I loved the movie. But.
These are heroes? Time after time in the movie characters are given a choice. Save the one you love and risk all life in the universe. Time after time the so-called-heroes choose to save the ones they love and let everyone else die. What a bunch of pussies. The more villainous the character, the more they are willing to value the lives of people they don’t know. The villains are the moral ones, the heroes are self-centered babies.
Roughly in chronological order:
- The Asgardian dwarves forge the Infinity Gauntlet in a misguided attempt to save each other.
- Loki gives the Space Gem of his own free will to save Thor. Loki is faking it, it was a trick to kill Thanos that fails. Note that Loki is a “villain.”
- Vision wants to sacrifice himself to destroy the Mind Gem. The Scarlet Witch won’t go along with it, no one else will either. They go to Wakanda to try and get it out without killing him, but taking endless amounts of precious time to do it. They gamble the fate of the universe at long odds.
- Starlord/Quill has the opportunity to kill Gamora rather than have her be Thanos’ victim. He has sworn this to her. But when it is time, he won’t do it. He won’t do it. He thinks about it. He finally pulls the trigger. Far far too late to matter, as Thanos turns the blast into bubbles.
- Gamora then tells Thanos where the Soul Gem is kept in order to save her sister.
- Thanos sacrifices the only being he loves in order to get the Soul Gem. Note that Thanos believes he is saving the universe from untold anguish by doing so.
- Dr. Strange gives the Time Stone of his own free will to save Tony Stark. (In fairness, this may be because he believes that is the only path to ultimate victory.)
- Scarlet Witch shows some guts finally, but far too late. Of course the good guys lose when that wasted time leads to Thanos’ victory.
None of them make the choice correctly. It is an obvious choice. There is nothing heroic about allowing trillions of others to die so your loved one can live. It is selfish and immoral, it is the opposite of heroic.
(On a side note – now that Thanos has control of reality, instead of killing half of life he could simply create twice as many resources. Problem solved!)
I mean… yeah. Or he could use his powers of time and space and so on to make people not need as much resources. Or superfund Impossible Foods. Or make people slightly better at cooperating and long-term thinking. Make the fertility rate lower. Have people feel less suffering when they’re suffering. Or a dozen other things.
Finally saw the movie last night. Great point about creating more resources! That’s a big plot problem. What jumped out at me was the futility of his solution. Once half the life is wiped out, the survivors will inevitably expand and repopulate, undoing Thanos’ hard work. He will need to return regularly and re-cull to keep things in check.