Okay, so it’s finally landed and as promised, it’s an absolute epic. Just about every Disney/Marvel character from the past decade makes an appearance – that’s about twelve leading characters in all, and to be honest I wasn’t sure how they were going to handle it; that is a lot of people to pack in a movie set to run for two-and-a-half hours.
Well … they pulled it off, and I think I see how they did it.
So you’ve got Thor, the Black Panther, Doctor Strange, the Guardians of The Galaxy, Spider-man and the Avengers in one movie, fighting a common enemy on Earth and in space, and that was what the movie was about: the common enemy: Thanos, possibly the most powerful and complex villain in Comicdom.
So instead of trying to divide the audience attention between too many heroes and their problems and personality defects, the directors focussed on Thanos and his very simple agenda: eliminate half the population of the universe. What makes him so fascinating as a villain trul is that believes he’s doing this for the greater good (there aren’t enough resources in the universe to support its ever-increasing population, so a drastic “correction” is needed). Yup, lots of villains reckon they’re on the side of the greater good, but Thanos is willing to sacrifice anything to achieve his aim, no matter what the cost to himself.
Who survives his universe genocide will not be a choice based company in wealth, race, age or religion – it’s a choice the universe itself will make completely at random (though I imagine he’s going to make sure he’s safe). Thanos himself is brilliantly played by Josh Brolin (who’ll be pulling double duty as Cable in the next Deadpool movie) and a lot of CGI. The rest of the cast does an excellent job even though they’re support players to the villain’s master plan. There’s a lot of humour, a lot of tense interaction between the people trying to save the universe, and considering how much screen time has to be shared between so many people, you still get the sense that the characters are more than two-dimensional. That couldn’t have been easy, but it was probably helped by the fact that we know them so well already.
The story works, the plot hangs together (a small miracle in itself), and Marvel Studios continues to kill it when it comes to set action pieces and special effects (this has got to be one of the most expensive movies ever made). It’s edge of your seat stuff from start to finish, so don’t even think you’ll have time to nip out for a comfort break.
An easy ten out of ten.