Avengers: Infinity War

[slothian]

Black Panther = Roman Reigns?!?! Dude, seriously.......people *like* Black Panther.

Just seen it. As a film, it has too many subplots to properly focus upon and is overly long, which will lose anyone who hasn't seen the majority of the MCU films that came before. As an experience, it ranks up there with one of the Lord of the Rings movies in terms of spectacle. Still processing the film as to where I would rank it within the MCU.

Random question: why is Chris Pratt now the end credit? Has his non-GOTG career warranted this?

[dc20willsave]

I have definitely warmed on it since my initial feelings of "Meh." It's nowhere near as ambitious and it feels it is but I'm will to see it a second time before I firmly say if I feel if it's C-Grade or B.

Mike, are we at the point where we still need to use spoilers or should we go ahead and keep with it?

[Dan]

5 hours ago, slothian said:

Random question: why is Chris Pratt now the end credit? Has his non-GOTG career warranted this?

Not even kind of. He has another mega-franchise in Jurassic World, but they've given him the "beloved cinematic icon with a decades-long career" credit. He must have a hell of an agent.

[Molly]

Andy Dwyer and a sub-par reboot do not a superstar make. And I love Andy Dwyer. 

[Koete]

A sub-par reboot that made 1.5 billion dollars, plus he was in a $100 million December release with Jennifer Lawrence, on top of Guardians of the Galaxy. In an interview, he referred to his role in the movie as a "cameo," but...it's not? I have no idea why he has that credit. 

[Dread]

3 hours ago, Dan said:

Not even kind of. He has another mega-franchise in Jurassic World, but they've given him the "beloved cinematic icon with a decades-long career" credit. He must have a hell of an agent.

My best guess is that he isn't getting paid as much as Downey or Evans (or maybe even Cumberbatch) and this is a contractual concession which is important because of his Jurassic World cache (which is still like the 4th biggest movie of all time).

[dc20willsave]

The contract negotiations for this film must have been a nightmare. Just from some accounts of other films where you had a large amount of big actors, all with big careers (and myabe big egos) we probably had stuff like, "Mr. Pratt agrees to take a paycut if he is last billed, his costumes account for any weight fluctuation, and there are sprinkles at any events involving ice cream and/or frozen yogurt. Gelato is excluded."

[slothian]

Pratt viewed his role as a cameo?!? He had roughly 10x the lines that Cap did. Aside from that scene in which he's chewing out Ross, Steve is virtually monosyllabic throughout.

[Donomark]

That's definitely something to take away, Steve Rogers is hardly in this film. The Russos did say that was almost by design, and that some characters who wouldn't be featured prominently in this would get their get-back in the next one, but the ad campaign was clearly working off of Cap's renewed popularity of the last few years. Minstrel Mark Ruffalo had more of a felt role than he did.

[S-T]

On 5/9/2018 at 7:02 AM, dc20willsave said:

Hard agree with Preston here. Just... no.

Solid advice for life: look at what you type before you hit reply. Ask yourself: "Does this make me sound like a dick?" If you can construe that it does, rethink your approach. Unless you're being a troll. In that case, go to 4Chan or Reddit instead.

Oh, good grief. No, I'm not trolling. I thought Mike was being overly judgmental of a guy he has never met in person and does not know. You don't know him either, and you don't know why he was clapping. No one here does, and yet he's being condemned as a terrible person.

Could he have been applauding because he is racist? Maybe he was, and if so he's a massive jerk. Racism is utterly morally repulsive and if he was clapping because he is a racist then then I condemn him and what he did.

But nobody knows that for sure. Nobody here knows what he was thinking or why he applauded, and it is unfair to condemn him for what his motivation might be when you know absolutely nothing about the man.

That I have a different opinion than you do does not mean I am trolling. If anyone is trolling, it is those who falsely accuse me of trolling because I dared to have a different opinion. I have been on Earth-2 since the very beginning. I defy you to look through my posts going back 14 years and find anywhere that I was trolling.

Spoiler

And yes, Black Panther has been pushed to the moon. It is not just screen time that matters, but outside media as well. Did you see the glowing media coverage of his movie for a solid month?

So, no, I'm not going to 4chan or Reddit. If you think I don't belong here because of one opinion in 14 years that you find "offense," then use your mod powers to ban me.

[dc20willsave]

6 hours ago, Donomark said:

That's definitely something to take away, Steve Rogers is hardly in this film. The Russos did say that was almost by design, and that some characters who wouldn't be featured prominently in this would get their get-back in the next one, but the ad campaign was clearly working off of Cap's renewed popularity of the last few years. Minstrel Mark Ruffalo had more of a felt role than he did.

Considering the way that everything was segmented, I hope so.

Spoiler

Because of the way that the plotlines were distributed, Steve and his team of Avengers had to share screentime. Widow is basically in the same boat. After being built up as being the previous big couple,  Widow/Hulk got only the slightest bit of lip service. All things considered, this makes sense considering his team was largely made-up of the characters that lived. Also, this makes sense considering, with the films being shot at the same time, it gives the actors time to rest. Hell, of the Guardians, Rocket lives and he's the CGI one. RDJ and Chris Hemsworth will likely get a little less dialogue next time to balance things out. Iron Man will likely pop up around the halfway point if I had to make a guess.

Seriously, the more I think I about this movie, the more I'm liking it. It's like a strange sickness.

[Missy]

Stop. I shouldn't have worded it the way I did, but I did. And now it's over.

And per your question, Will, we can drop spoiler tags now.

[S-T]

The character's death I giggled at was...

 

Spoiler

 

Spider-Man.

Come on. Spider-Man was Disney/Marvel's big acquisition after the character spent years with Sony. There's no way they're killing that character now. That would be like lighting a big pile of cash on fire.

The fact that Tom Holland is signed up for more movies kills suspension of disbelief even more.

Playing his death the way they did, trying to tug at the heart strings, was silly given that we know he's not dead permanently. I can't take it seriously.

If you want me to take a death seriously, kill Iron Man. That is a character I can see being phased out of the MCU permanently with this series. There's no way that's happening with Spider-Man.

 

I know spoiler tags aren't required, but I figured, no harm.

I said on Twitter on March 2013 that I want to see a live-action movie with Miles Morales as Spider-Man. I would love to see him in Infinity War II, even if only in a cameo to set up his first full appearance in the next Spider-Man movie.

[Donomark]

Spoiler

When Thanos stabbed Tony, that was a legitimate "Woah...is this it for him?" moment. 

 

[dc20willsave]

Personal theory on the Thanos stabbing is that Tony gave him 10 ccs of Antman and/or Wasp.

[Pan-dub]

9 hours ago, S-T said:

The character's death I giggled at was...

  Hide contents

Spider-Man.

 

I get that, and about 7 seconds into the credits I was asking myself "Well how is he coming back from in time for his next film...?"...but you giggled at a scared young man who thinks he's dying?

If nothing else that moment reminds you that after you take away all the cheek and pop-culture references and spunky attitude, he's still just a kid. A kid who's looking to his mentor for help. THAT is the reason that moment got me - more than any lack of disbelief-suspension failure.

[S-T]

25 minutes ago, Pan-dub said:

but you giggled at a scared young man who thinks he's dying?

No, I giggled at a scene I cannot take seriously given all of the real-world facts I mentioned in my post. I giggled because nobody in the theater believed for a second that his "death" was ever going to be permanent and because Marvel/Disney overplayed their hand by making it so dramatic. There's no way they're setting that big pile of cash on fire. If the scene worked for you, awesome. I'm glad a lot of people were touched by the scene. I wasn't.

If it had been any of a number of other characters, I could see it being played the way it was. The crippling of War Machine in Civil War was a sad scene, especially because it was believable that he could die, be permanently crippled or be in a persistent vegetative state. That's why I hated that they spoiled James Rhodes' return in the trailer. That he is even conscious, much flying around in his armor should have been a huge reveal in the movie, but it was just thrown in the trailer like it was nothing. I hated that so much.

Spider-Man isn't going anywhere.

[JackFetch]

When I saw Spider-Man fade away my suspension of disbelief was killed because they already announced the next movie. I knew it didn't mean anything in the long run. I wish they had either kept him alive or held off announcing the next movie. The question I have is about Gamora. She wasn't snapped so can they bring her back and if they don't how will it affect Starlord when he comes back? 

[Missy]

Recently I saw a video noting the trailer for Spider-Man: Homecoming 2 will have to spoil Avengers 4 to some extent, as the movies will be released two months apart. (Avengers then Spider-Man.) That means their marketing campaigns will also overlap. Marvel and Sony are probably have some serious conversations -- with lots of money being thrown around -- to decide how these two movies will be advertised without one ruining parts of the other.

EDIT
The video in question:

 

[dc20willsave]

In hindsight, Marvel might have been better served to have run Avengers 4 as their 3rd movie of the year it came out, I know they wanted that critical First Movie of the Summer position but for promotion, it's kinda sucky for Homecoming 2. Gotta guess they're gonna angle for that all-important post credit sequence.

As part of my gradual softening on this movie, I'm trying to look at the deaths in the context of the film instead of the universe (even if the movie itself doesn't stand on it's own). Why Peter's works so well for me is three fold: 1) His takes longer because of both Spider-sense and his healing factor. Hence more time for overdramatics. 2) The actors really sell the scene. It's hinging on Overdramatic but never quite hits that point. 3) With the Iron Man 2 retcon (That Peter was the kid at the Stark Expo), it's kind of full circle. First thing Stark ever says to him is, "Nice Work, Kid." His last words are apologizing for failing Stark.