Avengers: Endgame releases in a few weeks, and I find myself in the strange position of being both incredibly excited and deeply skeptical. The MCU has done remarkable things over the past decade, but the setup from Infinity War has created some problems that Endgame will need to address. Let me lay out my concerns and predictions.
The Captain Marvel Power Level Problem
Kevin Feige has asserted in interviews that Captain Marvel is the most powerful Avenger. This is a marketing decision that creates logical problems within the MCU's established power scaling.
Captain Marvel's abilities derive from the Space Stone—specifically, she absorbed energy from an explosion powered by the Tesseract. She gained superhuman strength, flight, energy projection, and near-invulnerability from this exposure. These are formidable powers.
But here's the problem: her abilities come from a single Infinity Stone. How does absorbing energy from one stone make her more powerful than Thanos wielding all six stones? The math doesn't work.
Consider the benchmark we already have. In Infinity War, Thor with Stormbreaker threw his axe through a beam powered by all six Infinity Stones simultaneously—and it reached Thanos, nearly killing him. Thor accomplished this despite Thanos having literally all the power in the universe at his disposal.
Stormbreaker Thor pierced a six-stone gauntlet beam. That's the benchmark for power in the MCU. If Captain Marvel exceeds this, the filmmakers need to explain why one stone's power exceeds six stones' power.
There are ways to resolve this. Maybe Captain Marvel's absorption process amplified the Space Stone's energy in ways that exceed Thanos's direct control. Maybe her human-Kree hybrid physiology channels the power more efficiently. But the film needs to address this rather than simply asserting she's the strongest because Kevin Feige said so.
Vision: The Most Useless Infinity Stone Wielder
Vision's underwhelming performance throughout the MCU highlights a deeper paradox in how Marvel handles power scaling.
Vision doesn't just have exposure to an Infinity Stone—he literally has the Mind Stone embedded in his forehead. It's part of him. He should, by any logical measure, be one of the most powerful beings in the universe. The Mind Stone grants telepathy, telekinesis, and reality-warping abilities in the comics. It's one of the six fundamental forces of existence.
Yet Vision consistently underperforms. He gets stabbed in his first appearance in Infinity War and spends the rest of the movie being rescued. Characters like Scarlet Witch and Captain Marvel, who merely absorbed portions of stone energy, appear significantly stronger than the guy who houses an entire stone.
The Russo Brothers seemed to acknowledge this problem by immediately incapacitating Vision at the start of Infinity War. If he fought at full power, the plot would need to explain why the Mind Stone's wielder can't handle threats that stone-fragment users overcome easily. Sidelining him avoids this question without answering it.
This creates awkward implications. Either Vision is incompetent at using the stone's power, the Mind Stone is significantly weaker than other stones (contradicting lore), or the filmmakers simply didn't want to deal with the logical implications of his power level. None of these are satisfying answers.
The Russo Brothers and Misdirection
Marvel's marketing team has a documented history of misdirection in trailers. Scenes are reshot, CGI is altered, and entire plot points are fabricated to mislead audiences.
Remember the Infinity War trailer showing the Avengers running into battle in Wakanda—including Hulk? That scene doesn't exist in the film. Hulk doesn't appear; Banner uses the Hulkbuster armor instead. The trailer deliberately misled audiences about Hulk's role.
With this precedent, I'm skeptical of everything the Endgame trailers have shown. The quantum suits that dominated early marketing may or may not be significant. The somber tone might not reflect the actual film. Characters shown in trailers might not actually be in those scenes.
This makes prediction difficult but also exciting. The Russo Brothers have earned enough trust that I'm willing to go in relatively blind, trusting they have a plan that justifies the misdirection.
Time Travel: The Most Plausible Resolution
Despite the misdirection, certain elements seem confirmed. The quantum realm will play a major role—Ant-Man's connection to the quantum realm and the suits suggest interdimensional or time travel. Set photos have leaked showing characters in old costumes, suggesting scenes set in earlier MCU films.
Time travel is the most plausible resolution to the Snap. The surviving Avengers will likely use the quantum realm to access earlier timelines, either to collect the stones before Thanos or to prevent the snap in some other way.
This creates its own problems. Time travel in film typically raises questions about paradoxes, alternate timelines, and why characters don't simply go back further to prevent even earlier problems. The Russos will need to establish clear rules for how their time travel works and stick to them.
I'm optimistic they can pull this off. The MCU has handled complex narratives before. If anyone can make time travel work in a superhero context, it's this creative team.
The Antagonist Problem
Here's my biggest concern going into Endgame: Thanos post-snap may not be a compelling final antagonist.
In Infinity War, Thanos worked because he was on a mission. He was active, pursuing stones, executing his plan. His conviction made him compelling even as we disagreed with his methods. He was the protagonist of his own story.
But post-snap Thanos has achieved his goal. He's retired to his garden. His motivation is preservation of what he's done, not pursuit of something new. This makes him reactive rather than active—a defender rather than an aggressor.
Reactive villains are inherently less compelling. We saw this with Kylo Ren in the Star Wars sequel trilogy—a conflicted antagonist who repeatedly lost to undertrained opponents doesn't project menace. He functions more as a pale imitation of Vader than a distinct threat in his own right.
Without additional villain setup, Thanos risks becoming like Kylo Ren—defeated by his own internal conflict more than by his opponents' strength. A villain who has already won and just wants to be left alone is hard to root against with the same intensity.
The trailers' hints about Thanos's armor and weapons suggest he'll be more active in Endgame than "retired farmer" implies. I hope so. The climax of a decade-long saga needs a villain who commands the screen.
What I'm Hoping For
Despite my concerns, I'm genuinely excited. The MCU has earned this moment. Twenty-two films building to a single conclusion is unprecedented in film history, and whatever happens, Endgame will be a cultural event.
I'm hoping for:
- Clear rules for time travel that are established early and followed consistently
- Explanation of Captain Marvel's power level that makes sense within established lore
- A Thanos who remains compelling despite having already achieved his goal
- Meaningful stakes for the original Avengers—this should feel like an ending for some characters
- Earned emotional payoffs for storylines that have developed over a decade
I have faith in the filmmakers to deliver something satisfying. They've earned that trust over ten years of successful storytelling. Even if every concern I've raised here proves valid, the Russo Brothers have demonstrated an ability to navigate complex narratives while delivering crowd-pleasing entertainment.
In a few weeks, we'll know how it ends. Whatever happens, it's been a remarkable journey to get here.