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The Avengers and their allies must be willing to sacrifice all in an attempt to defeat the powerful Thanos before his blitz of devastation and ruin puts an end to the universe.
What are the most difficult tasks to pull off in a comic-book film? Let’s distill it down to six main ones: 1) Fleshed out, endearing characters; 2) A sustained balance of tongue-in-cheek quips and apocalyptic darkness; 3) A complex villain; 4) Visceral action; 5) A Relevant Theme or two; and, of course, 6) A worthy climax. Most decent-to-good Marvel flicks manage to achieve two or three of those goals. “Captain America: Civil War” did great with 4; “Thor: Ragnarok” aced 1 and 2; the recent “Black Panther” focused primarily on 3 and 5. It’s rare for a Marvel film to pull off a genuinely satisfying ending – it’s even rarer for it to tick off all six of those proverbial boxes (Nolan’s “Dark Knight” trilogy comes to mind as a successful example). The Russo brothers’ “Avengers: Infinity War,” despite being riddled with plot holes large enough for an army of Dr. Strange clones to hop through, comes damn close to accomplishing this task.
Similarly to the irreverence, joy and self-awareness Taika Waititi displayed in “Thor: Ragnarok” – or James Gunn in both volumes of “Guardians of the Galaxy” – the Russo brothers seem to have realized the inherent silliness of it all and embraced it, shedding the admirable-but-laughable attempts to infuse the Marvel universe with a 1970’s “Parallax View” aesthetic in their ambitious but deeply flawed “Civil War.” “Infinity War”’s overarching theme is that of our world being overpopulated, its villain Thanos (a highly memorable mo-cap performance by Josh Brolin) a Hitler-like deity who believes population control is the only way to save planets from self-destructing. A hefty theme, sure, but it’s the other themes the directors’ pepper (Potts) the film with that leave a lasting impression: the surprisingly (for a Marvel film) complex relationships between father and daughter, as well as lovers, friends, and siblings.
For once, I have to admit that the film’s two-and-a-half-hour running time is somewhat justified. The Russos cram so much into the narrative, the entire enterprise is constantly on the brink of self-implosion. The sheer number of storylines, characters, special effects (both eye-pleasing and eye-gouging), bombastic action and, well, utter ridiculousness, is overwhelming. I mean, we are watching a crew of aliens – including a tree, a green girl with daddy issues and a raccoon – join forces with a (not quite) green beast, a king, a space-hopping Norse god, a half-spider-half-man, an anthropomorphic manifestation of the internet (or a “synthezoid”, or whatever Paul Bettany’s Vision character happens to be), a witch and a robot-billionaire to fight the most powerful intergalactic monster. “Infinity War” makes the wacky “Guardians of the Galaxy” seem tame by comparison. It’s “Guardians” on crack. And that’s a good thing.
For what it is – a silly fantasy – “Infinity War” achieves it with aplomb. It’s crammed with crowd-pleasing jewels – especially numerous ones involving a beloved character getting beaten to a pulp before the rousing, ex-machina introduction of yet another beloved Avenger to save the hapless hero. Each of those moments made the crowd at the press screening I attended cheer with unadulterated joy. Hulk! Spider-Man! Nebula! Star-Lord! Bucky! Dr. Strange! T’Challa!!! A bearded Captain America!!! All actors get to have their spotlight, Saldana’s Gamora and Brolin’s Thanos being the two standouts. The film ended exactly where I hoped it would, a pleasingly sadistic twist on the “happily ever after” Marvel staple.
Sure, a million questions arise. Most of them are not worth scrutiny, considering the subject matter and the palpable joy with which the directors careen along. I’ll ask one: Why doesn’t Dr. Strange just send Thanos through one of his “wizard portals” to forever tumble into a bottomless abyss? Because there wouldn’t be a movie, that’s why. Plenty of silly dialogue (“The fate of the universe is in our hands”) comes hand-in-hand with witty banter (“He’s not a dude. You’re a dude. This is a man. A handsome, muscular man.”) and soulful exchanges (“Today we don’t fight for any life – we fight for all of them!”) – again, that comes with the territory.
So does “Infinity Wars” pull off the six most difficult tasks in a comic book? Well, let’s see: 1) It has weird and nuanced characters; 2) It manages to get under your skin with its dark, foreboding tone, while simultaneously assaulting you with some of the better one-liners in the Marvel universe; 3) It certainly has one of the most memorable Marvel villains, Brolin shining through all the CGI pixels; 4) It relentlessly hops from one action sequence to the next, pausing only to collect its breath and exhilarate with unexpected lyricism; 5) It has a Relevant Theme; and 6) Its climax may be the most dismal, resonant one in comic-book history. But I forgot to mention one thing, perhaps THE toughest task to achieve in a comic book movie – the ability to embrace its own absurdity. This makes “Infinity Wars” one of the best, purely enjoyable Marvel films to grace our screens yet. Here’s to Part Deux.
In theaters Friday, April 27th
