The Ringer - Everything You Need to Know About ‘Avengers: Infinity War’2018-05-04T07:45:00-04:00http://www.theringer.com/rss/stream/170684512018-05-04T07:45:00-04:002018-05-04T07:45:00-04:00Revisiting ‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ After ‘Avengers: Infinity War’
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<figcaption>Disney/Ringer illustration</figcaption>
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<p>‘Avengers: Infinity War’ and ‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ both use their fans’ years of emotional investment as a weapon, but the latter boldly does so without a safety net </p> <figure class="e-image">
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<p id="akCcaC">With Disney quickly morphing into entertainment’s <a href="https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/3/19/17138522/disney-black-panther-wrinkle-in-time-avengers-infinity-war-coco">many-faced, multipurpose god</a>, it’s not the least bit surprising that two of the biggest blockbusters of the past year are Mouse House productions. <em>Avengers: Infinity War</em> and <em>Star Wars: The Last Jedi</em> were capital-E Events—the former a massive cinematic crossover and the culmination of a decade of universe-building from Marvel Studios, and the latter a highly touted continuation of a new trilogy that promised darker undertones. Both movies hit theaters with a built-in audience: the millions who had stuck around to see the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s prior 18 films were guaranteed to tune in for the payoff in <em>Infinity War</em>. <em>Star Wars</em>, meanwhile, has been a cultural touchstone since its birth in the late ’70s, a phenomenon that with 2015’s <em>The Force Awakens</em>, appeared to have its groove back after a string of disappointing prequels in the early aughts. But where these blockbusters stand apart is in the way they wielded, subverted, and perhaps even exploited the expectations of their most ardent fans. </p>
<p id="ePbCFf">The history that both franchises have with their fans, some of whom grew up alongside these characters (don’t ask me about the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfeUyUu3fjQ">fine additions to my General Grievous collection</a>), engenders a deep emotional investment. Both franchises have cultivated this relationship for years—through their films, companion books, TV series, and fan conventions. But in <em>Infinity War </em>and <em>The Last Jedi</em>, both franchises deliberately disrupted the history the fan bases held so dear, delivering hefty gut-punches. In <em>Infinity War</em>, the long-hyped villain Thanos successfully acquired all six Infinity Stones, and with the snap of his fingers, eliminated half of the universe’s population—along with a handful of superheroes, including Spider-Man, Bucky Barnes, and Black Panther. <em>The Last Jedi</em> transformed Luke Skywalker into an aggravating, pessimistic, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC4A7y7ONoI">alien-milking</a>, reticent Jedi Master, and that was <em>before</em> he sacrificed himself to save the few remaining Rebels, who could comfortably fit inside the <em>Millennium Falcon</em>. Even <a href="http://deadline.com/2017/12/mark-hamill-luke-skywalker-criticism-rian-johnson-star-wars-the-last-jedi-1202231920/">Mark Hamill</a> had a hard time accepting his character’s arc. Neither movie left you with a warm feeling—watching both of them felt like walking through a thunderstorm without an umbrella. </p>
<div class="c-float-right"><aside id="LDTmiG"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"The Marvel Relevance Rankings","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/2/17308820/marvel-relevance-rankings-avengers-infinity-war"},{"title":"The Only Death That Matters in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/27/17289858/avengers-infinity-war-review"},{"title":"Do I Have to Care About Infinity Stones?","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/26/17282564/avengers-infinity-stones"},{"title":"The ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Exit Survey","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17301676/avengers-infinity-war-exit-survey"},{"title":"Which Deaths in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Are Permanent?","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/27/17292012/which-deaths-are-permanent-avengers-infinity-war"},{"title":"The Fight Scenes in Marvel Movies Suck","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/1/17304438/marvel-fight-scenes-avengers-infinity-war"},{"title":"‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Is a Record-Breaking Box Office Hit","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17302364/avengers-infinity-war-box-office-record-marvel-cinematic-universe"},{"title":"Does Thanos Have a Point?","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/3/17313486/thanos-avengers-infinity-war-villain-marvel-movies"}]}'></div></aside></div>
<p id="Waz3b8">However, the receptions to Disney’s latest mega-events—both commercially and in online circles—have been noticeably different.<em> Infinity War</em> broke the <a href="https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17302364/avengers-infinity-war-box-office-record-marvel-cinematic-universe">global and domestic box office opening-weekend records</a>, and its 84 percent “fresh” Rotten Tomatoes rating is on par with the rest of the MCU. Only <em>Black Panther</em> and the first <em>Avengers</em> movie have a higher CinemaScore grade among MCU movies. The same can’t be said for <em>The Last Jedi</em>, which had a box office haul that was <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/news/disneys-last-jedi-box-office-sales-lower-wall-street-expectations/">disappointing by <em>Star Wars</em> standards</a>. The film had a <a href="https://www.theringer.com/movies/2017/12/26/16819420/christmas-box-office-winners-losers">steep 69 percent drop-off</a> after its opening weekend, and while its 47 percent “rotten” Rotten Tomatoes audience score is more the result of a <a href="https://www.theringer.com/2017/12/18/16791754/star-wars-the-last-jedi-negative-reaction-reddit-fans">troll campaign</a> than a unifying consensus, there was an indisputable backlash to Rian Johnson’s movie that didn’t exist with J.J. Abrams’s <em>The Force Awakens</em>. </p>
<p id="amSNtv">But the polarizing reaction to <em>The Last Jedi</em> isn’t a sign of the film’s shortcomings; rather, it’s a sign of its audacity. <em>The Last Jedi</em> let its characters and story evolve, even if that meant destroying the foundations from which the franchise was built, and polarizing some of its fans along the way. Kylo Ren said it best: “Let the past die; kill it, if you have to.” </p>
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<p id="Ne7Af3">Today, <em>The Empire Strikes Back</em> may be considered <em>Star Wars</em>’ finest entry, but it had a <a href="https://io9.gizmodo.com/heres-how-fans-reacted-to-the-empire-strikes-back-in-19-1821551259">similarly polarizing reception</a> from fans in 1980. Darth Vader’s “I am your father” moment is now ingrained in the cultural lexicon, but it was one of cinema’s most unexpected, game-changing twists, and Han Solo being frozen in carbonite was a chilling image (literally) that wouldn’t be resolved for another three years. Like <em>Empire</em>, <em>The Last Jedi</em> didn’t retreat from its shocking moments: Yes, Luke wasn’t a flawless, mythological Jedi hero; yes, Rey’s parents were nobodies with no ties to the Skywalker or Kenobi bloodline; yes, the <a href="http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/its-a-trap">fan favorite</a> Admiral Ackbar really died an unceremonious, off-screen death; and yes, Luke is really gone too. </p>
<p id="sYsing">But <em>The Last Jedi</em> didn’t just impart lessons from <em>Empire</em>’s bold storytelling choices—it used <em>Star Wars</em>’ history to subvert expectations, and make a world that’s been around for decades feel lived in for the same amount of time. Luke didn’t exist in narrative stasis in the decades he was left off-screen; instead, like any compelling character, he evolved. The Luke we meet in <em>The Last Jedi </em>is far removed from the bright-eyed farm boy on Tatooine. He’s been weighed down by the hypocrisy of the Jedi order, and his own failings as a teacher that manifested in Kylo Ren. <em>The Last Jedi</em> is a fluid continuation of <em>Star Wars</em> that asks its audience to reconsider their franchise nostalgia and plunge into the deep end along with its characters. </p>
<p id="dm2CtY">The MCU, meanwhile, seemingly cleared its roster in <em>Infinity War</em> by wiping out half the franchise’s heroes in a heart-wrenching send-off, but it did so with a “Get Out of Jail Free” card in its back pocket. As gutting as it was to watch Peter Parker fear the unknown and say, “I don’t wanna go,” it was impossible not to watch that moment while simultaneously thinking, <em>I know there’s a Spider-Man sequel in the works</em>. The expectation is that Thanos’s <em>Leftovers</em>-esque rapture will be undone—the only question remaining is how. (Leading theories in the clubhouse: the remaining heroes will use the Infinity Stone that can reverse time, or Ant-Man and Captain Marvel<em> </em>will do something involving the “Quantum Realm.”) Characters like Spider-Man and Black Panther, who were ostensibly killed, are the new, young heroes who will shepherd Phase 4 of the MCU, while we know that guys like Captain America and Iron Man, who survived in <em>Infinity War</em>, are played by actors on expiring contracts. What we witnessed wasn’t a bold, sweeping emotional climax, but a gimmick meant to ensure that fans will park their butts in the theater next year to see how this all unfolds. </p>
<p id="j0ctvo">Perhaps if <em>Infinity War</em> opted to kill its older heroes, or killed off a combination of younger and older heroes—say, a mix of Iron Man, Captain America, Star-Lord, and Bucky Barnes—then the ending might’ve been taken at face value and had a greater, lasting impact. Instead, as most fans probably expect, <em>Avengers 4</em> should bring its new heroes back and return us to Marvel’s status quo. This is the problem with the MCU in miniature: The emotional and narrative stakes are placated by an infinite loop of new “Phases,” new heroes, and potential franchises to branch out, which will beget more crossover events like <em>Infinity War</em> in the years to come. The franchise doesn’t ponder its own history or how to subvert it; it considers only how to keep feeding its loop ad infinitum. It’s an excellent business plan, but not a way to tell stories with humanity, thematic depth, and real stakes.</p>
<p class="c-end-para" id="ujpCwV">And it makes a blockbuster like <em>The Last Jedi</em> feel like a unicorn. By not just considering its own legacy, but letting its new heroes in Rey, Finn, and Poe take the spotlight and represent new values, <em>The Last Jedi </em>epitomizes how a decades-old franchise can handle its history without falling into repetitive traps. Letting the past die is just <em>Star Wars</em>’ way of ensuring its future.</p>
https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/4/17315514/avengers-infinity-war-star-wars-last-jedi-endingsMiles Surrey2018-05-03T09:11:36-04:002018-05-03T09:11:36-04:00Sacrifice in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’
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<img alt="Thanos" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/ewssz_zp9zqNTJuaFvVeqi-Cl94=/293x0:1542x937/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/59613821/MV5BMTg1MjMwNTQ3MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMDg4MjkzNTM_._V1_SX1777_CR0_0_1777_937_AL_.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures</figcaption>
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<p>Mallory and Jason break down Marvel’s latest hit and give their favorite moments of the film</p> <div id="hgZU4q"><iframe src="https://open.spotify.com/embed-podcast/episode/6phFzXu5khwvEmNZPdDSPQ" style="border: 0; width: 100%; height: 232px;" allowfullscreen="" allow="encrypted-media"></iframe></div>
<p id="LSyETB"><a href="https://art19.com/shows/binge-mode-game-of-thrones/episodes/04a5ba37-e123-4a63-ab20-809c4980f983">Mallory Rubin and Jason Concepcion explore</a> the theme of sacrifice in Marvel’s <em>Avengers: Infinity War</em> (14:52), theorize on how the heroes could make a comeback against Thanos (14:52), list seven of their favorite moments from the blockbuster (53:02), and award the champion’s purse to the villain of the movie (1:07:33).</p>
<p id="ePXoNZ"><strong>Subscribe:</strong> <a href="https://go.redirectingat.com/?id=&xs=1&url=https%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.com%2Fus%2Fpodcast%2Fbinge-mode-game-of-thrones%2Fid1243247464%3Fmt%3D2">Apple Podcasts</a> / <a href="https://art19.com/shows/binge-mode-game-of-thrones">Art19</a> / <a href="https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/the-ringer/binge-mode-game-of-thrones">Stitcher</a> / <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/bingemode">RSS</a></p>
https://www.theringer.com/binge-mode/2018/5/3/17313630/sacrifice-in-avengers-infinity-warMallory RubinJason Concepcion2018-05-03T05:50:01-04:002018-05-03T05:50:01-04:00Does Thanos Have a Point?
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<figcaption>Marvel Studios/Ringer illustration</figcaption>
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<p>The ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Big Bad is a villain with a plan for world domination—and maybe the motivation to justify it. Is Marvel’s monster a reasonable brute?</p> <figure class="e-image">
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<p id="oHhbkr"><em>This post contains spoilers for </em>Infinity War<em>,</em> <em>like, right after this sentence. </em></p>
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<p id="Paftsh">The greatest trick that Thanos ever pulled was to nearly convince you he had a point. And that really is saying something, considering that the supervillain the Marvel Cinematic Universe has spent the past six years threatening us with snapped his fingers at the end of <em>Infinity War </em>and magicked away half the sentient population of the universe. Thanos, played by Josh Brolin, called this “mercy.” Which tracks if you also subscribe to the notion that life is an inconvenient mess forced onto people, or if you’ve ever rooted for the asteroid, so to speak. The thing is, when people make grim pronouncements like that, they’re usually joking <em>a little</em>. I looked around the theater after the lights came up and saw children with their hands on their heads and tears in their eyes. With so much emotional fallout, does Thanos actually have a leg to stand on?</p>
<p id="mYhGHN">Let’s go back to the beginning of time, to the first <em>Avengers</em> movie. The Big Bad was Loki, riding into midtown Manhattan on a flying chariot, backed by a massive alien invasion force pouring out of a gaping hellmouth to another dimension suspended in the sky. The goal? Raze the world and preside over the ashes. The freshly assembled Avengers beat the incursion back and Loki into submission just barely, and with an amount of trauma the MCU didn’t really acknowledge for another two movies or so. Fast-forward to the opening exchanges of <em>Infinity War</em> and Thanos, the existential threat long promised, has already beaten Thor to within an inch of his life. He piledrives the Hulk so hard that the once overly combative rage monster <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3uMMjZGhnI">wants no smoke</a> for the rest of the movie, and then throttles Loki, laying his blue, lifeless body at Thor’s helpless feet. The first <em>Avengers</em> movie turned on every crank in the space of 10 minutes. </p>
<div class="c-float-right"><aside id="Vyi0NM"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"The Marvel Relevance Rankings","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/2/17308820/marvel-relevance-rankings-avengers-infinity-war"},{"title":"The Only Death That Matters in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/27/17289858/avengers-infinity-war-review"},{"title":"Do I Have to Care About Infinity Stones?","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/26/17282564/avengers-infinity-stones"},{"title":"The ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Exit Survey","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17301676/avengers-infinity-war-exit-survey"},{"title":"Which Deaths in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Are Permanent?","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/27/17292012/which-deaths-are-permanent-avengers-infinity-war"},{"title":"The Fight Scenes in Marvel Movies Suck","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/1/17304438/marvel-fight-scenes-avengers-infinity-war"},{"title":"‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Is a Record-Breaking Box Office Hit","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17302364/avengers-infinity-war-box-office-record-marvel-cinematic-universe"}]}'></div></aside></div>
<p id="HyaWFp">This is a good villain, and I’m not trying to tell you he’s not. Large? Check. Cruel? Check. Apparently unstoppable? Check. But the seams start to show in his backstory. In the comics, Thanos was responsible for the destruction of his homeworld, Titan; but in <em>Infinity War</em>, he made an honest attempt at saving Titan many years before. With the population ballooning and natural resources dwindling, Thanos made a logical but no less heinous suggestion: kill half the population at random so the rest can live. He was rightly laughed off the planet, but then again the planet did eventually die. This becomes the bad thing in his past that he vows never to let happen again, animating his quest to acquire all six Infinity Stones for want of killing half of everything so that no one will have to go to sleep on an empty stomach. This is a choice only he has the will to take responsibility for, as he tells his adopted daughter Gamora before forcing her to lead him to the Soul Stone.</p>
<p id="A2XME3">About that: If you can already bend space and time and go literally anywhere in an instant, why, then, would you choose to teleport to the base of a mountain and climb up? Further, why, if you had the power to bend all reality to your whim, would you sacrifice half of the universe instead of just ... you know, providing for it? It’s like the cookie-jar adage—Thanos, with his massive, dumb, purple hand caught in a bind, chose to smash the jar instead of letting go of the cookie. </p>
<p id="gJcaDS">It’s not a plot hole that existed in the comics, in which Thanos was proudly unredeemable. See, he had a weird thing for Mistress Death, who is the concept of death, personified as a desirable woman. And Mistress Death had done some accounting and noticed that there were more people alive at the time than had ever died. And if Thanos truly loved Death, she reasoned, he would balance the scales for her. So he gathered the Infinity Stones, and that’s where Jim Starlin’s <em>Infinity Gauntlet—</em>the series on which the movie is loosely based—<em>begins. </em>(You’ll notice that, in his first mid-credits scene after <em>Avengers</em>,<em> </em>he smiles when his adviser tells him that <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4JlBceuLgY">to invade Earth is to “court death.”</a> Get it? “Court Death.”)</p>
<p id="qOywov">Thanos’s genocidal mission makes more sense when he’s the leader of a death-worshiping cult. One of his many perverse attempts to win Death’s affections includes keeping Nebula in limbo between life and death. In the MCU, that meant replacing her flesh with robot parts, as she tearfully explained in <em>Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. </em>In <em>Infinity Gauntlet</em>,<em> </em>that meant something much more grotesque and literal.</p>
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<em>Infinity Gauntlet </em>no. 1</figcaption>
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<p id="TCXlnD">Ten years of world-building were riding on <em>Infinity War</em>, the end meant to justify the means. That said, there was a need to present the Biggest Big Bad in the most flattering light possible. In making a “Thanos Movie,” as codirector Joe Russo <a href="http://comicbook.com/marvel/2018/04/10/avengers-infinity-war-thanos-backstory-motivations-titan/">called it in an interview in early April</a>, especially one that’s nearly three hours long, there was always a chance Thanos could be perceived as, well, correct. The unsettling thing is that people seem to think there’s a chance he really could be. “You want to write him off as insane,” Brolin <a href="http://ew.com/movies/2018/03/09/josh-brolin-thanos-avengers-infinity-war/">said of his role in March</a>. “And yet what he’s doing makes sense, if you break it down.” </p>
<p id="JrCZ0I">Hmmm. No. No, it doesn’t. Let’s start here: Thanos says that there was a caste system on Titan, and that resources weren’t limited so much as disproportionately distributed. And to ruin everyone’s fun by applying serious, real-world politics to a movie featuring a talking raccoon for a second: Environmental concerns about overpopulation are at best <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2017/12/12/16766872/overpopulation-exaggerated-concern-climate-change">dramatized</a> and at most other times <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/mar/19/overpopulation-cities-environment-developing-world-racist-paul-ehrlich">discriminatory</a>. Population control as a solution is often coercive and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/12/asia/myanmar-rohingya-un-violence-genocide-intl/index.html">antihumanist</a>. </p>
<p class="c-end-para" id="rp45Fj">Once you start to seriously consider expedience at such a dire cost, you’re too far gone. You don’t even need me to help orient your thinking on what are acceptable losses and what are not. Captain America does it for you. About an hour after it all hits the fan, Vision suggests the gang destroys the Mind Stone, which would mean destroying Vision along with it, because one (super)life shouldn’t stand between victory and failure. “But it should,” Captain America says, now bearded and spicier, but just as idealistic. It’s cheesy, and Pollyannaish, but he’s right. Thanos, it must be said, was not.</p>
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https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/3/17313486/thanos-avengers-infinity-war-villain-marvel-moviesMicah Peters2018-05-02T07:00:04-04:002018-05-02T07:00:04-04:00A TV Critic Reviews the Marvel Cinematic Universe
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<figcaption>Marvel Studios/Getty Images/Ringer illustration</figcaption>
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<p>The MCU is often compared to another popular serialized medium: television. But is it good television?</p> <p id="jTEMiy"><em>Avengers: Infinity War </em>is not really a movie as we’ve come to understand them. Even <em>The</em> <em>New York Times </em><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/24/movies/avengers-infinity-war-review.html">says so</a>! The definition of “a movie” has come a long way in the past decade, but it still might be fair to call it “entertainment that’s at least 80 minutes long and that you don’t have to research beforehand.” But with <em>Infinity War, </em>neither the characters nor their relationships nor the plot<em> </em>make much sense in isolation. Would you know Shuri was T’Challa’s sister if you hadn’t seen <em>Black Panther </em>or that the ship in the opening scene was full of Asgardian refugees if you hadn’t seen <em>Thor: Ragnarok</em> or that Scarlet Witch and Vision are dating if you hadn’t seen … whichever movie that happened in? </p>
<p id="YIRtD6">If <em>Infinity War </em>doesn’t totally scan as a movie, then logic holds that its fellow component parts of the Marvel Cinematic Universe don’t always either. (Though not all of them! One of <em>Black Panther</em>’s many virtues is how self-contained it was, apart from that Bucky teaser.) And if these <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvel_Cinematic_Universe#Feature_films">soon-to-be-dozens</a> of component parts aren’t movies, what are they? Probably something close to television, a medium where serialized storytelling drawn out over a period of years isn’t the exception—it’s the norm.</p>
<p id="RW5sqM">“The MCU is actually TV” is a take that belongs squarely in the first couple of panels of the <a href="http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/expanding-brain">Expanding Brain Meme</a> (meaning it’s warm, but not exactly hot). Joe and Anthony Russo, the directing duo entrusted with <em>Infinity War</em>,<em> </em>its sequel, and several prior Marvel ventures came up through the world of episodic television, having worked on shows like <em>Community. </em>Taika Waititi’s charming<em> Thor: Ragnarok </em>prompted a wave of articles with headlines like “<a href="http://collider.com/thor-ragnarok-marvel-movies-as-tv-mcu/">Why <em>Thor: Ragnarok </em>Is the Best Example of Marvel Treating Movies Like TV</a>” and “<a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/12/is-the-marvel-cinematic-universe-actually-the-most-popular-tv-show-of-the-decade">Is the Marvel Cinematic Universe Actually the Most Popular TV Show of the Decade?</a>,” the latter of which quotes producer Kevin Feige directly comparing <em>Infinity War </em>and its follow-up to a season finale. Even <em>The New Yorker</em>’s famously contrarian Richard Brody uses the analogy in <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/richard-brody/avengers-infinity-war-reviewed-the-latest-marvel-movie-is-a-two-and-a-half-hour-ad-for-all-the-previous-marvel-movies">his <em>Infinity War </em>review</a>.</p>
<p id="xZBOkv">Most of the time, however, the MCU’s status as a de facto television series is used as either an <a href="https://twitter.com/AlannaBennett/status/990420231012134913">excuse</a> for its flaws (it’s unfair to evaluate something by the standards of a movie when it isn’t <em>really </em>a movie) or an explanation for them. In both cases, elaboration is considered unnecessary. Rarely is “The MCU is actually TV” used as a starting point instead of a destination. Sure, it’s a show—but what kind? Is it any closer to conventional television than it is to conventional movies? And most importantly: Is it good?</p>
<p id="Q91SvA">As a TV critic, I decided to try to answer (some of) these questions. Much like a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man suddenly doing battle in deep space, I’m not one to let being obviously underqualified for the task at hand stop me.</p>
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<p id="SLswFb">There’s a lot keeping MCU elements from working as a traditional movie, but there are just as many barriers to the whole enterprise working as traditional TV. Most movies don’t lean so heavily on their own self-generated mythology; most episodes of television don’t cost $9.16 <a href="http://deadline.com/2018/04/average-movie-ticket-price-2018-first-quarter-1202379390/">on average</a> to watch apiece. Most movie franchises don’t release 19 installments a decade; most TV series don’t release an average of one episode every six months.</p>
<p id="UrluIE">Those prices and that schedule trip up a TV brain like mine. It’s fair game for film critics to chafe at the obligation to constantly consume the next Marvel product in order to understand the <em>next </em>next Marvel product, so it’s fair game for me to grumble about shelling out each and every time I want to hang out with my make-believe friends. As a person with rent to pay, let alone a critic, I’m wary of anything that requires a $150 buy-in. That’s 10 months of HBO Now! I could watch half a dozen pantheon shows and infinite middling studio comedies for the price of those 19 “episodes.” Same goes for the problem of just how much time passes between new entries in a larger continuity. Lots of Marvel movies are available to stream, but given the importance of box office revenue, one can safely assume the MCU isn’t intended as a binge, give or take a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/27/movies/marvel-movie-marathon.html">punishing 31-hour stunt</a>. Bingeable shows can afford not to constantly refresh their audience on relevant information on the safe assumption they first learned it mere hours ago; live (or live-ish) shows can’t. And <em>Infinity War </em>relies on a <em>lot </em>of years-old information, for both its MacGuffin (what’s the Tesseract again?) and its emotional stakes. </p>
<p id="wsFLXT">Looking at the MCU purely as TV, the project seems to take on and shed formats as it sees fit. Sometimes it’s an episodic anthology, with building blocks that are distinct from each other to the point of being totally disconnected. (Believe it or not, <em>Guardians of the Galaxy </em>takes place in the same narrative continuity as Ed Norton’s <em>Incredible Hulk.</em>) Sometimes it’s an over-serialized drama in the vein of the “13-hour movie” streaming series, where two-hour segments are so concerned with resolving what’s happened and setting up what’s to come they forget to meaningfully exist in the present. The connective tissue of the MCU—your <em>Age of Ultron</em>s<em>, </em>your <em>Captain America: Civil War</em>s—resembles nothing so much as a midseason excerpt from a punishingly long Netflix season. </p>
<p id="bsEbDl">The MCU swaps out TV styles as frequently as it does TV templates. It’s by turns a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider-Man:_Homecoming">CW teen drama</a>, a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thor_(film)"><em>Thrones</em>-ian high fantasy</a>, a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_America:_The_First_Avenger">period piece</a>, and, most frequently, a workplace comedy. Combined with the MCU’s almost militaristic commitment to origin stories, the whole looks less like a single series than an assemblage of pilots, some of them <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_pilot#Backdoor_pilot">backdoor</a>. (<em>Civil War </em>dedicating 20 minutes apiece to T’Challa and Spider-Man smoothly sets up the emotional stakes of two fledgling franchises.) It’s useful to think of the MCU as a collection of interrelated series—<em>The Iron Man Show</em>,<em> The Thor Show</em>,<em> The Captain America Show</em>—under the watchful eye of a single producer, with Feige as its Ryan Murphy or Shonda Rhimes.</p>
<p id="jtL4kX">The MCU may be without precedent, but it does have a close contemporary: <a href="https://www.theringer.com/2016/9/23/16041368/greg-berlanti-superhero-shows-arrow-the-flash-5d019fda06a">the Arrowverse</a>, a joint TV collaboration between the CW and DC Comics. <em>Infinity War </em>has been billed as “<a href="http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/infinity-war-is-the-most-ambitious-crossover-event-in-history">the most ambitious crossover event in history</a>,” but the Arrowverse has been replicating the comics model of separate properties and heavily hyped climaxes since <em>Arrow</em>’s debut in 2012. It’s since been joined by <em>Supergirl</em>,<em> The Flash</em>,<em> Legends of Tomorrow</em>,<em> </em>and most recently, <em>Black Lightning. </em>Of course, the MCU has its own TV branch, which turned a convenient metaphor for streaming bloat into a <a href="https://www.theringer.com/2018/3/15/17122624/prestige-procedural-good-fight">textbook example of one</a>. <em>The Defenders </em>didn’t quite turn into a TV version of the <em>Avengers </em>phenomenon, perhaps because the Marvel Netflix ventures embodied so many of the MCU’s weaknesses—slack pacing, monotonous uniformity, the uneven success of some characters over others—and so few of its strengths. (<em>Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.</em>,<em> </em>on the other hand, is trucking along well into its fifth season.) Meanwhile, the Arrowverse has crafted a mega-narrative that fits more comfortably into customary definitions of TV, which closely mirrors the issue-to-issue style of actual comic books anyway.</p>
<p id="mooOHj">That Netflix is a major Marvel partner feels fitting, because reckoning with the MCU’s grip on the culture feels not unlike grappling with Netflix’s inexorable influence on our viewing habits. Both thumb their nose at category distinctions: Is it TV? Is it movies? Who cares, as long as they’ve successfully created a Pavlovian incentive to watch? Ditto for typical markers of quality: Does a movie or episode deliver a satisfying experience on its own? Who cares, if nothing exists on its own anymore? All critics are left to do is stand on the sidelines and grumble into our CMS. </p>
<p id="tyMXoP">So, is the MCU good TV? The answer is: sometimes. Like any good anthology, the MCU can be nimble and flexible in a way that lends itself to pleasing the widest possible assortment of crowds. Any universe that’s found a way to teleport from Asgard to Wakanda and make both worthwhile places to spend our time is to be commended. The MCU can also be as distended and overburdened as any B-minus Peak TV drama. Its worst moments are when a sense of obligation or entitlement—the <a href="http://www.vulture.com/2018/04/long-episodes-are-the-manspreading-of-tv.html">root cause</a> of all prestige bloat—peeks through: Doctor Strange’s cameo in <em>Thor: Ragnarok </em>exists for no other reason than to further ingratiate him as a primary MCU character for years to come; the ending of <em>Infinity War </em>is as cheap a cliffhanger as any sweeps-week stunt. </p>
<p class="c-end-para" id="069SEH">To my mind, the most important takeaway is that the traits that often compromise the MCU apply in any genre, as do the ones that make it so popular—I don’t care how a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ant-Man_(film)">heist caper</a> or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guardians_of_the_Galaxy_(film)">space opera</a> is packaged so long as I have a good time. Pointing out the MCU’s resemblance to a different kind of storytelling doesn’t hand-wave its challenges, including the ones showcased in <em>Infinity War. </em>It just highlights common problems both movies and shows tend to take on at their most excessive, and they’re not the kind that can get magically Departed by an unfriendly purple dinosaur. But a <a href="http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=marvel0518.htm">$600 million opening weekend</a> isn’t broke, so I wouldn’t get my hopes up about fixing it.</p>
https://www.theringer.com/2018/5/2/17309640/marvel-cinematic-universe-televisionAlison Herman2018-05-02T05:50:01-04:002018-05-02T05:50:01-04:00In Defense of Marvel’s MacGuffins
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<p>The MCUs Infinity Stones are often treated with scorn—but ‘Infinity War’ wouldn’t work without them</p> <p id="RudTgI"><em>Avengers: Infinity War</em> capstones a decade of world-building across 18 movies, ten television shows, and two Hulks, but the most ambitious crossover event in (cinematic) history ultimately comes down to the bartering of six magical gems. The Infinity Stones, varying in power, name, and color, are the currency of the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe. For Thanos, the mad Titan, the stones will buy closure<em>—</em>he’s been committing genocide for a long time. For the Avengers, the stones buy continuity<em>—“</em>you can’t be a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man without a neighborhood,” explains Peter Parker. Moviegoers have learned to refer to objects like the Infinity Stones as MacGuffins and to treat them with suspicion or scorn, and it’s hard not to empathize. The tesseract of <em>Captain America: The First Avenger, </em>for instance, didn’t make the Nazis <em>more</em> evil. Nor did the scary “hole” of <em>The Defenders</em> make their alliance feel less contrived. But MacGuffins aren’t all empty holes. <em>Infinity War </em>proves that with the right objects and characters in pursuit, MacGuffins can have real meaning.</p>
<div class="c-float-right"><aside id="c913Bv"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"Do I Have to Care About Infinity Stones?","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/26/17282564/avengers-infinity-stones"},{"title":"Everything You Need to Know About ‘Avengers: Infinity War’","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17304410/avengers-infinity-war-marvel-ringer-coverage"}]}'></div></aside></div>
<p id="9FqNVS">MacGuffins are shorthand for objects that exist to propel the plot. The <em>Harry Potter </em>series has Horcruxes and the Philosopher’s Stone; <em>Pulp Fiction</em> uses a glowing suitcase; <em>Moana</em> features a magical heart. Alfred Hitchcock <a href="http://www.newwavefilm.com/HitchcockTruffautInterviews/TruffautHitchcock1962_10.mp3">described</a> MacGuffins as “a name given to this kind of thing such as stealing ‘the papers.’ And really they don’t matter. The plausibles and the logicians are always looking for the truth in the MacGuffin, in the papers, or the plans, or the fort or whatever. My contention has always been that although for the characters in the story they are most vital, for me, the teller of the story, they are absolutely nothing.”In <a href="http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MacGuffin">modern usage</a>, MacGuffin implies that an object in a film is arbitrary or uninventive, but Hitchcock used it to note his personal disinterest in symbols with fixed meanings. As a director, his goal was to translate a character’s fixation on the MacGuffin, as well as their will to obtain it, into compelling cinema. For genre fare involving espionage, crime, and heists, or deep character studies (all of which were Hitchcock’s bread and butter), ‘MacGuffin’ signaled that the characters and their motives were the real vehicle of the storytelling rather than the plots, which were often repetitive. Through a MacGuffin, a story can be fueled by pure desire<em>—</em>obsession, revenge, greed, will<em>—</em>even if the object in question has no underlying value. MacGuffins convert desire into narrative. In <em>Avengers: Infinity War, </em>we see Thanos’s shadowy desire for the Infinity Stones, a plot that was introduced in 2012’s <em>The Avengers</em><em>, </em>finally become the main story. The Infinity Stones have frequently changed hands across all these movies, and those various exchanges undergird how the characters of <em>Infinity War</em> conceive of themselves and their purpose. For Doctor Strange, for example, the Time Stone embodies his commitment to protection; it elevates him from sorcerer and is instrumental in his unlikely defeat of Dormammu. For Loki, the Space Stone, which he pilfered in <em>Thor: Ragnarok</em>, gives him yet another chance to one-up Thor. The Mind Stone lodged in Vision’s forehead makes him sentient, which in turn affects his relationship with Iron Man: Tony Stark respects Vision’s wish to live independently because Vision embodies his past abuses of technology. The Infinity Stones could easily be “Infinity Bracelets” or “rings,” and their goofy name certainly doesn’t hide their comic book origins, but their value is ultimately relational. They become significant through the mechanisms in which they are lost, gained, and used. Calling them MacGuffins obscures how this value works. As the focal point of <em>Infinity War</em>, Thanos makes all these transactions explicit. In his various encounters with the Avengers, he essentially haggles his way into galactic power. From his initial encounter with Thor and Loki in deep space, to the showdown on Titan, to the standoff with the Guardians of the Galaxy on Knowhere, Thanos boils conflicts down to transactions: a life for a stone. It’s a terrible deal, and that’s the point: Each stone embodies some hero’s commitment to preserving the lives of friends and strangers, a task that’s complicated by making death a bargaining chip. With each successful negotiation<em>—</em>and its shimmering haul<em>—</em>Thanos is able to show how feebly the heroes grasp what they’re up against. Each of his victories could be avoided by one small sacrifice, but the heroes refuse to compromise, furthering Thanos’s quest. It’s a clever inverse of the superhero triumphing through perseverance. </p>
<p id="kxhcAR">Meanwhile, Thanos has been pursuing the Infinity Stones behind the scenes for years, so it’s a feat to see him inflate their value from battle to battle. In the lead-up to his fatal finishing move, we have a front row seat as Thanos traverses worlds and galaxies and battlefields just to make himself a martyr for a cause he has convinced himself is right. We see him toss a moon and beat the Hulk into hiding and torture his daughters solely because of his own neuroses, never considering what the universe might become if he fostered life rather than snuffed it. In one movie, he goes from manipulating the Marvel Cinematic Universe to controlling it. </p>
<p id="G4phh6">The Infinity Stones are more than just plot devices in this context; they make this takeover clear and translate its varying impacts on the sprawling Avengers lineup. When Thanos tortures Nebula to extort Gamora’s knowledge of the soul gem, the sisters’ already fraught relationship is wound tighter. When he tells Iron Man, “I hope they remember you,” he diminishes the Avengers’ accomplishments and mocks Iron Man’s wearying journey from a cave in Afghanistan to the depths of space. You don’t have to know how the time, space, soul, power, mind, and Reality Stone work to comprehend that Thanos shouldn’t wield them. But by focusing on the maniac beneath the lavender rind and the craggy skin beard, <em>Infinity War</em> is able to route 18 movies worth of victories and losses, lessons and follies, jokes and gags, through one being’s corrupting will. Thanos is a gravity well of ego and malice. The Infinity Stones are the spoils of his great bargain and emblems of his astounding arrogance, the entirety of the universe reduced to one man’s relationship with his left hand.</p>
<p class="c-end-para" id="iRZrLG">Hitchcock dismissed MacGuffins because they were irrelevant to <em>his</em> particular creative interests. He was more focused on telling the story, not explaining it. This doesn’t make energon or mother boxes or crystal skulls any less goofy, but MacGuffin is just a cruder word for symbol. In the right context, any symbol can accrue or lose value. The MacGuffins, in their way, mean absolutely everything. <em>Avengers: Infinity War</em> compensates a decade’s worth of narrative investment. Put some respect on those stones. </p>
https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/2/17309042/marvel-macguffins-infinity-stonesStephen Kearse2018-05-02T05:30:02-04:002018-05-02T05:30:02-04:00The Marvel Relevance Rankings
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<figcaption>Disney/Ringer illustration</figcaption>
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<p>‘Avengers: Infinity War’ shook things up and moved major characters out of the spotlight in favor of newer ones. As the dust settles, it’s time to look at which characters’ stocks are down, and which ones’ are up.</p> <figure class="e-image">
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<p class="p--has-dropcap" id="kudTRy">In <em>Avengers: Infinity War</em>, the Avengers weren’t just fighting the swole Barney/alien titan Thanos, they were fighting time. Even with a lengthy 160-minute run time, the sheer number of superheroes and sidekicks who appeared in <em>Infinity War</em> meant that some characters who typically command the spotlight were shortchanged by plot machinations and screen-time restrictions. Some heroes, like Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye and <a href="https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/1/17307214/ant-man-wasp-new-trailer-infinity-war-answers">Paul Rudd’s Ant-Man</a>, didn’t even appear at all! </p>
<p id="IGBi4o">As a result, the Avengers deck has been shuffled. Certain heroes who felt integral to the team are now peripheral members who were basically useless against Thanos, while other characters have become central to stopping the menacing new villain and, quite possibly, reversing the rapture-like event that occurs at the end of<em> Infinity War</em>. And on a more macro level, <em>Infinity War</em> made it evident which heroes the MCU is favoring as it moves to “Phase 4,” and which characters—[<em>cough, Iron Man</em>]—might be put out to pasture, if only because of contractual obligations. </p>
<div class="c-float-right"><aside id="0BV1nE"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"The ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Exit Survey","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17301676/avengers-infinity-war-exit-survey"},{"title":"‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Is a Record-Breaking Box Office Hit","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/30/17302364/avengers-infinity-war-box-office-record-marvel-cinematic-universe"},{"title":"Which Deaths in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Are Permanent?","url":"https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/27/17292012/which-deaths-are-permanent-avengers-infinity-war"}]}'></div></aside></div>
<p id="DCnOKf">Because the scales have shifted so greatly, it feels like the perfect time to rank the Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, and the rest of the saga’s many sidekicks in terms of relevance, to see whose stock has risen and whose has dropped. To give all the Avengers a fair shake, we’ll still consider the ones who got raptured at the end of the movie—because presumably some like Black Panther will come out on the other end of this just fine, unless Disney and Marvel have decided they hate making money. We are, however, cutting out of contention the characters who died <em>before </em>Thanos went all <em>Leftovers </em>on us. They more than likely are going to stay dead and won’t be a part of the MCU’s future plans (RIP, Zoe Saldana’s Gamora, Paul Bettany’s Vision, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, and Idris Elba’s Heimdall.)</p>
<p id="dTnTHD">Let’s begin, starting with the least relevant Avenger and working our way up. </p>
<h3 id="clXHeJ">23. Hawkeye (Stock Remains Steady) </h3>
<p id="OSS9ca">LOL.</p>
<h3 id="axfGFD">22. Peter Parker’s Friend Ned (Stock Up) </h3>
<p id="WIlNNh">Excellent job distracting your classmates so Peter could change into his Spidey suit, Ned! You are this much closer to becoming the full-time Guy in the Chair sidekick you’ve always dreamed of being. </p>
<div id="60OLCD"><div style="left: 0; width: 100%; height: 0; position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.2493%;"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/IQfFyls6iA4?rel=0&" style="border: 0; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; position: absolute;" allowfullscreen="" scrolling="no"></iframe></div></div>
<h3 id="SiEGIu">21. Wong (Stock Remains Steady) </h3>
<p id="u6mgxy">Was hanging out at the Sanctum Sanctorum so important that you couldn’t teleport to Wakanda at the end of the movie? Thanks for nothing, buddy.</p>
<h3 id="E0u2tH">20. Nebula (Stock Rising) </h3>
<p id="eXGRZA">Nebula is, surprisingly, one of the surviving characters at the end of<em> Infinity War</em>, and the sequel could set her up for a revenge arc against Thanos for killing her sister, Gamora (on top of all the other extremely disturbing acts he’s committed against her). As with Loki, every MCU installment Nebula’s appeared in has made her increasingly sympathetic; the next Avengers movie could see her become a full-fledged member of the team. </p>
<p id="CTSFfK">Still, if we’re taking early odds on who could die in <em>Avengers 4</em>, Nebula’s a safe bet. Imagine her making a noble sacrifice in honor of her sister—or doing something similar to reverse Gamora’s death. In the meantime, though, her stock is pointing north. </p>
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<img alt="Nebula" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/N4MD1tYo31jzlSCVsvGh7wJi9j0=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/10761257/ATB1840_v309.1012.jpg">
<cite>Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures</cite>
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<h3 id="WUx79e">19. Groot (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="yNeREm">While it is extremely cool that Groot used a branch from his own body to help create Thor’s new weapon, Stormbreaker, that was the only thing of consequence Groot did in <em>Infinity War</em>. I spent the rest of his scenes yelling, “PUT THE VIDEO GAMES AWAY AND PARTICIPATE, ANGSTY TEEN GROOT,” like a disgruntled parent. </p>
<h3 id="Owwvb5">18A. War Machine (Stock Down) </h3>
<h3 id="PEVvvu">18B. Falcon (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="4PaEi8">Sorry guys, carpet-bombing Thanos isn’t going to work. </p>
<h3 id="M9Tx79">17. Mantis (Stock Rising)<strong> </strong>
</h3>
<p id="DJiLbx">Mantis temporarily subdued Thanos using her empathic abilities to put him to sleep, which is more than most Avengers can say after getting pummeled throughout the film. Drax, stop calling her ugly. </p>
<div id="9t8IMT"><div style="left: 0; width: 100%; height: 0; position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.2493%;"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3XoJhhIfihs?rel=0&" style="border: 0; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; position: absolute;" allowfullscreen="" scrolling="no"></iframe></div></div>
<h3 id="eYVdWA">16. Shuri (Stock Remains Steady) </h3>
<p id="Evw9HI">Shuri has more technologically advanced gadgets than Tony Stark, and she’s probably the funniest Avenger—remember when she called Martin Freeman “colonizer” in <em>Black Panther</em>? Those were good times. </p>
<p id="dQTn4s">If only she got to flash those qualities in <em>Infinity War</em> for more than a few minutes. When Tony maybe, hopefully retires after<em> Avengers 4</em>, Shuri ought to take the Resident Gadget Hero mantle she rightly deserves. </p>
<h3 id="Qb847P">15. Bucky Barnes (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="p9Nm4A">The good news: Bucky and Cap’s sexual chemistry remains electric, even after having to do the long-distance thing with Bucky healing up in Wakanda and Cap growing out his beard somewhere else. It was like they hadn’t lost any time when they were fighting side-by-side in the third act of the movie, and of course it was Steve’s name that Bucky called out just before he turned to dust. </p>
<p id="8rdUDm">The bad news: Bucky does very little in <em>Infinity War</em>. This was a guy who <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXPOl6EjbWg">looked virtually unstoppable</a> as the villain of his own movie, and now he’s just punching random alien goons before getting vaporized? #JusticeForBucky. (#BuckyAndCapForever.) </p>
<h3 id="tQVsJW">14. Star-Lord (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="FxVYvf">[<em>Tries not to think about Star-Lord ruining his own carefully constructed plan to remove the Infinity Gauntlet from Thanos’s hand by getting overly emotional and PUNCHING THANOS OUT OF MANTIS’s SLEEP SPELL.</em>] </p>
<h3 id="v2B0SK">13. Okoye (Stock Remains Steady) </h3>
<p id="0KF5o3">In<em> Infinity War</em>, Okoye delivered killer side-eye (an iconic glare at Bruce Banner tripping in the Hulkbuster armor) and continued to prove that she knows her way around a staff. She’s still an ancillary character, but between her and Shuri, Wakanda’s in good hands until T’Challa returns from limbo.</p>
<h3 id="RFPVog">12. Black Widow (Stock Remains Steady) </h3>
<p id="eigk4g">A spy with no superpowers isn’t going to take Thanos head on, but Black Widow handled herself against Proxima Midnight, the titan’s henchwoman, voiced by acclaimed thespian and <em>my</em> personal Avenger, Carrie Coon. Black Widow played a quintessential sidekick role ... and also was very respectful of Wanda Maximoff’s choice to date a robot. </p>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="Vision holding Wanda Maximoff’s face" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/tPwKfvsXyfsOw3KkmWkFVkr4s1w=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/10761275/AET1240_v008.1057.jpg">
<cite>Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures</cite>
</figure>
<h3 id="nzjwMl">11. Black Panther (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="Pm7Ay2">Coming into <em>Infinity War</em>, T’Challa was (justifiably) riding the wave of his own movie’s success. Unfortunately, <em>Infinity War </em>didn’t get the memo that <em>Black Panther</em> was one of the most successful movies in history and that its main character was now the centerpiece of Marvel’s new young crop of heroes. </p>
<p id="Fl7tR3">Marvel didn’t anticipate <em>Black Panther</em> becoming this big; otherwise T’Challa would’ve had a meatier role and a more emotional “death” scene in the crossover. Instead, he was more like a begrudging Airbnb host, inviting all the characters to stage their Generic Third-Act Superhero Fight in the Wakandan countryside. But even if<em> Avengers 4</em> doesn’t have much T’Challa screen time—you’d imagine most of the movie will focus on the surviving heroes reversing time for the characters who perished—a <em>Black Panther</em> sequel is, at this point, a foregone conclusion. T’Challa will rise up the rankings in no time, and perhaps one day even claim the Marvel relevance throne.</p>
<h3 id="kccIek">10. The Incredible Hulk (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="cEicvN">Bruce Banner’s Hulk persona has the maturity level of a small child, so when Thanos beat the ever-living crap out of the green guy at the beginning of <em>Infinity War</em>, the Hulk refused to come out and play for the rest of the film. It made narrative sense, but it was no less infuriating to go through an entire <em>Avengers</em> movie without a single Hulk smash. It’s just not as fun watching Mark Ruffalo try to learn his way around Iron Man’s Hulkbuster armor.</p>
<p id="rnHsCr">This should set up a redemptive Hulk arc in the sequel; until then, though, the character’s a middling Avenger. </p>
<h3 id="WCbdSS">9A. Rocket (Stock Up) </h3>
<p id="nbTR1t">Though he was called “rabbit” for most of the movie, Rocket played an important role in <em>Infinity War</em>, wingman-ing for Thor and helping him create Stormbreaker. Rocket is also more empathetic than we give him credit for: He’s the only character in this movie who asks Thor how he’s feeling. (He’s not feeling great, having lost all his family in the last two films, a tragedy Rocket admits “can be annoying.”) Rocket also gets some screen time to do some mourning of his own, since all of his Guardians pals are either killed or raptured. He’s gonna be looking to do <em>damage </em>in <em>Avengers 4</em>. </p>
<div id="Pt0Wfq"><div style="left: 0; width: 100%; height: 0; position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.2493%;"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sWSktj8RYNE?rel=0&" style="border: 0; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; position: absolute;" allowfullscreen="" scrolling="no"></iframe></div></div>
<p id="p8eqAh">(Imagine the grass is Thanos.) </p>
<h3 id="jYM6mq">9B. Drax (Stock Up) </h3>
<p id="5kT7fF">Considering that the Avengers’ dialogue is mostly made up of one-liners, being funny is just as important as super-strength, and nobody had a better Joke-to–Screen-Time Average (JSA) in <em>Infinity War </em>than Dave Bautista’s Drax. I’m still cracking up that the dude thought he’d be invisible if he stood <em>very</em> still while also eating space snacks. </p>
<h3 id="coUWl7">8. Captain America (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="TdDUN4">Cap is a member of the old guard who seems outclassed by Thanos. That shot of him holding his own against Thanos and his Infinity Gauntlet in the <a href="https://youtu.be/QwievZ1Tx-8?t=1m45s">second <em>Infinity War</em> trailer</a> was misleading; Thanos wasn’t stopped by Cap’s emotional show of strength, he was amused by a pitifully weak (but brave) human standing in his way.</p>
<p id="79DcNs">Steve Rogers is still a good veteran presence who can mentor the newer members of the team, but he’s not strong enough to carry the load anymore.</p>
<h3 id="KFQe4R">7. Ant-Man (Stock Up) </h3>
<p id="TPNK64">Ant-Man’s absence in <em>Infinity War</em> amplifies the character’s value and puts him in a position to undo the calamity Thanos wrought. </p>
<p id="YRgi36">See, there’s this thing called the <a href="http://marvelcinematicuniverse.wikia.com/wiki/Quantum_Realm">Quantum Realm</a>, a place that is “between molecules” and where time has no meaning. If the surviving Avengers can’t get their hands on Thanos’s Time Stone, relying on Ant-Man’s understanding of the Quantum Realm might be their best bet. (Captain Marvel is <a href="https://www.inverse.com/article/32022-ant-man-quantum-physics-dr-spiros-superman-captain-marvel?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=on_site&utm_campaign=article-footer">also going to explore the Quantum Realm,</a> by the way, which does not feel like a coincidence.) To stop Thanos, the Avengers will need the little guy. </p>
<h3 id="icDMcZ">6. Scarlet Witch (Stock Up) </h3>
<p id="p5Nf7g">Simple rule: If you have the power to destroy an Infinity Stone—and to convince a group of superheroes that your relationship with your AI boyfriend is as important as the lives of half the people in the universe—you are important and strong.</p>
<p id="vnNPs0">We should deduct some points for Scarlet Witch’s refusal to kill her AI boyfriend in order to save half the population of the universe—but hey, that’s what makes her human. What’s less excusable is that she sat on the sidelines for much of the fight in Wakanda, when her psychic powers could have been useful against Thanos’s army of alien dogs. </p>
<h3 id="E3ovPl">5. Iron Man (Stock Down) </h3>
<p id="66NL2r">Tony Stark might’ve began the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2008, but seeing the character hog the spotlight in <em>Infinity War</em> was a lot like watching Kobe’s final few years with the Lakers. This dude’s losing value, and fast. </p>
<p id="WsbFLi">What does Iron Man do in <em>Infinity War</em>? Well, aside from thinking about starting a family with Pepper Potts (don’t let her share <a href="https://goop.com/">Goop insights</a> with the kid, Tony!), he was thrust into space while saving Doctor Strange’s skin and knocked around like a rag doll by Thanos on the planet Titan. Being one of the richest guys on earth in a metal suit isn’t all that important when your opponent can hurl literal moons at you from outer space. If Strange didn’t trade the Time Stone for Tony’s life, the guy would be dead and ineligible for this list. </p>
<h3 id="tc4Kek">4. Spider-Man (Stock Up) </h3>
<p id="9H2UUr">For a kid who was officially declared a member of the Avengers by Tony only in the middle of <em>Infinity War</em>, Spider-Man’s racked up an impressive résumé. It was his plan that stopped Thanos’s telepathic henchman Ebony Maw from delivering Doctor Strange straight to Thanos. (Good thing he watched <em>Aliens</em>!) </p>
<p id="y70Qz2">We also have to give Spidey points for his assault on our tear ducts—even though he’s <em>definitely</em> getting revived, when he said, “Mr. Stark, I don’t feel so good” before vanishing, it was the most heartbreaking moment of the movie. If that’s not a sign of superhero relevance, I don’t know what is. </p>
<h3 id="AyV0Tx">3. Captain Marvel (Stock Just Hit the Market) </h3>
<p id="WKJxQU">Sure, we still haven’t <em>seen</em> Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel, but that’s going to change next year. Not only will Captain Marvel have her own movie, but what’s surely going to be a crucial role in stopping Thanos in <em>Avengers 4</em>. You don’t tease the introduction of a new superhero—like <em>Infinity War</em> did in its post-credits scene with Nick Fury’s beacon flashing Captain Marvel’s star-shaped logo—without giving them something important to do. Expect Captain Marvel to have a huge role in stopping Thanos; after all, she’s basically Marvel’s equivalent of Superman and might <a href="https://www.cbr.com/why-captain-marvel-can-beat-superman/">even be stronger than the Man of Steel</a>. </p>
<h3 id="4CDuxR">2. Doctor Strange (Stock Rising) </h3>
<p id="EkPeQb">Your stoner friend’s favorite superhero was inherently important in <em>Infinity War </em>because he had the Time Stone—one of the six Infinity Stones that Thanos needed to pull his <em>Leftovers</em> maneuver—and could bend reality with his psychedelic powers when needed. Turns out he also has chemistry with Peter Parker, too? By next year’s sequel, Strange could be the Avengers’ MVP because he’s the only one who knows how to stop Thanos. The guy ran through more than 14 million simulations for the Avengers’ clash with Thanos, and only one timeline had a positive ending. We don’t know what it involved, but Strange’s lackadaisical reaction to being disintegrated implies that we’re in the one good timeline. Strange is now one of the most important characters in the MCU, which you never would’ve said a week ago.</p>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="Thor" data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/5QNY3mS9gEV7-RfH0Zsqhwp9SmA=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/10761303/ABT3470_v011.1056.jpg">
<cite>Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures</cite>
</figure>
<h3 id="Dflvyd">1. Thor (Stock Rising) </h3>
<p id="SK11JR">What a difference a year can make for the God of Thunder! After languishing through two sluggish, overly Shakespearean solo films, Thor’s stock had already risen before <em>Infinity Wars</em> with November’s <em>Thor: Ragnarok</em>. <em>Ragnarok</em> proved that not only is Thor just as impressive a hero without his trusty hammer, he’s got the chops to join an intergalactic comedy troupe on the side. <em>Infinity War</em> only added to Thor’s overall importance (and ability to drop one-liners). He shouldered the emotional weight of the film—mourning his brother, Loki, and his best friend, Heimdall—and also led the charge in imbuing <em>Infinity War </em>with a needed dose of comedic relief. And not for nothing, but if Thor didn’t reenergize a dying star and create a new all-powerful weapon—with the aid of the dwarf king Eitri, of course—the Avengers wouldn’t have come <em>close </em>to nearly defeating Thanos. If only he had aimed for Thanos’s head when he got to Wakanda. </p>
<p class="c-end-para" id="sHdg3O">Thor isn’t just the most jacked, aggravatingly attractive Avenger. After nearly defeating Thanos himself and carrying <em>Infinity War</em>, he’s also the emotional center, and the most important part, of this superhero universe.</p>
https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/2/17308820/marvel-relevance-rankings-avengers-infinity-warMiles Surrey2018-05-01T06:00:02-04:002018-05-01T06:00:02-04:00The Fight Scenes in Marvel Movies Suck
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<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/4BJIMRKIJ6r9L4zLjcoRMD_UaEM=/63x0:1840x1333/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/59585631/MCU_fights_suck_ringer.0.gif" />
<figcaption>Ringer illustration</figcaption>
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<p>The Marvel Cinematic Universe offers up the biggest, most popular action movies in history. So why is the worst part of these movies the action scenes?</p> <figure class="e-image">
<img alt=" " data-mask-text="false" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/49bxp5XChXiFXvzoQjHQ5YfP1zo=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/10754447/spoiler_alert__2_.gif">
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<p id="fKQk4C">For a group of people endowed with either superpowers or fantastical technology, the superheroes of the Marvel Cinematic Universe spend a lot of time fighting hand-to-hand. In real life, every advance in weapons technology allows humans to kill each other more efficiently and from greater distances. Iron Man would be flying around Sokovia shooting bad guys, but Tony Stark would be in a trailer in Nevada operating the suit by remote control. That’s smart warfare, but it’d make for a really boring movie.</p>
<p id="LuUy8L">We all want to watch the hero and the villain look each other in the eye and test each other in solo combat, which works in movies about gladiators, samurai, knights, or even Old West gunfighters. The climactic fight unfolds over several minutes, with its own narrative arc, as hero and villain trade verbal jabs or <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwtaM0GC-js">reveal hitherto unknown secrets about their family tree</a>. It’s tough to talk trash if the fight lasts only long enough for one person to sneak up behind the other and shoot him in the back of the head — that’s why missiles and automatic firearms tend to be used mostly on anonymous henchmen, not the Big Bads themselves.</p>
<p id="RC5LJE">The MCU’s penchant for punching isn’t the problem — it is, after all, a more dramatic and elegant expression of cinematic violence than firearms. Obi-Wan Kenobi’s description of blasters (i.e. guns) as “clumsy or random” in <em>Star Wars: A New Hope</em> applies to film as well as space combat. And in a story where one of the primary heroes is a talking tree-man from space, realism isn’t exactly job no. 1.</p>
<p id="ozlA8K">The problem is that MCU fight scenes suck.</p>
<p id="PmPDpE">Great fight scenes tend to be either extremely pretty or extremely ugly. The pretty ones focus primarily on the virtuosity of the fighters, their lightning-fast hands or exquisite weapons skills. These fights look like dance routines, and balletic fighting motions are often paired with bright colors and stirring music. Pick any five-minute stretch from <em>Hero</em> and you’ll see a good example, and the MCU could also take some lessons from <em>Star Wars</em>. In a fortunate coincidence for a franchise in need of relatively bloodless PG or PG-13 violence, lightsabers cauterize the wounds they create, so fights that look brutal for <em>Star Wars</em> — specifically the climactic <em>Empire Strikes Back</em> duel and the throne room fight in <em>The Last Jedi</em> — aren’t particularly gory.</p>
<p id="dP8iet">Contrast the vivid reds of the <em>Last Jedi</em> throne room battle or the graceful “Duel of the Fates”–backed <em>Phantom Menace</em> fight with <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXPOl6EjbWg">this, from <em>Captain America: The Winter Soldier</em></a>. This fight, which features a nearly “I am your father”–level reveal of its own, is a total mess. It’s all drab colors, from the overcast gray sky to the dark costumes, and with the camera so close to the action and cutting as frequently as it does, you can barely see what’s going on.</p>
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<p id="Dq3tyL">With superhero fight scenes, it’s tough to showcase fighting skill in characters who range from genetically engineered supermen to aliens to gods — the whole point is that they’re capable of physical feats beyond what normal people can pull off. Weirdly, when Captain America stabs a hole in a van or throws someone through a window, his abilities diminish how cool that looks — Captain America is a different kind of fictional than Jason Bourne or even Luke Skywalker, and that goes double for Drax or Thor.</p>
<p id="MRl7eY">Or for T’Challa, who wears a suit woven out of one of the strongest metals in the fictional world, and if you hit it, the suit can store the energy from the impact and spit it back out. <em>Black Panther</em> — which contained two of the MCU’s better fight scenes: Killmonger’s art museum heist and the casino brawl — was thrilling, beautifully colorful, and thoughtful. Except for its nominal climax: the train tracks fight scene between Killmonger and T’Challa, in which the film discarded its soaring wide shots and gorgeous color palette for two CGI dudes scrambling around in the dark.</p>
<p id="6hycLc">Speaking of CGI, take a gander at the opening of <em>Avengers: Age of Ultron.</em></p>
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<p id="4bkTvD">The movie’s first battle starts with an unbroken, minute-long shot that establishes the heroes and their fighting styles, which is pretty tidy storytelling, but the special effects are so flashy they don’t look real. The long take is a useful tension-building device if you can pull it off, but mostly it’s a way for directors to show off. Having a long take that’s mostly CGI feels so much like cheating you wonder why director Joss Whedon even bothered.</p>
<p id="OlVcR6">Contrast that long take with the stairwell brawl from <em>Atomic Blonde</em>, which is a perfect example of a great ugly fight scene.</p>
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<p id="SrrNZt">The reason humanity has spent the past 70,000-plus years devising increasingly sophisticated weapons is that it takes a lot of hard work, and a lot of commitment, to beat someone to death with your bare hands. It’s dangerous, too — in order to get close enough to stab, bludgeon, or strangle someone, you have to get close enough for them to stab, bludgeon, or strangle you right back. Hand-to-hand combat is exhausting and scary, and great ugly fight scenes capture that.</p>
<p id="hKbVQs">Such fight scenes <em>can </em>also inspire awe at the virtuosity of the fighters. <em>Atomic Blonde</em> director David Leitch is one of the best at blending brutality with jaw-dropping stunts, and after directing the second unit on <em>Captain America: Civil War</em>, he has a superhero movie of his own in <em>Deadpool 2</em>. But Leitch’s fight scenes are exceptional, and an action sequence doesn’t have to be beautiful to move the audience. Sometimes, quite the opposite.</p>
<p id="VYRYgQ"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEEcInsy3oA">The bathhouse fight scene in <em>Eastern Promises</em></a><em> </em>is gut-wrenchingly unpleasant to watch, but it drives home what it takes to stab someone to death. The fight scene I think about more than any other comes at the end of <em>Saving Private Ryan</em>, when a German soldier stabs Mellish while Upham cowers outside the door. There’s nothing to that scene — it’s just two guys rolling around and shouting — but you appreciate how much effort goes into a literal life-or-death struggle.</p>
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<p id="SGMfgw">The violence of the MCU, for the most part, is super-sanitized, even by Hollywood’s standards. The combatants, even those who can bleed, usually don’t. They don’t even bruise. Bullet wounds are all clean, stab wounds are all bloodless, and minutes-long fistfights end with our heroes barely having to adjust their hair. I cut myself while making dinner last week and bled more than Captain America did after his fistfight with Thanos.</p>
<p id="4MQbDb">In the climactic battle at the end of <em>Infinity War</em>, one of Thanos’s henchpeople is thrown into the path of a flying machine that resembles a gigantic circular saw, which one imagines would turn a person into a mist of viscera like the wood chipper at the end of <em>Fargo</em>. We don’t see that, and just a few drops of blood end up on Black Widow’s face — less liquid than the average person would have to wipe off after eating a plate of wings. But she stops to comment about how disgusting her enemy’s end was nonetheless.</p>
<p id="UGHcA5">Not showing the physical consequences of violence cheapens it, and the MCU’s extremely clean and extremely glib brand of violence isn’t entirely the product of it being a movie made at least partially for kids. Superhero movies <em>can</em> convey the brutality of hand-to-hand combat. <em>Deadpool </em>and <em>Logan</em> did, although they were both were rated R. However, just about every big-budget PG-13 action franchise these days is more willing to engage with the brutality of a fight scene, from Daniel Craig’s James Bond movies to the Bourne movies to <em>Mission: Impossible</em>. You don’t see arterial splatter or swords cleaving flesh from bone in those films either, but you appreciate how hard it is to beat someone to death, and you appreciate the intense adrenaline-fueled anxiety of those moments, rather than twiddling your thumbs and waiting for the next round of exposition.</p>
<p id="95UNh4">The trick is wrapping up that tension and anxiety in a package that isn’t going to scare kids to death. Despite its PG-13 rating and two-hour, 29-minute run time, the showing of <em>Infinity War </em>I attended this weekend was full of kids — before the trailers started rolling, the theater sounded like a playground at recess. Nobody’s taking their 8-year-old to see Bond or Bourne, so the sanitized PG-13 violence in those movies doesn’t have to be quite as sanitized as the violence in an MCU film. It’s difficult but not impossible, as <em>Star Wars</em> proves. And perhaps we’re not giving kids enough credit — <em>Infinity War</em> subjected them to countless deaths, including a massacre of unarmed innocents, and discusses genocide openly. Perhaps they’d be able to handle it if Captain America ran out of breath or Spider-Man picked up a bloody nose.</p>
<p id="k1YVzf">The lack of physicality or stakes might not be so big an issue if anyone believed the MCU’s heroes could lose a fight, let alone die. The worst offenders were the last two fight scenes in <em>Civil War</em>, specifically the Leipzig airport brawl, in which about a dozen superheroes fight without even wanting to particularly hurt each other, let alone kill each other. Perhaps that’s changing now that <em>Infinity War</em> <a href="https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/4/27/17289858/avengers-infinity-war-review">has threatened to clear the decks</a>, but the knowledge that more <em>Guardians of the Galaxy</em> and <em>Spider-Man</em> movies are in the works turns genuine shock into annoyance at having to wait a year to see how it all shakes out.</p>
<p id="0pePNO">Maybe this is just an appropriate kind of violence for a post–Gulf War viewing audience that’s used to war as a TV event that can be conducted from a safe distance. Maybe it’s a consequence of turning stand-alone movies into serialized cogs in a commercial empire, planned so far in advance that while we don’t know how the film will end, we do know who has to live long enough to star in the sequel. And maybe the more vibrant visual tones of <em>Thor: Ragnarok </em>and <em>Black Panther</em> will bleed into future films’ action sequences, and the post–<em>Infinity War </em>MCU will feel like there’s real peril.</p>
<p class="c-end-para" id="lrtVtI">But for now, it’s mystifying that movies this expensive and this fussed-over can’t seem to land this particular punch.</p>
https://www.theringer.com/movies/2018/5/1/17304438/marvel-fight-scenes-avengers-infinity-warMichael Baumann2018-04-30T17:19:46-04:002018-04-30T17:19:46-04:00‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Mega-pod, Plus ‘Killing Eve’
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<p>Chris and Andy review this weekend’s big release and discuss ‘Killing Eve’</p> <p id="YEwvGY"><a href="https://art19.com/shows/the-watch/episodes/b879a877-0658-41a7-b2a9-9a1df05942d5">Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald review</a> this weekend’s massive blockbuster, <em>Avengers: Infinity War</em>, and discuss its plot, emotional stakes, and impressive accomplishment (2:00). Later, they discuss one of their favorite shows on television right now, <em>Killing Eve </em>(51:00).</p>
<div id="5Aj6D7"><iframe src="https://open.spotify.com/embed-podcast/episode/6J551lU4s2ZiRX8UZ9Nx2A" style="border: 0; width: 100%; height: 232px;" allowfullscreen="" allow="encrypted-media"></iframe></div>
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https://www.theringer.com/2018/4/30/17304804/avengers-infinity-war-mega-podChris RyanAndy Greenwald