we appreciate her while we could” or her name added to an altered  “fallen” monument. There was no payoff to her chemistry with Bruce, and no final closure with un-dusted Fury to pay his respects, which would have been a small but vastly fitting gesture. WHAT A WASTE. 
Captain Marvel’s use in the film as essentially a ballistic, ship-destroying missile and her anticlimactic Thanos battle. Why use her at all in this film if it’s going to be as a plot device? She could have had potential opposite Thor, and I’ll argue that she should have been Banner’s tag-team person to bring him out of new-Asgard exile. But the Russos and writing team missed that opportunity as well. Danvers’ appearance felt hollow.
The pacing / cycle down of tension post-opening sequence was off-putting to me. I was revved up to level 10 ready to go to 11, but had to dial back down by half (ex: even though I love the montage of Tony and Nebula playing table football, it crawls by comparison to the expectations set right after Infinity War). The tonal shifts between the three acts of Endgame made me feel like I was watching two good films as opposed to the one great, legendary film I was expecting. Perhaps I came in to Endgame too pumped and needed to be more in the moment, because this displaced feeling was very strong on initial viewing, but faded the second time I saw the film.
Honorable mentions: Parts of the alternate reality “time travel” sequence really bothered me: ie the battle of New York (from A1). Hulk smash didn’t work for me, though Hulk “take the stairs” and Stark’s minor cardiac dysrhythmia corrected by Thor’s hammer were funny. Also Cap’s “I found Loki” was priceless. So I guess you have to absorb the disagreeable montages of time alterations to enjoy the good, like Banner and the Sorcerer Supreme, Howard and “Howard.”
Honorable mention #2: This movie did a hell of a job at all the couple / BroTP splitting, WTH! Steve and Sharon never stood a chance, Wanda and Vision, Banner and Natasha, Steve and Bucky, Steve and Sam, Thor and Loki, Gamora and Quill. Dammit, I hope Phase 4 at least patches up a few holes in these ships before sending in the speculated new ensemble of comics characters.
In SUMMARY: as my dislikes wane with time and my likes grow in retrospect with each saga part I rewatch, and each time I revisit A4 in theaters, I think that Avengers: Endgame, while not quite my favorite installment, will stick with me forever. What a decade! And my next great joy will be 10…15…20 years from now, when I get to meet a kid, let’s call her Morgan, who’s never seen an MCU film before and vicariously relive that first joy watching it with them. To the end of the line.
I can’t wait. 
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seawolvesanddragons · 5 years
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Endgame
--HOLY SHIT what a movie
--if you don’t want spoilers, stop reading
--this is gonna be a mess and out of order probably, not sorry.
--I got one hour of sleep but by god it was worth it
--ok I kind of wished they had kept the Stan Lee Marvel intro for this, that would have been really sweet
--I am SO glad I went to a midnight premiere with at least one other big fan (henceforth referred to as “K.” I didn’t get to go to a midnight or even opening weekend showing of IW and that sucked; the audience type really does make a difference.)
--K and I were so excited and nervous that we started grabbing each other’s hands during the freaking IMAX countdown. The movie hadn’t even started yet.
--Also, IMAX was cool in someways (it really did feel like I was in the spaceship at times) but it also weirdly disproportioned everyone’s bodies, a lot of the time it was like looking at a bunch of Luther’s from UA.
--Ok, Hawkeye losing his whole family? So damn sad. Also kind of took me out of the tragedy just a bit -  the whole “fifty percent” but Hawkeye is the only one of his family to not get dusted?
--Tony and Steve’s reunion was handled so well, like at first they are like “lets just get through this” (and the line “I lost the kid”; my heart cracked) but then they get to the real issue: Tony warned them of this, He and Steve split. And Steve wasn’t there when Tony needed him most. Both are responsible for their actions in CW, and neither are really to blame here, but they realize they could have done better.
--THANK GOD PEPPERS ALIVE
--When they full on killed Thanos I was like wait. what. what is the plot then. Its been five minutes. What.
--”FIVE” K and Me: No..... “YEARS” K and Me: No no no....
“LATER” K and Me: Oh shit
--Thor was a god damm treasure in this movie and anyone who says elsewise can fight me
--So that whole “One in 14 billion chance we win” all depended on...a rat accidentally letting Scott out? Damn. Stephen really was taking a gamble.
--Ok I’m sorry but wasn’t Cassy like 7, maybe 8 in Wasp? It’s been five years why does she look like she’s 16 or 17 if not older? I legit thought it was her mother at first.
--Nat is doing so great trying to keep everything going. I love it, I love how she and Steve support each other, everything about this is good.
--Rhodey and Nebula were the surprise Brotp of this movie and I approve
--Ok let’s be real we all thought that was a doghouse and Tony and Pepper got a dog at first right?
--Oh shit we really are doing time travel aren’t we
--PETER AND TONY
--K and I nearly jumped out of our seats in excitement when we revisited that first Avengers 360 pan
--LOKI. (For a moment I really did think that him disappearing with the stone meant that he was going to be able to show up in future movies, but I was reminded later that the timestreams were fixed by Steve.)
--I really thought they stunt doubled Natalie Portman until we got up close, like damn they did a good job keeping that under wraps
--I spent this whole movie waiting for Harley to show up; I want you to know that
--Revisiting these points in the past was so nostalgic, K and I kept being like “ohhhhhh yesssss”
--watching Starlord’s dance from the outside was hilarious “so basically he’s an idiot” Rhodey is so done with everyone except Nat, Nebula and Tony
--OK the 2012 flashback was cool but it also just made me want an entire season of Avengers:Covert Ops because it was so fucking smooth
--For a moment, I got my details mixed up and thought that the date and place Tony mentioned to get the tesseract and Pym’s forumla was when Bucky killed his parents and guys I was terrified and ready at the same time.
--K and I could not stop moving around out of antsy anxiety the whole damn movie; good thing we were in the front
--We literally clutched each other’s arms when Thanos was beating the shit outta Steve because we really thought this was gonna be it for him and we were NOT READY
--Legit the moment Thor dropped his hammer I started muttering “Cap pick it up pick it up Cap Cap Cap pick it up” like a manic religious fanatic. K wasn’t bothered, but I felt bad for the guy on my left - until he started checking his phone every 5 minutes. Its 3 am dude, who the fuck is texting you
--I SCREAMED when Sam called. Thankfully, so did the rest of the theater
--K and I did not stop clapping for about ten minutes straight and my hands still hurt when I got home an hour later
--Steve: Avengers...
The whole damn theater: ASSEMBLE
--that scene though. We didn’t get the full 360 redo like I hoped for, but that aieral scan of EVERYONE was just. So amazing. Beautiful cinema. Those colors oh my god
--Look I clapped, exclaimed/shouted, and had my heart swell pretty much every single time the characters returned, it was an emotional mess. K cried. If my tear ducts weren’t removed by the Empire, I would have too
--PETER PARKER FINALLY GOT HIS HUG
--I’m vaguely aware of yelling “YES QUEEN” when Scarlet Witch showed up and kicked Thanos to Knowhere and back. It was either me or K. Or maybe both.  
--We went in a group of mostly women (in a theater of mostly guys) and we screamed SO LOUDLY at that badass woman warriors scene
--doesn’t make up for how angry I was that after killing Gamora, the Gaurdians’ one female (Mantis doesn’t really count for me yet, she just joined them in my head) they went and killed one of the few female superheroes, the sole female original avenger, and one of two females in this mission. I ranted about that under my breath for a long, long while
--I am going to need to rewatch that fight scene a good thousand more times because I just could NOT keep up with everything
--K yelled “ITS OVER ITS FUCKING OVER” when Captain Marvel showed up
--I AM IRON MAN *SNAP* look our theater rioted ok.
--WTF
--look there really was a moment there where I whispered “wait...are they giving us a happy ending” and K was like “no way” and then they did the face close up and GOD DAMMIT
--Ok look I REALLY thought Tony was going to be safe! I was CONVINCED he would be safe! I was like “Ok, Steve is 100 percent going to die fighting” but I was SO SURE they wouldn’t kill off Tony. Maybe he would get really injured. He absolutely would retire afterwards, for good. But they wouldn’t kill him off. Not after they intwined him into the Spiderman movies, and as many other movies as they could. They built this franchise off of him. He was, if not everyone’s favorite, a top tier player. I was convinced Marvel wanted to keep him alive so that, if they were ever worried about a movie turn out, they could throw Tony in there for a few scenes. They wouldn’t kill him. Absolutely not. Steve was gonna die fighting. OH DAMN WAS I WRONG
--look my optimism played me and after being a GOT fan for so many years I really should have known better
--oh hell they did NOT make such a big deal about Harvey coming back just to throw him in at the funeral screw y’all
--Thor joining the Guardians was an unexpected gift god bless Hemsworth
--Steve’s ending was so sweet but I do kind of wonder what Bucky is gonna do now. Stay in Wakanda? Partner with Sam? Oh damn I want a Bucky, Sam, and Tchalla team up movie, with Wanda popping in occasionally to be like “you idiots need a hand?”
--I’m devastated about Tony and Natasha, and I feel for Wanda, but honestly good call not bringing Vision back outta all the options; I truly even forgot about him till Wanda started going after Thanos.
--look we clapped so much for the original six but everyone stood up and cheered for RDJ (which, yes SJ/Natasha also deserved but the dude STARTED this franchise)
--This movie emotionally ruined me and I want to watch it six more times today.
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