Infinity War Writers Almost Left The Snap Until Avengers 4

Avengers: Infinity War ended on the most shocking note possible, as Thanos managed to beat Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and use the Infinity Gauntlet to achieve his warped goal of wiping out half of all life in the universe, with just a single snap of his fingers. Cutting to the credits with a number of our favorite superheroes reduced to a pile of ashes was a ballsy move and made sure that all of us would be back next May when Avengers 4 rolls around to find out what happens.

At one stage, though, it wasn’t the plan to fully explore the after-effects of “The Snap” in this movie. Instead of witnessing the likes of Doctor Strange, Black Panther, the Guardians and Spider-Man die off in heartbreaking ways, Infinity War could have ended on the moment that Thanos snapped his fingers, leaving the audience to wonder what the consequences would be.

Writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely revealed as much while talking to The New York Times. Markus explained that they played with the idea but ultimately decided that it would mean that the film ended on more of a cliffhanger than an actual conclusion.

“It wasn’t just, well, we’ve got too much story, we’d better chop it in half. But what we realized is, it would feel more like a cliffhanger than we intended.”

The scribe went on to add that they decided to settle on exploring the deaths of (some of) our heroes due to the Gauntlet as it gave Infinity War a more “tragic ending,” rather than just making the beginning of Avengers 4 “a continuation” of the last film.

“It would be a continuation of exactly what you were watching before. [But it needed to] be as big as it wants to be, and as sprawling… [So we went with a script] that went all the way to a tragic ending. And then one where mysterious things happen that I can’t tell you about.”

You can see why Markus and McFeely would initially jump to this as the perfect way to end Avengers: Infinity War, but I think we can all agree that they went with the right decision in the end. Sometimes cliffhangers that offer no resolution can be infuriating rather than thrilling. Instead, we got a climax that categorically brought Earth’s Mightiest Heroes to their lowest ebb, leaving us without a clue as to how they’ll fix the situation they’re in. As Markus himself says, “It’s really, I think, difficult to predict where we go next.”