**Major spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War.**
No matter what happens in Avengers 4 and to what extent Thanos’ damage is undone, each death in Avengers: Infinity War was emotionally trying for its own reasons, especially for the characters left behind. But one of them in particular got an extended spotlight and wound up being the one that really put a sick feeling in my stomach, even though I know he’s got another solo movie already on the schedule. I’m talking, of course, about Spider-Man.
The wall-crawler’s post-gauntlet-snap goodbye to his mentor, Tony Stark, was incredibly hard to watch, and it turned out to be one part of the movie’s trailers that wasn’t playing tricks on us (except for keeping that no good dust out of our view). On top of pleading and somehow topping David Tennant’s Doctor Who exit with his own “I don’t want to go,” his parting words to Tony were, indeed, an apology. This moment has destroyed so many of us for so, so many reasons, and it only gets worse the more you think about it:
It’s also inspired heart-wrenching fan art, as well as an entire meme to kill the pain. All those emotional character implications between Peter and Tony would’ve been there on their own, just like they were for all the others who were lost, but it turns out we owe the extra pain of this one to none other than Tom Holland. According to those in attendance at a Q&A with director Joe Russo, he said that Spidey’s death scene was completely improvised, and their faith in Holland’s abilities was not misplaced. Russo also confirmed that Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie escaped along with half of the Asgardians (and some other interesting tidbits), but even that cannot make up for the damage this has done.
It certainly wasn’t the only death that made an impact on people, though—an approximately 12-year-old kid in the row in front of me literally got up and walked out of the theater when T’Challa disappeared. It was, however, the one that made me connect the most with the feelings of the person who was doing the vaporizing, rather than those of who they left behind, and that’s the feeling that really got to me.
I will never forgive Tom Holland and his incredible acting skills for this.
(via PopBuzz, image: Marvel Entertainment)
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