Avengers: Infinity War

It speaks volumes to the confidence and success of Marvel Studios’ cinematic universe thus far that they have been able to get away with naming the nineteenth movie in their stable Infinity War. To manage that without fear of asshole critics and detractors snarkily dubbing it something like Infinity Bore or Infinity Chore is no mean accomplishment. Can you imagine if the Justice League had tried to slip by with such an open goal of a subtitle? Fish in a barrel.

The only fish in a barrel where Infinity War is concerned, however, is in its eponymous fight. After six long years of teasing and sneering on from the sidelines (or post credits), Thanos is finally here. And, as established during the film’s earliest moments, the Mad Titan is taking no prisoners. It’ll take the might of the Avengers, plus those the MCU has accrued since Age of Ultron (Spidey, Black Panther, Doctor Strange etc) to stand a chance of defeating the man before he wipes out half of the universe. And even then, nothing is guaranteed. Avengers: I’ll Do it Myself: The Movie is the brutal, confident answer to Marvel’s critics. The stakes never feel real? Nobody ever really dies? The villains are always shit? That last one was never really true, but Infinity War pounds those criticisms into submission within moments, and much of the film feels like an episode of Game of Thrones. You’re never sure who might bite it or when, and each big set piece feels genuinely dangerous, no matter how many layers of plot armour the characters seem to be wearing at the time… and in spite of any potential resurrection that might come, somewhere down the line.

We’ve known many of these characters for ten years now, so there’s a weight and heft to the action, no matter how little some of them actually get to do in Infinity War. The whole film feels like a series of third-act confrontations and battles; it’s fast and breathless, stuffed to the hilt, yet incredibly lean. Everyone trips over themselves for screentime, but few feel particularly sidelined (poor Black Widow aside, and Captain America and Black Panther are kind of just… there) and everyone gets their big moment. Or moments, when it comes to show-stealers like Drax, Teenage Groot and Banner. There was a moment somewhere in the middle where my jaw dropped, and I uttered an audible “fucking hell” right then and there in the cinema.

Meanwhile, Thor, Doctor Strange, Stark and the rest of the Guardians duke it out for top billing, with relative newcomer Benedict Cumberbatch proving to be surprisingly important – and great – as Strange. But this is the Thanos show, and the testicular-chinned giant walks (or stomps) away with it. Josh Brolin is excellent as Thanos, married to some of the best CGI ever seen in a Marvel movie. For once we have a CGI villain that feels real; every punch, every blow hurts, and I genuinely worried for the fate of the film’s more human characters. And even some of the Gods, too.

Infinity War whips from one end of the universe to the other, blowing things up on an epic scale, dragging each and every one of its characters through the wringer. It’s funny, thrilling and absolutely everything you’d expect from a Marvel movie, but it’s also an emotional rollercoaster – upsetting and exhausting in equal measure. I haven’t been this affected by a piece of pop culture since Buffy the Vampire Slayer (hey, I was seventeen) and left the cinema feeling something more akin to shell-shock than the sense of triumphalism we have come to associate with Avengers movies.

Marvel fans will not be disappointed. Some elements from previous films (most noticeably Civil War) are swept under the rug, while others revert back to the status quo with alarming speed, but that’s inevitable in a film this size and with so many moving parts. Everyone else may be left nonplussed or even a little irritated by this gigantic toybox-come-to-life movie (eighteen films is a lot of homework to do before watching a film), but it achieves everything it sets out to do, and then some. Now, how about that Infinity Encore?