What Happens in the Infinity War?
Jondee here on Titan (moon of Saturn, birthplace of Thanos),
The next phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe culminates in The Avengers: Infinity War films. Part I will hit theaters in May 4, 2018 and Part II in May 3, 2019. They are directed by the Russo brothers who started with Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) and continued with this year’s Captain America: Civil War. Before the war is the Black Panther movie slated for February 16, 2018 and then Ant-Man and the Wasp afterwards on July 6, 2018. Captain Marvel is said to debut after the Infinity War. The villains in the Marvel films will pale in comparison to Thanos who had a cameo in the credit scene of The Avengers (2012) and appeared in Guardians of the Galaxy (2014). He is seeking the Infinity Stones to assemble the Infinity Gauntlet shown in a preview image shown at the Marvel Studios event at the El Capitan Theater on October 28, 2014. Comicbook.com covered the Russo brothers speaking about the Infinity War films at an IMAX screening, “We were being figurative when we said [67 characters] and people took it as literal but there’s a lot of characters.” The directors added, “It’s very ambitious in its scope, it wants to take everything that you’ve seen before and coalesce into some kinda of climactic ending. It’s complicated , ambitious storytelling…We’re not talking about lead characters, just people that make an appearance.” Screenwriter Stephen McFeely spoke to JoBlo about the comics and the films, “…we tend to take the ingredients and make a different meal out of it. WINTER SOLDIER owes a great deal to the Brubaker run but it’s not the Brubaker run. CIVIL WAR owes a great deal to Millar, but it’s not close to the Civil War run. So we’ll do the same thing with Thanos and his gauntlet.”
The Infinity Stones may be the clue to characters involved in the war. We’ve seen four of the six stones so far. The green Tesseract showed up in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) and ended up on Asgard (mostly likely in Odin’s vaults) in The Avengers. It is the Space Gem. The Aether was the malleable red stone in Thor: The Dark World (2013) and it ended up with the relics of the Collector. The Orb discovered by Star Lord in Guardians of the Galaxy, purple in color when opened and called the Power Gem in the comics, was given to the Nova Corps. The blue Mind Stone was given to Loki in The Avengers and in his specter, it was placed in the forehead of the Vision in Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015). This leaves the orange Time Gem and the yellow Reality Gem. It looks like Doctor Strange might have the Reality Gem that may be the Eye of Agamotto, the medallion on his chest. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is said to deal with an earlier time period in Star Lord’s life so most likely this will involve the Time Gem. I imagine Thanos will snatch away the Space Gem in Thor: Ragnarok in November 3, 2017. Hulk is needed because he is a match for Thanos in the strength department. Thor is also on a power level to threaten Thanos if he makes it out of Ragnarok. It may be that Thanos works with Jeff Goldblum’s character, Grandmaster, to get the Infinity Stones. I picture Thanos defeating the guardians of the Infinity Stones and possibly assembling them in the first film for the Infinity Gauntlet.
In the comics, Thanos defeated the cosmic entities protecting the gems in The Thanos Quest limited series by Jim Starlin and Ron Lim. They continued in the Infinity Gauntlet in several series and just recently finished Thanos’ story in Thanos: The Infinity Finale. Thanos takes over the universe in the Infinity Gauntlet series. He has Mephisto as his advisor, but I think this will probably be Loki in the films. Thanos destroys Nebula with the gauntlet in a state between death and pain and she recovers enough to take the Infinity Gauntlet. This is the character played by Karen Gillan in Guardians of the Galaxy. Adam Warlock was formed in the cocoon seen in the Collector’s collection in Thor (2011). The golden-hued cosmic hero was covered in Warlock and Strange Tales by Jim Starlin as a counter to Thanos. He takes the gauntlet, but sees that he can’t control it, and distributes the individual Infinity Stones to other heroes forming the Infinity Watch. Adam Warlock tries to eliminate the good and evil part of himself to control the gauntlet. His alter ego, the Magus, seen in Strange Tales, reassembles the gems and he is defeated by Adam Warlock in the Infinity War series. His good half forms into the Goddess who has control of heroes through spirituality. Thanos and Warlock team up to trap the Goddess in the Soul Gem in Infinity Crusade. The comic books are cosmic and throw in every Marvel hero. It is almost a given that the Guardians of the Galaxy are involved with Thanos. I also see Iron Man’s Avengers involved first with Thanos before Captain America’s group is also brought in.
