The Avengers: Endgame home release has allowed fans to explore the movie in more detail than ever before. Not only does the excellent commentary track provide a ton of behind-the-scenes detail about how the film was made, but simply being able to pause and study it has enabled some forensic analysis of what’s going on in the busier shots. This analysis has primarily focused on the titanic battle at the movie’s climax, when every MCU superhero to date turns up to throw down against Thanos’ army. But there’s one element that has some fans scratching their heads.
It comes just after Ant-Man and the Wasp have begun trying to get the Quantum Tunnel in their van operational. The pair dive into the front seats and quickly realize that it needs to be hot-wired – a process that Scott Lang says will take him ten minutes to do. But one minute later, during Black Panther’s spotlight moment, we see Ant-Man (in Giant-Man mode) beating up a Chitauri leviathan in the background. So, what gives?
Handwaving this away as Lang briefly stepping out to deal with a Leviathan doesn’t feel plausible, so we’re going to have to chalk it up to a simple editing mistake. The final battle sequence is by far the most complicated scene in the movie, featuring 36 superheroes using their own powers. With all manner of craziness going on, mistakes like this are understandable enough.
Still, this goof was noticed by eagle-eyed fans during the film’s run in theaters and I assumed the Russo Brothers would take the time to correct it for the home release. But it seems like they either forgot or just couldn’t be bothered. I’d go with the former, as given how much care they put into the rest of the movie, keeping it in is a strange omission.
Maybe one day down the line we’ll see a George Lucas-style special edition that fixes this, but for now, Avengers: Endgame fans are just going to have to deal with the mistake.