Rarely do fan theories hold up against any measure of scrutiny. Even the most convincing, canon-abiding concepts are ripped apart by Redditors within nano-seconds.
Which is why it’s so strange that one of the most unlikely Avengers: Endgame theories to emerge in months is also the one that’s gained the most credence.
Redditor u/repfect68 believes that Thanos, the finger-snapping supervillain who destroyed half of all life in Avengers: Infinity War, will perish within the first 20 minutes of Endgame.
In the post, which has earned over 2,000 upvotes, the Redditor posited:
“Avengers will defeat Thanos in the first 20 minutes of endgame! As I watch all the trailers and read all the information we have my theory is the next. Captain Marvel join the Avengers at beginning of the movie, saying (based on the Disney shareholder screening) that they should go take down Thanos ASAP and reverse the Decimation. We see Thor approving Marvel and the idea, so the team is going right to the Garden fight Thanos easily overpowering him with Stormbreaker and binary Captain Marvel. Only they cant use the Gauntlet, whether it is broken or none of them has the knowledge to figure out how to do it. So at the end of the day they won the fight but solve nothing. Going home, and we get the "we should move on" attitude we saw in trailers. They are desperate but has nothing that they can do about it.
“Months or years goneby, when the wheel getspinned again. Suddenly Antman shows up after such a long time, (we saw in first trailer) and Cap does not believe his eyes. Which is totally understandable, Antman is counted missing like the other half of all life. (we saw this as well in trailers) Antman say hi i have just come back from a trip to quantum realm and they let him explain. He is not the brightest of minds but has access to pym particles and tech that the geniuses of Avengers can use.
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"They put together the plan of travelling through the quantum realm, time vortex etc super deep science stuff. All the information, scenes from trailers, time gone by, and the transformations of clothes, hairstyle etc are all supporting my theory. In the next chapter the team must "start over" meaning they go back to the beginning which is the first Avengers film. They will prevent the snap, and make some sacrifices. That doesn’t mean death, but good things maybe that happened, and we all see in previous movies we like. So a lot of good stuff is being undone that made this past 10 years MCU what it is. A complete start over is happening.”
Many have pointed out that, while the theory holds water, it could result in a pretty unsatisfactory and anticlimactic finale. Not to mention the fact that erasing the past 10 years of the MCU isn’t too far removed from the lazy ‘it was all a dream!’ movie trope we've all come to dread.
On the other hand, this cash cow is far from spent. Marvel will welcome any opportunity to start from scratch, and this theory feeds into that perfectly. We’ll just have to wait and see.
Avengers: Endgame is out in cinemas on 25 April, 2019.
This story originally appeared on Esquire.co.uk. Minor edits have been made by the Esquiremag.ph editors.
