The wait is almost over. Avengers: Infinity War officially opens in theaters on Friday and is set to bring in a massive box office haul during its opening weekend in North America. However, even for all the excitement, there are still those whose first Marvel Cinematic Universe experience will be Infinity War.
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And no, there’s not enough time stage a marathon MCU intervention. It would take a little over a day and a half at least to watch them all. That doesn’t mean that the uninitiated can’t get caught up before settling in for Infinity War, though. Thanks to one very creative fan there is a PowerPoint-style presentation that will get any MCU novice caught up on the basics when it comes to the Infinity Stones and makes for a pretty great refresher for even the most die-hard fan, too. After all, we have to do something to pass the hours between now and showtime.
The presentation, which you can check out here, isn’t going to recap the previous movies in the MCU or quite what Thanos wants with them, but it does a good job of explaining in a very basic form what the stones are, what they do, and the hands they’ve passed through (you might still have to explain why Loki keeps getting and then not having stones). As one would expect, there’s no real information on the Soul Stone and there’s no worry about the presentation accidentally ruining Infinity War, either. This presentation is entirely spoiler-free for the upcoming film.
And it’s not just the Infinity Stones that the presentation presents an overview of. It also breaks down the heroes into groups based off their last locations in the MCU which should help even the newest of viewers have an understanding of who is who. The only real information that the presentation is missing that might be useful is an explanation of who Thanos is. The Mad Titan appears only on one slide with footage from some of the trailers for Infinity War showing him emerging from a dark cloud. The notation on that slide is “Infinity Stones gone right” and depending on if you’re Team Thanos or Team Everyone Else, that might be a little misleading.
Realistically, though, given that Infinity War is the culmination of a decade’s worth of MCU stories and films, there’s no primer that can prepare someone for the film. Many of the early reactions for the film from those fortunate enough to see it at Monday night’s red carpet premiere noted that, even for the most devoted Marvel fans, they simply weren’t ready. It sounds like everyone is going in a little blind on this one — which could make for the most exciting MCU installment yet.
Avengers: Infinity War opens on April 27th. You can check out ComicBook.com’s review here.
Other upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe movies include Ant-Man and the Wasp on July 6th, Captain Marvel on March 8, 2019, the fourth Avengers movie on May 3, 2019, the sequel to Spider-Man: Homecoming on July 5, 2019, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 in 2020.
