The latest Avengers movie, Infinity War, strikes me as one of the best additions to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU.) It approaches more mature themes than other recent releases, creates a fleshed out and interesting villain in the character of Thanos, and breaks the somewhat predictable mold most Marvel movies follow. Below are some of my initial reactions.
~Spoiler Warning~
The opening scene where Thanos kills Loki wonderfully sets up the main theme—a theme paralleling my post, Musings on Goodness. In it, Loki chooses to give up an infinity stone—one of six MacGuffins Thanos needs to complete his plan, more on that later—in order to save Thor’s life. Now this decision, where a character must choose between the loved object and the future of the world, is time and again replayed, with different characters exploring different paths.
Both Thanos and Star Lord decide to sacrifice the loved object for the future, in both cases the object of love being the character Gamora. Their paths diverge however: Peter’s attempt to kill Gamora is frustrated by Thanos, whereas Thanos successfully kills his daughter. Along with these two, the Scarlet Witch chooses to sacrifice the life of her lover to save the world in an ultimately futile homicide. This sacrifice is played out again and again: it comes to mind that the Black Panther turns off the force field protecting his home in order to protect his home, sacrificing immediate safety to grasp at a long term victory.
Most of the other characters make the opposite decision, choosing the loved object over the future of the world, with two notable exceptions: Thor, who has a scene explaining that all he loves is destroyed, and Dr. Strange.
Thor is separated from this decision, as his people, family, and friends are all dead. However, his sacrifice is himself. In a wonderful line I can only paraphrase, he sums up the nature of sacrifice, “It will only kill me if I die.” Thor is a little mad in this movie, or perhaps berserk would be a more fitting term. He sacrifices himself in order to create a weapon capable of killing Thanos, and then is reinvigorated by that weapon before dying. I think this bit is a microcosm of the whole story yet to be unfolded.
Before getting to Dr. Strange, let us consider Thanos. He is something of an environmentalist, wanting to end the galaxy’s food shortage—a shortage not yet fully realized, but one he predicts—by killing half of the galaxy’s population. Why the six magical stones couldn’t simply make enough food for people once collected when they seemed to have no boundaries upon their power, I don’t understand. This small plot hole aside, Thanos is a well expressed and interesting villain. His “moral” perspective, his imperative to murder half of the universe is believable, and the conflict between him and the heroes is engaging.
Now, Dr. Strange makes the most mysterious decision. Using the Time Stone, he finds the one future wherein the heroes win. However, in the final battle, he saves Iron Man’s life, exchanging it for his Infinity Stone, paving the way for Thanos to enact is genocidal dream. Yet, Dr. Strange’s dialogue implies that this sacrifice was part of the plan, making an allusion to the end game of chess.
The unfortunate fact is, the movie ends with Thanos possessing all infinity stones, turning half of the Avengers to dust, and this means I have to buy a ticket to see part 2.
Tale Told 