The biggest let down with Endgame was not Fat Thor. (Spoilers)

[Midvillian1322]

Another things that irks me.
1.The AO said in effect the stones keep time flowing as we know it, so when Thanos destroyed the stones, time should have stopped.

2. Tony and Nat didn’t have to die, after Tony did the reverse sap he still had the reality stone in his possession, he had time to change reality where he and Nat is still living.

3. Tony took the stones out of the Gauntlet, he and Peter could have easily removed the stones in IW, but I guess it’s better to make two blockbusters films over just one.

4. This one might be a little nitpicking. Tony creatives a time machine overnight, but couldn’t find a way to defeat Thanos in IW.

The reality stone by itself didnt work like that. I dont recall what the Aether did in Thor 2 but in order to change reality Thanos needed all the stones. The reality stone did surface level stuff and wasnt permanent. Like when he Changed what Knowwhere and Titan looked like. Or when he turned Mantis and Drax I mnto cubes and a slinky. The effects wear off. It's very surface level it's not changing reality to bring people back to life.

[mr_crisp]

The biggest let down was no 'Doctor Who' jokes.

[WebLurker]

Another things that irks me.
1.The AO said in effect the stones keep time flowing as we know it, so when Thanos destroyed the stones, time should have stopped.

The Stones were "reduced to atoms." The matter still existed, just not in a form that could be used like they could when they were still Stones.

2. Tony and Nat didn’t have to die, after Tony did the reverse sap he still had the reality stone in his possession, he had time to change reality where he and Nat is still living.

Black Widow had to die to get the Soul Stone and it's repeatedly stated and shown that that cannot be undone. If Hulk's snap (using the Reality Stone alongside the others) couldn't resurrect her, the one Stone by itself could not be enough. (Also, once Iron Man used it, he wasn't in any shape to even try doing anything else with the Stones. And, as previously noted, the Reality Stone's effects don't last.)

3. Tony took the stones out of the Gauntlet, he and Peter could have easily removed the stones in IW, but I guess it’s better to make two blockbusters films over just one.

Different Gauntlet; there's no indication that Thanos' was designed in a way that they could be removed like with the Avengers one, even if you don't want to invoke Doctor's Strange's knowledge that there was only one way to win and taking the Stones out was not it. (Besides, the only reason it failed was because Quill lost it; they had the Guantlet off him by the time Thanos broke free; he literally grabs it back and puts it back on.)

4. This one might be a little nitpicking. Tony creatives a time machine overnight, but couldn’t find a way to defeat Thanos in IW.

Thanos had most of the Infinity Stones at his command, and Iron Man was operating with only the stuff he'd brought with him and had zero preparation time for the battle and no insider knowledge on Thanos; it's impressive he lasted as long as he did. (For the record, the plan to subdue Thanos was actually Peter Quill's and, for all the grief he gets for loosing it and messing it up, it actually would've worked in terms of them being able to get the glove off him by that method.)

All of it obviously. Because that isn’t how it works. The movie shows us how it works and that theory was WRONG!

This isn’t about being stubborn. I myself have said on multiple occasions that future writers can pick up these threads however they want and thereby tell us more about the rules. But this movie tells us the rules ONLY in the AO/Banner scene. It doesn’t tell us the rules in the Banner/Lang scene, that scene is just a casual reassurance to the general audience that they can stop worrying about rules.

The equation is this:

Movie facts + Banner’s theory = a messy time travel movie that isn’t logical.

Movie facts + Ancient One’s explanation = a slightly hand-wavy mystical movie that is logically sound if we are prepared to accept magical time manipulating gems.

Now I know many fans want tight logical non-magical time travel, but this isn’t that movie.

The only logic problem is old Cap not coming back on the pad at the end. Everything else plays by the rules. I double-checked and was specifically interested in the workings of the time heist because of threads like this.

[Beaddle]

All of it obviously. Because that isn’t how it works. The movie shows us how it works and that theory was WRONG!

This isn’t about being stubborn. I myself have said on multiple occasions that future writers can pick up these threads however they want and thereby tell us more about the rules. But this movie tells us the rules ONLY in the AO/Banner scene. It doesn’t tell us the rules in the Banner/Lang scene, that scene is just a casual reassurance to the general audience that they can stop worrying about rules.

The equation is this:

Movie facts + Banner’s theory = a messy time travel movie that isn’t logical.

Movie facts + Ancient One’s explanation = a slightly hand-wavy mystical movie that is logically sound if we are prepared to accept magical time manipulating gems.

Now I know many fans want tight logical non-magical time travel, but this isn’t that movie.

Many fans wanted an imperfect but smoother time travel story , most importantly many fans wanted the time travel plot device to still be present for 2/3 of the movie. its a time travel movie afterall. Usually time becomes a pain or a source of importance to the protagonists during the main climax of the film but doing that must have been too complicated for a Disney movie plot.

The biggest let down was no 'Doctor Who' jokes.

There were back to the future jokes. An Avenger called back to the future theories nonsense in Endgame. In reality Back to the future 1 turns out to be a better time travel movie.

[JKtheMac]

Many fans wanted an imperfect but smoother time travel story , most importantly many fans wanted the time travel plot device to still be present for 2/3 of the movie. its a time travel movie afterall. Usually time becomes a pain or a source of importance to the protagonists during the main climax of the film but doing that must have been too complicated for a Disney movie plot.

By ‘many fans’ who exactly do we mean? The fans of these movies are a much more diverse and mainstream audience than any of us here. Denigrating it for being a Disney movie is just attacking it for being what it was always supposed to be. I imagine the main reason the director’s and writers didn’t have a prepared answer for the kind of questions they got is because they were not really focused on those things. They are not mainstream concerns and this is a mainstream movie.

[JKtheMac]

The only logic problem is old Cap not coming back on the pad at the end. Everything else plays by the rules. I double-checked and was specifically interested in the workings of the time heist because of threads like this.

That’s not a logic problem. Only if you start bringing in branching time for every change, and the AO clearly tells us that branching doesn’t happen unless a stone is removed. In other words Cap can live his life and then walk to the lake safe in the knowledge that the stones will have made sure the universe stays mostly unchanged. He can live a quiet life. Not make too many ripples.

Put it this way. If big changes happen there would be a branch, but the stones make sure branching doesn’t happen so potential big changes are steered away from by their action on the timestream. Take away a stone and that big change can’t be compensated for and a branch occurs. A branch without the governance of the stones. A darker and more dangerous branch warned against by the AO.

The big question is whether the MCU ongoing is in a darker branch now. The stones are gone. Branching will occur.

If you look at it like that then it makes perfect sense why Feige hasn’t stepped in with an explanation. It would spoil future movies. That’s the kind of thing a whole phase could explore.

Just as we knew as soon as we saw Thanos that we were headed towards some kind of Infinity event, we can now predict that we are heading into a multiversal or reality shifting story of some kind. But the general audience needs that to develop as a story. They can’t suddenly throw in Mephisto for example.

This slow build approach is why the MCU works. It owes a lot to the Harry Potter approach. Slowly develop big ideas and then the main event can actually be a big story. Don’t rush to do the big stories as soon as possible. For the X-Men, rushing to Dark Phoenix has not worked well. For DC rushing to Dark Knight themes or huge Doomsday/Darkseid plots makes for no contrast or development. Before we know it there is nowhere to go from there. Even ASM was guilty of being in a hurry to go for the Gwen snap. You just did the biggest stories, now what? That’s not what worked for the comics, why should it work for a movie franchise?

[Star_Jammer]

To me that was a little bit of a stretch, maybe the biggest stretch of the movie. An IG is formed using some kind of neutron star using a single-use only mold and made by elder dwarf guys who really, really know what they are doing.

But then again, Tony's homemade IG only had to hold them for a short time, just long enough for him to click (and state his name, obviously!)

You're implying that there's only one way to make an IG, which is never confirmed.

Tony's IG was probably an inferior design, but also used nanotechnology, which can be "comic-book logiced" as being able to constantly "adapt" to the Infinity Stones' powers (at least long enough to do what needed to be done).

[Jabare]

Infinity War was a tighter more sucinct film.

Endgame was a little over stuffed, but time travel was fully expected after the snap happened. Were there plotholes? Absolutely, and I don't think Marvel cares they got the movie they wanted. The highlight of endgame is the final hero battle thats what those two movies buil toward.

So again as soon as the snap happened I knew there was going to be some over the top way to bring everyone back and thats what annoyed me about that story element. However, this is something everyone should have expected after the snap.

[Scott Taylor]

You're implying that there's only one way to make an IG, which is never confirmed.

Tony's IG was probably an inferior design, but also used nanotechnology, which can be "comic-book logiced" as being able to constantly "adapt" to the Infinity Stones' powers (at least long enough to do what needed to be done).

Yah thats as good an explanation as any. There's also the precedent of the first Guardians movie where an Infinity Stone was repeatedly contained by some old thieves hunk of tin. In my own canon, Starlord just got lucky it didn't blow the planet up when he grabbed it originally and put it in that cheap little orb thing.

All of this really comes down to style over substance, and I'm ok with that.

[JKtheMac]

Infinity War was a tighter more sucinct film.

Endgame was a little over stuffed, but time travel was fully expected after the snap happened. Were there plotholes? Absolutely, and I don't think Marvel cares they got the movie they wanted. The highlight of endgame is the final hero battle thats what those two movies buil toward.

A plot hole always used to be defined as literally a gap in the plot. For example the heroes suddenly acting with knowledge they didn’t seem to gain, as if we missed something not even referred to as an offscreen action. I can’t think of any of those. It is debatable if there were logical inconsistencies the way many now like to define it in the modern informal and often overly critical, dismissive manner.

Personally I am not convinced there were any of those either. Just some things left for the audience to work out or to be explained in later movies and or TV shows. Does that really count as a plot hole? Not in my book.

As to the ‘loose ends’ definition well that’s kind of irrelevant in a serialised movie franchise.

So again as soon as the snap happened I knew there was going to be some over the top way to bring everyone back and thats what annoyed me about that story element. However, this is something everyone should have expected after the snap.

What seemed to animate most people was the assumption that whatever happened would be a reset. Most of us knew from hints and rumours that there was going to be a time travel story. Why would that annoy anyone?

[WebLurker]

That’s not a logic problem. Only if you start bringing in branching time for every change, and the AO clearly tells us that branching doesn’t happen unless a stone is removed. In other words Cap can live his life and then walk to the lake safe in the knowledge that the stones will have made sure the universe stays mostly unchanged. He can live a quiet life. Not make too many ripples.

That does make a lot of sense. However, is it only when a Stone is removed from the past? The Ancient One's little lesson is worded in a way that it could mean that only the Stones being removied alter the flow of time, or that removing anything from the past creates another branch and she was using the Stones as a specific example due to it being relevant to the conversation (unlike, say, Hawkeye's baseball glove). Thing is, Iron Man and Hulk repeatedly telling us that the past cannot be changed really pushes things to the latter; you don't drop information like that and leave it standing if it's not meant to be correct.

Put it this way. If big changes happen there would be a branch, but the stones make sure branching doesn’t happen so potential big changes are steered away from by their action on the timestream. Take away a stone and that big change can’t be compensated for and a branch occurs. A branch without the governance of the stones. A darker and more dangerous branch warned against by the AO.

The big question is whether the MCU ongoing is in a darker branch now. The stones are gone. Branching will occur.

If you look at it like that then it makes perfect sense why Feige hasn’t stepped in with an explanation. It would spoil future movies. That’s the kind of thing a whole phase could explore.

Just as we knew as soon as we saw Thanos that we were headed towards some kind of Infinity event, we can now predict that we are heading into a multiversal or reality shifting story of some kind. But the general audience needs that to develop as a story. They can’t suddenly throw in Mephisto for example.

This slow build approach is why the MCU works. It owes a lot to the Harry Potter approach. Slowly develop big ideas and then the main event can actually be a big story. Don’t rush to do the big stories as soon as possible. For the X-Men, rushing to Dark Phoenix has not worked well. For DC rushing to Dark Knight themes or huge Doomsday/Darkseid plots makes for no contrast or development. Before we know it there is nowhere to go from there. Even ASM was guilty of being in a hurry to go for the Gwen snap. You just did the biggest stories, now what? That’s not what worked for the comics, why should it work for a movie franchise?

We'll see if the branching works that way or not, but it is an interesting point I didn't think of r.e. the MCU's future. Course, maybe since the Stones were destroyed as part of the natural course of events and not removed from existence, that might have an effect?

[Beaddle]

By ‘many fans’ who exactly do we mean? The fans of these movies are a much more diverse and mainstream audience than any of us here.

''Many fans'' like myself who are burned out by time travel movies tropes.

Denigrating it for being a Disney movie is just attacking it for being what it was always supposed to be. I imagine the main reason the director’s and writers didn’t have a prepared answer for the kind of questions they got is because they were not really focused on those things. .

Not denigrating Disney, talking of some of the main flaws of Disney's writing style is not denigrating them. Disney loves to go for the most juvenile predictable plots in movies, its not doing their marvel films any favors any more.

I imagine the main reason the director’s and writers didn’t have a prepared answer for the kind of questions they got is because they were not really focused on those things.

How to have a less than stellar script.

They are not mainstream concerns and this is a mainstream movie.

Most time travel movies are mainstream. Back to the future that Endgame called nonsense was mainstream.

[Midvillian1322]

''Many fans'' like myself who are burned out by time travel movies tropes.


Not denigrating Disney, talking of some of the main flaws of Disney's writing style is not denigrating them. Disney loves to go for the most juvenile predictable plots in movies, its not doing their marvel films any favors any more.



How to have a less than stellar script.



Most time travel movies are mainstream. Back to the future that Endgame called nonsense was mainstream.

I mean I guess since you used it as an adjective and not a noun Many isnt false. But by that token you can make an endless list of what "Many fans" wanted. Many fans wanted Steve and Bucky to declare they're love for each other and settle down. Many fans dont want Cap passing the shield to a black man. Many fans think Thanos was Thicc and sexy and shouldnt have died(I'd actually liked if they found a way to not kill him). Anyway I get that what your saying is you wanted that. And honestly I loved the movie but some of the time travel stuff brought it down just a little for me. So I get it.

[JKtheMac]

That does make a lot of sense. However, is it only when a Stone is removed from the past? The Ancient One's little lesson is worded in a way that it could mean that only the Stones being removied alter the flow of time, or that removing anything from the past creates another branch and she was using the Stones as a specific example due to it being relevant to the conversation (unlike, say, Hawkeye's baseball glove). Thing is, Iron Man and Hulk repeatedly telling us that the past cannot be changed really pushes things to the latter; you don't drop information like that and leave it standing if it's not meant to be correct.

All you are saying here is it could have been worded slightly clearer. The images do most of the work so personally I don't agree, YMMV.

But, my point is partly that they didn't want to be clearer. They wanted to both show us how it worked in a way that reassures the audience, and leave some things unexplained and mysterious so that they don't close down avenues in the future. It's a tricky job to write serial fiction without spoiling future movies or closing off one's own potential options. It's an even trickier job answering fan questions for which they probably don't really want to know the answers. Sometimes directors, producers and even writers are forced to lie or hand wave.

We'll see if the branching works that way or not, but it is an interesting point I didn't think of r.e. the MCU's future. Course, maybe since the Stones were destroyed as part of the natural course of events and not removed from existence, that might have an effect?

Indeed my main thesis has always been that there is a way of interpreting this movie that is logically sound and we will get to learn more later. It looks to be a developing theme. The seeds of the entire next phase and possibly the next three phases were potentially being planted.

[JKtheMac]

''Many fans'' like myself who are burned out by time travel movies tropes.

I honestly don't want to sound dismissive here but perhaps stop looking at stories as collections of tropes? It can very easily make one cynical. Especially as tropes are not actually what most people think they are.

Not denigrating Disney, talking of some of the main flaws of Disney's writing style is not denigrating them. Disney loves to go for the most juvenile predictable plots in movies, its not doing their marvel films any favors any more.

How is that not denigrating them? How is the most successful movie of all time not doing them any favours?

How to have a less than stellar script.

Clearly that is subjective. I think it is a stellar script.

Most time travel movies are mainstream. Back to the future that Endgame called nonsense was mainstream.

You have lost me now. I have seen and read literally hundreds of time travel stories that are not mainstream. My point is that the mainstream audience, including myself here, wants to know when we can disengage from rules of time travel. There are no totally logical rules of time travel, there are only satisfying stories and unsatisfying stories. Those will be different for different people.

Take Looper. For me the rules made no real sense, but it is one of my all time favourite time travel movies. It's different, it leaves some things unsaid, and it makes me think.