It’s taken me ages to write this review because… once you’re through, it has felt like there’s not much to say. So this isn’t going to be the most comprehensive of reviews.

The opening is awesome: Banner arriving back and Stark and Strange having to work together; Wanda and Vision having Their Moment; all of Thanos’ minions are very much bad takes on 1960s-style Bond villains. The interaction between Quill and Thor is just cringeworthy and I continue to dislike Quill.

Etc etc. Things go bad, people meet up, Peter Parker is adorable (“this really old film called Aliens…”). The fight in Wakanda is wonderfully choreographed and showcases different abilities. I think one thing I love about this and the next film is the way people from the different franchises are matched up and work together.

I love that Shuri gets such great moments. And Wanda – although her arc is one of the more heartrending. Okoye is of course transcendent, and M’Baku can have his own film as far as I’m concerned.

And then Quill proves that he’s a right tosser and destroys everything. Yeh, yeh, Strange saw all possible futures etc blah blah. Doesn’t negate the fact that Quill let his emotions get in the way in a spectacular way that basically means half the galaxy’s population DIES, QUILL. Tosser.

The very end, with people disintegrating, is genuinely distressing (although also a bit nonsensical, since why do some people take a while to go, and others don’t? why doesn’t everyone disappear at the same time?). And it took someone else to point out that basically we’re left with the original Avengers, at the end; everyone else is dead.

This film is exactly what it needs to be (except: too long). It brings together a whole bunch of threads that have been building up for nearly 20 films; it destroys the world and leaves the desperate need for things to be better in the next film; it gives some lovely character moments (except not for you, Quill. You suck). It doesn’t ignore the problems that have gone before – Steve and Tony, etc – but allows the characters to be genuinely heroic (except for Quill) in swallowing that animosity, in general, and doing what is required.

It’s not a perfect film, but I like it a lot. It doesn’t really have a heap of rewatchability, for me; the dramatic tension is a bit lessened with repeat viewings. But I have to admire the foresight that enabled a film like this to be the culmination of all that came before – and if there were reworkings and things had to be rewritten because they previously hadn’t worked, well, the writers and producers did a good job of that, too.