Spoilers ahead

I went to this movie really expecting it to be less than good. I was afraid that it just wouldn’t measure up to the previous movies. I was pleasantly surprised at how good the movie was. I was expecting a massive “Captain Marvel Saves the Day” ending, and we didn’t really get that. Having Thor straight up pointlessly murder Thanos was an awesome feeling. It didn’t fix anything. It didn’t really point them in a direction to fix things, but it was satisfying to have Thor cut Thanos’s head off and use the line “I went for the head” after Infinity War. It provided a sense of closure even though nothing had changed. Having Captian Marvel in the movie, obviously overpowered, and not even attempting to be written in a way to upstage the other characters was nice. She was there, for a few scenes, and then she was gone. Not the major role I was expecting for the character. Each of the characters had their own amount of awesome scenes and I think breaking down this movie by character would provide a good clear overview.

Captain America

The First Avenger Cap started all of this because he was a science experiment for a German scientist with a conscience who felt that he could no longer trust Germany with the super soldier serum he was developing. Much like the real life German scientist Werner VonBraun he felt that Germany had become a country of bullies who would not wisely use the technology he had developed. Steve gave everything to stop Hydra, he lost time with the love of his life, he lost his best friend, and the thought he was going to loose his life to stop the bomb Hydra had sent at the US. And he ends up frozen for 50 years only to wake up in a world changed. A world where the “good guys” won, using cruel means destroying peoples homes to win. The entirety of “Civil War” was about him not trusting a government with the power he had. He believed that he was able to allow his own conscience to guid the usage of that power and was willing to throw away friendships to keep it that way. And he proves that he was truly worthy of that power when he wields Mjölnir in the final battle with Thanos and his army.

He finally gets his well earned reward. After defeating Thanos and returning the infinity stones to the past where they had been stolen he manages to live a full life with Peggy Carter and passes the shield to Falcon.

It was a fitting end for the man who remained a Hero no matter the personal cost.

Iron Man

Tony Stark. He finally has a family. He crafts the plan that brings everyone back. He makes time travel possible. And he snaps Thanos and his army out of existence paying with his life for using that power. He died a Hero. It was one of the more heart-wrenching moments in the movie to see Pepper standing over him holding his had with everyone knowing that he was about to die and leave her and their daughter alone. But without his sacrifice there would not have been a world to leave them in. Thanos would have destroyed everything. The funeral scene and Happy talking to Tony’s daughter promising he’d be there for her was both crushing and uplifting. Tony’s final words to Thanos were proven to be true, “I am Iron Man.”

Iron Man, you will be missed in the MCU.

Hulk

Bruce Banner. What is there to say about The Hulk. He suffered immense damage to bring everyone back without resetting the timeline. He is no longer a mindless rage monster and his strength being combined with the awkward personality of Banner makes for an amazing character. He survived but I don’t expect to see him back.

I hope he gets to retire to the country somewhere a be left alone to enjoy life.

Thor

Thor got the raw end of this deal in the beginning. He was a drunk, overweight, lazy, pain in the a$$ to anyone that had to deal with him. He got his revenge on Thanos early on and as I said before, it was meaningless. But in the time travel scene he got to see his mother one last time. And that was awesome. He got to benefit from her wisdom once more before he rids off into the sunset. Thor was always a fun character and he is supposedly being replaced with Jane as Thor in the next set of movies. It’s going to be a loss to not see the comedy of Ragnarok in future Movies with Thor, but not so much of a loss that I’m upset by it. He leaves his people in Valkyrie’s hands and I think that was a good call, she will lead well and it will allow Marvel to use her in future movies.

Thor, your unintentional comedy will be missed but here’s to you having adventures off screen that will feed your insane Asguardian lust for war so we don’t have to watch your character revert to “That Guy”.

Hawk Eye

He went DARK in this movie, and the full caps are intentional. He felt that it was not fair that his family died and those in the world that thrived on pain and suffering should be killed to balance the scales. He had worked so hard to keep his family safe, and they were taken anyway. I can see why he might have snapped after that. It wasn’t fair. He wanted to die to make right what he had done in his past. But ultimately, Black Widow had it right. If their plan worked, he would clear the marks against him by being a good husband and father. He had the opportunity to give life and light to the world through his family.

I hope Hawk Eye retires with his family after this. He deserves it.

Black Widow

I saved the best for last. I know we are supposed to get an origin movie for Black Widow at some point. But after that, she’s dead. She won’t be coming back or else the sacrifice she made would be meaningless. And that would not be fair. Unlike Gamora’s death where it was Thanos making the sacrifice, Nat choose to give here life to get the Soul Stone so Clint would’t have to.

Black Widow your ledger is clear, may you rest in peace for the future of the MCU.

Final Thoughts

There was way too much in this movie for me to really critique it without setting down and taking notes while the movie was playing. I enjoyed this movie way too much to do that. I might at some point in the future, but not for now.

The quick appearance of the A-Team women was a nice shout out to that group from the Comics and a quick set-up for the future of the MCU. I have no idea if Marvel/Disney will do justice to these characters or if it will just make a bunch of Mary Sues with boring movies but I hope they try to keep these characters believably human with flaws and good character growth each time we see them. The movie didn’t waste as much time as it was presented on the “all powerful” women of the MCU and focused on ending this era of the films in a good way. I appreciate that from Marvel even it was unintentional.

I’m standing by my theory that they wanted to see if they could manipulate people’s perceptions of the movie with all the negative press surrounding Bre Larson/Captain Marvel, they did to some extent but End Game performed well and was pretty well received. I still think we will see more of this gross manipulation from Disney in all of their franchises in the future and I am not really looking forward to that but it does make for an interesting social experiment. But that line of thought deserves a post all on its own.

End Game was a fantastic end to this era of Avengers/Marvel Cinema.

Excelsior!