With a budget of 356 million dollars, Endgame became the biggest opening weekend in history, making 350 million dollars. It is anticipated that it might dethrone the film “Avatar” as the highest grossing movie of all time. When arriving at the Redwood City movie theater opening day , almost every theater is occupied by the movie that everyone is obsessing about. In the spring 2008, the first Marvel Cinematic Universe movie was brought to our screens as “Iron Man” became an instant success. As the popularity of Marvel increased over the next 4 years with the production of movies like “Captain America: The First Avenger” and “Thor,” Marvel Studios released “The Avengers”, featuring our favorite superheros. Although these movies seemed to be side projects, they ultimately helped build up to the final move. With that, Marvel created “The Avengers: Age of Ultron,” “The Avengers: Infinity War” and finally “The Avengers: Endgame.” 

The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is a complicated one; every movie Marvel has made in the last 11 years connects to one storyline that was concluded in “Endgame”. And with huge movie franchises like the MCU, plot holes are inevitable. 

One key theme in Endgame was time travel, which can easily get messy for writers due to all of the laws of time travel that they have to follow. At the end of the movie, Captain America travels back in time to replace the infinity stones after the main conflict is resolved, and came back as an elderly man. After explaining that he stayed back in time to spend time with his love, fans were left unsatisfied and confused. Also, since Black Widow sacrificed herself in order to get the soul stone, shouldn’t that mean that she could be alive now since the conflict she was getting the stone for got resolved? And since Loki and the Asgardians were killed in Infinity War by Thanos, wouldn’t they come back also, since past Thanos was defeated before he could have massacred half of a race? In Infinity War, Thanos sacrificed Gamora to get the Soul Stone. But in Endgame, Black Widow and Hawkeye go to get the soul stone before Thanos gets it. Since he was defeated before the time when Gamora was murdered, doesn’t that mean she would come back also? All these questions and more sparked up conversations on social media, attempting to understand Marvel’s rules of time travel.  Although the confusion, Freshman Parker Allen has an explanation: “[Their time traveling mission] would screw up the timeline. I think they’re just erasing the present and replacing it with another timeline, so the future was kinda scrapped. They destroyed it [and] then kind of ‘rewrote’ it.”

Although Marvel has a reputation of having a lack of diversity in its characters, it’s slowly removing itself from that reputation with characters like Captain Marvel and Black Panther. Now, a new Captain America emerges, increasing the diversity that fans have been asking for, for years. More movies with more diverse characters are coming, such as a solo Black Widow movie, Black Panther 2 and  Shang Chi, the first Marvel movie featuring an Asian lead. Although it pained fans to see Captain America growing older, they were happy to see Sam Wilson get the recognition he deserves. Fans hope to see Sam and Bucky’s friendship grow in there Disney+ showm “Falcon and Winter Soldier.” 

No one who has seen Endgame can deny shedding a tear or two when Tony Stark gave up his life to save the universe from Thanos. Peter Parker’s and Pepper Potts’ tearful goodbyes tugged on fans’ heartstrings and made the scene all the more devastating. Since Iron Man started the MCU, it is only fitting that he save it. Many fans noticed that after his funeral, his daughter asked for a cheeseburger, similar to how Tony asked for one after escaping from terrorists in Iron Man 1.

After most of the Asgardian population is killed in Infinity War by Thanos and his army, Thor loses hope and gets a “beer belly”. While he is in agony, Valkyrie becomes a leader of the fallen civilization. After Thor helps defeat Thanos, he makes her the new queen of Asgard. Without the duty of being the leader of Asgard, Thor joins the Guardians of the Galaxy. Although fans lost a significant number of the original Avengers, they’re grateful that Chris Hemsworth has extended his contract for Thor 4 and Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3.