New Avengers: Infinity War character bios shed light on some of the key players’ motivations, including big bad Thanos. Next on the Marvel Studios docket is arguably their most ambitious undertaking yet. Assembling every single hero in the famed franchise in a two in a half hour big screen spectacle sounds fun. But it needs a strong narrative reasoning to bring all these characters together, otherwise, Infinity War will be nothing but a nonsensical blockbuster - the worst way to end the MCU’s interconnected storyline that they have been working in the last decade.

Oddly, while Marvel has been hyping up Thanos for the last six years, we barely know anything about him and what his motivations are. Aside from wanting to collect all six Infinity Gems, we’re still in the dark as to what his end-game is. The film’s first trailer teased that he’s attempting in “balancing the universe,” but that is too vague to gauge whether it’s worthy of all this commotion that has ripple effects across the MCU. Fortunately, brand new character descriptions from tie-in toys give us a bit more context about his plan.

A slate of new Infinity War merchandise has just recently hit the Toys R Us website, including action figures of some of the film’s key players. While we’re interested what character descriptions revealed about Captain America and Spider-Man, the main takeaway from the bunch is Thanos’ considering we’ve spent the least time with him. The Mad Titan’s character description reveals that he is a “ruthless cosmic threat consumed with saving the universe from itself.” As to what logic backs up Thanos’ motivation is anybody’s guess at this point, but it’s definitely a better reasoning than just wanting to rule the whole galaxy like most blockbuster villains do.

Pressure for Thanos to be as menacing and strong as he’s advertised is immense. Not only is he supposed to be the baddest villain that the MCU has seen to merit all heroes to band together, he also follows arguably the best Marvel antagonist in its existence: Black Panther’s Erik Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan). It’ll be difficult to really flesh his character out the traditional way considering that a dozen more characters need to share screen time. So Marvel’s best bet is to establish him first so we understand him a bit better before we get back to our heroes, perhaps why Kevin Feige teases that chaos is ensued in the film’s first five minutes.

Aside from Thanos’ character bio, it’s interesting to see that both the Hulk and Thor are still struggling with their personal issues. While Thor: Ragnarok’s comedic tone undermined some of the dramatic events in the film, these character descriptions hint that their individual struggles can still factor in the Avengers’ upcoming face-off with the Mad Titan, and that’s a great thing as it adds an emotional layer to what could just be an empty spectacle. On top of our heroes’ main goal to ensure the safety of the universe, adding personal stakes into the mix will ground the film’s story, making people more invested. Since they are the only two main Avengers that weren’t in Captain America: Civil War we’re hoping that the Russo brothers highlight on that as part of their respective trajectories in Infinity War.

Fortunately, we won’t have to wait that long with Marvel Studios and Disney announcing that Avengers: Infinity War is hitting theaters a week early (at least in North America) than it supposed to.

MORE: Does This Avengers: Infinity War Art Reveal Who Holds the Soul Stone?

Source: Toys R Us

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