To Infinity ... and Beyond!: Avengers: Infinity War

Walt Disney Studios

3/5 Stars
For ten years the "Marvel Cinematic Universe" has been working on an ambitious and unprecedented idea in movie-making: to make a massive series of unrelated films (nineteen and counting) all set in the same universe. It's been fun for the most part but it has all come to this; the moment when all the subplots and characters come together for the mother of all battles. Infinity War is here and it's a long, periodically entertaining and surprisingly bleak affair.

Finally revealing the story only teased to us in the first Avengers, this film follows Thanos (Josh Brolin), a purple monster on a quest to retrieve six magic stones that he needs to wipe out half of all life in the universe and only the Avengers (with a few new friends from outer space) can stop him. But can Earth's mightiest heroes stand up against a being with seemingly god-like power?

Featuring enough characters to give Robert Altman a run for his money and multiple plots involving magic axes, space travel and robots, it seems like Infinity War should be a giant mess, but its subplots all flow extremely well. Also, plenty of the action set pieces and emotional character moments are very effective, making the punishing runtime go by a little easier. My only complaint is the fact that the film goes much too far in being the "dark and gritty" entry in the series. Coming from a cinematic universe as fun and exciting as this one, the film is shockingly dour and frankly depressing. It's a bold direction to take but it may have gone too far with the death and destruction. I feel weird for saying this, but this is a superhero film that you may consider not bringing young kids to see. — Forest Taylor

Directed by: Joe and Anthony Russo // Written by: Stephen McFeely and Christopher Markus // Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Benedict Cumberbatch, Tom Holland, Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Josh Brolin, Chadwick Boseman, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen and the voice of Bradley Cooper // 149 minutes