When the first trailer for the film formerly known as Avengers 4 dropped last Friday, not only did this long-awaited moment draw to a close several exhausting weeks of speculation on when and how the footage was most likely to arrive, but it also laid to rest all debate around the movie’s official title, displaying in big, purple-tinted lettering the name Avengers: Endgame.
As many of you will know, the “Endgame” subtitle was previously rumored earlier this year, and some would argue was even teased in a Twitter post from co-directors Anthony and Joe Russo. Nonetheless, in the days leading up to the trailer’s release, much of the fanbase didn’t even regard “Avengers: Endgame” as the most likely candidate, largely because the Russo Brothers outright denied that the subtitle would stem from any Avengers: Infinity War dialogue. And according to frequent Twitter leaker @DanielRPK, Marvel Studios was juggling a few names around before settling on their final choice:
“I got word about the title change a MINUTE before the trailer was out LOL. They went back and forward with three different titles as [Jeremy Conrad from MCU Cosmic] said: Infinity Gauntlet, Endgame and Annihilation. They ended with Endgame.
If you’ve been keeping track of the various reports and discussions around the official title of Avengers: Endgame, the “Avengers: Annihilation” rumor will likely be all too familiar to you, with the name rising to the top of the heap in recent months as the internet’s favorite candidate. As for “Avengers: Infinity Gauntlet,” the title gained a little traction in the first half of 2018 before Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige shot down the suggestion.
Seeing how Marvel has gone as far as creating fake scripts to prevent leaks, it seems perfectly plausible that the studio would also throw around a fake title or two in order to throw off the fans. With that in mind, it’s possible that this back-and-forth between names was just one most spoiler-proofing measure taken by Feige and his team, but regardless of whether “Infinity Gauntlet” and “Annihilation” were ever genuinely in the running, Avengers: Endgame is what we’re calling the film, and we’ll be seeing it in theaters from April 26th, 2019.