I finally saw Infinity War, which means I finally get to read your post in its entirety and comment on it. Sorry it took so long. :)
I read the Infinity Guantlet series a few months ago to familiarize myself with what could be happening in the movie, knowing that things would not go exactly as it did (that would be way too practical :). It's been my main gripe with any comic book movie adapting some well known story arc outside of the MCU.
For me, the X-Men have largely missed with their attempts, and so has the Fantastic Four and the original Hulk movie. The first two Spider-Man movies were pretty good. The rest, until Homecoming, weren't up to par.
Inside the MCU, however, they've done some pretty smart updating of the characters, and I don't mind it because it is in keeping with the original intent while fixing it within their own universe and more with today's times.
That said, I think Thanos as a more complicated villain is fine. The issues he's raised about running out of resources are good ones to have and to try to do something about, outside of genocide, mass sterilization or other drastic measures that go against the will of the people, of course.
And while I'm not one of those folks who feels we need to manage the population or necessarily go bankrupt turning to alternate energy resources, I can understand the problem, particularly in countries where overcrowding is an issue. And we've already seen forms of what Thanos has carried out through limiting the amount of children, wars, which ultimately end up being at the very least an unintended form of population control, and other means.
So, I get Thanos, and his reason for wiping out half the universe is much better than the reason for doing it in the comic book series, where he says he's doing it to please Lady Death, when it's more because he's insane with power.
All that said, while you may have heard gasps from the audience as far as who died, I found it very interesting that none of the original Avengers were among them—it was nearly every phase two and phase three superheroes instead. The ones who have one and at most two movies under their belts, rather than three of their own, plus two Avengers movies (leading to this), plus whatever crossing over they may have done already (such as Civil War, which was essentially an Avengers movie).
Plot-wise, it's an interesting choice, and not one I would have gone with. I probably would have taken out some of the Avengers and some of the others, maybe leaving the least likely mix of superheroes to try to figure things out.
The problem is, I know how the comic book ends. I also know where the movie is likely to go, and it's based less on what would be good for the characters or the story lines as it has to do with actors, budgets and so forth. Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. have both talked about not renewing contracts once their done, and so my guess is, they will die somehow saving everyone else. The rest of the folks will be left to soldier on.
So, what they've done, in essence, is delay the inevitable for one last movie. :) Which is fine. I'd rather not see Steve Rogers or Tony Stark die just yet. But I probably would of had one of them die now to live later and maybe have them retire into the sunset somehow, leaving them to make cameos here and there later on. :)
Dang, Glen, this is a blog post in itself!
Good thoughts all around and I agree with pretty much everything you said.
Yeah. I only realized how much I'd written until after I went back to re-read and edit. :) Doesn't happen like that very often, I must say. I guess I really liked the topic. :)
Of course, I waited a month to be able to leave something, too, so hopefully something of worth came out.