Avengers: Infinity War
We are now at the climax of the 10-year build-up that Marvel Studios has had us anticipating for so long. The Avengers are literally coming together over Thanos. They should have used the Beatles-Come Together as the trailer song……...get it??? Anywho this is it. Thor meets the GOTG, Stark meets Strange, Banner returns, where to begin? Let’s start with the main man himself- Thanos.
He was first introduced to audiences in Avengers back in 2012, made a cameo appearance in GOTG in 2014, another cameo in Age of Ultron a year later and now in his own feature film. Of course, we know that the MCU has been all about the gathering of the 6 Infinity Stones. Let us go through the journey that Thanos walks in order to obtain these stones. In the beginning, we see he has the purple stone- The Power Stone. “It has the ability to access and manipulate all forms of energy, enhance their physical strength and durability and enhance any superhuman ability.” Of course, Thanos would have to have taken this stone from Xandar where the Guardians left it as Thor confirmed it was destroyed and Thanos also would have decimated half its population according to his philosophy of balancing the universe.
Sadly we had to say goodbye to Heimdall, guardian of the Bifrost bridge, and Loki. Loki is one who you can never fully foresee what his motives are and surprisingly he could not watch Thanos torture his brother with the Power Stone. Loki trades the Tesseract containing the blue Space Stone inside it for Thor’s life after which Thanos breaks the Tesseract and places the Space Stone beside the Power Stone on the Infinity Gauntlet. The Space Stone “allows the user to exist in any location, move any object anywhere throughout reality, warp or rearrange space, teleport themselves and others any place the user can imagine, increase their speed, and alter the distance between objects contrary to the laws of physics.” Loki then redeems himself by sacrificing his life in an attempt to stop Thanos after giving him the Tesseract though it was in vain.
In an effort to claim the remaining stones in the least amount of time possible, Thanos went one way and had his emissaries, the Black Order, head another way. Thanos went to Knowhere and his four ‘Children’ went to Earth. There are 4 members of the Black Order in the film and they are Corvus Glaive, the leader, Proxima Midnight, his wife, Black Dwarf the giant one, and Ebony Maw, the most powerful. There are actually 5 members but Supergiant, another female, is absent from the film. Maw and Dwarf attempt to attain the Time Stone from Strange but meet resistance from Spiderman, Iron Man, Wong, and Strange. Maw overpowers Strange and takes him captive aboard the ship he came in and Stark and Spidey attempt to rescue him where they get stuck on the ship en route to Thanos’s planet Titan. Whilst rescuing Strange, Maw is jettisoned into space where he freezes to death. Meanwhile, in Edinburgh, Scotland, some time has passed and clearly, Scarlet Witch and Vision are in a romantic relationship. Out of nowhere Vision is stabbed by Glaive’s spear, which renders him unable to phase, and deflects Vision’s head beam back at him seriously weakening him. Vision manages to hold his own as well as Wanda but Vision is too hurt to continue so Wanda prepares for solo battle but in the nick of time, reinforcements arrive as Steve, Natasha, and Falcon come to help. Black Widow gets a good hit on Glaive and he and Midnight are forced to retreat.
On Knowhere, the Guardians (minus Rocket and Groot) are tailing Thanos since that is where Thor told them Thanos would go next. Only Quill, Gamora, Drax, and Mantis are there since Groot and Rocket opted to go with Thor to Nidavellir to forge a new weapon. Nidavellir is the eighth of the Nine Realms to show in the MCU after Midgard (Earth), Asgard, Jotunheim (home of the Giants), Vanaheim (home of Hogun), Svartalfheim (home of the Dark Elves), Muspelheim (home of Surtur), Niflheim (home of Hela), and now Nidavellir, home of the Dwarves. The only one missing now is Alfheim, home of the Light Elves. In Nidavellir, Thor forges a hammer/axe named Stormbreaker, which is stronger than Mjolnir in the MCU but not in the comics. It is equally as powerful as Mjolnir and belongs to a character named Beta Ray Bill.
On Knowhere, Gamora confronts Thanos and even stabs him but little did she know that he had already obtained and was using the power of the red Reality Stone. The Reality Stone “allows the user to fulfill their wishes, even if the wish is in direct contradiction with scientific laws, and do things that would normally be impossible and create any type of alternate reality the user wishes,” hence Gamora did not stab Thanos at all. Gamora tells Quill to kill her because she knows something Thanos will utilize but when he tries to his gun is merely turned into bubbles. Thanos then teleports away with Gamora to his ship telling her he knows that she knows the location of the orange Soul Stone. She lies to daddy but he says otherwise and tortures her sister Nebula to get the information to which Gamora gives in and tells him it’s on a planet called Vormir.
Thanos and Gamora teleport to Vormir and he tells Gamora it’d better be there for her sister’s sake. Thanos and Gamora climb up the mountain and meet a mysterious figure who knows their identities and who is this mysterious figure??? None other than Red Skull ladies and gentlemen, the prodigal son has returned and most people were surprised. Somehow for some reason, the fates have chosen Red Skull to be an eternal guardian of the Soul Stone. Red Skull explains that he once sought the stones out for himself but bad luck would have the Tesseract transport him to that desolate place where he would forever be unable to sacrifice someone he truly loved for the Soul Stone for that is what it costs. Thanos sacrifices Gamora for the stone and obtains it. The Soul Stone “allows the user to steal, control, manipulate, and alter living and dead souls.” The Soul Stone is also the gateway to an idyllic pocket universe.
As the battle begins in Wakanda over the Mind Stone, so does another on Titan for the green Time Stone. Thanos arrives and the Avengers and Guardians do battle with him. Each and every one of them put up a good fight particularly Iron Man and Doctor Strange with Iron Man using his new nano-tech and Strange using the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak. This is the same Cyttorak that also has a Gem that powers the unstoppable Juggernaut of the X-men series. When Thanos stabs Tony, Strange bargains (he seems to like doing that) for his life by giving the Time Stone to Thanos. Strange later explains that they are in the endgame and it was the only way perhaps suggesting that Strange has a plan after all and maybe playing in favour of one out of fourteen million six hundred and five chances they have of surviving. Thanos obtains the Time Stone and with it, it “allows the user to see into the past and the future; stop, slow down, speed up or reverse the flow of time; time travel; change the past and the future; age and de-age beings, and trap people or entire universes in unending loops of time.”
In the meantime, Glaive, Dwarf, and Midnight attack Wakanda in pursuit of the yellow Mind Stone and Vision is critically injured again but manages to survive and the 3 offenders are killed. Thanos arrives to gain the last stone and Wanda is forced to destroy the stone along with Vision to prevent Thanos from obtaining it as he easily dispatches every Avenger trying to stop him. Thanos simply reverses time and yanks the stone from Vision’s head rendering him lifeless. The Mind Stone “allows the user to enhance their mental and psionic abilities and access the thoughts and dreams of other beings.” Thanos is virtually unstoppable now except it seems by Stormbreaker which Thor used to seriously maim Thanos but then right at that moment Thanos snaps his fingers and that is when we see many heroes vanish- Spiderman, Bucky, Falcon, Scarlet Witch, Black Panther, Groot, Drax, Quill, Mantis, and Strange.
The end credits scene show Nick Fury and Maria Hill also being victims to Thanos’s universal clean-up as we see them wisp away into oblivion but are they truly dead? One can theorize that they be may residents of the aforementioned pocket universe of the Soul Stone. Oh and let’s not forget our hint of the coming Captain Marvel. Keep reading if you want to find out what happens next, the story is not over yet……….