Let’s Talk About That Tantalizing Avengers: Infinity War End Credits Scene

*** INFINITY WAR SPOILERS AHEAD ***

Marvel has conditioned us to expect more once the credits have rolled on their movies, and what we saw after the conclusion of Infinity War was extremely important to the MCU’s future.

When I say conditioned, I mean conditioned. At my first Infinity War screening, I joked with the guy sitting next to me that I now generally sit through the credits at most movies, either expecting or hoping that they’ll follow this Marvel tradition and give us just one more scene thereafter. (He said that he does the same.) In Marvel’s case, the movies sometimes have two: mid-credits and post-credits, and these scenes can range from crucial to silly.

Take Thor: Ragnarok, for example: the mid-credits scene has Thor and Loki staring out into space on the Asgardian refugee ship, debating if they should go to Earth, when suddenly Thanos’ massive warship, Sanctuary II, bears down on them. While Thor looks up in confusion, you can see Loki’s face fall, as though he understands what’s coming. If you missed Ragnarok or that scene, you missed a bridge into the beginning of Infinity War, which opens with Thanos’ ship decimating the Asgardians. And if you stayed all the way to Ragnarok‘s post-credits sequence, what you get is a comedic scene of Jeff Goldblum’s Grandmaster jokingly trying to persuade the revolutionaries on Sakaar that they should declare a tie. Marvel’s end credits can strike a variety of tones.

Infinity War‘s post-credits scene is no joke. We open with some well-known faces, as Nick Fury and Maria Hill are driving around and monitoring that there’s something big going down in Wakanda. Then, the car in front of them spins out and crashes into theirs. (I was reminded of the car attack on Fury in Winter Soldier, and at first thought he was under siege again.) But when Maria gets out to investigate, the car’s passengers have vanished. That’s when chaos seems to strike the city around them, as people start being affected by the Gauntlet snap. A helicopter, we presume now pilotless, careens into a building. People run around in terror. Maria exclaims, “Nick—” and then she’s dusted herself.

Fury moves quickly, retrieving some kind of device from their car and just managing to activate it before he, too, falls victim to the Gauntlet and fades away. The device drops to the ground, and appears to be a kind of old-school beeper with a few more futuristic additions. It seems to be transmitting—I assume a distress call—and at last connects with its recipient: the screen fills with Captain Marvel’s insignia.

Now, we’ve obviously known for quite some time that Brie Larson’s Carol Danvers is positioned to be big in the MCU going forward. Captain Marvel will be the first MCU female-led superhero movie, and that’s a pretty huge deal in and of itself; now it appears that Carol will be essential in saving the whole damned galaxy. That’s our girl.

At current, Captain Marvel is slated for March 6th, 2019, with Avengers 4 coming out two months later on May 3rd. This sets things up to introduce audiences to Carol, establish her origins, and show what she can do before she makes her debut among the Avengers in Avengers 4. Now that we know what happens in Infinity War, it makes even more sense that Captain Marvel is set in the ’90s. Carol couldn’t well be running around in the now-ravaged present day to tell her origin story, and the ’90s give her a safe distance from the events Infinity War. However, the fact that Fury calls Carol raises a bunch of questions:

• What happens in Captain Marvel to presumably take Carol off the grid by its end? Otherwise, wouldn’t she be a sort of senior-level superhero on Earth by now?
• Is Carol even on Earth during the events of Infinity War? My guess is no, and Fury has a cosmic beeper capable of communicating with her.
• What’s her relationship with Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D.?
• How will they explain Carol remaining the same age that she is 30 years ago in Captain Marvel when she shows up in Infinity War? (She also often doesn’t appear to age in the comics, so this could just be a Carol Thing.)
• What’s with the beeper? This suggests that Nick hasn’t been in contact with her since the ’90s, but he’s kept it around for safe keeping in an emergency. I joked thereafter that maybe Carol is “trapped in the ’90s,” but that’s probably not the case. On the other hand, all signs of Avengers 4 point to a time travel plot, so you never know.

What else did the end credits sequence make you wonder? And were you as relieved and as excited as I was when that insignia popped up? Help us, Carol Danvers; you’re our only hope.

(image: Marvel Studios)

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