Carlos Bastarache: avengers.jpg

Tuesday, 1 May 2018

avengers.jpg

Marvel/Disney

**Spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War below**

Avengers: Infinity War is out. Just about everyone has seen it, which has helped boost the movie to the biggest opening weekend globally and domestically of all time. And while much has been made about the stakes being somewhat diluted thanks to the announced forthcoming movies from characters who are now floating ash, there were other swerves that kept viewers on their toes. Slights of hand via marketing, and trailers that were simply red herrings.

We have an entire, lengthy article detailing the changes and misdirections Marvel made with their collection of trailers, and in retrospect their decision to fake out the audience makes sense. No one wants to see the movie in the trailers. That’s the worst. The directors of Infinity War know it, too. So Joe and Anthony Russo set out to not only push the story forward but do their best to deliver fresh scenes to the audience that haven’t been rewatched and dissected into oblivion. They explained their motivation to Variety, who states: “misdirection was employed in the marketing of the film to keep the brand’s very loyal and savvy audience from sniffing out what he and his brother were up to.”

“If you look at every film we’ve done for Marvel, there are huge, game-changing events at the end of the movies. We are interested in pushing the boundaries and pushing the story forward in unexpected ways, surprising the audience as much as we can.

We do our best work when we follow our instincts and tell the story we want to tell. We’ve had one or two experiences early in our careers where we didn’t do that and we learned a very hard lesson: When you try to predict what an audience wants, you’re going to make mush. When you commit to the story you want to tell, it tends to have a much more resonant impact on the audience … The audience can tell you they love chocolate ice cream, but if you give it to them every day, they’re going to get sick of it real fast. You’ve got to stay ahead of them.”

And the audience loves Spider-Man and Black Panther, which is why it’s best to turn them into freeze-dried chocolate ice cream and scatter them into the wind. At least for now.

(Via Variety)