Eleven years after Tony ‘Iron Man’ Stark kicked off what we now know as the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the multi-billion-dollar, 22-film MCU-Avengers franchise (arguably the most lucrative franchise ever) has finally been wrapped up.
The question most fans are asking is, does it all end with a bang or a whimper? Happily, and despite the film’s bum-numbing three-hour runtime, the answer is without question the former.
At the end of last year’s …Infinity War, the intergalactic despot Thanos (Josh Brolin) had with a snap of his fingers wiped out half of all life in the universe, including several of our super-powered friends.
Their numbers depleted, it’s now up to the surviving Avengers — among them Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr), Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) — to figure out a way to reassemble, fight back, and tackle the genocide unleashed by the arch-villain.
The narrative is bogged down from time to time by hoary time-travel and heist tropes, but the co-directing brothers Anthony and Joe Russo do manage to still keep it engaging. They spend as much mileage on character interplay and emotional stakes as on CGI-augmented spectacle.
The plot also provides adequate representation to super-heroines such as Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Nebula (Karen Gillan) and Captain Marvel (Brie Larson).
In addition to playful banter, the script is stuffed with cameos by A-list actors from earlier films in the series. Seamless storytelling and majestic visuals commingle in …Endgame making it a superheroes saga for the ages.