Everyone seems to be sharing their thoughts on Infinity War. At first, I thought writing a review of my own would just be creating white noise. But then I gave it some more thought and realized that I had to write a review; because if I don’t, I might go crazy from all the thoughts swirling around in my head! I need to get them out of my mind before I’m driven mad, so without further ado, here’s my Infinity War review and analysis!
Warning: Spoilers!
Infinity War is different from any other Marvel movie in history. It opens different. It ends different. It even plays out different. Right from the cold open, to the end credits, this movie takes you through a unique journey. And when I say cold open, I mean a cold open out in the middle of space, where in the first five minutes of the movie, two of the longest running characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe die. Both Loki and Heimdall, fan favorites, die relatively harsh deaths before the actual story even starts. The directors want to make it very clear to the audience that this movie will be unlike any other Avengers movie ever made. In one genius stroke, they let the audience know that no one is safe. For once, a Marvel movie has very real stakes.
It’s totally ambitious, not just because it is the culmination of 10 years and 18 movies in one shared universe, but also because it risks alienating the very fans that have made the franchise so popular. They took risks with the themes of the film and even with the lives of characters, raising the death toll with the possibility of making some viewers upset that favorite characters had been axed. The fans of the comics, including myself, may have been mentally prepared for it (even if they didn’t know the exact details), but the average viewer was not. With one wrong move, the makers of this film could have alienated a large portion of the fan base.
But with a brilliance that is often overlooked, the directors (the Russo Brothers) managed to pull off these calculated risks, all whilst honoring what had come before, juggling dozens of A-list stars, and even…dare I say it…telling a fairly engaging story. It’s interesting how many people take this feat for granted. If you looked at the facts, you’d see how nearly impossible this film should have been to pull off; at least on a technical level. And yet they did it.
The theme is sacrifice. We don’t have time to cover all the instances of this theme here, but there are quite a few (especially from Gamorra and Vision). Even with the villain, the Russos didn’t shy away from playing with this theme. Even if I still hate Thanos, and his backstory only makes me hate him even more, at least they managed to make him believable. The character, even through heavy CGI manages to convey weighty emotion, and really makes you believe he’s a real person with real motivations (whether we sympathize with those emotions as an audience or not).
Thanos is not some forgettable Dark Elf that wants revenge. He’s a deeply disturbed individual who believes that killing half the universe will curb overpopulation. He watched his home world die because of that, and he wants to prevent it from happening anywhere else. It may be insane and morally wrong, but it’s also a unique and plausible motivation for this ‘Mad Titan’. He really believes himself to be the hero. Most of the audience is pulled into this slightly different perspective. In Thanos’ mind, he is the hero who is sacrificing everything that he has, and the Avengers are the villains arrayed against him; attempting to stop him from obtaining universal peace.
This uncomfortable perspective makes the audience, at least in my opinion, hate him even more, as one-by-one my favorite heroes are swatted away like mere insects. It’s a bit depressing to see our heroes not have much of a chance. Thanos managed to dispatch Hulk with a single Infinity Stone. What can our heroes possibly do when he has more? The answer is nothing. Even the strongest Avenger is no match for Thanos and for the first time in Marvel cinematic history, the heroes have lost before the movie even begins. They can do absolutely nothing about it.
Well, almost nothing. My last point is the theme of failure and mistakes. The heroes have several opportunities to beat Thanos, and every small glimmer of hope is snatched away by a single character’s mistake. It’s not just Star-Lord and his sentiments for Gamorra that you should be mad at…everyone had a chance to mess things up. Of course, there were several of these chances that I’m glad they avoided (like Star-Lord killing Gamorra so Thanos didn’t get the Sould stone, or Scarlet Witch killing Vision so that he didn’t get the Mind Stone), but there are also several that would have been fine. Iron Man went to Titan to fight Thanos on his own turf, even when Strange said it was a stupid idea. Scarlet Witch went out to battle in Wakanda when she should have been protecting Vision. Even Thor failed to land a killing blow, or at least cut the gauntlet off Thanos’ hand, with Stormbreaker. There were so many moments when the good guys could have won, but they did not and that is the true art of this movie; to show that, even in the world of superheroes, mistakes have real consequences.
For the first time, several real heroes died in battle; not just token characters. They did not shy away from killing off popular heroes that we love, and they even managed to surprise the audience with who died; leaving alive the older heroes that everyone thought were going to die, and instead killing the newer ones that we expected to live. Not only was it emotional for the audience, but it was also emotional for the characters. The filmmakers have, by killing off the Avengers’ closest friends and family, brought the original heroes of this universe to the lowest place that they have ever been; raising the stakes to the absolute maximum to bring them to the point of desperation for the coming battle in Part 2…and that is feat to be reckoned with!
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