Avengers: Endgame Could Have Featured An Epic Reunion
Contains spoilers for Avengers: Endgame
Every major corner of the Marvel Cinematic Universe came together for Avengers: Infinity War. What was left of life after Thanos (Josh Brolin) snapped his fingers and turned 50 percent of the universe into space dust in that film reconvened for Avengers: Endgame. Longtime friends joined forces, heroes who had never met one another before finally got the chance to, and a pair of former pals confronted their past, settled their squabbles, and rekindled their bond. Avengers: Endgame was arguably as much a film of reunions as it was one of action, emotion, and Thanos getting his butt handed to him by the Avengers.
As it turns out, though, Endgame short-changed audiences in the reunion department. It could have featured one more epic and long-awaited meet-up.
To reiterate, Avengers: Endgame spoilers ahead!
The concluding moments of Endgame completed the character arcs of Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man, Chris Hemsworth's Thor, and Chris Evans' Captain America. Iron Man successfully swindled the Infinity Stones straight from Thanos' hand, slid them into his suit, and snapped his fingers to dust the dastardly tyrant and his Black Order and army of Chitauri. In doing so, Tony Stark sacrificed himself, dying in front of his fellow heroes. Looking worse for wear and rocking a beer belly, Thor pushed past his post-Snap blues, helped defeat Thanos, left Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) in charge of "New Asgard," and joined the Guardians of the Galaxy on their new mission to find Gamora (Zoe Saldana). And Captain America? He traveled back in time, returned the Infinity Stones, then used up the remaining Pym particles go back even further in time to reunite with Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell) and live a long life with her.
Endgame didn't explicitly reveal much from Steve Rogers' time with Peggy, save for a sweet dance between the two of them at the very end of the film, and it skipped out on showing viewers anything from his trip to return the Stones. That's a bummer, since fans could have seen Captain America meet back up with his nemesis Red Skull (Ross Marquand).
A villainous member of Hydra, Red Skull served as the central antagonist in Captain America: The First Avenger, the end of which saw him teleport to Vormir, the far-off planet where the Soul Stone is located, after he held the Tesseract with his bare hands. There, Red Skull has been stuck in a purgatory-like state and served a Stonekeeper who guards the Soul Stone and advises those who wish to obtain it — people like Thanos in Infinity War and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) in Endgame.
While returning the Soul Stone to Vormir, Captain America almost certainly ran into Red Skull — unless the baddie somehow took a leave of absence from his position as the Keeper of the Soul Stone after Hawkeye acquired it. Assuming Red Skull didn't abandon his post and he and Cap did meet up again, what might have happened between the old foes? Did they have a small spat? Did Cap sneak past the sinister guy and slip the Soul Stone back into place without him noticing? Did they duke it out to the fullest, or did they just passive-agressively stare at each other in silence before Cap zipped to his next stop?
Sadly, we'll never now how the reunion went or what could have been, as Steve Rogers caught up with the present as a wrinkly, white-haired old man. There's no more fight left in him: he had his run as Captain America, retired once the Infinity Stones were back where they belonged, grew old, and then passed on his Captain America shield to Sam Wilson/Falcon (Anthony Mackie). There's no going back to the past for the Star-Spangled Avenger, and thus there's no chance for viewers to see Captain America and Red Skull face off once more.
It's a shame Endgame cheated audiences out of that moment, especially since fans had hoped a Captain America-Red Skull reunion would take place at some point in the film, but in the grand scheme of things, it's not a huge complaint. More than anything, it's another lingering question Endgame has left us with — one that's nowhere near as pressing as, say, where the heck Loki (Tom Hiddleston) went, how the billions of once-dusted people are going to reintegrate into society after being gone for five years, and how many Fornite wins Thor has under his belt.