As the culmination of a decade of blockbuster storytelling, Avengers: Endgame was loaded with references to previous movies. Some were small nods, some weren’t, given that the film literally revisited the events of prior outings by time travel. But one that’s definitely on the subtle end of the spectrum has just been spotted by Redditor Montgutenry.
They were watching the final battle against Thanos in Endgame and realized some of the choreography looked familiar. Closer inspection revealed that the moment where Captain America wields Mjolnir in his fight against Thanos has many similarities to Thor’s tussle with the Hulk in The Avengers. As you can see in the video via the link below, both Cap and Thor use similar moves, both slide under an incoming projectile, objects in the environment are destroyed in a similar manner and both scenes end with the hero choking his adversary. But is there an in-universe explanation for this?
Well, comments on Reddit theorize that Captain America is the kind of guy that does his homework, studying battle data in order to work out how best to improve his fighting skills. Plus, with Kevin Feige having confirmed that Cap was worthy enough to lift Mjolnir back in Avengers: Age of Ultron (he didn’t do so though so as not to offend Thor), he may have suspected that one day he’d have to use it and wanted to brush up on how.
Or, perhaps more prosaically, the same team at ILM worked on both scenes and decided to throw this sequence in as a nod to their past work. Whatever the case, the resemblance between the two is undeniable.
It’s nice that Avengers: Endgame still has a couple of secrets tucked away so long after its release, too. Just when you think you’ve seen it all, an eagle-eyed fan turns up something new. Impressive.
