By George Haerle
For The Daily World
I’m going to break the professional wall a little bit here to convey my own experience with “Avengers: Infinity War.”
Let this sink in: the original “Iron Man” came out 10 years ago — the same year President Barack Obama was elected. As did “The Dark Knight,” and “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been with us through the joyful, sorrowful and strangest events of the last decade. Like an old best friend from school years, our relationship with the MCU has been almost a formative experience along with the unfolding of our own lives.
The Avengers have been with us through it all, regardless of religion, political leanings or personal beliefs of the following, just to drive the point home more: the Captain Phillips incident, swine flu, Michael Jackson’s death, the miracle on the Hudson, the Deepwater Horizon incident, the Fukushima earthquake and meltdown, Bin Laden was killed, too many mass shootings to list, the Arab Spring, marriage equality, marijuana begins legalization, Robin Williams’ death, Occupy Wall Street, the Royal Wedding, Hurricane Sandy, “Game of Thrones,” Facebook going public, Lance Armstrong doping the whole time, Trevyon Martin, the Black Lives Matter movement, Ebola, Pope Francis, the rise of ISIS, the return of “Star Wars” and the 2016 election.
It’s only fitting that the strangest and most uncertain of times would give us the epic culmination and roller-coaster of emotions from the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the form of “Avengers: Infinity War.”
It may not be your favorite film in the series; it may not be the most complete or perfect – but it will be the most memorable. And what it shares in common with all of the previous films from “Iron Man” to “Guardians of the Galaxy” to “Black Panther” is its sheer enjoyability. Though perhaps not as classic as “The Empire Strikes Back,” it is without a doubt that this culmination of 10 years and 18 previous films is the most comparable to the middle “Star Wars” film in terms of its tone, finale and amount of fun.
This is a huge movie in terms of cast (literally too many to list here), how it unfolds and changes the Marvel Universe, its budget, special effects, scale of the story and how hard-hitting it will be to the kids and most devoted of fans. This review won’t include any significant spoilers. In fact, it’s best you know the absolute bare minimum about the plot, because “Infinity War” should be seen as blind to its plot as possible.
Thanos (an applause-worthy performance by Josh Brolin), the titanic villain teased and built up throughout many films of the series, has come for the Avengers — or rather, something they have. Across the world and the universe, every hero you’ve seen from the original team of Avengers — to Dr. Strange, to Black Panther and the Guardians of the Galaxy — are drawn into this conflict to stop Thanos, as the fate of the entire universe and the existence of all life is at stake.
Before you go, it is recommended that you’ve seen most or all of the Marvel films up to this point. “Infinity War” is meant to be a culmination and is most definitely a “part one” ala “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.” It’s not a stand-alone film by any means, and it requires familiarity with all of the characters and their previous adventures to have the desired and most hard-hitting impact the directors (Anthony and Joe Russo) are trying to make. If you keep in mind that this movie works as a sequel to the 18 prequels before it, it is fantastic.
Getting to see the Guardians of the Galaxy meet Thor and eventually the other Avengers is just incredibly satisfying. Seeing Dr. Strange and Star Lord verbally spar with Tony Stark alongside a wide eyed Spider-Man goes about as well as you can imagine it, and watching Captain America brawl with aliens alongside Black Panther while awkwardly introducing himself to Groot is both hilarious and awesome. You know it is all coming, but to see it realized and go about as fantastic as it possibly can will probably make it the most satisfying half conclusion to the series you could want. The amount of humor and heart among the heroes has been concocted perfectly, and everyone’s character feels like they were written and performed perfectly considering the character histories and how they would react to meeting other strange heroes from different walks of life. This part of the movie is perfect, as well as the mind-blowing and absolutely grade-A action scenes that make the first “Avengers” look like child’s play. A few of the heroes get shortchanged a little bit on screen time, but seeing as the film unfolds it becomes clear why.
To add to this, Thanos will hopefully be remembered as one of the better villains in cinematic history. For a series that has had trouble with intriguing villains, it’s clear that they’ve just all been small potatoes leading up to the big rib-eye steak of villains. Brolin was motion captured for his performance, and this proves to be a fantastic feat. Throughout the film I never felt like I was looking at a CGI character or fake villain — I completely forgot throughout the whole film that it was a computer-generated character as he felt so real on screen. Brolin’s expressions and physicality translate to Thanos with perfection, and his reasons for conquering the universe, while definitely reprehensible and to be stopped, is surprisingly understandable — even relatable. Where other villains are presented as evil beings with evil intentions of the abuse of power, Thanos actually believes in what he is doing and that it is what’s best for the universe. There is no doubt in his mind that it must be done, and he will achieve it through ruthless and relentless means. He is truly a presence akin to Darth Vader’s.
Just go see it. It would be really hard not to enjoy the 95 percent of the movie that is done perfectly for what it is, and it’s probably in the top five or 10 MCU films ever made. Any fan of the series up to this point will laugh, be thrilled, blown away and at times utterly heartbroken by watching this “Infinity War” unfolding onscreen.
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“Avengers: Infinity War” is currently playing at the Riverside Cinemas, 1017 S. Boone St. in Aberdeen.
George Haerle holds a bachelor’s degree in creative writing for media and lives in Cosmopolis.
