Avengers Endgame Is The Best Comic Book Movie Ever
3. It Features The MCU's Best Performances
At this point, it's probably fair to say that the Russos have presided over the best the MCU has to offer. The Winter Soldier, Civil War and Infinity War all boasted some of the series' best performances, and managed to raise the bar in each entry. Endgame, by design, is the film that demands most from its stars though.
The aforementioned Captain America sequels and Infinity War were all emotional films, and Civil War in particular deserves praise for the way it marshals the fallout between Steve Rogers and Tony Stark. Until Endgame, Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. gave their best performances as Cap and Iron Man respectively in that film, but whereas they're both highlights of a convincing cast in that entry, come Endgame, they're a part of an ensemble all equally in tune.
Once again, Evans and Downey Jr. are spectacular as Cap and Iron Man. The former seems almost lost at the beginning, unable to see where the line actually ends and what to fight for. Stark, on the other hand, feels immense guilt for what happened on Titan, and attempts to settle down into family life while battling with an alter-ego he can't seem to let go of. Both are immaculate in their final moments, and it's in those sequences that both actors can rest assured that they've conjured two of the most memorable comic book movie performances of all time.
It isn't just Stark and Rogers who emerge from Endgame having raised the bar though. Jeremy Renner and Scarlett Johansson secretly give the film's two best performances as Hawkeye and Black Widow respectively. It's a huge shame that the latter's is overshadowed by a poorly handled death - the fallout of which is glossed over far too quickly - but Endgame still features Johansson's most subtle turn as Natasha yet. It's clear that Nat feels she owes so much to the Avengers, and it's in those earlier moments when everything is at its most hopeless that she's able to lay down the character's armour, and convey just how much the team means to her.
Likewise, Renner is finally able to deliver the performance everyone knew he was capable of giving back when he was first cast as Hawkeye. His Barton is grief-stricken, in way over his head and desperate to see his family again, and though it might be easy to mock the character's questionable do, there's a rawness to Renner's performance that bears the echo of the one that earned him an Oscar nom in Kathryn Bigelow's The Hurt Locker.
On the opposite end of the scale - at least in terms of tone - are Mark Ruffalo and Paul Rudd. The former performs 95% of the role in Endgame through facial capture technology, with Bruce Banner marrying his own personality to the physicality of the Hulk, and it is tremendous. Ruffalo deserves so much praise for the work he's done on the character - especially so, given he hasn't had a single solo film to his name - and in giving him a different platform to take the performance somewhere new, Endgame deserves just as much.
Rudd, meanwhile, is the heart and soul of the fourth Avengers film. He looks up to Captain America with gleeful abandon, and is the one to galvanise Earth's Mightiest Heroes into action. Sure, it's easy enough to sing the praises of Paul Rudd - a man who, realistically, has no flaws to speak of - but it's fair to say this was the film where he made Ant-Man his own.