Avengers Endgame: How History Defines The Avengers – Wisecrack Edition

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wisecrack

jared here and today we're talking about a movie that's almost as lucrative as that blue furry remake of dances with wolves

avengers

end game is the culmination of 21 movies made over the course of over a decade by dozens of different writers and directors and considering how so many equally big projects have crashed and burned, we might have expected a similar fate for the MCU, but two point billion at the box office certainly suggests there's something about Endgame that resonates with the public and although it did not turn out as we predicted after Infinity War, in Wisecrack we found it to be a quite satisfying conclusion and not only because it culminates with a battle so epic that it makes Pelinor Fields seem like a small skirmish.

The

endgame

was able to provide a satisfying conclusion to so many narratives to answer that we're going to delve into each member of the Marvel trinity, Thor, Captain America and Iron Man, three heroes who have a variety of differences in powers, personalities and philosophies, but one. One of their main differences is the way their arcs are structured - not only do each of the Big Three embody different methods the writers use to dramatize character growth, but they also align quite closely with some of the different ways philosophers have thought about the arc of human

history

. and we maintain that by building on these traditions that are so central to our understanding of human

history

, the Marvel films can reach conclusions that we find appropriate and emotionally resonant, welcome to this witty

edition

of the

endgame

of the Avengers and in case you were dusted for the last 10 years and only received spoilers for the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe, but before we get into this, I want to thank our sponsors at Wix in our recent automation video. i asked you to send us your wix websites and honestly i was responding to some of the submissions we received you guys did some amazing things today i want to feature angela's work angela's wix site showcases her incredible talent as an entertainer and artist media, I especially liked her figure drawing model animation, Whether you want to create a blog to share your thoughts with the world or make a creative portfolio like Angela Wix, which offers many ways to create a professional looking website that It will really allow your work to shine even.

If you've never built a website before, Wix gives you the tools to create something truly unique, you can start from scratch or use its thousands of beautiful templates to create something that perfectly fits your vision. Keep sending us your work and we will continue. to feature our favorites, so create your website today by visiting wix.com and send it to us when you're done. Plus, it's free, so why not? Now, back to the show, let's start with the god of thunder, Thor's arc throughout the movies. He is cyclical, he undergoes a constant process of being on top of the world only to come back down learning and relearning the same lessons.

The first Thor film begins with him about to be crowned king of Asgard, but just before his coronation, Thor's pride and combativeness in The Yottenheim Invasion results in him being banished from Asgard and unworthy to wield his hammer, probably the worst day of his 1500 years of life. While he is exiled on earth, he learns the lesson that Odin wanted to not be so warlike and vainglorious, as a result he becomes worthy. Once again he ends right where he began as the prince of asgard, the dark world begins with thor on high as he restores peace to the nine kingdoms, but in one day he falls again when his girlfriend is infected with space sludge kidnapped by an elf. evil and both his mother and brother die, his luck here has fallen lower and lower than when he was exiled, but in the end he is saving the nine kingdoms once again.

Of all the movies, it fits the most haphazardly into the paradigm, but there's a reason it's widely considered one of the worst Marvel movies, Thor Ragnarok begins with Thor on top saving Asgard from Ragnarok by defeating the giant. of Surter fire, but again in one day he returns to his lowest point when his father dies, his hammer is broken and he is sold as a slave to Sakhar, the slaves. they have armed themselves I don't like that word through the ordeal he learns the lesson that asgard is not a place but a town as a result his arc in the movie ends right where it began with him saving the people of asgard from ragnarok even when the place itself receives the Death Star, he is eventually crowned king as well, but the big cycle that all these smaller cycles fit into is not over as King Thor is briefly on top, but Infinity War begins with Thanos giving him his ass and killing half his people.

He backs down when he acquires Stormbreaker and the power to grimace, but quickly backs down when killing him comes too late. He undergoes a self-imposed exile to his man cave, becomes a sloppy mess, and is defeated in Fortnite. This time, the lesson he learns is to accept himself as he is instead of who he is supposed to be, while Asgardian law and his own ambitions always told him that he was supposed to be the king, his conversation with his mother It reminds him that deep down he is a hero and a warrior, so it's appropriate. that after helping the fellow

avengers

defeat thanos, who abdicates the throne to go with his friends on incredible adventures throughout the universe and end up back on top, there is a general forward progression, the word goes from covet royalty to no longer desire it, but for the most part the process of growing up is tortuous thor expresses it himself in ragnarok oh dear brother becoming predictable i trust you you betray me going around and around in circles let's see loki life is about Growth is about change as well as your personal The arc returns on itself again and again, the same pattern repeating itself throughout the history of Asgard.

Thor not only succeeds his father to the throne, but recapitulates his father's most notable act: losing an eye in exchange for wisdom. Thor in the films and comics is based on the pagan deity of Norse mythology as such, it is particularly appropriate that this cyclical storytelling structure is employed for the character. Many ancient philosophies and religions, such as the Stoic Hindus, Mayans, and Aztecs, conceived of history on the largest scale as cyclical from the fragments of Norse mythology. mythology that has come down to us through works such as the prose edda and the poetic edda by snorri sterlison it is believed that the norse thought about history in a similar way in the eddas the original man and woman ask and embla first emerged From the wood of ash and elm, our current story cycle concludes with Ragnarok and then the cycle begins again with the only two survivors, Blade and Blade Thracier.

Likewise, Richard Wagner captured this cyclical nature of Norse and Teutonic mythology in his Ring Cycle which begins with the theft of the Rhine gold from the Rhine Maidens. And after much turmoil resulting in Ragnarok, the Rhine recovers the gold. right where it started. Neil Gaiman in his recent retelling of Norse mythology makes it even more explicit when these six gods who survived Ragnarok find a chess set that represents the gods of ancient times. On the field where Asgard once stood, they begin to play a game and as they move the pieces, the drama unfolds exactly as before, just as the entire cosmological cycle in Norse mythology always returns to where it began, so does the arc. of Thor's character, Captain America.

On the other hand, he basically has no character arc, the world may change around him, but he doesn't change with it. The famous screenwriting guru, Robert Mckee, criticizes those characters in the story of his book when the inner life and the outer appearance are like a cement block of a single substance. the role becomes a list of repetitive and predictable behaviors, it's not that that character is amazing, superficial, non-dimensional, people exist, but they are boring, the type of character you describe sounds like someone the audience wouldn't want to see, especially a hero who stays. Same for 7 movies, but Captain America is clearly an exception to that rule.

There's an initial physical change when taking the super soldier serum at the beginning of the first film, but after that, the all-American that people see on the outside is exactly who he is. it's on the inside and neither of them changes, my goodness, watch your language, it's not going away anytime soon, even Captain America taking on the American and global governments in Winter Soldier and Civil War doesn't reveal any new facets to the character that don't. we have revealed. I know before I pee, when they met, he explained to Dr. Abraham Erskine that his patriotism is not jingoistic and that he just wants to stand up to the bullies.

I don't want to kill anyone. I don't like bullies. The idea of ​​the project was to secretly monitor American civilians and execute them without due process. The Sokovia courts prohibited the Good Samaritans from helping those in need and reserved the right to send the Avengers on missions that they could consider unconscionable, making them more mercenary. that heroes both ideas of the deals sounded like the work of thugs to rogers, so he fought them, that inner strength is a trait that persists throughout all the films, starting before his transformation, as he faces off against multiple thugs bigger than him and continues to always get up and stand alone in the face of overwhelming odds if I see a situation pointing south.

I can't ignore her sometimes I wish I couldn't. You know, this is played straight as a callback to the Civil War when Iron Man defeats him only for Rogers to repeat his joke from the first movie he ever made. All Day satirized ending when Cap is confronted by a past version of himself who slaps him on the butt and the double also announces that I can do this all day, to which future Rogers replies that yes, I know, even steve is aware of the fact. that his immutable nature makes him predictable, but the trope is treated seriously again when Captain America, after being defeated by Thanos and having his shield broken, still stands ready to face him and an entire army single-handedly. nobody and as predictable as it was anything but boring The Avengers Assemble even his cheerful optimism is inexhaustible, as shown in the end of the game when he is able to see the bright side of life after Thanos breaks, half of all Life may be dead, but at least there are whales in the Hudson again. and in the same scene, he astutely notes his own lack of Black Widow's character development when he says that other people change but we don't like the inner character of him.

Steve Rogers' personal philosophy is equally inflexible. This is best summed up by Agent Sharon Carter in Civil War. sharon quotes cap's most famous speech verbatim in the comics, even if everyone tells you that something wrong is right, even if the whole world tells you to move, it's your duty to stand like a tree, look them in the eyes and say No. move, this unwavering commitment to his moral duties is shown again in Infinity War, where he refuses to sacrifice vision to stop Thanos despite the compelling moral calculus of sacrificing a single life to save trillions. We do not exchange the vision of Live.

Captain America's unchanging nature is uniform. most extreme in comics in recent times by mark miller steve rogers goes straight old man yelling at the cloud about all the ways life has changed since the 1940s, from the higher price of clothing and coffee to the way women dress, he spends his days going to the same decrepit gym that has been in his neighborhood since his childhood, rebuilding his old record collection, and spending time with other World War II veterans well into his 90s, It might seem like the movies portray a Steve Rogers who is seemingly more adaptable to changing things, right? so bad food is much better we used to boil everything there is no polio it is good the internet is very useful but in many important ways times do not change any more than Captain America himself, he was fighting Hydra in 1945 and is still fighting them in 2014 rather than a cyclical version of the story.

Captain America presents the belief that certain things are eternal, regardless of how much time passes or new circumstances that arise. He shares this view of history with the author of Ecclesiastes, who wrote what has been, is what will be, and what has been. What has been done is what will be done and there is nothing new under the sun among the things that both Steve and Solomon would agree are immutable throughout the centuries. There is only one godman and I'm pretty sure he doesn't dress like that. there is a fixed moral law that does not change just because the stakes are high and human nature does not change, whether in 1945, 2019, or the 10th century BC.

C., and because people are always the same,so are the problems they cause. thanos was just a more successful hitler who was just a more successful pharaoh, all of whom are more successful than loki, but the same immutable human nature is also responsible for the courage that made the people defend the plains of wakanda and storm the beaches of normandy the last time i was in germany and we saw one man above all the others we ended up disagreeing heroes like cap are nothing new, they are a strong response to a world that continues to face the same perennial problems despite being a man out of time, captain america is relevant in all eras.

We see this most clearly in the comics in Hickman's The Avengers. The time stone sends Captain America to the end of time. There Iron Lad tells him that the perspective you are talking about is based on the morality of a society of individuals and not a collective one. Remember that I lived in your now and that thinking simply has no place in the future to which Cap responded well it's a shame I never got over the past like Steve Rogers Tony Stark is a man out of time but there's a reason why that they do it.

They often find themselves on opposite sides. The contrast between Captain America and Iron Man is best explained by Reed Richards. You are a good man, you do good things. Tony, however, is not as simple as us. He is a man from the future trapped in the now. An angry prisoner. against the slow march of evolution his relationships his morality his ethics all of these are highly adaptable malleable to what he would call the greater good of humanity's necessary survival and undeniable progress Tony Stark's character arc is all about progress At the beginning of the first Iron Man he is completely self-centered.

He is not concerned about his nickname the Merchant of Death or the accusations of war profiteering, but upon seeing the damage his weapons have caused in the hands of terrorists, Stark changes his mind and decides that Stark Industries will no longer design weapons at the beginning of Iron Man 2. He is no longer personally selfish, but his political philosophy (Randian Objectivism) is still explicitly based on selfishness and believes that maximizing self-interest is the only rational way to live an idea. which was instrumental in his defense of laissez-faire capitalism. This philosophy is on full display in Tony's testimony before Congress.

You want my property, you can't have it, but I did you a big favor. I have successfully privatized world peace in The Avengers. He progresses from selfish to completely selfless initially criticizing Cap's willingness to die in the line of duty. the only thing you're really fighting for is yourself, you're not the type to make the sacrifice, play lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl all over you, I think I'd just cut the wire, it's always a way out you know He won't be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero, but at the end of the battle, he shows his willingness to sacrifice himself when he launches the nuclear bomb through the wormhole and although he didn't end up losing his life , he faced death left him psychologically scarred with the third Iron Man movie showing him suffering from severe PTSD as a result, it is still a progression of his character and he has been changed by the trauma, even if it is not progress In terms of improvement, be it the progression of your character in the civil war. is it an improvement or just a crude change depends on your political leanings in your support for the Sokovia accords iron man has abandoned his libertarian leanings in favor of greater government intervention for the sake of a safer society this progression is quite gradual initially he supports the agreements in part because as a futurist he sees them as inevitable when I realized what my weapons were capable of in the wrong hands I closed it stop manufacturing tony you chose to do that if we sign this we give up our right to choose but if This panel sends us somewhere we don't think we should go.

What if there is a place we need to go and they won't let us? We may not be perfect, but the safest hands are still ours if we don't do this now. What we will be told later, that is the fact that by the end of the game, both his personal and political progression reach their conclusions, finding him on the opposite side of the spectrum from where he started politically, he has completely abandoned any libertarian leanings he ever had, blaming Cap for the snap because steve wasn't willing to violate freedoms and liberties to quote make armor on everyone personally, he goes ahead and makes the ultimate sacrifice of not only his life, but in doing so he becomes a widow. to pepper and leaves morgan fatherless in the process such as the instant cost thanos everything that did the same for stark's character philosophy and technology progress in a fairly linear manner understanding the story as a linear progression from a past more primitive towards a technologically and socially superior future is common among several prominent figures philosophers hegel saw history as an inexorable advance towards the german state karl marx conceived of history in a similar way although as a progression towards communism for francis fukuyama history had followed a linear path of progress but history ended with the fall of the Soviet Union and the rise of liberal democracy throughout the world, which even he admits did not turn out as a futurist envisioned.

Tony Two sees history as a linear progression and Inexorable, although he may seize the end in a very different way than Hegel, Marx or Fukuyama, he saw the agreements as an inevitable part of that process, but only for what the world would face in the end, a hostile alien army came charging through from a hole in space, we are standing 300 feet below it, we are the avengers, we can catch all the arms dealers. the live long day, but up there that's the end of the game, a more optimistic view comes from Marvel heroes like Reed Richards, who calls Tony Stark, the man from the future at the end of the story, towards what everyone else They are moving forward slowly but surely if that is the case.

It's entirely appropriate that his character arc in the MCU is marked by a direct linear progression, perhaps the only vision of history that the three heroes fit is the great man theory of Thomas Carlisle, who wrote about the heroes, the cult of heroes and the heroic in history, the history of the world is nothing more than the biography of great men, certainly the history of the marvel universe from 1942 to 2023 is basically a biography of the different members of the Avengers and none more so than tony thor and cap, each had done more to accelerate the course of history or change its path entirely than anyone else of their time.

This same sentiment is echoed in the comics by Captain America when he exhorts his companions Illuminati we shape the world, he does not shape us as we have seen, this is particularly true of the unchanging steve rogers, but even tony as he walks the path of progress and thor as he spins up and down the Wheel of Fortune, both shaped the world far more significantly than they did, but we don't love these characters simply because they are the Napoleons and Caesars of their world seemingly charting the course of history on their own. No, we love them in part because there's a fit between each character's core concept and how their arcs develop and the moments when Marvel chooses to break from that clearly established pattern.

It's always a deliberate exception to great effect, like Iron Man's final joke when he returns at the end of the first film. I am Iron Man or Steve Rogers, finally accepting that he had fulfilled his duty as a soldier and finally moving forward. with a life of its own, but what do you think the joke did wonder tie together the core characteristics of its heroes and the story structure in a clever and satisfying way or did all the arcs end as unsatisfyingly as a certain show about dragons and ice zombies thanks to all our sponsors? those who support the channel and our podcast, be sure to hit the subscribe button and before you leave, I want to thank wix again the destination if you want to create a website like we mentioned before.

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