How 'Avengers: Infinity War' Influenced the Ending of 'Captain America: Civil War'

It's widely known among fans that Avengers: Infinity War is the beginning of the end for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, serving as the culmination for a decades worth of films. But it's also the next step for the directors, who began their own journey with Captain America: Winter Soldier.

Anthony and Joseph Russo, the brothers behind the scenes of the next two Avengers movies, spoke about how their previous film, Captain America: Civil War, set up what's to come in the biggest Marvel Studios movie to date.

"Marvel has this attitude, in general, which Joe and I really admire, that is a one-movie-at-a-time philosophy, even though there is certainly a plan and ideas about where things can go," Anthony said to The Telegraph. "The focus is always one movie at a time because it's your job just to make that movie everything that it can be regardless of any other film. You want to find the potential in that particular story. So that's how we came to our process."

Of course, the state of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in this film was established by the events of Civil War, and all of those fractures suffered will continue to be affected in the new events.

"But I think through the experience of working on Captain America: Civil War and working with (Christopher) Markus and (Stephen) McFeely on Civil War, we knew that there was a culmination coming," said Anthony. "I think part of the reason why we were drawn to tell the story of Civil War and one of the reasons why we thought it was such a great place to leave the Avengers divided at the end was because we knew the greatest threat they would ever face would be coming in Thanos."

The Russo Brothers have thrived in their work with Marvel Studios, creating a billion dollar film with Civil War as well as one of their most critically acclaimed entries with the Winter Soldier. And they seem to be chomping at the bit in tackling the biggest crossover movie yet.

"For storytellers it's like you always want the most extreme. You want your heroes to be at their lowest point when they meet their worst threat," Anthony said. "That's a great jumping off point for a story. So, we were smelling that as we were working through Civil War, and that's when I think Joe and I began to start thinking about how you carry it forward from that moment."

Avengers: Infinity War premieres in theaters on April 27th.

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