Movie review: Avengers: Endgame throws down the gauntlet
If you have still yet to see this, rest easy. No spoilers yet.
What is not a spoiler is that the pee breaks for this three-hour spectacle are either before or after the film.
So forgo the waste bin-sized soft drink.
If you do go see it again and add to the record-breaking US$1.2 billion (S$1.6 billion) opening, you will know which parts will not give you FOMO.
The reason for a second viewing is that Endgame is packed to the rafters. To call it epic is an understatement. So much happens that you will try to recall the start of the film like it is a long-lost memory.
That said, it does not feel like its running time.
Endgame is big, bold and throws down a huge gauntlet to any and all franchises.
The message? Beat that!
After 11 years, the Marvel masterplan, the envy of every movie studio, has come to fruition.
And like Thanos, they are here to lay waste to all competition.
If other studios saw last year's Avengers: Infinity War and thought that they had their work cut out, they will feel like shutting shop after seeing this.
It is a gleaming 24-carat cap to the first three phases of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But we know that there is still much more to come.
There are events in here that turn various innocuous scenes from the past decade of movies into cunning long-game pay-offs.
There are some minor issues - some CGI really does not work and there are some contrivances that raise an eyebrow. But they are minor.
Directors Anthony and Joe Russo, with writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, have crafted a tight multi-pronged plot, that also gives every character an arc to fulfil.
Every actor brings their A+ game, with special shouts going to Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. - the heart and soul, respectively, of the entire Marvel endeavour.
If you leave this film not once having felt your eyes heat up, had your vision distort as a tear wells or felt like cheering, you might just be Thanos. Rating- 4.5 Ticks
FILM: Avengers: Endgame
STARRING: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Chris Hemsworth
DIRECTORS: Anthony Russo, Joe Russo
THE SKINNY: The effects of Infinity War run deep. Our heroes lost and it has hit them hard. But could the Avengers (what is left of them) find a way to counter Thanos' snap?
RATING: PG13
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