Avengers: Endgame scrapped the original portals scene because it “didn’t play” as the VFX team wanted

‘Avengers Endgame’ marked the highest point of Marvel Studios in 2019 with a premiere that is among the highest grossing in history and a great reception among critics and the public, going down in history as one of the most important milestones of superhero cinema. All this through the resolution of the Infinity Saga and a final battle against Thanos that surprised the entire world because of the epicness of bringing together all of the characters of the MCU at the same time and place. Who does not remember the “Avengers, assemble” by Cap in a clear nod to the comics? But such a brutal moment could have been much simpler, as the film’s digital effects supervisor, Dan Deleeuw, has pointed out in a recent interview for his direction of the second episode of the second season of ‘Loki’.

A final act without “Avengers Assemble”?

This is what Dan Deleeuw, one of the directors of ‘Loki’ Season 2, who worked as a digital effects supervisor on ‘Avengers Endgame’, stated, revealing that the scene with the portals was not planned that way at the beginning: “There was a version of the cut, the day that we had all the actors together, and it was like this long panning shot across all the actors. It was the day that everyone was there and it was like this giant, expensive in essentiality you had all the actors there, but it just didn’t play as well as we wanted,” explains the creative.

He continued: “And so it was something that I got with pre-viz and Jeff Ford, our editor, and we just said, ‘We have to go with the portals and just you picking who comes out when.’ It was just something that for I think originally it was like we knew who survived and when they were coming back, but we needed to slow it down and give the audience a chance to welcome their heroes back.”

“And so it was so interesting in terms of like, ‘Okay, who comes from Titan first? Okay, you get the Guardians and then Star-Lord’s going to show up.’ And then just being in the theater that day, it’s like starting, okay, we got to do Spider-Man last because Spider-Man! So it was very much crafted to be emotional, and I think it was amazing for all of us that opening weekend, how well the fans responded to it.”

We will see if with ‘Avengers Secret Wars’, an epic moment is achieved as outstanding as the climax of ‘Avengers: Endgame’; In this sense, the latest rumors point to the definitive multiversal  crossover to end with a reboot of the MCU in the purest Ultimates style. For now, we will have to wait for 2027 to find out.