Avengers: Infinity War ends on what’s literally a killer cliffhanger, as Thanos succeeds in his goal of wiping out half of all life in the universe. It leaves the galaxy’s mightiest heroes at their most desperate and the audience with one major question: how on Midgard are they going to undo what the Mad Titan’s done in next year’s Avengers 4?
The common theory is that time travel will be involved, as set photos have revealed that some of the surviving heroes will revisit key moments of their past. But what if this is just part of the story? What if one particular line in Infinity War actually tells us how everything will be resolved in the fourth Avengers film?
The line in question occurs when Captain America and his Secret Avengers rescue Vision and Scarlet Witch from being attacked by the Black Order in Scotland. A wounded Vision says he’s willing to die in order to prevent the deaths of billions of others. Steve Rogers is having none of this, though, and decrees that they “don’t trade lives.” Just to ram home how important this piece of dialogue is, Vision repeats it back to Cap when he saves him from Corvus Glaive during the battle in Wakanda.
Steve might not believe in sacrificing the lives of himself and his friends right now, but with the situation a whole lot more desperate going into Avengers 4, he might be forced to take drastic action. And that’s because Twitter account Marvel Unsolved has theorized that there may be some switch of lives in store in the upcoming sequel.
Remember that many of the second generation of heroes were killed by Thanos, leaving the original Avengers in tact. So perhaps when the time comes, the old guard will give up their own lives to let their replacements live? As Red Skull would say, “a soul for a soul.”
You can see how this would definitely work on a thematic level, with those heroes who’ve been with the franchise from the beginning going out in a blaze of glory and handing the baton over to the newer batch of Avengers. This doesn’t explain, though, how the billions of others that Thanos killed might come back. Still, it’s a very persuasive theory and we’ll just have to wait and see how close to the truth it is when destiny – otherwise known as Avengers 4 – arrives next May.
