Avengers: Endgame (2019)Movies

[LeGeNd-1]

^I don't think Japan generally cares about anything not made in their country. Patriotism and all that jazz. The only exception was Frozen because it fits the mahou shoujo trope to a tee.

Spoiler

Was a stone used for the Avengers to travel back in time?

Spoiler

Well it could work, but would be impractical Imagine "Dormammu I've come to bargain. But wait! Let me set up this quantum tunnel first."

 

[UKMikey]

 

[05XR8]

Put him in the Spidey movie. When I first saw the debut of Deadpool in the comics, I thought he was like Spider-Man. Just do it.

 

[JKgo]

After sitting down to watch the film in the comfort of my own home, it's easier to find little faults with it that you don't notice the first time around. But as the movie's was rather excellent, I can mostly overlook them - except one...

Spoiler

Steve Rogers went to the past to live with Peggy Carter, so doesn't that mean he created one of those "nasty" alternate timelines? Wasn't he traveling back to the past in order to prevent that from happening in the first place? What gives? Just to fulfil that "I'll dance with you" promise from the first Cap America movie?

It was a poignant moment, sure, but doesn't that also mean the entirety of MCU's timeline is now out of whack? How confusing, this time travel shenanigans.

 

[DesertPenguin]

I know this sounds obvious but you're a little late. The writer and the screenwriters have given their official statements on the matter and there are plenty of YouTube channels with videos detailing it.

 

[JKgo]

I know this sounds obvious but you're a little late. The writer and the screenwriters have given their official statements on the matter and there are plenty of YouTube channels with videos detailing it.

I haven't seen any of them. Youtube's recommended video algorithm works in mysterious ways, you see. Besides, I noticed that only after watching the movie at home (as my previous post alluded to).

 

[DesertPenguin]

Do a search for Looper, CBR, and Endgame and you'll get everything you need.

 

[PocketZeven]

After sitting down to watch the film in the comfort of my own home, it's easier to find little faults with it that you don't notice the first time around. But as the movie's was rather excellent, I can mostly overlook them - except one...

Spoiler

Steve Rogers went to the past to live with Peggy Carter, so doesn't that mean he created one of those "nasty" alternate timelines? Wasn't he traveling back to the past in order to prevent that from happening in the first place? What gives? Just to fulfil that "I'll dance with you" promise from the first Cap America movie?

It was a poignant moment, sure, but doesn't that also mean the entirety of MCU's timeline is now out of whack? How confusing, this time travel shenanigans.

The endgame theory on Timetravel differs a lot from how most movies deal with it though. If anybody can link a video with a more detailed explanation?

 

[Populuxe]

The endgame theory on Timetravel differs a lot from how most movies deal with it though. If anybody can link a video with a more detailed explanation?

This video from CBR should help with that.

 

[Danoff]

Ok, I watched most of the above youtube video and I have thoughts about Endgame after being fairly disappointed with Infinity War

Spoiler

First of all, my hat is off to the studio for trying to hold together a coherent plot involving time travel. So many movies introduce paradoxes, and this one really tries to keep those straight, in a way that seems as compatible with physics as is possible. I didn't like the fact that they invent time travel (from scratch) to try to undo the damage from Thanos, but I do like that having done so they work hard to keep it straight. They created a number of alternative universes, and possible alternative universes, in the process of their travels.

There is a universe that Thanos left in order to come to the movie's universe and try to destroy everything. That universe is absent Thanos's entire army, and his daughters. It also cannot be the universe that cap traveled back to to put the stones back, because cap is present in the movie's universe at the end - meaning he went through the vanishing, including potentially getting vanished himself, and restored by the glove. Who knows. So there is no way that cap replaced the power stone in that universe, because that Universe lacks Thanos entirely. And this highlights the problem with cap going back to put back the stones - each of the universes where the stones were removed are different universes. He can't travel back to just one and put all of the stones back, because they're all different. Each one would require separate time travel if that were even possible. But it's not because...

Once you travel back in time and create an alternate timeline (by taking a stone) and returning to your own timeline, you exist in a separate reality from that other universe. It plays out without you ever returning, instantly from your perspective. If you try to go back to it and return that stone, you create yet another universe where that stone was returned. So you effectively create both the universe where it never gets returned, and a universe where it does. Problems!

The video above implies that it's impossible for cap to go back and have a relationship with his ex in this universe because he'd be creating an alternate universe. And that's true, except that he could be in that alternate universe. And this is the real head trip. You don't know which of the alternate universes you're actually already in when you go back in time. So the presumption is that cap finds out that he's already in the version of the universe where he goes back in time and reunites with his lost love. And he has to live out that life in order to maintain that universe's timeline.

So we have a new rule, which is that anything that is different from what we know happened, represents a new universe (like Loki escaping). And anything that is consistent with what we know happens should probably be assumed to be on the same timeline (like cap living out his life). And there's one more element - which is that anything that we don't know whether it's consistent (like perhaps Tony visiting his father to take a benign example) is fairly assumed to be within the same timeline as well, because otherwise stuff gets super confusing fast.

So we do not know whether the time stone got borrowed in the main timeline, so we should presume that it does. We do not know whether thor's hammer gets borrowed in the main timeline, so we should presume that it does. We don't know whether fat thor visits his mom in the main timeline, so we should presume that he does. As long as they don't change the ultimate outcome, it's not necessary for them to exist as alternative branches in the universe tree. They're consistent with a universe that ultimately goes through the vanishing and sends someone back to retrieve the stones. They do create their own branch, but the branch collapses back in on itself. I'd like to draw at this point, but I'll try to type out an explanation for an important event.

So hulk goes back and takes the time stone from his own timeline. Boom, new universe that doesn't have the time stone. And since if he goes back again anything he does creates a new branch, he can never affect the future of the universe that doesn't have the time stone. However, the all of the universes in which hulk borrows a time stone involve hulk being able to time travel. And as far as we know, the Avengers are successful in all of those universes (there may be only one). So there is no timeline in which hulk borrows a time stone in which he never returns. So there is no parallel universe created, the waveform collapses. No problems!

The only cases where I'm absolutely sure that alternative universes exist are the cases where the power stone gets taken (because we saw a conflicting set of events before). The universe where Loki escapes (because we saw a conflicting set of events before), and the case where Thanos brings his army into the main timeline (because that Thanos doesn't accomplish the vanishing). Each of those universes (one without thanos, one without the power stone, and one with Loki having the Tesseract) apparently exist.

This also solves the problem of cap having to go back to lots of different universes to replace the stones, because presumably they collapse into one. There should be two power stones though, since he can't revisit the power stone universe.

Surprisingly, I can't find just a completely game-breaking treatment of time travel, and that alone makes this movie impressive.

Things I didn't like:
- Tony didn't need to "snap his fingers". He could have wielded the gauntlet to victory without the same huge effort gone through to wipe out half of all life in the universe.
- Thanos's motivations continue to not make any sense.
- I don't understand the soul stone's hold on BW. It speaks to a power that is beyond any that are commanded with the stones, and that's quite confusing given that they seem to be all powerful.
- I do not understand how Tony got the stones from Thanos. There was some kind of trickery there that I didn't follow.
- Thanos is quite a bit too powerful in the absence of the stones.
- I don't like that Thanos changes his plan when he finds out people are sad. He should have a longer view of time than that, and realize that eventually people will move on and "fullfill their potential" according to him... even if it takes generations.
- I also don't like that Thanos "used the stones to destroy the stones". That part makes little sense given that his plan would require curtailing life on a periodic basis. I'd have thought he'd stay godlike in order to maintain his vision.

Things I did like:
- Finally we got an excuse to let some of these actors really act.
- Lots of RDJ
- Unusually smart time travel
- A fitting end to so many characters and storylines.

Overall, I'd say it was a decent comeback from the Infinity War intelligence letdown.

 

[Danoff]

On second thought!

Spoiler

Ok so I think I was (a little) wrong about the ability to close the loop in your timeline.

So let's suppose for a moment that you're cap, and you're in a timeline where you realize that you went back in time and reconnected with your ex. So you're like... ok so I have to go back in time and reconnect with my ex. Well, no, you can't do that. Because you're already present in your own timeline. So if you go back in time to reconnect with your ex, your timeline already included a cap at that particular time, and will now have two caps at that time. Kinda like the two tonys that exist right before Loki escapes. You simply cannot participate in your own timeline through time travel. The moment you go back, atoms change, things adjust, memories are different, and you're in a different universe.

So is there any way to make this work?

I think there is, but it requires something that they did not talk about in the show. One question I had was how anyone could affect the future of any existing timeline. Can you simply only create new timelines, new universes, while never actually affecting the future of any of those universes once you create them? Well we know you can affect the future of the universe you can create while you're there. Because it's playing out in real time. But could you return to a universe you created with time travel, and affect the future of that universe? That's kinda what's proposed in Endgame. Does it create a paradox?

I don't think it does, but only if you return to that universe after you were there previously. If you return to that universe prior to when you had created it, you'd be essentially returning to your own timeline (prior to the bifurcation) and would therefore be splitting a new universe. You can't affect the future of the new universe any more than you could affect your own. However, you should be able to travel to the future in that universe, at any time (including well beyond the advancement of your own universe) after you had created it. And if you think hard enough about this (and apparently that's where my head is right now), that's required in order for you to be able to return to your own timeline. Because once you create this new timeline that is bifurcated from "yours", that new one is now yours. The only way you can go back to yours is to go to a point in time that occurs after you left. If you go to any time before you left, you're creating something new.

There's another little tidbit here that you have to give to the movie, which is the ability to pick between alternate universes to travel. In order to return to a universe you created, you have to be able to select which one you want to go to. That's tricky as hell, but I think you just have to assume that they invented that too.

So cap could go to alternate universes and return the stones if he arrived only after those universes were created. So he needed to do a bunch of time travel sessions in order to return the stones (not shown or implied). And finally, in order to live out his life, he needs to find the universe that the cap that created his universe (the one that lived his life with his ex, the one that shows up in the end of Endgame) came from, and go to that one to live out his life. Except he couldn't, because that would be affecting the future of a universe after it must necessarily exist. So that's impossible.

So basically, what we're left with, is that the cap at the end of Endgame is not the cap that leaves. And we don't know where the cap that leaves ends up. What we do now is that the timeline in the avengers was created by a cap that returns to it. But the cap that leaves can never affect that past, and can never affect the one universe where he never returns.

It's possible that the cap that leaves simply returns to his own time a split second before the second cap showed up, thereby creating a new universe for him to exist in. That would create an infinite number of universes as each cap bails on his universe to start a new one. The only one where he never returns is the first one.

Ok hopefully I can stop thinking about this now.

 

[MIE1992]

^I don't think Japan generally cares about anything not made in their country. Patriotism and all that jazz. The only exception was Frozen because it fits the mahou shoujo trope to a tee.

I'm not too sure about that. It reminds me of how a sizable amount of foreign films here in the US get relatively limited distribution. I wouldn't say it's as simple as a matter of xenophobia, but perhaps comparatively un-romantic elements like funding for marketing and distribution.

 

[PocketZeven]

On second thought!

Spoiler

Ok so I think I was (a little) wrong about the ability to close the loop in your timeline.

So let's suppose for a moment that you're cap, and you're in a timeline where you realize that you went back in time and reconnected with your ex. So you're like... ok so I have to go back in time and reconnect with my ex. Well, no, you can't do that. Because you're already present in your own timeline. So if you go back in time to reconnect with your ex, your timeline already included a cap at that particular time, and will now have two caps at that time. Kinda like the two tonys that exist right before Loki escapes. You simply cannot participate in your own timeline through time travel. The moment you go back, atoms change, things adjust, memories are different, and you're in a different universe.

So is there any way to make this work?

I think there is, but it requires something that they did not talk about in the show. One question I had was how anyone could affect the future of any existing timeline. Can you simply only create new timelines, new universes, while never actually affecting the future of any of those universes once you create them? Well we know you can affect the future of the universe you can create while you're there. Because it's playing out in real time. But could you return to a universe you created with time travel, and affect the future of that universe? That's kinda what's proposed in Endgame. Does it create a paradox?

I don't think it does, but only if you return to that universe after you were there previously. If you return to that universe prior to when you had created it, you'd be essentially returning to your own timeline (prior to the bifurcation) and would therefore be splitting a new universe. You can't affect the future of the new universe any more than you could affect your own. However, you should be able to travel to the future in that universe, at any time (including well beyond the advancement of your own universe) after you had created it. And if you think hard enough about this (and apparently that's where my head is right now), that's required in order for you to be able to return to your own timeline. Because once you create this new timeline that is bifurcated from "yours", that new one is now yours. The only way you can go back to yours is to go to a point in time that occurs after you left. If you go to any time before you left, you're creating something new.

There's another little tidbit here that you have to give to the movie, which is the ability to pick between alternate universes to travel. In order to return to a universe you created, you have to be able to select which one you want to go to. That's tricky as hell, but I think you just have to assume that they invented that too.

So cap could go to alternate universes and return the stones if he arrived only after those universes were created. So he needed to do a bunch of time travel sessions in order to return the stones (not shown or implied). And finally, in order to live out his life, he needs to find the universe that the cap that created his universe (the one that lived his life with his ex, the one that shows up in the end of Endgame) came from, and go to that one to live out his life. Except he couldn't, because that would be affecting the future of a universe after it must necessarily exist. So that's impossible.

So basically, what we're left with, is that the cap at the end of Endgame is not the cap that leaves. And we don't know where the cap that leaves ends up. What we do now is that the timeline in the avengers was created by a cap that returns to it. But the cap that leaves can never affect that past, and can never affect the one universe where he never returns.

It's possible that the cap that leaves simply returns to his own time a split second before the second cap showed up, thereby creating a new universe for him to exist in. That would create an infinite number of universes as each cap bails on his universe to start a new one. The only one where he never returns is the first one.

Ok hopefully I can stop thinking about this now.

These paradoxes had my head spinning too. I assumed we were watching a specific timeline/universe (out of many). I also always saw myself as a timetravel movie veteran.

Spoiler

However what innitially really confused me was Loki dissapearing with the tessareact, which would mean that the Gaunlet would have been incomplete in the first place. But then I indeed figured it perhaps was retconned by cap returning the tessaract from the current timeline. And that every change to a timeline would create an alternate one.

I think what temporarily restored my sanity was realisation of the fact that Dr. strange explored 14 million+ outcomes and therefore hypothetically there are 14 million+ alternate universes and only 1 with a positive outcome. But that would mean Loki ended up in one of the alternate universe where the "snap" was permanent?

 

[Famine]

On second thought!

Spoiler

Ok so I think I was (a little) wrong about the ability to close the loop in your timeline.

So let's suppose for a moment that you're cap, and you're in a timeline where you realize that you went back in time and reconnected with your ex. So you're like... ok so I have to go back in time and reconnect with my ex. Well, no, you can't do that. Because you're already present in your own timeline. So if you go back in time to reconnect with your ex, your timeline already included a cap at that particular time, and will now have two caps at that time. Kinda like the two tonys that exist right before Loki escapes. You simply cannot participate in your own timeline through time travel. The moment you go back, atoms change, things adjust, memories are different, and you're in a different universe.

So is there any way to make this work?

I think there is, but it requires something that they did not talk about in the show. One question I had was how anyone could affect the future of any existing timeline. Can you simply only create new timelines, new universes, while never actually affecting the future of any of those universes once you create them? Well we know you can affect the future of the universe you can create while you're there. Because it's playing out in real time. But could you return to a universe you created with time travel, and affect the future of that universe? That's kinda what's proposed in Endgame. Does it create a paradox?

I don't think it does, but only if you return to that universe after you were there previously. If you return to that universe prior to when you had created it, you'd be essentially returning to your own timeline (prior to the bifurcation) and would therefore be splitting a new universe. You can't affect the future of the new universe any more than you could affect your own. However, you should be able to travel to the future in that universe, at any time (including well beyond the advancement of your own universe) after you had created it. And if you think hard enough about this (and apparently that's where my head is right now), that's required in order for you to be able to return to your own timeline. Because once you create this new timeline that is bifurcated from "yours", that new one is now yours. The only way you can go back to yours is to go to a point in time that occurs after you left. If you go to any time before you left, you're creating something new.

There's another little tidbit here that you have to give to the movie, which is the ability to pick between alternate universes to travel. In order to return to a universe you created, you have to be able to select which one you want to go to. That's tricky as hell, but I think you just have to assume that they invented that too.

So cap could go to alternate universes and return the stones if he arrived only after those universes were created. So he needed to do a bunch of time travel sessions in order to return the stones (not shown or implied). And finally, in order to live out his life, he needs to find the universe that the cap that created his universe (the one that lived his life with his ex, the one that shows up in the end of Endgame) came from, and go to that one to live out his life. Except he couldn't, because that would be affecting the future of a universe after it must necessarily exist. So that's impossible.

So basically, what we're left with, is that the cap at the end of Endgame is not the cap that leaves. And we don't know where the cap that leaves ends up. What we do now is that the timeline in the avengers was created by a cap that returns to it. But the cap that leaves can never affect that past, and can never affect the one universe where he never returns.

It's possible that the cap that leaves simply returns to his own time a split second before the second cap showed up, thereby creating a new universe for him to exist in. That would create an infinite number of universes as each cap bails on his universe to start a new one. The only one where he never returns is the first one.

Ok hopefully I can stop thinking about this now.

I've been thinking about this recently - because we have Loki coming up with the Time Variance Authority...

Spoiler

because he nicked the Space Stone in Endgame

... and because I've been bothered about exactly what timeline MCU Phase Four is in given...

Spoiler

Steve remaining with Peggy, growing old, apparently dodging his niece Sharon for the entire time, and then showing up to give Sam the shield at the end of Endgame

... but it turns out I shouldn't have been. There's two different descriptions of time travel in Endgame, and they apply differently.

Spoiler

Firstly, BruceHulk, Scott, Hawkeye, Rhodey and Nebula discuss time travel of people, and Hulk and Nebula have to tell Scott and Rhodey that you cannot change your future by changing your own past.

Rhodey refers to strangling Thanos at birth with his own umbilical cord, which Hulk points out is horrible and then says time travel doesn't work that way, adding "changing the past doesn't change the future", because the future you came from is your own past and can't be changed by your own future actions in the past. I don't know how the MCU time continuum would prevent you from enacting major changes such as that, but it seems that it does.

Then the Ancient One talks to Hulk about time travel as it relates to the Infinity Stones. She specifically says that the Infinity Stones between them "create what you experience as the flow of time", and it's the act of subjecting them (any one of them) to time travel that creates new realities. She uses the example of removing the Time Stone from her time to take to the future as creating a new reality in which the Time Stone no longer exists - which is bad for her, because that's the thing she guards and uses to protect Earth from the dark dimensions - though she does say "remove one of the stones and that flow splits", rather than the Time Stone specifically.

In short: people travelling through time can't change the past and don't create new realities, but Infinity Stones do.

This of course begs two questions immediately:

Spoiler

If the Stones "create what you experience as the flow of time" and Thanos uses the stones to destroy the stones - as he does in Endgame - why does time still exist?

If people travelling through time can't change it, what the smeg is it that the TVA actually does? I'm sure we'll find out

 

[Dave A]

Spoiler

Although Thanos "destroyed" the time stones in Endgame they didn't completely cease to exist, what he actually did was reduce them to atoms. So they still exist albeit now in a different form.

At least that was my understanding.