I’m sure by now that most of you reading would have seen Avengers: Infinity War, and if not – what the hell are you doing here?!
Yes, this article is going to delve head first into spoiler territory so I’m giving you this warning to get out now…
Okay, are they gone? Good. So as we all know, the plot of Avengers: Infinity War saw Josh Brolin’s Mad Titan, Thanos, making his play to acquire all six of the Infinity Stones in his attempt to balance all life in the universe. This is where you would be thinking,
But of course, The Avengers will stop him and everything will be fine.
That’s right, despite putting up one hell of a fight, Earth’s Mightiest Heroes ultimately weren’t able to stop Thanos from enacting his endgame and with a snap of his fingers, half of all life in the universe was snuffed out, along with some of our beloved heroes.
The Wakandan Front
In an attempt to keep Thanos from acquiring The Mind Stone located on The Vision’s forehead, Captain America and his team of Secret Avengers, along with help from Rhodey, Banner, Winter Soldier, T’Challa and his armies mounted a defense in the country of Wakanda and despite some last minute assistance from Thor, Rocket and Teenage Groot weren’t able to stop the villain from acquiring his prize.
Naturally we ended up losing a few faces here including The Vision, who had the stone forcibly removed from his head by Thanos and then Falcon, Bucky, Wanda, T’Challa and Groot who slowly faded from existence leaving the other heroes to look on devastated.
Survivors – Captain America, Thor, Black Widow, Hulk, War Machine, Rocket, Okoye, M’Baku
Casualties – Black Panther, Vision, Scarlet Witch, Falcon, Teenage Groot
Unaccounted – Shuri
The Outer Space Crew
Early in the film Thor runs into the Guardians of the Galaxy which leads the crew to split with Star-Lord, Drax, Gamora and Mantis heading off to Knowhere to stop Thanos from getting his purple mitt’s on the Reality Stone. This unfortunately fails leading Gamora to be taken by her Father in order to make her give up the location of the Soul Stone, which after plenty of coercion, she does.
This ultimately ends up sealing her fate after it is revealed that Thanos needs to trade something he loves for the stone, leading him to kill his ‘favorite daughter’ in a heartbreaking scene. The rest of the Guardians find their way to Titan ready to engage Thanos head on when they run into Tony Stark, Doctor Strange and Peter Parker, where they devise a plan to defeat him.
Naturally this fails, leading Strange to give up the Time Stone in order to spare Stark’s life. Then once Thanos has snapped his fingers, we start seeing the team one by one fade from existence. Mantis, Drax, Star-Lord and Doctor Strange all fall, with Spider-Man having one final goodbye with his mentor before he too, disappears – leaving Tony and Nebula on the planet devastated.
Survivors – Iron Man, Nebula
Casualties – Star-Lord, Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, Gamora, Drax, Mantis
Asgardian Refugees
From Thor: Ragnarok‘s post-credits scene and the early trailers, we knew it was never going to end well for those Asgardian refugees. We begin the film, in-medias-res, with the ship already taken and Thor at the Titan’s mercy. Despite the Hulk’s best attempt at fighting Thanos, he is easily outmatched and then sent to Earth by Heimdall, mustering the last of the dark forces he could.
Unfortunately, this ultimately leads to his death in front of Thor. However, it doesn’t stop there, as moments later we see Loki killed by Thanos after a botched assassination attempt.
Casualties – Loki, Heimdall
Unaccounted – Valkyrie, Korg, Miek
What about the rest?
Besides the film’s single post credit scene, which features Nick Fury and Maria Hill being slowly removed from existence, not a lot is seen of the cosmos – Which leaves many characters unaccounted for including Hawkeye, Scott Lang, Wong, Pepper Potts and really, every other named character.
What’s interesting will be how Marvel will tie this pretty massive story development into it’s smaller screen counterparts. All the shows have utilized the Battle of New York in the past and realistically, half of the universe disappearing is a bit of a talking point. Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. have referenced the battle between Iron-Man, Strange and the Children of Thanos so perhaps we may see some other characters disappear soon.
Of course we won’t truly know what’s going on with these characters until Avengers 4 is released next year. Hopefully all is not lost.
What do you think? Who do you think had the saddest goodbye? What do you think happened to the characters? Let us know below!