Since Endgame is probably one of the most anticipated films we've had here in a while, let's quarantine all discussion from those who have seen the film (or who have otherwise read spoilers). If you don't want to see stuff get spoiled, stay out!
(And this will likely be the last time I view this thread until Friday, so if you need me to put something in the OP or similar, shoot me a PM. I won't read posts in here.) [Reply]
Originally Posted by DaFace:
Time travel stuff is always messy, and I'm not sure that they really tried to explain it all fully, but...
From my perspective, it's all about multiple timelines. If you consider everything that we've seen thus far in the MCU to be "Timeline A," all of that stuff still happened. When Thanos showed up in the final battle, that created a new "Timeline B" in 2014 in which he never had a chance to gather the stones and basically nothing ever happened. There's a "Timeline C" where Loki got the Tesseract and is still alive. There's a "Timeline D" in which Cap went back to live out life with Carter. All of these timelines exist and were impacted by the results of Endgame, but we're still just watching "Timeline A" in 2018.
The question moving forward is whether they call time travel a "been there, done that" thing or if they decide to keep using it. If they keep using it, then Loki's series could be set just after the events of Avengers (the first one). He wouldn't have grown as a character in the same way we knew it through the later movies. If they don't, it'll be some sort of side story parallel to other events we've seen, or maybe we'll learn that he STILL didn't die in Infinity War after all.
But with Gamora being brought back from a different timeline and inserted into this one, haven't the Avengers effectively defeated mortality? I mean, why can't they go back a bit to a timeline where Stark is still alive, take him out of it and drop him into this one?
I guess I can only come up with a single answer to that one and it's that removing someone FROM a timeline means that timeline would then exist without that person. So for Gamora, that's no big deal because she's not needed in that timeline anymore (and now I guess that timeline has a completely different outcome? One where she's not there to form up the Guardians of the Galaxy at all?).
But for Tony, the only way he'd be relevant in the 'new' timeline is if you took a Tony out that had already gone through the events of the Infinity War and had his kid. So you'd essentially need to scoop one up from right before the major battle and since Strange says there's only 1 outcome where they win, removing him from THAT timeline would serve to wreck it. So what's the point apart from being strictly selfish?
Best answer I can come up with, at least as it relates to Tony - he would effectively have to stay dead either way.
So to make the timeline thing work, you have to kinda understand what The Ancient One was getting at - anything you do for YOUR timeline still creates an alternate timeline where that thing has an impact. If you're just robbing Peter to pay Paul, I guess you leave well enough alone? [Reply]
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
So to make the timeline thing work, you have to kinda understand what The Ancient One was getting at - anything you do for YOUR timeline still creates an alternate timeline where that thing has an impact. If you're just robbing Peter to pay Paul, I guess you leave well enough alone?
I kind of mentioned it earlier but if, for example, the Avengers go back in time to bring Black Widow back, from the point of view of the timeline they created by doing that, Widow was kidnapped and those Avengers could try to get her back, sort of creating a war of timelines. Very messy to think about. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Buehler445:
Same with his reaction to Black widow sacrificing herself.
Damn you Nat.
Fuck. That sticks with a guy.
That was the home run line of the movie, for me.
It's easily our two most 'human' characters with an incredibly long, intertwined history. And Jeremy Renner is just good; his look of pained resignation and the delivery on the line made it really hit home.
I've said it before - I have no empathy. So no, I didn't cry or whoop or anything during this movie, but that one line was a moment where I really could sense the pain in the character. I didn't get that anywhere else; the rest was just a comic book movie (good, bad or otherwise). [Reply]
Originally Posted by Frosty:
I kind of mentioned it earlier but if, for example, the Avengers go back in time to bring Black Widow back, from the point of view of the timeline they created by doing that, Widow was kidnapped and those Avengers could try to get her back, sort of creating a war of timelines. Very messy to think about.
Exactly right. I just saw it so I'm parsing through the thread as I go here, but that's the issue time travel creates.
It's why the 'Why didn't Cap stop all of this?' answer is so easy - he did. In his 'new' timeline that we aren't seeing. And then he did a quick popover into 'Universe A' here at the end of the movie.
I mean they wouldn't necessarily need to kidnap her; they could just ask her if she wants to come, but if we presume all the events have unfolded exactly as we know them prior to that point, then she'd probably be needed in the timeline she's in.
Now HERE'S an interesting one - lets go to the 'Cap stays in the past' timeline. He knows all of this stuff now. He's presumably gonna destroy Hydra. He's presumably gonna do what he can in THAT timeline to prevent the snap. There's a real chance that in that particular timeline, Natasha isn't needed. But she also isn't the Natasha we know who the Avengers would see a desperate need to bring back into 'Timeline A'. That particular timeline is so damn wonky that there's just no sense in pulling from it. You could get your Stark from that timeline because he's probably just remained a playboy having not gone through the rigors of the wars in the MCU - but he also wouldn't have any interest in coming through.
In other words, to bring forward a character from another timeline who's a close enough proxy to their lost 'Timeline A' character, you have to let time play forward far enough and identically enough that the character is largely indispensable in THAT timeline. Otherwise, like I said, you're robbing Peter to pay Paul. There's just no utility in going into some clean timeline where Steve went back to 1970 and killed all this shit in the crib because the Natasha/Tony and anyone else you could pull from those timelines (who would now be largely non-essential) wouldn't be anything close to the person they are in the Timeline A universe. [Reply]
I just felt really disappointed...Hulk is my favorite character by far, and his character was flat out Vince Russo'd.
I absolutely loved the Professor Hulk run in the comics and even I hated how they used his character in Endgame. In the comics he became proactive and went after the bad guys instead of a mindless brute randomly bumping into them. He fought with his morality on when to and not to use that type of power. [Reply]
Should have made it more fun. The first half of the movie was depressing. Fat Thor and timid Hulk were not as fun as regal Thor and rampaging Hulk. [Reply]
Originally Posted by el borracho:
Should have made it more fun. The first half of the movie was depressing. Fat Thor and timid Hulk were not as fun as regal Thor and rampaging Hulk.
I’ll disagree. Heavily.
The big knock on super hero movies is they always win and there aren’t much for stakes.
They had to make establish the stakes and jokes probably wouldn’t be told in those instances.
And rampaging hulk was fucking hilarious in 2012. NO MORE STAIRS [Reply]
Originally Posted by Rausch:
I absolutely loved the Professor Hulk run in the comics and even I hated how they used his character in Endgame. In the comics he became proactive and went after the bad guys instead of a mindless brute randomly bumping into them. He fought with his morality on when to and not to use that type of power.
Professor Hulk was my biggest disappointment with End Game. Professor Hulk was a really damn smart ASS kicker, not a nerdy violence avoider. [Reply]