Yesterday, we brought you to the reaches of the Marvel fan theories for some Infinity Stone speculation that was … well, kind of a reach. But what if something both more obvious and incredibly meaningful and perception-altering is afoot? It may be that we’ve already seen the final piece of Thanos’ Infinity Gauntlet puzzle in a way that has more impact than seeing the glowing Soul Stone itself.
**Warning: If you want to go into Infinity War completely untainted, turn back now.**
The culmination of the entire iconic superhero movie universe up to this point is on its way in Marvel’s Avengers: Infinity War, and past movies have given us the whereabouts of the “Infinity Stones” that overarching big bad Thanos will use to power his devastating Infinity Gauntlet, except one: the Soul Stone. Marvel stalwarts have no doubt already thought of this themselves, even if they don’t buy it, but a compelling theory on the Soul Stone goes like this: The orange planet we see in the official Infinity War trailer is the result of the Soul Stone being used on one or more of the Avengers.
So while we haven’t seen the stone itself, what we have seen of it in the movie’s marketing may be even more important. This is backed up by Marvel’s current comic book storyline, which, as ScreenRant points out, features an orange planet as the manifestation of Soul World, the place where the souls trapped inside the Soul Stone reside. Soul World was first introduced back in 1975, with a different look, but it’s been retooled in its recent appearance to align with the expected orange appearance of the movie’s Soul Stone, as well as the unknown planet and some of the orange-tinted shots from the Infinity War trailer.
With Marvel’s propensity to adjust what’s happening in the comics to stay movie-adjacent, it’s pretty likely that’s not a coincidence, but what it means is still fairly open for speculation. While Soul World has a history of being a place of peace for those trapped there, it’s possible the movie version could be Tony Stark’s worst nightmare. His struggles with inadequacy and fear have been a major part of the story arc of Marvel’s movies, and from the apocalyptic look of the Soul World-colored parts of the trailer, it could be that Thanos has used the Soul Stone to create a personal version of hell for Stark.
That could even fit together neatly with Black Panther’s use of the afterlife and theories that, while we never saw the Soul Stone in that movie, it’s still in Wakanda somewhere and was responsible for the Black Panthers’ powers and their peaceful afterlife. It’s possible that whoever wields the Stone is responsible for the state of the Soul World they create, and Thanos would naturally create one that’s a lot less friendly to its inhabitants.
Whatever the case, it’s hard to tell how that will figure into the overall plot of the movie, and the trailer is almost certainly playing with our expectations by showing us things that aren’t necessarily “real.” Are Tony and Peter Parker both in Soul World, with Thanos crushing the latter to destroy Tony emotionally, or is Tony there all alone, and Peter—and maybe even that version of Thanos—and the other Avengers aren’t really there at all, but phantom versions designed to play on Tony’s fears? Will we see the rest of the team mount a rescue attempt for him? What does his memory-recreating B.A.R.F. technology, featured in Captain America: Civil War, have to do with this, since it’s apparently going to make a comeback? That, on top of Soul World, makes for a lot of opportunity for introspection in what otherwise seems like one giant action set piece of a movie.
Or is B.A.R.F. all a really deeply embedded real-world misdirection, designed to explain away why we’ve seen some throwback outfits on the movie’s set in an attempt to hide the Soul Stone’s manipulative fantasy world as the real reason? Really, anything’s possible with the power of the Space Stone, Time Stone, Power Stone, and the Mind Stone all in play, as well. What do you think about this possibly reality-altering interpretation of the trailer?
(image: Marvel Entertainment)
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