5 Oddly Specific Ways In Which Avengers: Age Of Ultron Defines The Franchise

5) The Villain’s Endgame Is Foreshadowed Midway Through The Movie

We don’t know much about Thanos’ grand scheme just yet, beyond his intention to cosmically bedazzle that gauntlet teased in Ultron’s mid-credit sequence. If history is any indicator, though, you might be able to piece his plan together by the halfway point of the next film. It’s a thin connection, but the offhand Galaga reference in The Avengers does foreshadow Loki’s master plan of summoning a bunch of space aliens to descend upon the Earth.

Ultron’s agenda for world destruction involves turning a massive heap of metal into a planetary pile driver. No less tenuous, and much more blunt, the finale is setup earlier during the fight between Iron Man and Hulk. Flying him high in the air before hurtling the Hulk down to Earth, Tony uses his Veronica suit to give Banner a top-to-bottom tour of a developing skyscraper in record time. Enlisting gravity to solve a problem is no more successful for Ultron than it is Tony (it takes a follow-up sucker punch to knock the Hulk out), but once again, Stark winds up a step ahead of his foe without even realizing it.