Well it's like 3:30 so I might as well just write out my thoughts and stay up.
Basically, the film has good ideas, and fun action, but sloppy execution.
Liked:
• Pretty much all the action. It's wish fulfillment, especially the final battle, which feels like a dream because of how surreal it is to see all the characters together.
• RDJ, finally. Gave a good performance, and I actually liked the character as more than just comic relief. Shame it took over 10 years to do it.
• Commitment to the despairing tone. Reminds me of Return of the King in a way. It really does feel like 5 years has passed by the end, so the film accomplished it's core purpose, I think.
Disliked:
• Captain Marvel. She's still such a nothing character. If we wanna talk female superheroes, Olsen, Gurira, Gillan, and ScarJo's characters are far more compelling and they didn't even get their own film. I don't get why Larson was chosen for this, because she's a great actor but adds nothing to what's already there. Perhaps she's just so underwritten. Feige & Co need to figure out what the fuck they wanna do with her, because right now she's just a set of powers as far as I'm concerned.
• Thor. Ragnarok made me like him, Endgame made me hate him again. He could have used more development in this, otherwise he's mostly comic relief ... again. I don't know if making him part of GotG is gonna work for the character.
• Anything that made Thanos compelling in Infinity is just sucked out of him here. You could argue it's because the character's arc ended when he snapped, but he just feels generic in this.
• The convoluted time travel. Days of Future Past did it better.
• The way Cap's arc ended. It's cute, but seems shoehorned in.
• Hawkeye's story didn't make a lick of sense to me.
• Music. What music? Other than the typical Avengers brassy flourish, these films might as well have goats screeching in the background.
Yeah the film's biggest and really its only big plot hole is that
the timeline can't be fixed and the time travel rules doesn't really make sense the way they do it
but beyond that the film is pretty tight, especially considering how much happens.
The time travel rules don't really make sense the way they do it, based on what? Time travel makes sense and works based on the rules a film establishes and applies. Time travel is a concept recognised within science fiction. There are no set "rules". As long as that work of fiction establishes it's own rules and remains within those parameters and sticks to its own logic then it works. Which is exactly what Endgame does.
The time travel rules don't stick to the logic they establish.
Why does Cap have to go back and return the stones where they took them? Why does Hulk tell the team they have to take the stones back when they're fighting Thanos. It's to stop the branched off timelines from existing, right? That's what Hulk and the Ancient One were discussing.
Except....
That can't be the case because some of the actions they take are unfixable and can't be reversed. And even if he succeeds, he creates a splintered timeline when he gets with Peggy, but somehow lives to see Tony's funeral...unless he hops back as an old man?
I want them to continue with Captain American back in the 1940s era. I think it's the perfect setting for him and they got him out of the era too early for my liking. Give it a bit of a Return To Castle Wolfenstein settings and it would be perfect.
Well it's like 3:30 so I might as well just write out my thoughts and stay up.
Basically, the film has good ideas, and fun action, but sloppy execution.
Liked:
• Pretty much all the action. It's wish fulfillment, especially the final battle, which feels like a dream because of how surreal it is to see all the characters together.
• RDJ, finally. Gave a good performance, and I actually liked the character as more than just comic relief. Shame it took over 10 years to do it.
• Commitment to the despairing tone. Reminds me of Return of the King in a way. It really does feel like 5 years has passed by the end, so the film accomplished it's core purpose, I think.
Disliked:
• Captain Marvel. She's still such a nothing character. If we wanna talk female superheroes, Olsen, Gurira, Gillan, and ScarJo's characters are far more compelling and they didn't even get their own film. I don't get why Larson was chosen for this, because she's a great actor but adds nothing to what's already there. Perhaps she's just so underwritten. Feige & Co need to figure out what the fuck they wanna do with her, because right now she's just a set of powers as far as I'm concerned.
• Thor. Ragnarok made me like him, Endgame made me hate him again. He could have used more development in this, otherwise he's mostly comic relief ... again. I don't know if making him part of GotG is gonna work for the character.
• Anything that made Thanos compelling in Infinity is just sucked out of him here. You could argue it's because the character's arc ended when he snapped, but he just feels generic in this.
• The convoluted time travel. Days of Future Past did it better.
• The way Cap's arc ended. It's cute, but seems shoehorned in.
• Hawkeye's story didn't make a lick of sense to me.
• Music. What music? Other than the typical Avengers brassy flourish, these films might as well have goats screeching in the background.
Yeah the film's biggest and really its only big plot hole is that
the timeline can't be fixed and the time travel rules doesn't really make sense the way they do it
but beyond that the film is pretty tight, especially considering how much happens.
The time travel rules don't really make sense the way they do it, based on what? Time travel makes sense and works based on the rules a film establishes and applies. Time travel is a concept recognised within science fiction. There are no set "rules". As long as that work of fiction establishes it's own rules and remains within those parameters and sticks to its own logic then it works. Which is exactly what Endgame does.
The time travel rules don't stick to the logic they establish.
Why does Cap have to go back and return the stones where they took them? Why does Hulk tell the team they have to take the stones back when they're fighting Thanos. It's to stop the branched off timelines from existing, right? That's what Hulk and the Ancient One were discussing.
Except....
That can't be the case because some of the actions they take are unfixable and can't be reversed. And even if he succeeds, he creates a splintered timeline when he gets with Peggy, but somehow lives to see Tony's funeral...unless he hops back as an old man?
The point is, just as the ancient one demonstrates, the stones existing in the same timeline create the flow of time and that removing one of the stones to a different timeline would create a new branched off timeline that would cause problems. Ultimately Cap going back and placing all the stones back from where they were taken just as they were taken is what's important.
The Avengers going back and influencing things which will create new alternate timelines isn't the issue because ultimately going back and changing the past or affecting the past won't affect their present. Their present will always remain the same.
The main point is to not create branched off timelines by removing the stones to a different timeline. Which they stick to.
It's an ok film. Nebula was the most interesting character of the film and I think Marvel just can't decide what to do with Thor in terms of his character.
The point is, just as the ancient one demonstrates, the stones existing in the same timeline create the flow of time and that removing one of the stones to a different timeline would create a new branched off timeline that would cause problems. Ultimately Cap going back and placing all the stones back from where they were taken just as they were taken is what's important.
The Avengers going back and influencing things which will create new alternate timelines isn't the issue because ultimately going back and changing the past or affecting the past won't affect their present. Their present will always remain the same.
The main point is to not create branched off timelines by removing the stones to a different timeline. Which they stick to.
I'm aware of this but they do create tons of branched off timelines and Cap going back doesn't fix this at all. The actions that they take (like Loki stealing the Tesseract or Cap revealing to SHIELD that he's a Hydra agent) are not fixed by Cap going back in time and putting the stones back when they are taken. Additionally, if the idea was that the stones HAVE to exist in a universe in order for reality to work fully and that's the reason Cap has to go back, the main timeline is screwed because Thanos destroyed their set of stones.
