Avengers: Endgame

The direct continuation of the previous film. The loss happened. The film jumps five years forward and the survivors have not recovered; some are in therapy, one is farming, one is travelling the world killing people. That first section is the best part of the film. Long, quiet, and nobody behaving like a hero. Then an idea appears. Go back in time and take the stones while they still exist. From there the film returns to its own past. Teams enter scenes from earlier films and we watch those events from outside; the section is both a heist and a farewell tour. What the narrative is interested in is not victory but closure: the film's real work is finishing the stories of three main characters, and each one ends differently. A price is paid for one stone again, and this time it is clear who pays it. The final battle opens with a sequence of portals; everyone built across ten years of separate films enters a single frame, and the scene was applauded in cinemas. The rules of the time travel are the weakest thing in it. The narrative explains its rule once and then breaks it in several places. It runs over three hours. On release it became the highest-grossing film worldwide. Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo, Jeremy Renner, Karen Gillan and Josh Brolin are in the cast. Anthony and Joe Russo directed. Who it is for: anyone who watched the series from the beginning; the film was written for them. Who it is not for: anyone looking in from outside; its feeling rests entirely on attachments built in the earlier films.