“With A Snap Of His Fingers…”
In contrast to the first trailer, this second look at Infinity War opens with the Guardians instead of closing with them. Specifically, Zoe Saldana’s Gamora gets to kick things off with an ominous speech that handily lays out Thanos’ (Josh Brolin) goal in the film. “The entire time I knew him,” says the Mad Titan’s adoptive daughter, “he only ever had one goal… To wipe out half the universe. If he gets all the Infinity Stones, he can do it with a snap of his fingers.”
This will be very familiar to any fans of the comics. In The Infinity Gauntlet arc, Thanos does just that. When he gets his hands on all the Stones, or Gems as they’re called on the page, the villain snaps his fingers and halves the population of the universe – meaning that half of the human beings on Earth disappear in an instant.
What’s different here, though, is that this was not Thanos’ ultimate goal in the source material, it was more like an opening gambit to display his immense power. The Russo brothers have previously opened up about how they’ve taken some liberties with the character in order to make sure he’s as compelling an antagonist as possible, and it looks like they’ve achieved that.
Tony Has A Plan
It’s then revealed that Gamora is talking to none other than Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark, who’s clearly learning about Thanos for the first time, as he asks the former assassin turned galactic hero to clarify her ol’ pops’ name. Going by his doom-laden look, Gamora’s warning severely shakes Tony – and why wouldn’t it? Thanos represents the apocalyptic threat he had been trying to prepare the Earth for since Avengers: Age of Ultron.
However, the invincible Iron Man isn’t going to wallow in despair. The trailer quickly moves to a voiceover from Tony in which he outlines a rough plan that might give the Avengers a chance against the Mad Titan. “We got one advantage,” Stark explains.” He’s coming to us. We have what Thanos wants, so that’s what we use.”
To illustrate his point, we get some clips of the two Infinity Stones located on Earth in action. Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) is seen in his Sanctum Sanctorum activating the Eye of Agamotto – or Time Stone – which he wears around his neck, while Elizabeth Olsen’s Scarlet Witch and Vision (Paul Bettany) look very worried over in Wakanda. It seems they’re well aware of the danger Vision’s in thanks to the Mind Stone lodged in his forehead.