Let's say this right here and now. I loved this movie because I had seen everything that came before it. Would I have liked it anyway? Sure. It's a very entertaining movie. But I'm a completist, and had I seen this movie before all the others I would have been bothered by not knowing what came before. I'm glad I engaged completely with the MCU because a film like Endgame is made so much richer for it
Incredibly effective intro with Hawkeye and his family
And then the intro gets even more effective. Of course they'll hunt down Thanos! Of course that will let them undo what he did! Nope. Thanos gets beheaded and our movie begins. Five years later.
I like how Endgame sits in the aftermath of Infinity War. The consequences are not glossed over, they are addressed and explored
Scott's reentry into the world is such a good way of showing us how much the world has changed. And him realizing that he's been listed as one of the dead was chilling
Sexy Ruffalo-Hulk is sexy
Love the condescension towards Scott
Time travel movie poking holes in every single other time travel movie
Before they time travel Nat says "See you in a minute." Now that's something that hits you right in the feels on a rewatch
The whole middle hour of the movie is brilliant in the way it entertains and revels in some of the movies and moments that came before. It celebrates the entire franchise while not forgetting to have value in its own right
Cap Vs. Cap fight is pretty great
Loved the Come and Get Your Love gag
And man, that climax. Fittingly enough, one of the best of the franchise. The action is good, the stakes are immense, and the emotional beats feel earned
When all the heroes start to come back, it is impossible not to feel invigorated
"Avengers assemble"
"And I am Iron Man." I cried.
Lastly we have a touching, fitting denouement to bid farewell to some of our heroes and tease the future adventures for some of the others. And I loved how they did the credits
I knew very little about the character, and this was a weirder movie than I expected going into it. The early part reminded me of Guardians of the Galaxy without the wisecracks (the Kree connection might have something to do with this), and I found it disorienting and hard to connect with. I couldn't tell how much I was liking or disliking the movie for most of its runtime, although it was keeping my attention
This is one of those cases where I developed a stronger appreciation after the fact. We watched it last night. I've landed on the conclusion that I quite enjoyed it after all, while not quite meeting the level of my favourites
A fair amount of this was familiar, but it worked for me. The Skrulls were effective villains while they were still the villains, and more on that in a moment. I liked what was done with shape-shifting
I'm not usually one to spend too much time anticipating what a movie's going to throw at me. Most people could have anticipated the twist a mile away, if for no other reason than the fact that we've seen the Kree before and they were not nice. But I liked the twist, and I liked how the movie changed our view of these characters
Fun cast, good chemistry. They do love their de-aging technology, don't they
Holy Moses, does Captain Marvel get super-powered. Not surprising that Fury hit up that pager at the end of Infinity War
This might be surprising to hear, but I liked the climax. The fact that it basically consisted of Carol absolutely DESTROYING set it apart from the same old climax beats we've seen 20 times already
Girl power without hitting you over the head with it. This movie fits into the Marvel formula, and it's been said many times that it shouldn't have taken this long for a female-centric Marvel movie, but looking at the team behind this is heartening. Also the subtle touches like the soundtrack, which is not only kick-ass, but also features some terrific contributions from ladies of rock
Liked it. It was a fun, light movie with a funny script and charming performances
Lost some of the ingenuity of the way the first Ant-Man played with scale. Best action scene was Hope fighting bad guys early in the movie, shrinking in size and using kitchen implements to her advantage
As per usual, villains were meh
For such a big name, definitely expected more Pfeiffer than what we got
Really liked Randall Park. He was a delight
Michael Peña was still fun but he didn't have as much to do. I was happy to see the return of the Luis story
I liked the climax. It was wacky, and multi-faceted, and it kept my attention
THAT MID-CREDITS SCENE, THOUGH. That got me. Possibly the most effective mid-credits scene yet, which is saying something considering this is one of the lower-stakes movies
Oh. And one last thing. The scenes of Paul Rudd on house arrest singing karaoke and playing drums reminded me of this video. Damn does our boy look good playing the drums
I cannot even fathom how anyone could watch this movie without having seen everything that came before it. I saw everything that came before it in the last 6 months and I was still lost at points. Where are all the Infinity Stones? Who's going where? Who's teamed up with whom? It was a lot to keep track of
Related to that, and due to the nature of the movie, some subplots were better than others
I generally liked the new team-ups we had here, especially when there were some heads being butted. The prickliness of Tony and Doctor Strange was a lot of fun, as was Peter Quill being so put off by Thor. I also liked the team of Thor, Rocket and Groot, although that whole subplot was pretty bland
The Guardians-styled segments were my favourites; in some ways I liked them even better than the actual Guardians movies. Quill and Drax had some good bits, and while Teenage Groot was really just one joke, they stuck with that one joke and it was a good running gag throughout the movie. Rubberband Man was also a fantastic choice for the Guardians' entrance
I also liked the aforementioned team of Tony and Strange, as well as Spider-Man. Strange's powers are still pretty cool and unique, though I wish they had leaned a little more heavily into them, perhaps more inspired by the visuals of the Doctor Strange movie. Spidey's new suit was also pretty neat
Everyone else got pretty under-served. Captain American has a beard and Black Widow is blonde now, and those were my main takeaways from the screen time given to those two. Oh, and Bruce Banner has performance anxiety
Thanos. Complex motivation for a villain, certainly the most powerful foe our heroes have ever fought, and I don't really care about him as a character. Considering how deep we are into the franchise, not to mention how the movie ends (which we'll get to in a minute), the most important thing about Thanos was that he had to feel like an actual threat to this multitude of incredibly powerful superheroes; the good news is he does, right from the start. But he doesn't have the charisma of the best MCU villains - Killmonger, Loki, and so on. Perhaps this was by design to make him all the more intimidating. Perhaps this was due to there not being much humanity behind his performance, by Josh Brolin, an actor I like. But even the parts intended to give him depth, like his relationship with Gamora, did nothing for me. His henchmen will have left my memory within the week if they haven't already. Parting word about Thanos for now: he has a surprisingly cute lil button nose compared to the lump of flesh that is his face
One has to respect a movie in which the bad guy wins. The subversion of our expectations is honestly shocking. However, the risk they ran was that it ended up making the first two hours of the movie feel somewhat hollow. Nothing the Avengers did before fighting Thanos actually made any difference. Thor's axe didn't save them. The battle in Wakanda didn't save them. Even sacrificing Vision didn't save them. This does add to the bleakness of the conclusion, but at the same time it diminished my appreciation for the movie as a whole story
It feels incredibly stupid and very 2019 to say this, but I knew a lot of details about this movie's ending thanks to memes. I tried to avoid spoilers, but it was to no avail. Spider-Man not feeling so good, people turning to dust, even the knowledge that Thanos was wiping out half the population of the universe. These were all things I knew. And with that said, I was pleasantly surprised to find that the ending to this movie still hit me hard. It was extremely well done. The emotions, the characters we've gotten to know, the ramifications, those are all going to stick with me. But if only I'd been a Marvel moviegoer when this movie came out, I'm sure seeing this ending in a theatre would have been next-level feels-hitting
Second time seeing it. We watched it when it was nominated for best picture
I admire this movie for the things that are unique about it. The African setting and the diversity of the cast and characters provide a welcome non-white, non-American focus. The movie is also full of strong, independent, plot-important women. These qualities do make it stand out from the crowd
Having said that, do I think this movie transcends the Marvel formula? No, not really. I was surprised it was nominated for best picture the first time I saw it, and it still doesn't blow me away after having seen everything that came before
The action is fine. There are some cool hand-to-hand fights, especially the waterfall scenes. The setting is interesting. Not a whole lot of memorably funny parts. Most of this movie kind of just slips away after seeing it
However, the one thing that stuck, both the first time and this time, was Killmonger. Considering I've complained about boring villains in the past, the villain in this one definitely elevates the whole movie beyond some of the others. Michael B. Jordan is super entertaining to watch, and his character's motivation has a lot of depth and nuance. Best part of the movie by a fair margin
I've started taking notes while watching these things, and my notes for Black Panther included me saying, "Same old climax. People just flying all over the place." And it's true! The CGI, weightless, generic climax is something that has plagued a lot of the Marvel movies. I've even started wondering if I'm placing too much weight on the climaxes, and perhaps I should start to judge these movies more on whatever comes before. But is it too much to ask for an engaging, original action movie climax!? What is it about the way they make these movies that the big, final, super important action set-piece, the culmination of the whole movie, is so incredibly forgettable? I can think of only a handful of Marvel movies with memorable climaxes that stand out from the others: Avengers 1 and 2, Thor: The Dark World (I know, I'm surprised it stands out, too), Ant-Man, Civil War, Doctor Strange, and Guardians 2 if I'm being generous. Am I missing something here? Does anyone out there have an argument for the Marvel climaxes being good? Or did I miss any individual movies that should get recognition? I'm open to discussion
The Marvel movies always get a boost in quality when you can sense the director's unique style, and that's the case here. Taika Waititi's dry sense of humour permeates to the core of this movie. I haven't seen all of his movies, but I liked What We Do In the Shadows, and he wrote and directed for Flight of the Conchords, one of my favourites. Everyone knows this is one of the funniest Marvel movies, and it sure is, but I really did love how distinctively funny it is through the writing and the performances
For that reason, I was surprised to find Waititi isn't actually a credited writer on this movie. Honestly, I'm assuming he put his spin on the script quite a lot, but if more praise is due to the credited writers, consider it given!
Running trend in the Thor movies: Asgard scenes are boring and self-serious, Thor out of his element scenes are funny and entertaining. Setting so much of the action on Sakaar was the best choice. There's an immediate shift in tone in this movie compared to the previous ones, almost jarringly so, but still not enough to make the Asgard scenes all that memorable. Although I did like the Matt Damon cameo and Anthony Hopkins was funny playing Loki/Odin
The whole climax of the movie was pretty forgettable. I liked Cate Blanchett as Hela, though. She was fun as a straight-up, no subtleties, villain. I also liked their tactic for defeating her. Karl Urban did nothing for me, considering how much screen time his character got
So with that in mind, back to Sakaar!
Mark Ruffalo is charming, Tessa Thompson is badass, Tom Hiddleston is mischievous. I liked them all
Jeff Goldblum! What I loved about him in this movie is that there was JUST the right amount. He made the most of every minute of time he was on the screen and it never got old. Same with Korg (voiced by Waititi, as most of you know). It takes restraint to use these characters sparingly, as I'm sure they knew how much the audience would love them
I've always liked Hemsworth in these movies, and I think he's a really funny actor. It's also always more interesting to see Thor in a vulnerable position, considering he's a God. But more importantly, THOR GOT A HAIRCUT
Ashley's reaction to said haircut: "OH MY DADDY DADDY. I'm going to flood this fucking couch!"
The joke was on her, dear reader. It was I who flooded the fucking couch. Hemsworth looked goooooood
And now, a little tangent for some Mark and Ashley lore. Way back in April 2017, the trailer for Ragnarok was released. You remember it. It featured Immigrant Song pretty heavily. Ashley and I were seeing a movie, no idea what it was, and this trailer pops up. Ashley decided to refer to Immigrant Song as "that song from Shrek 3!" Now, at first I just gently mocked Ashley for associating that song with Shrek, and not with, say, Led Zeppelin, by suggesting that Shrek 3 was her favourite movie of all time. And BOY has that initial mockery morphed. It has now become a running joke that Ashley is obsessed with the Shrek franchise, but also that she is sexually aroused by it and him. She affectionately refers to herself as a Shrek Slut. So! If ever you've heard us joke about Shrek and Ashley's fetishization of everyone's favourite ogre, well, this is why. Thanks, Thor: Ragnarok trailer, for inspiring this stupid thing we've been saying for over two years!
I very much enjoyed the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movies when they came out, including Spider-Man 3, as I remember. It has also been quite some time since I watched them. Those movies benefited greatly from being unique and novel, and earlier examples of how to do blockbuster superhero movies. They were light, and fun, and funny, while still having some good action scenes and special effects. If I watched them now, I'm sure they'd feel very similar to the *counts on fingers* SIXTEEN Marvel movies I've watched in the past half a year
Side note, I didn't see either of the Andrew Garfield movies
This is a long way of saying that Spider-Man: Homecoming was a very, very fun Spider-Man movie, while not really doing a whole lot better than the Tobey Maguire ones, in my opinion. But let's talk about the actual movie at hand, now
Loved Tom Holland in Civil War, and loved his interactions with Robert Downey Jr., so it was pretty disappointing there wasn't more of that. Instead we got Happy Hogan...Thanks?
Tom Holland was a lot of fun in this one, too, and definitely skewed younger than Tobey, feeling more like a high schooler. And speaking of which...
JESUS CHRIST, TOM HOLLAND. When I saw him without his shirt on I immediately looked up how old he was when they filmed this because I felt like a pervert. The good news is he's 23 now, so he was about 20 when they filmed it. The bad news is that Peter's supposed to be 15 in the movie, so I still kind of feel like a pervert
I liked Tom Holland's performance so much that it was even more of a bummer that his face was covered in so many scenes. Comes with the superhero territory, I suppose, but I think it affects Spider-Man more than most
Michael Keaton - kind of boring as a kind of boring villain, but great as a protective, vaguely menacing father. Combining these two aspects made the later villain stuff more interesting. At some point that character twist was spoiled for me, and I wish it had been more of a surprise, but it was still pretty effective
The action was serviceable, if not memorable
I really liked this movie's sense of humour and comic timing. All the way up to the last second of the movie, with Aunt May's "WHAT THE FU--," I laughed a lot at this one. The funny Marvel movies sit high on the list for me; I'm still holding Iron Man 3 as one of my favourites. For this reason, if you've been following along, you probably know why I'm excited for the next one in the franchise
