Avengers: Endgame

Plot

In 2018, 23 days after Thanos erased half of all life in the universe, Carol Danvers rescues Tony Stark and Nebula from deep space. They reunite with the remaining Avengers—Bruce Banner, Steve Rogers, Thor, Natasha Romanoff, and James Rhodes—and Rocket on Earth. Finding Thanos on an uninhabited planet, they plan to use the Infinity Stones to reverse his actions but learn that Thanos has destroyed them. Enraged, Thor decapitates Thanos.

Five years later, Scott Lang escapes from the Quantum Realm. Reaching the Avengers Compound, he says he experienced only five hours while trapped. Theorizing that the Quantum Realm allows time travel, they ask a reluctant Stark to help them retrieve the Stones from the past to reverse Thanos's present actions. Stark, Rocket, and Banner, who has merged his intelligence with the Hulk's strength, build a time machine. Banner says that altering the past does not affect the present, since any changes create alternate realities. Banner and Rocket travel to Norway, where they visit the Asgardian refugee settlement of New Asgard and recruit an overweight, despondent Thor. In Tokyo, Romanoff recruits Clint Barton, who became a vigilante after his family was erased.

Banner, Lang, Rogers, and Stark time-travel to New York City during Loki's attack in 2012. At the Sanctum Sanctorum, Banner convinces the Ancient One to give him the Time Stone after promising to return the Infinity Stones to their proper points in time. At Stark Tower, Rogers retrieves the Mind Stone from Hydra sleeper agents, but Stark and Lang's attempt to steal the Space Stone fails, allowing 2012-Loki to escape with it. Rogers and Stark travel to Camp Lehigh in 1970, where Stark obtains an earlier version of the Space Stone and unexpectedly encounters his father, Howard, who he is able to have a conversation with. Rogers steals Pym Particles from Hank Pym to return to the present and sees his lost love, Peggy Carter.

Rocket and Thor travel to Asgard in 2013. Rocket extracts the Reality Stone from Jane Foster. Thor is encouraged by his mother, Frigga, and retrieves his old hammer, Mjolnir. Barton, Romanoff, Nebula, and Rhodes travel to 2014. Nebula and Rhodes go to Morag and steal the Power Stone before Peter Quill can, while Barton and Romanoff travel to Vormir. The Soul Stone's keeper, Red Skull, says that it can be acquired only by sacrificing a loved one. Romanoff sacrifices herself, allowing Barton to get the Stone. Rhodes and Nebula attempt to return to their own time, but Nebula is incapacitated when her cybernetic implants link with her past self, allowing 2014-Thanos to learn about his future self's success and the Avengers' attempt to undo it. 2014-Thanos sends 2014-Nebula forward in time to prepare for his arrival.

Cast

Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark / Iron Man:The benefactor of the Avengers who describes himself as a "genius, billionaire, playboy, and philanthropist" with electromechanical suits of armor he made. According to directors Joe and Anthony Russo, Downey was the only actor to receive the entire screenplay for the film. Screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely knew that Stark's death was inevitable as a "[move] to selflessness" and as an end to the "chapter" Stark began. They felt that his death was earned after granting him "the perfect retirement life ... That's the life he's been striving for [...] They got married, they had a kid, it was great. It's a good death. It doesn't feel like a tragedy. It feels like a heroic, finished life." Joe Russo said that Stark "always knew he was going to die because he could never reconcile that notion in himself of not protecting the universe," and was the most defiant of the Avengers: "Stark is the most formidable of all of them [...] because of his heart." The Russos sought Downey's approval for Stark's arc, which they had developed since Captain America: Civil War (2016).

Chris Evans as Steve Rogers / Captain America:The leader of the Avengers, World War II veteran and former fugitive, he was enhanced to the peak of human physicality by an experimental serum and frozen in suspended animation before waking up in the modern world. Markus described Rogers as someone who is "moving toward some sort of enlightened self-interest". McFeely knew that Rogers "was going to get his dance" that he promised Peggy Carter in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011). He initially planned to complete Rogers's story arc by killing him off, given the character's long life for his occupation, before deciding to have Rogers bequeathing his shield to Sam Wilson. Patrick Gorman provided an on-set reference for an elderly Steve Rogers.

Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner / Hulk:An Avenger and genius scientist who, because of exposure to gamma radiation, transforms into a monster when enraged or agitated. Banner balances his two sides with gamma experimentation in this film, enabling him to combine his intelligence with the Hulk's strength and physical stature based on his "Professor Hulk" comic-book identity. Compared to other heroes who were demotivated by their loss to Thanos, Banner is the only character to remain hopeful; according to Anthony Russo, "Banner is the sole character who is actually forging into a bright new future, trying to build something totally new and find something completely new [...] Banner is the one who is most heroic in a sense that he maintains his will to keep trying." This concludes a character arc that was established in Thor: Ragnarok (2017) and continued in Avengers: Infinity War (2018).

Production

In October 2014, Marvel Studios announced a two-part sequel of Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) entitled Avengers: Infinity War. Part 1 was scheduled to be released on May 4, 2018, and Part 2 was scheduled for May 3, 2019. Marvel's plan was to film both parts of Infinity War back-to-back. Anthony and Joe Russo were hired to direct the films in April 2015. The next month, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely signed on to write the screenplays for both parts of the film. Producer Kevin Feige said they would be "two distinct" projects with shared elements, not one story split across two films. The Russos decided to rename them to remove this misconception in May 2016, and Marvel left the second film untitled that July. Feige and the Russo brothers indicated that the title was being withheld to avoid giving away plot details.

Principal photography began on August 10, 2017, under the working title Mary Lou 2 at Pinewood Atlanta Studios in Fayette County, Georgia, with Trent Opaloch the director of photography. The film and Infinity War were shot with ARRI Alexa IMAX 2D cameras, the first time a Hollywood feature film was shot entirely with IMAX digital cameras. Filming was done that month in the Gulch area of downtown Atlanta, near the Five Points MARTA station, and in Piedmont Park. Feige said that the films were originally scheduled to be filmed simultaneously but were ultimately shot back-to-back: "It became too complicated to cross-board them like that, and we found ourselves—again, something would always pay the price. We wanted to be able to focus and shoot one movie and then focus and shoot another movie." Anthony Russo originally felt that it made more sense to shoot the films simultaneously for financial and logistical reasons (including the large number of cast members), and had suggested that "some days we'll be shooting the first movie and some days we'll be shooting the second movie. Just jumping back and forth." The 2013 Asgard scenes were shot at Durham Cathedral in Durham, England during production of Infinity War in early May 2017. Production wrapped on January 11, 2018, although additional filming took place in New York's Dutchess and Ulster counties in June 2018. Re-shoots began by September 7, 2018, and ended on October 12. More re-shoots were done in January 2019. Location shooting also took place in St Abbs, Scotland, which doubled for New Asgard in Norway. Evans and Hemsworth earned $15 million each for the film.

The film's official title, Avengers: Endgame, and final U.S. release date of April 26, 2019, were revealed with the film's first trailer in December 2018. Visual effects for the film were created by Industrial Light & Magic, Weta Digital, DNEG, Framestore, Cinesite, Digital Domain, Rise, Lola VFX, Cantina Creative, Capital T, Technicolor VFX, and Territory Studio. Like previous MCU films, Lola worked on the de-aging scenes; the film has 200 de-aging and aging shots. Downey, Evans, Ruffalo, Hemsworth, Johansson, and Renner were de-aged to their 2012 appearances for scenes recreated from The Avengers (2012). Michael Douglas, John Slattery, and Stan Lee were also de-aged for the 1970 New Jersey scene, and Douglas's appearance in The Streets of San Francisco was referenced. Lola aged Evans for the final scene, where he is an elderly man, with make-up and a stand-in. Jeffrey Ford and Matthew Schmidt were the film's editors.

Music

Alan Silvestri, who composed the score for The Avengers, was announced in June 2016 to be returning to score Infinity War and Endgame. The Russos began working with Silvestri on the Endgame score in early November 2018, and it was completed in late March 2019. A soundtrack album with Silvestri's score was released digitally by Hollywood Records on April 26, 2019, with a physical release on May 24. A video for the track "Portals", composed for the climactic "Avengers assemble" scene in which reinforcements arrive for the Avengers, was released on June 13.

Silvestri described the score as having the franchise's most versatile tone, ranging from "thunderous percussion and powerful brass" for the action scenes to minimalist, jazz-inspired music for Ant-Man and the Quantum Realm. He reprised his themes from the previous Avengers films and Captain America: The First Avenger, including material he wrote for Thanos and the Infinity Stones in Infinity War. Silvestri found writing the music to end Captain America's story poignant, since he had "been on this journey with him since the beginning". The film also used the Ant-Man (2015) theme by Christophe Beck, the Doctor Strange (2016) theme by Michael Giacchino, and the Captain Marvel theme by Pinar Toprak. The songs "Come and Get Your Love" by Redbone and "It's Been a Long, Long Time" by Jule Styne and Sammy Cahn were also used after previously being heard in Guardians of the Galaxy and Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), respectively.

Marketing

The marketing campaign for Endgame cost over $200 million, the most for any Marvel Studios film. Promotional partners included Stand Up to Cancer, Mastercard, Ulta Beauty, the Audi e-tron GT concept car (which appears in the film), McDonald's, GEICO, Coca-Cola, Google, General Mills, Hertz, Ziploc, Oppo, and Synchrony Financial. A year before the film's release, Germain Lussier of io9 spoke on the approach Marvel might have to take in marketing the film, given the end of Infinity War where many established characters die. He questioned if those characters would appear on posters and in toy campaigns, and if the actors playing them would participate in press events leading up to the film's release. Lussier felt that Disney and Marvel could focus on the original Avengers team members (most of the living characters), but noted that it would be more beneficial to show the return of the dead characters; this would create a "mystery and curiosity about how they come back" and a "whole new level of interest" for the film "while having all the stars front and center". Feige said in June 2018 that the dead characters would not be featured in the film's marketing. He presented a behind-the-scenes video from the film at CineEurope, and said that its marketing campaign would begin at the end of 2018. In early December 2018, before the first trailer's release, Graeme McMillan of The Hollywood Reporter spoke about the "fevered anticipation" surrounding it and felt it "remarkable", mostly "fan-created, without [the] noticeable direction from Marvel or the filmmakers involved"; knowledge about the film, without promotion was, "a kind of brand awareness" that was unusual. McMillan urged Marvel not to release any trailers for the film, since "the advanced level of enthusiasm [...] [was] likely to build" before its release; a trailer would take away the "Schrödinger's cat-esque position", as it was "almost guaranteed" to disappoint fans.

The first trailer for the film was released on December 7, 2018. Dustin Sandoval, vice president of digital marketing for Marvel Studios, said that the marketing team decided to omit the "title or hashtag" for the film in its trailer posts, allowing fans to see the trailer without spoiling it by watching "at the end". Richard Newby, also of The Hollywood Reporter, felt that although little new material was revealed in the trailer, it offered a "somber glimpse of a universe made unrecognizable" and let the viewer consider "the ending of Avengers: Infinity War and our questions of loss". Newby noted that the trailer highlighted the characters' "humble beginnings" with its visual language, and left viewers with "just as many questions as we had before". Austen Goslin of Polygon said that the title references a line by Doctor Strange to Tony Stark in Infinity War and a line by Stark in Age of Ultron. Goslin said, "The scene surrounding this line in Age of Ultron is one of the most important ones in the movie. Things look dark, and the group of heroes face an enemy they don't think they can defeat." The Endgame trailer "mirrors this perfectly", and "shows us that the Avengers' two most prominent characters are who they've always been: Iron Man, a pessimist who keeps fighting no matter how hopeless things look, and Captain America, an optimist who believes that nothing is hopeless when the world's heroes fight together." The trailer was viewed 289 million times in its first 24 hours and was the most-viewed trailer in that time period, surpassing the record of Avengers: Infinity War (230 million views). It set a record for Twitter conversation for a film trailer in the first 24 hours, generating 549,000 mentions. By January 3, 2019, BoxOffice's "Trailer Impact" metric service indicated that 77 to 78 percent of people surveyed who viewed the Endgame trailer in the past three weeks had expressed interest in seeing the film. In the three weeks it was measured by the service, the trailer was number one for all and had the top two percent of respondents express interest in seeing the film since the service's introduction in March 2018.

Release

Theatrical

Avengers: Endgame premiered at the Los Angeles Convention Center on April 22, 2019. Disney converted the convention center's Hall K for the premiere, working with Dolby and QSC Audio to install a 70-foot (21-metre) screen, Dolby Vision projectors, and a Dolby Atmos sound system. The convention center also held the red carpet arrival and after-party for the premiere. The film was released in Australia, China, and other parts of Asia and Europe on April 24, in the United Kingdom on April 25, in the United States and India on April 26, and in Russia on April 29, in IMAX and 3D. It was originally scheduled to be released in the U.S. on May 3. Radio Liberty alleged that the Russian government postponed the film's release in that country to promote Russian-produced films. Endgame is part of Phase Three of the MCU.

Following the release of the second trailer for the MCU film Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) on May 6, it was added to the end of Endgame screenings with a message before the film from Far From Home star Tom Holland telling the audience to stay until after the credits to see the trailer. In June, Feige announced that Endgame would be re-released in theaters with seven minutes of new post-credits footage, including a Stan Lee tribute, an unfinished deleted scene, and the opening scene of Far From Home. A limited-edition poster was given out at select theaters. The re-release began on June 28 in 1,040 theaters in the U.S.

Endgame will be re-released in theaters on September 25, 2026, under the title Avengers Endgame: Encore, in anticipation of the sequel Avengers: Doomsday being released in December 2026. The re-release features new footage, a custom introduction, and a new post-credits scene, amounting to approximately four additional minutes. Joe Russo said the re-release was "critically important", believing it was "required viewing" to follow the story of Doomsday. The new footage acts as a narrative bridge between the two films, enhancing the story of Doomsday and showing a natural progression from Endgame. Commentators questioned whether the four minutes of new footage was worth the "hype" and justified re-watching the full film in theaters.

Encore received an IMAX release as well as Disney's Infinity Vision certification for premium large formats, informing audiences which theaters offer "the biggest, brightest, and most immersive cinematic experiences" and meet certain technical standards; these screenings feature an additional exclusive look at Doomsday. The trailer for Encore received 77 million views in 24 hours, the most for any re-release trailer and four times as much as the previous record holder, the trailer for the May 2026 re-release of the 1986 film Top Gun (19 million views). Encore's trailer was noted for its more saturated color grading compared to the film's original release.

Home media

The film was released for digital download by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment on July 30, 2019, and on Ultra HD Blu-ray, Blu-ray, and DVD on August 13. Streaming became exclusive to Disney+ on November 12, 2019. The digital and Blu-ray releases include behind-the-scenes featurettes, audio commentary, deleted scenes, and a blooper reel. Despite being filmed with IMAX cameras and released in IMAX theaters in the 1.90:1 aspect ratio, the home-media release has the cropped 2.39:1 aspect-ratio version used for non-IMAX screenings. The IMAX Enhanced version of the film was made available on Disney+ on November 12, 2021. The film earned $107.8 million from DVD and Blu-ray sales in the U.S.

Reception

Box office

Avengers: Endgame grossed $858.4 million in the United States and Canada and $1.941 billion in other territories for a worldwide total of $2.799 billion. It was the highest-grossing film of all time until it was surpassed by Avatar (2009) due to the 2021 re-release in China, and was the second-highest-grossing film of all time in the United States and Canada. Gone with the Wind (1939) remains the highest-grossing film (adjusted for inflation), and Avengers: Endgame is the fifth-highest-grossing film of all time worldwide.

The film had a worldwide opening of $1.2 billion, the biggest of all time, and nearly double Infinity War's previous record of $640 million. It is the fastest film to reach the $1 billion and $1.5 billion marks, doing so in five and eight days respectively. Deadline Hollywood estimated that the film would break even five days after release, "unheard of for a major studio tentpole during its opening weekend". The website calculated Avengers: Endgame's final net profit as $890 million, accounting for production budgets, marketing, talent participation, and other costs; box-office grosses and home-media revenue placed it first on its list of 2019's "Most Valuable Blockbusters".

On May 4, the film's earnings at the global box office surpassed the theatrical run of Infinity War. It was the fastest film to gross $2 billion worldwide, reaching that threshold in 11 days; Avatar did so in 47 days. Avengers: Endgame was the fifth film to surpass this threshold (after Avatar, Titanic (1997), Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), and Infinity War), and reached the $2.5 billion mark in 20 days; Avatar did so in 72.

Endgame was one of 2019's most anticipated films in late December 2018, ranked second by IMDb and first by Fandango and Atom Tickets. Due to high demand when pre-sale tickets became available in the U.S. on April 2, 2019, customers on Atom Tickets and Fandango experienced long wait times and system delays; AMC Theatres' website and app crashed for several hours. Fandango announced that day that the film was its top-selling pre-sale film for the first 24 hours, breaking Star Wars: The Force Awakens's record in six hours. Atom said that the film was the website's bestselling first-day film (outselling Aquaman (2018) by four times), and Regal Cinemas reported that Endgame had sold more tickets in its first eight hours than Infinity War did in its first week. The film grossed $120–140 million in pre-sales. Fandango announced the day before release that Endgame was its biggest pre-selling film of all time, surpassing The Force Awakens with over 8,000 sold-out showtimes across the US.

Critical response

Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported an approval rating of 94%, with an average score of 8.2/10 based on 551 reviews. The website's critical consensus reads, "Exciting, entertaining, and emotionally impactful, Avengers: Endgame does whatever it takes to deliver a satisfying finale to Marvel's epic Infinity Saga." Metacritic (which uses a weighted average) gave the film a score of 78 out of 100 based on 57 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an A+ grade on an A+ to F scale, the third Marvel film to receive the grade after The Avengers and Black Panther (2018). PostTrak audiences gave the film five stars out of five and an 85-percent "definite recommend".

Writing for NPR, Glen Weldon gave the film a positive review and found it a worthy sequel to its predecessor: "The Russos' decision to stick close to the experiences of the remaining Avengers proves a rewarding one, as they've expressly constructed the film as an extended victory lap for the Marvel Cinematic Universe writ large. Got a favorite character from any Marvel movie over the past decade, no matter how obscure? Prepare to get serviced, fan." In his Rolling Stone review, Peter Travers gave the film four stars out of five: "You don't have to make jokes about the clichéd time travel plot – the film is ready, willing and able to make its own, with Back to the Future coming in for a serious ribbing."

Peter Debruge of Variety wrote, "After the must-see showdown that was Infinity War, the Russo brothers deliver a more fan-facing three-hour follow-up, rewarding loyalty to Marvel Cinematic Universe." J. R. Kinnard of PopMatters wrote, "Big budget action filmmaking doesn't get much better than this." Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter said, "[W]hat comes across most strongly here, oddly enough for an effects-driven comic-book-derived film, is the character acting, especially from Downey, Ruffalo, Evans, Hemsworth, Brolin, and Paul Rudd". Richard Roeper, writing for the Chicago Sun-Times, gave the film four stars and praised its "emotional punch" and the "funny, well-paced, smart, expertly rendered screenplay by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, crisp direction from Anthony Russo and Joe Russo, [...] and the universally stellar performances".

The New York Times reviewer A. O. Scott gave the film a positive-but-guarded review: "Endgame is a monument to adequacy, a fitting capstone to an enterprise that figured out how to be good enough for enough people enough of the time. Not that it's really over, of course: Disney and Marvel are still working out new wrinkles in the time-money continuum. But the Russos do provide the sense of an ending, a chance to appreciate what has been done before the timelines reset and we all get back to work." Justin Chang of the Los Angeles Times wrote that "Avengers: Endgame achieves and earns its climactic surge of feeling, even as it falls just short of real catharsis". Some called the film a notable improvement over its predecessor, Avengers: Infinity War, including Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com: Endgame is "a more patient, focused film [than Infinity War], even as its plot draws in elements of a dozen other movies." Matt Zoller Seitz, also of RogerEbert.com, compared the film positively to Infinity War, which he considered "too crowded, too rushed and yet too long". Seitz called Endgame "a heartfelt and satisfying experience" and a "surprisingly relaxed, character-driven, self-aware yet sincere comedy [for] two-thirds of [the film]. Much of the script suggests a laid-back Richard Linklater movie with superheroes". Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal cited Avengers: Endgame as the conclusion of the Infinity Saga, calling the final battle "inevitably unwieldy [...] but thrilling all the same, and followed by a delicate coda. So many stories. So many adventures. So much to sort out before the next cycle starts."

Accolades

At the 92nd Academy Awards, Avengers: Endgame received a nomination for Best Visual Effects. The film's other nominations include an Annie Award (which it won), a British Academy Film Award, and three Critics' Choice Movie Awards (winning two). Its Wikipedia page was the most-viewed article of 2019, with 44.2 million views. Endgame ranked 41st in a March 2020 Empire magazine poll of the 100 greatest films of the 21st century. The Avengers' assembling moment was one of five finalists for an Oscars Cheer Moment in the "Oscars Fan Favorite" contest for the 94th Academy Awards in February 2022, despite the film's ineligibility for other Academy Awards that year.

Sequels

In May 2018, the Walt Disney Company CEO Bob Iger said Marvel Studios was focusing on new characters and franchises for the MCU following Endgame, but another Avengers film could happen eventually, given the popularity of the previous films. Shortly after the film's premiere, the Russo brothers said that they were not opposed to returning to the MCU in the future due to their positive relationship with Marvel Studios, but did not plan to do so at that time. Feige said in January 2021 that another Avengers film would happen eventually.

At the 2022 San Diego Comic-Con, Feige announced Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars. The films would conclude Phase Six of the MCU. Feige later said that the Russos would not return to direct the films. Destin Daniel Cretton, who directed Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021), was set to direct The Kang Dynasty, with a script from Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) writer Jeff Loveness. Loki season one (2021) head writer and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022) writer Michael Waldron was set to write the screenplay for Secret Wars. By November 2023, Cretton had stepped down as director of The Kang Dynasty, when Waldron was hired to replace Loveness as the writer for the film. Jonathan Majors, who portrayed Kang the Conqueror and was expected to appear in both films, was fired by Disney and Marvel Studios in December 2023 after he was convicted of assault. By then, Marvel was referring to The Kang Dynasty internally as Avengers 5.

At the 2024 San Diego Comic-Con, the Russo brothers were announced to be directing the next two Avengers films. They revealed that Avengers 5 was now titled Avengers: Doomsday and would feature Doctor Doom as the main antagonist rather than Kang. Downey was revealed to have been cast as Doom for both films, and McFeely had joined as a co-writer. Frequent MCU film writers Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers also worked on the scripts for both films. Numerous MCU cast members reprise their roles in Doomsday, along with several actors who starred in 20th Century Fox's X-Men film series. Evans also reprises his role as Rogers, despite his "definitive ending" in Endgame, with the Russos calling him "the character that changed our lives... it was always going to come back" to his story. Feige described Doomsday as "picking up" where Endgame ended. Doomsday is scheduled to be released on December 18, 2026, with Secret Wars following on December 17, 2027.