Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

Director: Anthony Russo, Joe Russo
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo

Synopsis:
As the Mad Titan Thanos begins to collect the Infinity Stones, the heroes of the galaxy launch a desperate bid to stop him.

Impressions:
We've been building up to this moment for ten years, over the course of 18 movies. You could be forgiven for thinking there was no way to coherently pull everything together, but this film does an admirable job of it. With so many characters and plot threads, it would be easy to lose control of the narrative, but it all holds together rather well. A more streamlined approach would have been more efficient, but it would have largely defeated the point of this film as the culmination of the entire MCU up to this point.

The stakes are suitably raised for this outing and while the jaded cynic anticipates the cosmic reset button to be pressed in the next film, that doesn't take away from the impact of the losses we suffer along the way. It's like Transformers: The Movie (the animated film from '86, not Bayformers). There is some interesting exploration of the theme of sacrifice to compare and contrast our heroes with Thanos. Speaking of Thanos, he gets an impressive degree of characterization here and went from being a character I really didn't care much about to one of the better-written antagonists of the MCU. All due credit to Josh Brolin's performance for selling it (and also to the VFX wizards who really went all out with the character). I also want to say that I'm pleased with the development of Tony's character. I've been pretty critical of him ever since Age of Ultron, but he finally seems to be growing out of his jackassery (and we see a full demonstration why it was at least partially justified). Now, depending on where your preferences lie, you may not feel your particular favorite got a big enough piece of the pie, but even if a certain individual didn't get much opportunity for character growth, they probably at least got in a good moment or two.

As you'd no doubt expect, the visuals don't disappoint and we get plenty of duly impressive action set pieces. A number of characters have expanded their abilities to raise the bar from prior outings. (I feel Scarlet Witch in particular kicks a lot more tail on the battlefield now.) Also, having Alan Silvestri back as composer ensures the music is up to the task of accompanying this epic yarn.

For MCU fans, this film is definitely a solid payoff for all the years of following the franchise. It's definitely worth seeing and if you've been adding any of these movies to your collection thus far, you'll surely want this right there alongside them.

Rating:
Own It