The gang’s all here in Avengers: Infinity War, in which Marvel reap the benefits of having so assiduously introduced us to one superhero after another over the past 10 years. (The ‘io’ in ‘Marvel Studios’ appears as a ‘10’, reflecting their decade of dominance.) All these comic-book characters are now in one place, allowing the studio to work on its broadest canvas ever. The Avengers exchange some choice insults with the Guardians of the Galaxy. Wakanda – the Black Panther’s homeland – is the setting for the fierce action climax. And Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), who’s been slightly out of the loop, gets to ask a question that a lot of us have probably asked, in our more befuddled moments: “Wait… There’s an Ant-Man and a Spider-Man?”.
‘So what now?’ asks the sceptical viewer. Having amassed all these people, what do we do with them? The answer remains to be seen – or perhaps this is the answer, getting the various invincibles to exchange geeky banter and go up against a villain called Thanos (Josh Brolin). Thanos, it must be said, is quite a good villain. His tactics are a little dopey – he’s obsessed with overpopulation and likes to help out by killing half the populace of every planet he invades, without apparently caring if the half he kills is made up of serial rapists or Nobel Prize winners – but still, he’s complex: his weakness is Gamora (Zoe Saldana), his adopted daughter who also happens to be a GotG. Thanos wants the six Infinity Stones which, if collected on his big leather gauntlet, would translate into world domination – but he doesn’t want money or power, all he wants is to save half the world by destroying the other half. He kills to be kind.
This is all mildly interesting; still, a comic-book villain is a comic-book villain. It’s hard to stay invested in Thanos and his doughnut-shaped spaceship for two and a half hours (yup, that’s the running-time; like I said, broadest canvas ever). This is not a problem, however, since Infinity War doesn’t stay on anyone – including Thanos – for very long, shifting constantly from one strand to another. This is the all-you-can-eat-buffet model familiar from many kids’ cartoons, especially the Ice Age franchise: a case of something for everyone, with e.g. the glorious lunacy of the GotG crew (Star Lord, Drax, Groot, etc) acting as the rough equivalent of Scrat in Ice Age while Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr), the voice of authority, is a bit like Manny the mammoth. Thor (Chris Hemsworth, possibly channelling Richard Burton) is goofy and stentorian, Banner’s having issues with his alter ego The Hulk – simply put, the big green lug “won’t come out” – Spider-Man (Tom Holland) rushes around being excitable and adolescent, and so on and so forth.
This may be the most entertaining Marvel movie after Thor: Ragnarok. (Obvious caveat: I like the funny ones more.) The characters alternate between self-sacrifice and self-deprecation. The action is properly excessive, with an army of sharp-toothed beasties unleashed at the climax; in between, however, the superheroes happily make fun of the concept of being superheroes. “I’m Peter, by the way,” chirps Spidey (né Peter Parker), extending his hand. “Dr. Strange,” replies Dr. Strange (né Dr. Strange). “Oh, we’re using made-up names? Sorry, I’m Spider-Man!”
Playful pastiche only gets you so far, though, especially with something as large-scale and elaborate as the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It’s a little deflating to realise that you’ve sat through 10 years and billions of dollars’ worth of superhero films just so you can watch them take the piss out of the genre (even if it is quite amusing). There’s also something slightly off-putting about this sentimental notion of a great big Marvel family being peddled through what is, after all, a 10-year strategy by a giant corporation – and there’s also something wrong about the patchwork structure itself, the way we keep flitting from one costumed hero to another, some of them forgotten for a good half-hour before reappearing. The execution works, but the model is flawed.
Reality is nowhere in Infinity War. We speak, of course, of the Reality Stone, which is located on a planet called Nowhere (actually Knowhere) – but we might also be speaking of the film’s peculiar weightlessness; even by comic-book standards, it doesn’t feel real. This is a jape, a light bit of fun – though the relationships between the various heroes are often dysfunctional, and of course you have That Ending. I won’t spoil the ending, but let me just mention (a) that it’s very ballsy, and (b) that, as fans doubtless know, Infinity War is the first half of a two-part adventure, the second, as-yet-untitled half coming out in 2019. Maybe Ant-Man will also appear in that one, being the only headliner from the past 10 years to be missing from this spirited Big Top of a movie. Yes, Virginia, there’s an Ant-Man and a Spider-Man.
DIRECTED BY Anthony & Joe Russo
STARRING Robert Downey Jr, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana
COMIC-BOOK ACTION
US 2018 149 mins
