Wick's Review

Summary - Really Great 4.5

Endgame doesn’t disappoint, surmounting both high expectations and a lengthy runtime. Marvelous!

Avengers assemble, with each of a dozen getting ten minutes on average to reintroduce themselves. After those two hours they spread out over time – literally over time – taking the movie to its three hour runtime. Yet Endgame never drags, never loses pace, always connects, without even always having to go BOOM.

• Starts human-scale and often returns to human-scale, one of Marvel’s best powers
• Moves back and forth through time, an old cinematic trick done with deft anticipation and payoffs
• Emotional closure over and over
• Changing of the guard in most satisfying fashion
• More than a few laughs, including several LOLs
• Stan Lee has one final cameo.
• No end credits scene, marking this as the conclusion of MCU Phase 1

Where does Avengers: Endgame rank in the canon? In the upper rank of the Iron-Man Series.

Acting - Perfect 5.0

Endgame has more cast members than DC has stars in their entire universe. Maybe not, but feels that way. Robert Downey Jr., 2 Chrises – Hemsworth & Evans, Ruffalo, Johansson & Renner assemble one last time.

• Renner gets his best scenes yet as Hawkeye, the man who brings a bow & arrow to a raygun fight.
• Hemsworth finds a new way to slay, comedically speaking.
• Johansson plays the heavy.
• Ruffalo gets to play light, light and green.
• Downey dominates. Tony Stark, we’re going to miss ye.
• Don Cheadle’s Rhodey won’t be missed.

This core is joined by over fifty others, each freighted with earlier Avengers’ interactions. Here’s some.

Iron Man
- Gwyneth Paltrow’s Pepper Potts
- Jon Favreau’s Happy Hogan
- John Slattery’s Howard Stark
Captain America
- Hayley Atwell’s Peggy Carter, aka Agent Carter
Ant-Man
- Paul Rudd’s Ant-Man
- Evangeline Lilly’s Wasp
- Michael Douglas’s Hank Pym
- Michelle Pfeiffer’s Janet van Dyne
Captain Marvel Brie Larson
Guardians of the Galaxy
- Chris Pratt’s Star-Lord
- Zoe Saldana’s Gamora
- Karen Gillan’s Nebula
- Bradley Cooper’s Rocket voice
- Vin Diesel’s Groot voice
- Pom Klementieff’s Mantis
- Dave Bautista’s Drax the Destroyer
Avengers movies
- Josh Brolin’s Thanos
- Elizabeth Olsen’s Scarlet Witch
- Anthony Mackie’s Falcon
- Sebastian Stan’s Winter Soldier
- Cobie Smulders’s Agent Hill,
- Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury
Dr. Strange
- Benedict Cumberbatch’s Dr. Strange
- Benedict Wong’s Wong
- Tilda Swinton’s Ancient One
Black Panther
- Chadwick Boseman’s Black Panther
- Letitia Wright’s Shuri
- Danai Gurira’s Okoye
Spider-Man
- Tom Holland’s Spider-Man
- Marissa Tomei’s Aunt May
Thor
- Tom Hiddleston’s Loki
- Rene Russo’s Queen Frigga, Thor’s Mother
- Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie, new King of Asgard

Film - Really Great 4.5

The Russo Brothers – Tony & Joe – deliver yet another in a long line of superlative Avengers movies. They are therefore the most superlative directors of superhero movies in this, the golden age of superhero movies. Billion-dollar opening weekends goes beyond superlative.

They’ve created an Easter egg soufflé on top of the world’s biggest Easter egg hunt.

Edge - Risqué 1.6

Reality - Fantasy 4.5

Fun fantasy: Conservation of Energy be damned, time travel and magical alien creatures welcomed.

More seriously, every Avengers movie addresses big notions of the day. Captain America: Civil War wrestled with weighty civic issues of security and control. Endgame plays out the results, which are that the good guys are seriously behind because they let the bad guy get the upper hand. Now? Endgame.

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