**** OFFICIAL Marvel's Avengers: Endgame **** SPOILERS ALLOWED! Enter at your own risk!!! (2 Viewers)

[Jaysus]

I think there is a big difference between an opening night crowd and a Monday night crowd in terms of enthusiasm.

I saw it twice: 1st showing at an IMAX theater Friday morning and 7pm on Sunday at a regular place.  IMAX theater was barely 25% full and the crowd made next to no noise at all the entire time save for a random chuckle here and there.  The Sunday night show is the one that had some reactions, but other then one loud "WHAT?" when Cap got the hammer it was not overly enthusiastic. 

Note1:  I got the IMAX ticket for free, but that was cool - nice place, great seats.

Note2: Showed up late to the regular one after a lacrosse game and had to sit to the side in the 4th row.  That kinda sucked a bit... and may have been why the movie seemed so dark.  I could not even make out the blood on Hawkeye/Ronin's sword in Japan after he impaled that dude.  In IMAX is was a bloddy mess. 

 

[heckmanm]

But Tony Stark wouldn’t have even known she was there or even who she was for that matter as she was already dead when he met the rest of the GOT on Nowhere.

I mean, we don't know the exact mechanics of the snap.  Do you just *think* something like "Dust Thanos and everybody fighting on his side right now", and trust the stones to know what you mean?

 

[GregR]

No, he wasn't but that's not the point.

Shuri examined Vision during Infinity War and seemed to believe she could separate Vision from the Mind Stone without killing him.

So:

1) In 2018 Thanos takes the Mind Stone from Vision in IW killing Vision.

2) SNAP (end IW)

3) (begin Endgame) Thanos destroys all the Stones and Thor cuts off his head.

4) Vision's body still presumably in Wakanda

5) Avengers time travel and get all the Stones including the Mind Stone from Loki's staff in 2012.

6) Tony Stark SNAP!

7) Captain America returns all the Stones to their proper place in time.

At this point everything happens as we saw in all the movies. Vision is dead in 2023 and the Mind Stone is not available to revive him (because Cap returned them) however Shuri will likely rebuild him in Black Panther 2 because she's got the big brain.

Make sense?

So what's the "proper place in time" for the Mind Stone? According to https://i.redd.it/f8hh7jt6whm21.jpg,  Thanos had it until he gave it to Loki for the Chautari invasion (Avengers) and then S.H.I.E.L.D had it until it was stolen by HYDRA, and later used to make Vision (Age of Ultron). 

 Just curious where/when Cap took it "back" to.

The mind stone was in Loki's scepter.   Tony and Ant-man go into Tony's penthouse and see the scene from the end of Avengers where they surround Loki ("If it's all the same, I think I'll take that drink now.")    They see the scepter put into a case by Widow and given to Jasper Sitwell of SHIELD/Hydra.  He gets into the elevator with basically the same cast of Hydra that Cap fights in the elevator in Winter Soldier.

Cap gets in the elevator. They make it look like a re-enactment of that fight will occur. But instead he whispers, "Heil Hydra" and then they show him walking off the elevator with the case, assumedly willingly given.

That's when they acquired the Mind Stone from. So right around that same time is where they would take it back to, and put it back in the hands of SHIELD. 

(Of course there might be the issue it is no longer in the scepter when returned. Though that's an issue for that timeline to deal with.  It can probably still be used to create Ultron, Vision, and the Maximoffs.)

 

[Chaka]

So what's the "proper place in time" for the Mind Stone? According to https://i.redd.it/f8hh7jt6whm21.jpg,  Thanos had it until he gave it to Loki for the Chautari invasion (Avengers) and then S.H.I.E.L.D had it until it was stolen by HYDRA, and later used to make Vision (Age of Ultron). 

Just curious where/when Cap took it "back" to.

Between Loki getting captured in Avengers 1 and SHIELD taking the Stone. That was the elevator scene before the two ####s of America fought each other.

 

[heckmanm]

The mind stone was in Loki's scepter.   Tony and Ant-man go into Tony's penthouse and see the scene from the end of Avengers where they surround Loki ("If it's all the same, I think I'll take that drink now.")    They see the scepter put into a case by Widow and given to Jasper Sitwell of SHIELD/Hydra.  He gets into the elevator with basically the same cast of Hydra that Cap fights in the elevator in Winter Soldier.

Cap gets in the elevator. They make it look like a re-enactment of that fight will occur. But instead he whispers, "Heil Hydra" and then they show him walking off the elevator with the case, assumedly willingly given.

That's when they acquired the Mind Stone from. So right around that same time is where they would take it back to, and put it back in the hands of SHIELD. 

(Of course there might be the issue it is no longer in the scepter when returned. Though that's an issue for that timeline to deal with.  It can probably still be used to create Ultron, Vision, and the Maximoffs.)

Ok so Cap took each stone back to where/when they got it earlier in Endgame. I think that’s the assumption I wasn’t making.

 

[Chaka]

I mean, we don't know the exact mechanics of the snap.  Do you just *think* something like "Dust Thanos and everybody fighting on his side right now", and trust the stones to know what you mean?

You're overthinking this.

 

[heckmanm]

You're overthinking this.

New here?

 

[GregR]

Ok so Cap took each stone back to where/when they got it earlier in Endgame. I think that’s the assumption I wasn’t making.

Yes. The Sorc Supreme's argument to Banner if you flesh it out more than she did, amounted to... Dormamu assaults the Earth in Dr Strange's movie. If you take the Time stone, he will win in this new timeline she will be in. So Hulk says they will return the stones to where/when they got them.

 

[-OZ-]

When referring to your mentor, some of us used to say they're "the Yoda to my Luke Skywalker", is it cool to refer to dudes on their last legs (say they're retiring soon) as "the Tony to my Peter"? 

 

[Thunderlips]

You know who probably liked/appreciated that a lot? Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of little girls. And lots of women too. 

Grow up. Not everything is about you. 

I think the biggest problem with The Charge is that, despite having 10 years and a plethora of good female characters....pretty much none of the movies (except for really Gamora and Nebula...whos relationship and dialouge was excellent) ever had the female characters interact with one another or build relationships.  

 

[Anarchy99]

I heard today that RDJ’s deal gives him a cut of the backend action. So he made $75M over the weekend. We really shouldn’t be shedding any tears for him. 

 

[The Dude]

I don't know how much people want to discuss the time travel part but I think there are three challenges to how the movie set it up

1 - they stated everything needed to be returned to the time it was taken to keep the time line intact.  So they returned the stone and the hammer - but didn't return Thanos to his timeline.

2 - the tesseract was not returned to it's timeline - not the one Loki took off with

3 - the old bird told Hulk disruptions in the timeline create divergent timelines and don't change the timeline - but Cap went back and hooked up with Peggy and should have created a divergent timeline but ended up in the current timeline on the park bench

You could just assume nobody knows how the time travel works and everybody that said they did had no idea what they were talking about - and that may explain it the best.

 

[Psychopav]

I don't know how much people want to discuss the time travel part but I think there are three challenges to how the movie set it up

1 - they stated everything needed to be returned to the time it was taken to keep the time line intact.  So they returned the stone and the hammer - but didn't return Thanos to his timeline.

2 - the tesseract was not returned to it's timeline - not the one Loki took off with

3 - the old bird told Hulk disruptions in the timeline create divergent timelines and don't change the timeline - but Cap went back and hooked up with Peggy and should have created a divergent timeline but ended up in the current timeline on the park bench

You could just assume nobody knows how the time travel works and everybody that said they did had no idea what they were talking about - and that may explain it the best.

I think that infinitely divergent timelines are inevitable with the time travel and actions taken.  The issues came from the stones themselves in general, and the time stone in particular, not existing in some of those timelines. Returning the time stone to the moment it left is required to prevent an endless darkness in the branches coming out of 2014 New York. The rest of the returns (stones and mjolnir) were important only to ensure that one branch still exists which leads directly to the snap from IW.

Which is what makes the Thanos Paradox uniquely troubling to me.

I'm also curious to know whether Cap II (old man Cap in 2018) was dusted or survived the snap. We know his alter ego survived - I wonder if that is inherent to his being regardless of incarnation within the timeline.

 

[Sebowski]

Yep. Not a gamer either. And I don’t go to Disney World every year for vacation. 

How often do you visit fantasy sports message boards?  

 

[GregR]

I don't know how much people want to discuss the time travel part but I think there are three challenges to how the movie set it up

1 - they stated everything needed to be returned to the time it was taken to keep the time line intact.  So they returned the stone and the hammer - but didn't return Thanos to his timeline.

2 - the tesseract was not returned to it's timeline - not the one Loki took off with

3 - the old bird told Hulk disruptions in the timeline create divergent timelines and don't change the timeline - but Cap went back and hooked up with Peggy and should have created a divergent timeline but ended up in the current timeline on the park bench

You could just assume nobody knows how the time travel works and everybody that said they did had no idea what they were talking about - and that may explain it the best.

A lot of this has been discussed heavily. But...

1)  They take, say, the Time Stone.  That timeline continues wholly separate from ours.  But it continues without a Time Stone.  So when Dormamu shows up in the events of the Doctor Strange movie... Dormamu wins. That's the millions that will suffer that the Sorc Supreme spoke of.   

They are NOT trying to make that alternate timeline identical to ours. They are just not robbing that timeline of the tools needed to defeat threats they know are coming. Like Dormamu. So they just return the stones so they are there to deal with the other coming threats.  They do not have to return Thanos. That timeline just won't have a Thanos now.

2)  The timeline with Loki escaping goes off on its own. The tesseract is there, in Loki's possession. Unless Cap changed that. Yes. Has no impact on our timeline.  Loki died in ours.  When DIsney starts up the Loki TV series that has been mentioned, hopefully they provide an explanation of how he ends up back in our timeline.

3) Correct, Cap going back in time doesn't change our timeline.  It's a discrepancy if we have to assume his sitting on the bench is because he went into our past and that by itself meant he shows up in our present.  But one easy solution that fixes this is if we assume Cap lived out his life in the alternate timeline with Peggy and got old.  Then once she dies, he uses the Pym Particles to return to our timeline as planned.  Only he didn't return onto the platform in front of Hulk he left from.  Note he also had to come up with a new shield to bring to Sam at some point in that alternate timeline.  It also means since he lived out his life in that alternate timeline, he could have fought the threats he knew about like Hydra taking over SHIELD, but he'd have done it in the alternate timeline alongside Peggy, then returned to our timeline.

 

[Sebowski]

So much trash in here. Sorry if this has been discussed. 

How did Cap return a the soul stone without getting a soul back for it? Redskull said it was a one-for-one tradeoff. So does that mean Nat is back? I expected her to reappear with him. Or did he accidently set Red Skull free? I doubt it. Just saying. Pretty sure that's how Nat is back. 

 

[shadyridr]

How did Thanos time travel back to 2023? I know Nebula had something to do with it but I forget exactly now. 

 

[Tom Servo]

How did Thanos time travel back to 2023? I know Nebula had something to do with it but I forget exactly now. 

Did you watch the movie? Seriously?

 

[shadyridr]

Did you watch the movie? Seriously?

I went to the bathroom during that scene

 

[Psychopav]

I went to the bathroom during that scene

So you forget? Or did you DITCH that scene?

For shame!

 

[Psychopav]

A lot of this has been discussed heavily. But...

1)  They take, say, the Time Stone.  That timeline continues wholly separate from ours.  But it continues without a Time Stone.  So when Dormamu shows up in the events of the Doctor Strange movie... Dormamu wins. That's the millions that will suffer that the Sorc Supreme spoke of.   

The are NOT trying to make that alternate timeline identical to ours. They are just not robbing that timeline of the tools needed to defeat threats they know are coming. Like Dormamu. So they just return the stones so they are there to deal with the other coming threats.  They do not have to return Thanos. That timeline just won't have a Thanos now.

2)  The timeline with Loki escaping goes off on its own. The tesseract is there, in Loki's possession. Unless Cap changed that. Yes. Has no impact on our timeline.  Loki died in ours.  When DIsney starts up the Loki TV series that has been mentioned, hopefully they provide an explanation of how he ends up back in our timeline.

3) Correct, Cap going back in time doesn't change our timeline.  It's a discrepancy if we have to assume his sitting on the bench is because he went into our past and that by itself meant he shows up in our present.  But one easy solution that fixes this is if we assume Cap lived out his life in the alternate timeline with Peggy and got old.  Then once she dies, he uses the Pym Particles to return to our timeline as planned.  Only he didn't return onto the platform in front of Hulk he left from.  Note he also had to come up with a new shield to bring to Sam at some point in that alternate timeline.  It also means since he lived out his life in that alternate timeline, he could have fought the threats he knew about like Hydra taking over SHIELD, but he'd have done it in the alternate timeline alongside Peggy, then returned to our timeline.

No to the bold. There has been nothing to suggest that Pym particles allow users to traverse dimensions.

 

[ConnSKINS26]

They said for Cap it would be as long as he needs, but for them it would only be 5 seconds. He decided to take a lifetime before returning. The plothole comes because for dramatic effect they had him be sitting on the bench as if he lived that life in this timeline and then marked on a calendar when to sit on the bench--rather than just having an old man cap return and then limp to the bench to have the same scene. It's a storytelling choice that is needlessly confusing with the rules they set up, for slightly more initial impact. But I think it's clear what they were going for.

The weird part is we know Peggy Carter died during Cap 1 or Cap 2, which was like a decade earlier. So it doesn't really make sense if he just waited till the right day to sit on that bench, even if we pretend it was possible he was in this timeline for a lifetime. 

Nah. I'll be headcannoning that he just walked to the bench while they were distracted and distraught lol. 

I'm way more surprised that Bucky isn't taking on the Captain America mantle. Falcon isn't a melee guy and has no Super Soldier serum--he's a guns and gadgets and wings guy. But I get it. Should be interesting. 

 

[ConnSKINS26]

Also the Loki thing isn't really a problem because he may have stolen the Tesseract...but it was his own divergent timeline's Tesseract. So it's still there unless he found a way to follow them to the main movie timeline (to escape Thanos' wrath for failing in the Invasion of New York maybe). And that's not a problem unless the writers want it to be for story reasons--we'll never see that timeline again otherwise. Hell that alternate timeline might be where they set his series. Doubt it, as they want people to be comfortable that most things are "cannon". 

Verdict: not a plothole imo. 

 

[GregR]

A lot of this has been discussed heavily. But...

1)  They take, say, the Time Stone.  That timeline continues wholly separate from ours.  But it continues without a Time Stone.  So when Dormamu shows up in the events of the Doctor Strange movie... Dormamu wins. That's the millions that will suffer that the Sorc Supreme spoke of.   

The are NOT trying to make that alternate timeline identical to ours. They are just not robbing that timeline of the tools needed to defeat threats they know are coming. Like Dormamu. So they just return the stones so they are there to deal with the other coming threats.  They do not have to return Thanos. That timeline just won't have a Thanos now.

2)  The timeline with Loki escaping goes off on its own. The tesseract is there, in Loki's possession. Unless Cap changed that. Yes. Has no impact on our timeline.  Loki died in ours.  When DIsney starts up the Loki TV series that has been mentioned, hopefully they provide an explanation of how he ends up back in our timeline.

3) Correct, Cap going back in time doesn't change our timeline.  It's a discrepancy if we have to assume his sitting on the bench is because he went into our past and that by itself meant he shows up in our present.  But one easy solution that fixes this is if we assume Cap lived out his life in the alternate timeline with Peggy and got old.  Then once she dies, he uses the Pym Particles to return to our timeline as planned.  Only he didn't return onto the platform in front of Hulk he left from.  Note he also had to come up with a new shield to bring to Sam at some point in that alternate timeline.  It also means since he lived out his life in that alternate timeline, he could have fought the threats he knew about like Hydra taking over SHIELD, but he'd have done it in the alternate timeline alongside Peggy, then returned to our timeline.

No to the bold. There has been nothing to suggest that Pym particles allow users to traverse dimensions.

Every time someone went back in time, the return to the present traversed timelines. All time travel was done with Pym Particles. This is no different.  

I.e. Cap and Tony went to 1970. A new timeline immediately spawned off separate from ours.  After a few hours in 1970 they both return to the present, jumping back into our timeline. 

Same exact mechanism. Cap goes to whatever year (1945 say).  Instead of a few hours, he spends 70 years there until Peggy's death. Then returns to our timeline.

The only difference is he didn't return to the platform as all the other times did. He returns to a little bit before and walks out to sit on the bench.

 

[The Dude]

Also the Loki thing isn't really a problem because he may have stolen the Tesseract...but it was his own divergent timeline's Tesseract. So it's still there unless he found a way to follow them to the main movie timeline (to escape Thanos' wrath for failing in the Invasion of New York maybe). And that's not a problem unless the writers want it to be for story reasons--we'll never see that timeline again otherwise. Hell that alternate timeline might be where they set his series. Doubt it, as they want people to be comfortable that most things are "cannon". 

Verdict: not a plothole imo. 

You make a good argument but why do all the other stones need to be returned?  

 

[ConnSKINS26]

You make a good argument but why do all the other stones need to be returned?  

Because they took them out of their home timelines (but then bring them back), which would then mess with events to come. As far as we know, while Loki stole the Tesseract--it was that timeline's Loki and that timeline's Tesseract. And until we're shown differently he is still there. They left themselves that wiggle room to bring him back

 

[GregR]

You make a good argument but why do all the other stones need to be returned?  

The Time Stone has to be there for Doctor Strange to stop Dormamu.  

The other Stones I think we can argue they don't HAVE to be for any world-saving reasons that we the audience, or the Avengers characters know of.  The other stones weren't involved in solving outside problems, only ones of their own creation (i.e. Mind Stone being part of creating Ultron).

But for completeness in doing the right thing, it makes sense. If you don't know what future the item you stole from that timeline has, and you can return it, then the right thing is to return it.  As an example, if they don't return the Space Stone, there's no Captain Marvel in that timeline.  If they don't return the Mind Stone, there's no Wanda or Pietro in that timeline.

 

[The Dude]

The Time Stone has to be there for Doctor Strange to stop Dormamu.  

The other Stones I think we can argue they don't HAVE to be for any world-saving reasons that we the audience, or the Avengers characters know of.  The other stones weren't involved in solving outside problems, only ones of their own creation (i.e. Mind Stone being part of creating Ultron).

But for completeness in doing the right thing, it makes sense. If you don't know what future the item you stole from that timeline has, and you can return it, then the right thing is to return it.  As an example, if they don't return the Space Stone, there's no Captain Marvel in that timeline.  If they don't return the Mind Stone, there's no Wanda or Pietro in that timeline.

Agreed - but what if they don't return Thanos....?

 

[B Maverick]

Agreed - but what if they don't return Thanos....?

And how can 2023 Nebula shoot and kill 2014 Nebula without erasing her own existence?

 

[B Maverick]

Everyone seems to forget that they themselves told us no one knows how time travel really works.  The best part is they comment on Back to The Future being BS, then pull a Back to the Future 2 move.  So you are all overthinking it, which basically means.....

YOU ARE ALL RIGHT AND AT THE SAME TIME ALL WRONG!!!!

 

[GregR]

Agreed - but what if they don't return Thanos....?

Then the alternate timeline spun off from their visit to 2014 won't have a Thanos in it and will play out without there ever being a Snap.

The other 3 alternate timelines (1970, 2012 and 2013) still have a Thanos.

 

[ConnSKINS26]

And how can 2023 Nebula shoot and kill 2014 Nebula without erasing her own existence?

It's not that kind of time travel where there is one continuous line, the Sorcerer Supreme explained this. That past Nebula was from an offshoot timeline they essentially created by going back

 

[Scott Tenorman]

Everyone seems to forget that they themselves told us no one knows how time travel really works.  The best part is they comment on Back to The Future being BS, then pull a Back to the Future 2 move.  So you are all overthinking it, which basically means.....

YOU ARE ALL RIGHT AND AT THE SAME TIME ALL WRONG!!!!

Time is a flat circle, bro.  That is all you need to know.

 

[B Maverick]

It's not that kind of time travel where there is one continuous line, the Sorcerer Supreme explained this. That past Nebula was from an offshoot timeline they essentially created by going back

Yeah.  I think I kinda knew that, but with the point of putting the stones back to maintain the timeline, it gets alittle whacky.

Time is a flat circle, bro.  That is all you need to know.

What like the Earth?

 

[The Dude]

I think in the end it doesn't completely stand up to scrutiny - and that nobody in the movie knew how time travel worked - despite that they thought they did.

 

[H Jass]

I think in the end it doesn't completely stand up to scrutiny - and that nobody in the movie knew how time travel worked - despite that they thought they did.

According to this article, an interview with the Russo bros, maybe it will be worked out in the future....particularly the Disney+ shows.  https://ew.com/movies/2019/04/30/avengers-endgame-russo-brothers-captain-america/

They do seem to confirm that Cap was in another alternate branch all together and not the prime timeline. So....  :scrambledbrain:

 

[Tom Servo]

<------------ The guy who lives in this thing knows how time travel works.

 

[Peak]

<------------ The guy who lives in this thing knows how time travel works.

Timey-wimey stuff....

 

[Tom Servo]

Marvel NFL helmets for every team.

 

[Peak]

Marvel NFL helmets for every team.

Some of those they tried to hard....but I could get behind the Cleveland Things or Cincinnati Symbiotes. 

 

[Nick Vermeil]

Some of those they tried to hard....but I could get behind the Cleveland Things or Cincinnati Symbiotes. 

Both of these should be adopted tomorrow. 

 

[Courtjester]

Mine wasnt full of loud emotion. At the obvious moments it was so quiet it was eerie.

The loudest was by far when Cap got mjolnir.  Stan Lee got a long ovation too.

Saw it today with my daughter—XD theater fairly  well attended. You had one group of fans who wanted to cheer and comment and then you had several other groups who were screaming at them to shut up. Really thought a brawl was about to go down.

We both enjoyed the movie a lot and we haven’t seen most of the previous movies.

The only small nitpick I had was why did the world look like most everyone had died? I mean driving home tonight in a Traffic jam, my daughter and I were like this would still be a traffic jam even if 50% of the cars were gone. During the CA support group scene there was like five people and outside there was trash  blowing in the street.  It was like a ghost town. 

Just a great movie overall and can’t wait to see it again 

 

[AcerFC]

Saw it today with my daughter—XD theater fairly  well attended. You had one group of fans who wanted to cheer and comment and then you had several other groups who were screaming at them to shut up. Really thought a brawl was about to go down.

We both enjoyed the movie a lot and we haven’t seen most of the previous movies.

The only small nitpick I had was why did the world look like most everyone had died? I mean driving home tonight in a Traffic jam, my daughter and I were like this would still be a traffic jam even if 50% of the cars were gone. During the CA support group scene there was like five people and outside there was trash  blowing in the street.  It was like a ghost town. 

Just a great movie overall and can’t wait to see it again 

Is this shtick?

If not, watch Infinity War on Netflix tonight. 

 

[Courtjester]

Is this shtick?

If not, watch Infinity War on Netflix tonight. 

My daughter and I did watch it last night, maybe I missed something, but didn’t Thanos just kill 50% or was there more? Wouldn’t there still be a lot of people walking around in a big city like NY?

 

[Insein]

My daughter and I did watch it last night, maybe I missed something, but didn’t Thanos just kill 50% or was there more?

That's 3.75 billion people gone in an instant if it's precisely 50%. That's a lot of people. But it's not like it was evenly distributed across the universe. There could be more gone from Earth than other places.

 

[Courtjester]

That's 3.75 billion people gone in an instant if it's precisely 50%. That's a lot of people. But it's not like it was evenly distributed across the universe. There could be more gone from Earth than other places.

Well that would make sense because Hawkeye’s whole family was gone. Just the one scene with Ant man, he is walking down the street and there were abandon cars everywhere and  all he finds is one kid on a bike.So that explanation makes sense. 

Again wasn’t trying to nitpick because we really did enjoy the movie and will be seeing it again

 

[Insein]

Well that would make sense because Hawkeye’s whole family was gone. Just the one scene with Ant man, he is walking down the street and there were abandon cars everywhere and  all he finds is one kid on a bike.So that explanation makes sense. 

Again wasn’t trying to nitpick because we really did enjoy the movie and will be seeing it again

I do think it was more a movie thing trying to show you that a lot of people are missing. 

 

[FreeBaGeL]

Saw it today with my daughter—XD theater fairly  well attended. You had one group of fans who wanted to cheer and comment and then you had several other groups who were screaming at them to shut up. Really thought a brawl was about to go down.

We both enjoyed the movie a lot and we haven’t seen most of the previous movies.

The only small nitpick I had was why did the world look like most everyone had died? I mean driving home tonight in a Traffic jam, my daughter and I were like this would still be a traffic jam even if 50% of the cars were gone. During the CA support group scene there was like five people and outside there was trash  blowing in the street.  It was like a ghost town. 

Just a great movie overall and can’t wait to see it again 

FWIW, and I remember this point coming up in the ancient "would you rather have an alien overlord flip a single coin to wipe out all of humanity or flip a separate coin for each individual" thread, but if 50% of the Earth's population is wiped out instantly then way more than 50% of Earth's population is going to die.  Mass suicide would inevitably follow from grief stricken people, planes and buses full of people whose operators were snapped away would crash, infastructure would break down, disease and hunger would spread, murder/pillaging would run rampant, etc.

And that's in addition to the point above about the 50/50 being across the whole universe, not necessarily 50/50 on Earth specifically.

 

[FreeBaGeL]

A lot of this has been discussed heavily. But...

1)  They take, say, the Time Stone.  That timeline continues wholly separate from ours.  But it continues without a Time Stone.  So when Dormamu shows up in the events of the Doctor Strange movie... Dormamu wins. That's the millions that will suffer that the Sorc Supreme spoke of.   

They are NOT trying to make that alternate timeline identical to ours. They are just not robbing that timeline of the tools needed to defeat threats they know are coming. Like Dormamu. So they just return the stones so they are there to deal with the other coming threats.  They do not have to return Thanos. That timeline just won't have a Thanos now.

2)  The timeline with Loki escaping goes off on its own. The tesseract is there, in Loki's possession. Unless Cap changed that. Yes. Has no impact on our timeline.  Loki died in ours.  When DIsney starts up the Loki TV series that has been mentioned, hopefully they provide an explanation of how he ends up back in our timeline.

3) Correct, Cap going back in time doesn't change our timeline.  It's a discrepancy if we have to assume his sitting on the bench is because he went into our past and that by itself meant he shows up in our present.  But one easy solution that fixes this is if we assume Cap lived out his life in the alternate timeline with Peggy and got old.  Then once she dies, he uses the Pym Particles to return to our timeline as planned.  Only he didn't return onto the platform in front of Hulk he left from.  Note he also had to come up with a new shield to bring to Sam at some point in that alternate timeline.  It also means since he lived out his life in that alternate timeline, he could have fought the threats he knew about like Hydra taking over SHIELD, but he'd have done it in the alternate timeline alongside Peggy, then returned to our timeline.

Maybe I am misremembering this but I thought they established that only changes with the infinity stones would create separate branches in reality.

Didn't they say in the scene where they were making fun of the time travel movies that changing things while time traveling wouldn't effect the timeline, but then it was later established that because the infinity stones were the driving force of creation or whatever star trek mumbo jumbo, if those were altered then it would break into a separate branch of reality.

 

[FreeBaGeL]

Do you really think they're going to dust a principal character from GotG?

She's fine.

That was my thought too, but my wife made a fair point that they said explicitly you couldn't get around someone being sacrificed to the soul stone.

If 2014 Gamora is still alive then why can't they just use the time machine to go back to pre-thrown-off-a-cliff Natasha, grab her, and bring her back to the present?