Warning: This post contains spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War.
Marvel Studios has dropped yet another trailer for Avengers: Endgame. This one definitively reveals that the Avengers will travel into space in order to try to fight Thanos again. The trailer also supports the fan theory that the Avengers will have to fight Thanos twice: once immediately after Thanos’ snap that cut all life in the universe in half, and again much later after the team regroups.
We still have many questions after watching the trailers. But here are our big takeaways below in the full breakdown of the new Avengers trailer.
Another Avengers: Endgame trailer dropped when tickets went on sale
Avengers: Endgame tickets are finally on sale for April 25th, the Thursday night before the movie’s full release on April 26th. AMC theaters is even hosting a 59-hour-long marathon of all 22 Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, ending with Avengers: Endgame (which is, itself, three hours long).
Marvel Studios celebrated the announcement with yet another trailer for the highly-anticipated sequel to Avengers: Infinity War. New footage showed the Avengers traveling to space to fight Thanos (Josh Brolin).
Thanos makes his first appearance in any of the Avengers: Endgame teasers
Marvel has been hiding Thanos from much of the promotional material for Avengers: Endgame, but the new trailer confirms that Earth’s Mightiest Heroes will take the fight to Thanos. Last we saw him, he had successfully destroyed half of all life in the universe for environmental reasons using the Infinity Stones that he gathered in Avengers: Infinity War. At the end of that movie, Thanos was overlooking an alien countryside from a small hut, celebrating his victory. But it’s still unclear where he is: whether it’s a reborn Titan or some other realm within his mind.
In the new Avengers trailer, the Avengers confront him on a planet that looks radically different from that peaceful oasis. But we don’t know how they find Thanos to fight him.
The Avengers may have to fight Thanos twice
Historically, studios restrict the use of footage in trailers for big movies like Avengers: Endgame. Our guess is most, if not all, of this footage is from the first half of the movie. It’s worth noting that the new, matching uniforms that the Avengers have sported in past trailers and in toy sets do not appear in this trailer. Fans have theorized that the Avengers will wear those uniforms — which look similar to the one that Michael Douglas’ Hank Pym wore in order to travel to the Quantum Realm to save his wife Janet Van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer) in Ant-Man and the Wasp — to travel through the Quantum Realm themselves.
Now it seems like that Quantum Realm journey may not happen until the second act of the film. In this trailer, we see the remaining Avengers make an intergalactic journey, presumably to Titan where Thanos has settled after the snap. They will probably try to wrest the Infinity Gauntlet from Thanos there so that they can undo the snap using the Time Stone. Given Thanos’ immense power, the Avengers will probably lose and have to plot another way to fight the Mad Titan.
That second mission will probably involve time travel and the Quantum Realm. The first trailer for Avengers: Endgame showed Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) emerging from the Quantum Realm and showing up at the Avengers headquarters. But if you look closely at the security camera footage of Ant-Man trying to enter the Avengers’ compound, the date on the footage is from the 20th century. Likely, Scott Lang accidentally traveled back in time. Ant-Man and the Wasp also hinted that the Quantum Realm could allow for time travel.
If the Avengers cannot take the Infinity Gauntlet from Thanos, they might have to go back in time and make sure that Thanos never collected all the Infinity Stones in the first place. They will then probably fight Thanos again, this time on more even footing. Either way, they’re likely to bring back the fallen heroes in some way since many of the characters who disappeared will appear in confirmed, future Marvel films, like Spider-Man: Far From Home, Black Panther 2 and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.
Captain America and Iron Man will reconcile
Captain America (Chris Evans) and Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) left one another on bad terms at the end of Captain America: Civil War when Tony Stark discovered that Steve Rogers’ brainwashed buddy, Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), killed Tony’s parents. At the end of that movie, Steve sent Tony a flip phone by which to contact him in an emergency. Tony resisted using the phone in Avengers: Infinity War before flying into space to chase Thanos’ Children. Captain America stayed on earth and fought Thanos in Wakanda. The two never interacted during that movie.
We see the two men shake hands for the first time in this trailer. Tony asks Steve if he trusts him, and Steve says yes. It’s easier to put aside your differences when half of all life in the universe has been destroyed. It’s likely that one of the other Avengers like Thor (Chris Hemsworth) or Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) will facilitate this reunion.
The Avengers may have to choose between the living and the dead
A lot of the shots in this trailer contrast those who still have their loved ones — like Iron Man — with those who lost everything — like Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner). If you need it, here’s a refresher on who died and who survived the last Avengers movie.
The campaign for Endgame has long suggested that some or several of the Avengers will die in this movie: The contracts for at least three of the original Avengers team (Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr. and Chris Hemsworth) are up. They may perish or at least retire in this film.
Breaking down every second of the Avengers: Endgame trailer
0:02 This is the Avengers Headquarters in Upstate New York. We have seen in other trailers that the Avengers are regrouping here.
0:07 Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) says that if they “do this,” the Avengers will go in short-handed. “You mean because they killed all our friends?” James Rhodes (Don Cheadle) asks. This line sets the stakes for this movie: If the Avengers could not defeat Thanos with all their super-power, then how are they supposed to fight him with only half of the number of heroes?
Also, Rhodey says “they” killed all our friends, presumably referring to the Children of Thanos. But at this point Thanos’ henchman are all dead. It’s unclear if Thanos has any help (or needs any) in Avengers: Endgame.
Note that Bruce Banner and James Rhodes are wearing different shirts in this scene than they were wearing in the post-credits scene for Captain Marvel when the Avengers first meet Carol Danvers (Brie Larson) in Avengers Headquarters. That means they are planning to fight Thanos in two separate scenes (at least). The two separate scenes could support the theory that the Avengers will take on the Titan at the beginning of the movie and fail before hatching up another plan to defeat him.
0:16 Rocket (Bradley Cooper) and Nebula (Karen Gillan) grab hands. Remember: the Guardians and Nebula were not on the best of terms in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. Nebula was set on her own vengeful mission against Thanos. But all the Guardians, save Rocket, perished in Thanos’ culling. Nebula is all Rocket has left.
0:17 Remember, the last time we saw Tony Stark in Avengers: Infinity War, he was stranded in space with Nebula. In the first trailer, for Avengers: Endgame it seemed like Tony might die in space, since he and Nebula were running out of food and oxygen.
This is likely a reunion between Tony Stark and his fiancée Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) after he returns to earth. He says, “It’s not about how much we lost. It’s about how much we have left.” We know from the recently-released Avengers: Endgame posters that Pepper survived the culling. Tony is probably trying to convince the Avengers to value what they still have at this point and not fight Thanos again.
0:22 Tony then intones, “We’re the Avengers. We have to finish this.” Likely, while encouraging the remaining heroes to cherish what they still have, Tony still sees Thanos as some sort of threat and believes that the Avengers need to defeat him in order to keep the universe safe — regardless of whether they can turn back time. Here is Tony suiting up as Iron Man.
0:23 Clint Barton, a.k.a. Hawkeye, is sporting an entire arm sleeve of tattoos! He has really taken this whole culling hard.
The fact that the trailer contrasts the circumstances of Tony Stark and Clint Barton is important: Tony still has the woman he loves, Pepper. But Clint presumably lost his wife and children during Thanos’ culling. He has nothing — and nothing to lose.
0:26 Thor meets Carol Danvers. This scene already appeared in another trailer. But the two share somewhat similar powers and a preference for hanging out in space. They’ll probably get along.
0:27 This show is basically all the Avengers left, except for Captain Marvel and Thor. What are they looking at? It could be Carol Danvers or Thor rallying the troops, or possible some weapon or invention that may help them. Black Widow has long, red hair, which likely means that quite a bit of time has passed since the end of Avengers: Infinity War.
0:30 Iron Man and Captain America reconcile. “You trust me?” Tony asks. “I do,” Steve says. the two shake hands. They appear to be in New York City around some construction. Some die-hards have theorized the the Avengers will travel back in time to the Battle of New York, since several of the Infinity Stones were in and around New York City at that time (the Time Stone in the Sanctum Sanctorum, the Mind Stone in Loki’s Staff and the Space Stone in the Tesseract). Could the Avengers be visiting the site of that battle in modern times as Tony hatches a plan?
0:33 This looks like the Guardians of the Galaxy ship, the Benetar, the only spaceship that was left intact on Titan after the Avengers’ battle with Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War. This could be Nebula and Tony launching away from the planet in their bid to make it back to earth. Or the Avengers could be re-using the ship later in the movie.
0:36 The Avengers head into space to fight Thanos. There’s an Intriguing combination of people here: Rocket and Captain America flying the ship together. Captain America (who as far as we know has not traveled to space), Black Widow, War Machine and Thor sit in the back. They don’t have on their special, matching uniforms yet, and Black Widow is sporting the short, blonde hair she had in Avengers: Infinity War, not the long, red hair she has in some shots in the Avengers: Endgame trailers. This is likely early in the movie when they try to fight Thanos the first time.
0:37 Peter Parker (Tom Holland) was the heart of the last film. He died in Tony’s arms. As Tony looks back on a picture of the kid here, Thanos says, “You could not live with your own failure.”
0:41 This is the same ship that Thanos used to overtake Thor’s ship in Thor: Ragnarok (and Avengers: Infinity War). Nebula and War Machine look out the window of their ship afterwards in fear. Thanos doesn’t need a ship to travel from planet-to-planet, as we saw in Infinity War. Could Thanos have more henchmen aboard this ship?
0:49 This is the first reappearance of Thanos in the Avengers: Endgame promotional materials. This shot is preceded by a series of shots of the Avengers looking very afraid. Thanos ends his quote: “You could not deal with your own failure. Where did that bring you? Back to me.” Thanos appears from blue streaks, which probably means he traveled to the planet using the Infinity Gauntlet, not a ship (hence the confusing shot above).
This entire sequence seems to support the theory that the Avengers try to fight Thanos early in the film when they’re still burning over the loss after the snap (hence Thanos in armor). Other trailers suggest a time jump happens later in the film, so they will likely take years to regroup.
0:50 Iron Man faces down Thanos in a shot that’s very similar to their fight in the last movie. This solo of Iron Man, plus the emphasis on his reunion with Pepper earlier in the teaser, spells out doom for this particular Avenger.
0:52 The original three Avengers — Iron Man, Captain America and Thor — all in a row. They approach Thanos, sitting down, as if exhausted by this whole process. This probably isn’t the time when they defeat Thanos, but it’s the first time the three heroes have presented a united front since Avengers: Age of Ultron.
These were the first three Marvel heroes to get solo movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. My guess is we’ll never see a solo movie from any of them again, at least not with these actors playing them.
