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zenolaliaI have been trying to ignore it for a couple of days now, but like, OOF, Peggy. Oh Peggy. The decision to basically give Steve Tony's ending, and Tony Steve's ending is just a fucking disaster.
Like, Endgame and IW spent their entire runtimes trying to set Tony and Thanos up as foils for eachother. Both super geniuses with higher ideals that don't tend to match up with the cultural moors of their respective planets, both built on a foundation of blood and rubble and trying to build up some greater good, but both going in two very different directions with it. And ultimately, the core conflict of Thanos's storyline is that he chooses to harm his family to achieve his greater good. So, logically, as his foil, Tony should choose to harm his greater good to achieve his family. And most of Endgame legitimately SETS. THIS. UP. His entire shifting everyone forward 5 years thing is premised entirely ON THIS GOAL.
So, in IW, Thanos chose the greater ideal over family, he won, and it creates our core conflict for Endgame. The entire runtime of Endgame is Tony trying to have both the greater good and his family, trying to have it both ways. And, narratively, since he and Thanos are FOILS, that means at the end he should (drumroll), choose family and win! This is set up multiple times! Tony's conversation with his father. The multiple lingering shots between Tony and Morgan. Tony's interactions with Peter. The blue Pepper suit. The entire drugged out breakdown at the beginning of the movie. His interactions with Nebula. Literally the entire film is just a litany of Tony being surrounded by imagery of family coming together, being found and formed and fertilized. For gods sakes he talks to his wife about fucking potting soil. This is not a subtle fucking film!
So, there's all this constant setup that Tony is going to pull a Guardians of the Galaxy 1 callback at the end of the movie. He's going to get the stones, the Avengers are going to GODDAMN ASSEMBLE, the family is FOUND, and by dispersing the overwhelming power amongst all of these beautifully unified souls, we're going to put the world back to rights at long last. Tony will choose his family, TRUST his family (a callback to standing together, a discussion at the very beginning of the film? Narrative cohesion? Shocking!), and by choosing family over his own construction of the greater good, a true victory will be achieved. This is inevitably where the narrative takes us.
From here things get speculative. I imagine we would have seen something to the effect of, the blast is still too much, this isn't GOTG and a single stone, this is 6 stones, so Steve--ever the first to throw himself on an exploding grenade--shields Tony from the blast as best he can, dying in the process. Tony is irreparably harmed by this, forced into retirement, to raise his daughter and surrogate son as a successful father, in stark narrative contrast to Thanos who was likewise damaged by an infinity blast and died as a failed father. Steve just fuckin dies.
And why does Steven Grant Rogers just fuckin die?
Well, first of all, so we don't have to EITHER erase Peggy's children and husband from existence entirely or, far far worse, live with the knowledge that Peggy married Steve in the 70s.
Meaning:
1) Steve tried to fuck his own daughter, and as a father he did nothing to prevent this from happening
2) Steve let his wife work for Nazis for 40-ish years with no intervention whatsoever
3) Peggy definitely just had to fucking deal with the fact that for the rest of her life she got dragged for marrying a man half her age who looked suspiciously like her dead BF from 30 years ago.
But also, because it is a narratively strong ending to his character. Steve has always been a self sacrificial and frankly suicidal maniac. He has always been dangerously unhinged, and the only thing holding him together has been his mission. But his mission has gotten increasingly abstract, increasingly deranged, and increasingly insufficient as well. It's become obvious, over the last few films that being Cap is no longer satisfying to him as a person. He is a man who wants to just stop. But, where growing old, retiring and raising a family is an option for Tony, it isn't an option for Steve. The super serum alone precludes it, to say nothing of the psychological strains of his time traveling shenanigans and his own unmanaged and perhaps unmanageable (after all, medications seem not to affect him) psychiatric issues. Morbid though it be, where Tony CAN find rest and peace in other places--in his lakeside cabin, with his family and his friends--Steve legitimately cannot. It's time for him to rest, and death his that rest.
But anyway, that's just me. Me and my hottest of takes. As per usual.
Also if one more fucking person comes at me to say the support group dude who gets two lines and no name is "groundbreaking gay representation" in Marvel, instead of a calculated marketing move, I will literally punch their teeth out. Thank you and good night.
Like, Endgame and IW spent their entire runtimes trying to set Tony and Thanos up as foils for eachother. Both super geniuses with higher ideals that don't tend to match up with the cultural moors of their respective planets, both built on a foundation of blood and rubble and trying to build up some greater good, but both going in two very different directions with it. And ultimately, the core conflict of Thanos's storyline is that he chooses to harm his family to achieve his greater good. So, logically, as his foil, Tony should choose to harm his greater good to achieve his family. And most of Endgame legitimately SETS. THIS. UP. His entire shifting everyone forward 5 years thing is premised entirely ON THIS GOAL.
So, in IW, Thanos chose the greater ideal over family, he won, and it creates our core conflict for Endgame. The entire runtime of Endgame is Tony trying to have both the greater good and his family, trying to have it both ways. And, narratively, since he and Thanos are FOILS, that means at the end he should (drumroll), choose family and win! This is set up multiple times! Tony's conversation with his father. The multiple lingering shots between Tony and Morgan. Tony's interactions with Peter. The blue Pepper suit. The entire drugged out breakdown at the beginning of the movie. His interactions with Nebula. Literally the entire film is just a litany of Tony being surrounded by imagery of family coming together, being found and formed and fertilized. For gods sakes he talks to his wife about fucking potting soil. This is not a subtle fucking film!
So, there's all this constant setup that Tony is going to pull a Guardians of the Galaxy 1 callback at the end of the movie. He's going to get the stones, the Avengers are going to GODDAMN ASSEMBLE, the family is FOUND, and by dispersing the overwhelming power amongst all of these beautifully unified souls, we're going to put the world back to rights at long last. Tony will choose his family, TRUST his family (a callback to standing together, a discussion at the very beginning of the film? Narrative cohesion? Shocking!), and by choosing family over his own construction of the greater good, a true victory will be achieved. This is inevitably where the narrative takes us.
From here things get speculative. I imagine we would have seen something to the effect of, the blast is still too much, this isn't GOTG and a single stone, this is 6 stones, so Steve--ever the first to throw himself on an exploding grenade--shields Tony from the blast as best he can, dying in the process. Tony is irreparably harmed by this, forced into retirement, to raise his daughter and surrogate son as a successful father, in stark narrative contrast to Thanos who was likewise damaged by an infinity blast and died as a failed father. Steve just fuckin dies.
And why does Steven Grant Rogers just fuckin die?
Well, first of all, so we don't have to EITHER erase Peggy's children and husband from existence entirely or, far far worse, live with the knowledge that Peggy married Steve in the 70s.
Meaning:
1) Steve tried to fuck his own daughter, and as a father he did nothing to prevent this from happening
2) Steve let his wife work for Nazis for 40-ish years with no intervention whatsoever
3) Peggy definitely just had to fucking deal with the fact that for the rest of her life she got dragged for marrying a man half her age who looked suspiciously like her dead BF from 30 years ago.
But also, because it is a narratively strong ending to his character. Steve has always been a self sacrificial and frankly suicidal maniac. He has always been dangerously unhinged, and the only thing holding him together has been his mission. But his mission has gotten increasingly abstract, increasingly deranged, and increasingly insufficient as well. It's become obvious, over the last few films that being Cap is no longer satisfying to him as a person. He is a man who wants to just stop. But, where growing old, retiring and raising a family is an option for Tony, it isn't an option for Steve. The super serum alone precludes it, to say nothing of the psychological strains of his time traveling shenanigans and his own unmanaged and perhaps unmanageable (after all, medications seem not to affect him) psychiatric issues. Morbid though it be, where Tony CAN find rest and peace in other places--in his lakeside cabin, with his family and his friends--Steve legitimately cannot. It's time for him to rest, and death his that rest.
But anyway, that's just me. Me and my hottest of takes. As per usual.
Also if one more fucking person comes at me to say the support group dude who gets two lines and no name is "groundbreaking gay representation" in Marvel, instead of a calculated marketing move, I will literally punch their teeth out. Thank you and good night.
