CriticalOfEverything

Far and away the best Clone Wars episode thus far, somehow topping the perfection of the one before it. Everything from the dialogue, the voice acting, the animation, Revenge of the Sith tie-ins, music, pacing, writing and THE FIGHTS are perfect. Sam Witwer deserves all of the awards imaginable for his performance in this episode; The desperation and venom in his voice is chilling and genuine, constantly managing to make Maul's goals and beliefs feel realistic. And the final fight scene is absolutely phenomenal and the choreography matched with the incredible motion capture make it one of the most incredible moments in the entire show. This entire story arc might just be one of the best pieces of Star Wars media ever created, and I cannot wait for the next episode. Even if it isn't as good as this one, it doesn't really need to be. And honestly, it'll be hard to get close to topping it.

I used to hail this film as some sort of masterpiece for months, and then every time I rewatched it I just started to like it less. To Endgame's credit, it wraps up a lot of things beautifully and has some genuinely tear-jerking scenes. Tony, Steve, Natasha and Clint had their arcs wrapped up fantastically (even if Steve has a bit of a grey area relating to another 100 year old man he said he'd be with "until the end of the line") and the CGI is obviously top tier. Coupled with an absolutely incredible third act that is paced perfectly, filled with some of the best delivered fan service I have ever seen and has one of the most epic, emotionally powerful scenes that I have ever seen from any film, and it always gives me goosebumps.

But when you take away that third act as well as the payoffs that were executed well, Endgame starts to fall apart quickly. Thor and Hulk had genuinely awful conclusions to their character arcs. Thor's one is definitely the most divisive among fans and I definitely see what they tried to do and it certainly made sense considering the narrative, but the way it was executed just didn't work. Hulk on the other hand was just straight up confusing, with his entire arc that was built up through Infinity War being solved OFF SCREEN and then not having him do anything for a good chunk of the movie. Not only that but the movie is a complete mishmash of tones. It's argued that Infinity War also had this problem to some extent, but it was able to actually balance those tones well considering the movie's structure and pacing. In Endgame, the emotional scenes and the comedy scenes are too close together and don't get enough time to breathe. I know it might be too much to ask a three hour movie to take a little more time with its pacing, but the second act of this film is an utter mess. Granted, some of the emotional scenes do work and the jokes aren't half bad (unless they involve Thor), but they are placed so sporadically that it just comes off as distracting. THEN there's the whole time travel fiasco. The time travel in Endgame, when explained, does genuinely make sense, it's just that when they try to incorporate the Infinity Stones into the time travel as if they control the flow of time then the movie collapses. It completely contradicts what we've been led to believe about the time travel that they're trying to do and generally doesn't make any sense. If they're simply going to an alternate timeline that's in the past, then what part do the Infinity Stones actually play in that? I get changing stuff will create another timeline, but the Infinity Stones creating the flow of time doesn't make a lick of sense at all. And everyone's made a load of memes about it already, but the rat being the thing to kickstart the movie is impossibly contrived and dumb, regardless of Doctor Strange's plan. I don't wanna put a spoiler warning on this review so I won't explain the exact details, but it really is ridiculous.

Other than the second act of the film throwing a wrench in the entire product, the first act is really well done, if just a tad boring at times. It has a consistent tone, balances the comedy and drama relatively well, basically does everything that the second act should've. Even with all of the time travel stuff, Endgame would be a whole lot better if the second act was actually cohesive and had a good balance of tones.

Overall, is Endgame a decent film? I'd say yes, and a satisfying one at that. But is it good? Hard question, because the film is technically well made and has a good first and third act, it's just that the third act takes up so much of the movie and puts so many holes and issues into the whole product. Is it as good as Infinity War? HELL no. Infinity War is still a fantastic film that does everything this movie did but correctly (minus the time travel of course). It is a shame to see the final chapter of the MCU almost go down in flames and to only be saved by a competently done third act, but I guess the Russo's just got a bit carried away when trying to wrap things up.

Everything has been pushed back at this point, some even weeks before release, so unfortunately we've only been graced with this so far this year among "Birds of Prey", "Sonic the Hedgehog" and "Onward" in terms of big releases, while the other movies will only release in the Summer. Truly a time to be alive. Oh and this movie sucked, truly shocking - unlike it's own plot. This was an incredibly generic and predictable snorefest with some incoherent and mildly entertaining action, featuring Vin Diesel because it just isn't a mediocre action flick without him, Dwayne Johnson or Jason Statham being involved.