Robert Downey Jr Posts An Iron Man Throwback To Kick Off Avengers: Endgame Launch

Avengers: Endgame comes to theaters tonight, serving as the conclusion not just to the massive, two-part story begun in last year’s Avengers: Infinity War but also as a kind of “season finale” to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole. No movie since the first Avengers has felt so much like it was the end of an era and the beginning of another — and so it seems only appropriate that Robert Downey, Jr. — the actor whose Iron Man launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe and whose journey has continued through all of the Avengers movies as well as two sequels to his solo film — is sharing a throwback photo of a key moment from Iron Man with fans today.

Calling the Endgame release “the day we’ve been waiting for,” Downey tweeted that his time as Iron Man has been “the ride of a lifetime,” and shared an image of Tony Stark bringing the first fully-functional JARVIS AI for his Iron Man suit online, forever transforming the idea of Iron Man from the self-contained, flying tank he used to escape from the Ten Rings into a supercomputer-powered superhero that can do just about anything if given enough prep time.

In some ways, the moment Tony Stark brought that AI on board signals the birth of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, even more than the moment he made his way out of the cave. It also served as the blueprint for Ultron, one of the Avengers’ greatest foes, and The Vision, one of their second-generation members. At the same time, the moment happened with a relative minimum of pomp and circumstance, driven more by Tony’s attitude and personality in the moment than anything else. That can be said for much of the first Iron Man movie, which came in 2008 with no real expectations that it would be what it turned into.

Avengers: Endgame is in theaters tonight. Spider-Man: Far From Home hits theaters on July 5th.

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