movie review: AVENGERS INFINITY WAR

Avengers: Infinity War is an epic event, but what it is not is a true Avengers movie. Captain America: Civil War was more of an Avengers movie.  What this movie accomplishes is being the cinematic equivalent of a comic book multi-title cross over story arc. What directors Anthony and Joe Russo have done is capture each of the individual franchises' tone for the segments featuring those characters. The segments featuring Thor and the Guardians of the Galaxy feel like they were directed by James Gunn.  The segments featuring Iron Man, Spider-Man, and Dr. Strange feel like they were directed by Jon Watts or Scott Derrickson.  But unlike Justice League, where the clash of styles of Zack Snyder and Joss Whedon caused a disconnect, Infinity War still holds together, and builds upon the diversity of styles, much like a multi-title cross over comic book arc does with different creative teams on each title building to the singular plot line.

The plot line here, is of Thanos, who bears more than a passing resemblance to pro-wrestler Kurt Angle, collecting the various infinity stones for his gauntlet for the purpose of wiping out half of existence. Truth be told, that's established in the first half of the movie, while the second half is one big battle royal across different locations.  At times, Infinity War starts to look more like a video game than a movie, with all the excessive CGI, as Justice League and the third act of Wonder Woman did, but over all, the Russos pull it off better than their DC counterparts. Still, it would be nice to have a superhero movie that does not feel the need to turn into a video game for the climax.

The large cast gives nearly everyone at least a few seconds to shine (the only ones not attending are Ant-Man, Hawkeye, the Agents of Shield and the Netflix heroes), but the characters that get the most screen time are Thor, the Guardians, Iron Man, Dr. Strange, Spider-Man, Bruce Banner, and of course Thanos.  The one character that I thought that got the short end of the stick is Captain America.  Despite one cool bit that is really a Batman rip off of Steve Rogers appearing seemingly from out of nowhere under cover of a passing train, he has little to do other than to lead his team of heroes into battle for the second half's mega fight scene.  After all the previous films where Steve dominates, its weird to have him pushed into the background for this go round.  The Scarlet Witch gets to have the most emotional role, and surprisingly the comedy, which has moved to the forefront in Spider-Man: Homecoming, Thor: Ragnarok, and the Guardians movies, is reined in to a certain extent this time. But then again, there is the running gag of Thor constantly referring to Rocket as a rabbit- perhaps a House of Mouse dig at Bugs Bunny?  There are some deaths of significant characters, and the movie ends on a cliffhanger to be continued in the next Avengers movie due one year from now. This conforms to the original reports that it would be a two-part film, although the Russos later denied this claiming the third and fourth Avengers movies would be separate installments. Infinity War is a satisfactory ten year milestone for the MCU.