This review is a spoiler-free piece that will not reveal any of the surprises of “Avengers Infinity War.”
Epic to the nth degree, bombastic and sweating with foreboding dread, Marvel lays it all on the table for their latest super nova’d blockbuster “Avengers: Infinity War” and then ruthlessly wipes it off clean. Shit is going down; heads will roll, Marvel is not f*cking around here. It’s not the most sophisticated Marvel story—bad guy collecting rainbow-colored stones, good guys trying to prevent an unstoppable doomsday—and it lacks the political texture and moral complexity that has defined the MCU in Phase 2 and 3, (particularly ‘Winter Soldier,’ ‘Civil War’ and “Black Panther”), but it’s intense. And there are enough thrilling and emotional moments of heroism, sacrifice and heavy costs that it satisfies and engrosses nonetheless.
‘Infinity War’ announces itself from its opening seconds before the film has even started. Instead of the heroic Marvel fanfare that heralds each superhero, the latest ‘Avengers’ slowly rumbles with dark notes of ominous despair. A storm is coming, the bad moon is rising, and its stress-inducing anxiety rarely lets up over the course of a striking two and a half hours that’s a little distended, yes, but most importantly, extremely entertaining.
Stakes are as high as they’ve ever been in a superhero film and while we’ve seen a thousand villains who want to decimate the world, Marvel’s latest antagonist, the mad titan Thanos (a rather terrific and understated Josh Brolin), is a genuinely terrifying agent of chaos because of his chilling dogma. If you’ve heard about an opening scene that’s as serious as a heart attack, the rumors are true. ‘Infinity War’ means business and plants a flag for the catastrophe to come from the jump.
A large ensemble film, obviously, ‘Infinity War’ features several story threads, different missions, and new mix-n-match permutations of Avengers and Guardians, but the central story belongs to the movie’s world-destroying ravager with a perverse philosophy about the meaning of mercy. Unforgiving and biblical in his ideas of destruction and rebirth, Thanos—who views himself as a prophet of destiny— believes in razing the ground. His unsparing ideology is balance and order through genocidal cleansing, and he believes only he has the will and resolve to see it through.
To accomplish his goals—and this is where it gets really comic book-y and silly, but it’s what Marvel’s set up over a decade—Thanos, the Grimace-looking guy, needs the full power of six infinity stones scattered across the galaxy, two of which reside on Earth and thus a reckoning is coming. Meanwhile, back on planet Earth, taking place several years after the events of ‘Civil War,’ the Avengers, as Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) puts it, have broken up. Captain America’s team—Falcon (Anthony Mackie), Scarlett Witch (Elizabeth Olsen), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Cap (Chris Evans) himself—are still considered fugitives by the American government. Scattered to the winds, these ex-Avengers are living clandestinely around the globe (the movie will explain to you where the remaining members of Cap’s team are).
Concurrently, in New York, a destructive, 9/11-esque horror has come to the doorstep of heroes like Iron Man, Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), Wong (Benedict Wong), Spider-Man (Tom Holland) and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo): Thanos’ henchmen, known as the Black Order, have come to retrieve his beloved Infinity Stones and they are as brutal and pitiless as their master.
The finding-the-stones-to-destroy-shit premise isn’t very elegant, frankly, but it’s told with so much passion and conviction: a cruel demigod convinced he’s doing the right thing for the greater good and only he can see the big picture, while Earth’s mightiest heroes have to fight for their lives in desperate, pulse-pounding battles. Moreover, the screenwriters (Stephen McFeely, Christopher Markus) do a great job of masking the flimsy plot with emotional stakes, and gripping melodrama that always signals a high price to pay. While full of frightening malice, Marvel imbues Thanos with a sense of empathy. He bleeds, he cries, he suffers for the painful sins which he believes are necessary. Tough, ultimate decisions are a running theme, and Thanos too is faced with grueling choices. He’s about as layered as a simple villain can be, and his false sense of compassion is truly scary.
While ‘Infinity War’ is certainly an Armageddon movie, the clock ticks as Thanos’ massacre rains down, after the film establishes that it’s not fooling around, ‘Infinity War’ begins to deliver Marvel’s trademark brand of humor and quips which are genuinely funny, sometimes hilarious and really diverting; a strong ballast to the slaughters that takes place. Destruction porn sucks, but when you have an emotional connection and humanity coursing through your characters, even through humor, the carnage can feel truly alarming.
One little issue that might stick in the craw is the contrived manner in which some of the heroes find each other. Sometimes the writing wants to rush to get the teams back together as quickly a possible. Results may vary for the blockbusterdom of the last act which might feel like an hour-long punchfest to some, but the drama of the fight scenes is nearly overwhelming. Directors Joe and Anthony Russo create a nerve-wracking air where the violence is visceral. The idea that any hero can meet their end at any moment definitely feels real.
As they pulled off in ‘Civil War,’ Marvel does an excellent job of continuing character story and crafting an emotional conversation through action. Fierce brawls convey Tony Stark’s fear and ongoing sense of responsibility for Peter Parker’s life; furious skirmishes underline the growing tenderness between Vision (Paul Bettany) and Wanda and the protectiveness they have for each other.
New pair-up dynamics are incredibly delightful too. The ego clash between Tony Stark and Stephen Strange is unexpectedly rich and funny, the buddy road trip vibe of Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Rocket Racoon’s (Bradley Cooper) relationship is endlessly hilarious and even surprisingly poignant (and the casting of Peter Dinklage which touches this storyline is brilliant). There are too many characters to give depth to every storyline—people like Black Widow, Falcon, Winter Soldier, Rhodey and even arguably Cap are underserved— but like ‘Civil War,’ Marvel does a lot with meaningful moments and little touches such as the brief reunion between Natasha and Bruce Banner.
‘Infinity War’ plays with a lot of themes the MCU has been toying with and leading up to, what it means to be a hero, are you on the right side of heroism, and what’s the ultimate price? What ‘Infinity War’ leans into further is personal: are you, the individual, willing to sacrifice that which you love the most? The answer is never easy, and the results often grim and tragic.
Comparisons have flown around to “The Empire Strikes Back,” and while these are enthusiastic superlatives, at least narratively, they’re not entirely off the mark either: ‘Infinity War’ has grave consequences for its broken and beaten heroes. And of course, you’re going to have to wait an excruciatingly long year to see how if Marvel dares to follow through on the bold gamechanger they’ve presented (they’ve reneged before).
Ultimately, the latest Marvel event is ‘Civil War’ on steroids and as enormous a spectacle as you’ll ever see on the screen that’ll leave you shook. For a movie plot this thin and basic, ‘Infinity War,’ is remarkably gripping, supersized entertainment that should exhilarate audiences, electrify the box office and continue the Marvel hegemony for years to come. [B+]