Last week’s post on Avengers: Infinity War generated interest in a follow-up, so we’re returning to the Marvel universe. Again, I’ve avoided spoilers, but I’ll understand if you want to play it safe and wait until you’ve seen the film.
It’s perhaps a strange thing to say about a 2 hour 40 minute movie so full of stars it threatens to collapse into a black hole, but I feel Avengers: Infinity War was missing something. Both earlier Avengers films made time to consider the plight of folks who don’t have alliterative names or the narrative security of an already announced sequel. We saw our heroes protecting and rescuing innocent bystanders, like the office workers for whom Captain America took a grenade or the family Iron Man carried to safety in a bath tub. We also met Beth the waitress (played by Ashley Johnson) in The Avengers and Zrinka the concerned older sister (played by Dominique Provost-Chalkley) in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Each got multiple, albeit brief, moments before, during and after the respective third act battles, allowing the audience to develop a personal, emotional connection to the global stakes.
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