It is all but guaranteed to be the biggest movie of 2019, so the arrival of the first trailer for Avengers: Endgame was a huge deal. At the end of the last movie, Thanos had killed 50% of Earth’s population. Many of our comic heroes were dead. Spider-Man turned to dust. Iron Man was alone. What the heck comes next? Let us take you on a breakdown of the new trailer to squeeze out all its secrets.
Lost in Space
We open appropriately bleakly. While Tony Stark was fortunate enough not to be vaporised with half the world’s population, we find him floating in space, all out of food and water and about to run out of oxygen. We’ve no indication of how long he’s been out there, but the exhausted supplies mean it’s been a while. He’s recording a message to someone he loves, presumably Pepper Potts (does he know she survived or is he hoping?), as he believes death is close. This would be a really good time for Captain Marvel to swoop in and rescue him.
The Benatar
A wide shot of the ship shows that Tony is adrift in Benatar, the ship that once belonged to the Guardians of the Galaxy. All the Guardians aside from Rocket the raccoon were killed by Thanos, so that ship was going begging. Some fans were so concerned about Stark being lost in space that they tweeted NASA. NASA responded.
Hey @Marvel, we heard about Tony Stark. As we know, the first thing you should do is listen in mission control for “@Avengers, we have a problem.” But if he can’t communicate, then we recommend ground teams use all resources to scan the skies for your missing man pic.twitter.com/zavXrsPljq
— NASA (@NASA) December 9, 2018
N.B. This is an absolute waste of NASA’s time and you shouldn’t bother them with this stuff. They have space stuff to do.
A tribute to Stan Lee?
Stark uses the phrase, “Part of the journey is the end”. Some fans are speculating that this is a deliberate tribute to Stan Lee, the Marvel comic book god who died in November, aged 95. Lee often used the word ‘Excelsior’ as his motto, meaning always reaching higher, and fans have taken Stark’s words as a nod to that. It’s a cute idea, but it’s far from certain that it’s intentional.
Thanos’ world
After the Marvel logo, we cut to a shot of Thanos’ armour standing in a field, like the world’s biggest scarecrow. After succeeding completely in his plan to rid Earth of half its living creatures, Thanos now has full dominion over our planet. Perhaps his armour is unused because he’s happily cavorting naked through the fields.
Thanos in the field
He is cavorting, slowly, but has trousers on. He’s also doing a good impression of Russell Crowe in Gladiator.
Back at head office
The surviving Avengers, or those who are not lost in space, have gathered at HQ. It must be quite roomy currently. Easy to find a parking spot.
Bare-chinned Cap
Our first shot of Captain America shows him crying and looking into the distance handsomely. It also shows that his much-memed beard has gone. Is this the greatest loss suffered by the Avengers? It might be.
Missing or dead?
As we see some more of the surviving Avengers, specifically Natasha and Bruce, we see a display of those heroes considered missing. There’s Scott Lang/Ant-Man and Peter Parker/Spider-Man, who we know were respectively trapped in the Quantum Zone but not killed and obliterated in Thanos’ cull. But we also see Shuri on a display. We haven’t seen her fate in any of the previous films, so is she dead, like her brother Black Panther, or just missing? Our money would be on missing.
Thor alone
Thor, out of costume, broods in an unidentified room. Sitting apparently behind glass, it looks like he might be jailed? We’ll have to wait and see.
Where is Nebula?
As Cap’s voiceover talks about losing loved ones, we see Nebula. She lost her adoptive sister, Gamora, at the hands of her adoptive father, Thanos. Is she on the Benatar too? It certainly looks like it, but if she is then when does this scene take place? Because Stark was talking like a man who’s all alone. It’s not impossible that Nebula abandons him at some point. She’s like that.
The return of Hawkeye
Hawkeye, the Avenger nobody has any strong feelings about, sat out the last movie, reportedly under house arrest. Now he’s back and he’s swapped his bow for a sword. In the comics, Hawkeye once took on the persona of Ronin, a loner ninja. It appears Hawkeye is playing with that role here, possibly fed up with his rubbish bow and arrow.
So long Peggy
There are long-standing rumours that at least one of the original Avengers will die in this movie. Given that all the originals survived Thanos’ cull, we have our money on all or most of them sacrificing themselves to somehow save those who were killed in the last film. It would be an effective handing over of the Marvel mantel to the new generation and a guaranteed tearjerker. //Anyway//, the moment that Cap opens his watch to look at an old photo of Peggy Carter, his great love who is now dead, seems a strong suggestion that he might not make it to the credits. That is some foreshadowing 101 right there.
What’s in a name?
And then there’s the title reveal. Endgame. It was predicted for a while and it’s, well, fine. Completely uninspiring but does the job. One way or another, the game has to end in this film.
But wait…
Just when you think we’re done, there’s the traditional Marvel post-credits scene. Scott Lang shows up at the Avengers HQ. Now, when he got stuck in the Quantum Realm all of those who knew how to get him out (Hope, Hank and Janet) had been killed. So how did he escape? Is this, as Cap asks, an old message? Probably not. We’ll have to wait until April to find out.
