Avengers: Infinity War
Apr. 30th, 2018 08:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
schneefinkI voluntarily sought out spoilers for Infinity War and then decided to watch it, and was glad I did. Basically at first my main thought was "this is a great basis for fix-it fic" and that turned out to be true, but it was also a better movie than I expected. I liked it a lot better than Age of Ultron or Civil War.
Some thoughts:
- The pacing and coordination of the giant cast worked much better than I expected, kudos. In general the action scenes worked well for me and most of the jokes did, and I don't expect that much more from an action movie.
- I didn't much like them killing off (half) of the last surviving Asgardians, including Heimdall. Seriously, they had to take even more away from Thor? And Loki too – I kind of get killing of Loki, because he would have been too big for the cast&time, but still, wow, harsh. (The conversation between Thor and Rocket was great though.)
- The Hulk was defeated by Thanos once and then so afraid(?) that he refused to come out while fighting Thanos' goons even to save Bruce's life? That makes no sense. The Hulk is anger.
- The battle tactics in Wakanda were weird, to say the least. Where are their fighter planes? Their artillery? Etc. etc.
- Gamora's death sucked. In the two GotG movies I was disappointed by what we saw of her, I felt like what we saw didn't live up to her reputation or potential, and that made her death here even harder to swallow. (At first I was also surprised she gave up the soul stone's location so quickly, but she knew that Thanos could imprison and torture Nebula and her indefinitely and she had no doubt that he would be able to get the mind stone so he would just be able to get it out of her mind eventually, it didn't really make that much of a difference.)
- And really, Thanos "loved" her? Wtf. We didn't get any detail and how this mystical thingy on Vormir works, but saying that Thanos truly loved her when he kidnapped and abused her is vile. Gamora was fridged for extra angst for Thanos (and Star-Lord), ugh.
- Speaking of Star-Lord, way to completely fuck up the plan, Peter Quill you moron. (I also found him obnoxious when trying to one-up Thor.)
(But Dr. Strange was right next to that scene with the time stone, couldn't he have just rewound time ten seconds? Or, for that matter, tried to trick Thanos with his portals and slice the hand with the gauntlet off that way, something like that, it just seemed like he could have done more.)
- One of the reasons why I enjoyed this movie a lot more than Age of Ultron or Civil War is because it had one clear villain with a very clear goal. And okay, that goal was very stupid and he is a psychopath, but still. But they didn't have to try so hard to make him sympathetic. Why.
- At first I thought the battle of Wakanda was being fought to save Vision, and I thought this is a weirdly big sacrifice for someone who already agreed to sacrifice their life (I liked Vision telling Steve that he did it too, after all), but then I realized that the battle wasn't really/just being fought for Vision's benefit but for Wanda, who otherwise would have been forced to kill the man she loves. And they needed Wanda's agreement because she's the only one who could do it. Still, they could have tried harder to convince her. I got the impression that they all severely underestimated Thanos' forces (except Bruce.) (Depending on the time stone's capability, destroying the mind stone earlier might even have worked… I'm going to watch Dr. Strange to learn more about it.)
- What else could have worked: Thor using Stormbreaker to cut off Thanos' arm (or the head), but in his defense he's lost everyone he cares for and probably thought killing Thanos with one blow would be enough.
- I was happy to see T'Challa and Shuri again and also Okoye and M'Baku, and I'm glad that the latter two definitely and Shuri maybe survived. (I'm also wondering who'll rule Wakanda now – Shuri is not really the ruling type, she's a scientist, so probably M'Baku? Or Ramonda as regent for a short while? Maybe Nakia will challenge?)
- To my surprise I didn't mind Dr. Strange, and he and Tony and Peter were a fun team-up. I especially loved Peter's Alien reference, that was a clever solution to a very powerful villain. Tony and Peter in general were great, and I liked that Tony mentioned his past trauma(s). The ending of the movie is pretty much Tony's nightmare… (At least he can team up with Nebula! That could be fun. For us, I mean.)
- Seen in the scene set in Scotland: a diner window saying "we can deep-fry your kebap" above a Scottish flag. Scots, man.
- I'm not sure how I would have felt about Thanos' plan succeeding if I hadn't been prepared for it. I'm not thrilled about it, and that every death cheated lessens the impact of each future death, but I hope they'll stick the landing in the sequel.
- I was happy about the Captain Marvel reference in the post-credit scene. It did remind me how few female heroes/characters there are in the MCU, and we didn't even see Valkyrie, or Nakia.
(Now I'm thinking about a MCU crossover D&D campaign. A few MCU characters are stranded in a D&D world and trying to find their way back, stealing powerful artifacts and annoying people in the process, and the party is hired to stop the thieves/something similar and only eventually will realize who these people are. Could be fun, and I've been wanting to try to DM again anyway, after our current campaign is over.)
Some thoughts:
- The pacing and coordination of the giant cast worked much better than I expected, kudos. In general the action scenes worked well for me and most of the jokes did, and I don't expect that much more from an action movie.
- I didn't much like them killing off (half) of the last surviving Asgardians, including Heimdall. Seriously, they had to take even more away from Thor? And Loki too – I kind of get killing of Loki, because he would have been too big for the cast&time, but still, wow, harsh. (The conversation between Thor and Rocket was great though.)
- The Hulk was defeated by Thanos once and then so afraid(?) that he refused to come out while fighting Thanos' goons even to save Bruce's life? That makes no sense. The Hulk is anger.
- The battle tactics in Wakanda were weird, to say the least. Where are their fighter planes? Their artillery? Etc. etc.
- Gamora's death sucked. In the two GotG movies I was disappointed by what we saw of her, I felt like what we saw didn't live up to her reputation or potential, and that made her death here even harder to swallow. (At first I was also surprised she gave up the soul stone's location so quickly, but she knew that Thanos could imprison and torture Nebula and her indefinitely and she had no doubt that he would be able to get the mind stone so he would just be able to get it out of her mind eventually, it didn't really make that much of a difference.)
- And really, Thanos "loved" her? Wtf. We didn't get any detail and how this mystical thingy on Vormir works, but saying that Thanos truly loved her when he kidnapped and abused her is vile. Gamora was fridged for extra angst for Thanos (and Star-Lord), ugh.
- Speaking of Star-Lord, way to completely fuck up the plan, Peter Quill you moron. (I also found him obnoxious when trying to one-up Thor.)
(But Dr. Strange was right next to that scene with the time stone, couldn't he have just rewound time ten seconds? Or, for that matter, tried to trick Thanos with his portals and slice the hand with the gauntlet off that way, something like that, it just seemed like he could have done more.)
- One of the reasons why I enjoyed this movie a lot more than Age of Ultron or Civil War is because it had one clear villain with a very clear goal. And okay, that goal was very stupid and he is a psychopath, but still. But they didn't have to try so hard to make him sympathetic. Why.
- At first I thought the battle of Wakanda was being fought to save Vision, and I thought this is a weirdly big sacrifice for someone who already agreed to sacrifice their life (I liked Vision telling Steve that he did it too, after all), but then I realized that the battle wasn't really/just being fought for Vision's benefit but for Wanda, who otherwise would have been forced to kill the man she loves. And they needed Wanda's agreement because she's the only one who could do it. Still, they could have tried harder to convince her. I got the impression that they all severely underestimated Thanos' forces (except Bruce.) (Depending on the time stone's capability, destroying the mind stone earlier might even have worked… I'm going to watch Dr. Strange to learn more about it.)
- What else could have worked: Thor using Stormbreaker to cut off Thanos' arm (or the head), but in his defense he's lost everyone he cares for and probably thought killing Thanos with one blow would be enough.
- I was happy to see T'Challa and Shuri again and also Okoye and M'Baku, and I'm glad that the latter two definitely and Shuri maybe survived. (I'm also wondering who'll rule Wakanda now – Shuri is not really the ruling type, she's a scientist, so probably M'Baku? Or Ramonda as regent for a short while? Maybe Nakia will challenge?)
- To my surprise I didn't mind Dr. Strange, and he and Tony and Peter were a fun team-up. I especially loved Peter's Alien reference, that was a clever solution to a very powerful villain. Tony and Peter in general were great, and I liked that Tony mentioned his past trauma(s). The ending of the movie is pretty much Tony's nightmare… (At least he can team up with Nebula! That could be fun. For us, I mean.)
- Seen in the scene set in Scotland: a diner window saying "we can deep-fry your kebap" above a Scottish flag. Scots, man.
- I'm not sure how I would have felt about Thanos' plan succeeding if I hadn't been prepared for it. I'm not thrilled about it, and that every death cheated lessens the impact of each future death, but I hope they'll stick the landing in the sequel.
- I was happy about the Captain Marvel reference in the post-credit scene. It did remind me how few female heroes/characters there are in the MCU, and we didn't even see Valkyrie, or Nakia.
(Now I'm thinking about a MCU crossover D&D campaign. A few MCU characters are stranded in a D&D world and trying to find their way back, stealing powerful artifacts and annoying people in the process, and the party is hired to stop the thieves/something similar and only eventually will realize who these people are. Could be fun, and I've been wanting to try to DM again anyway, after our current campaign is over.)
