Avengers Endgame came out recently and today's video focuses on the most important character
of the last two Avengers films...Thanos
[Intro]
First of all this video won't be dealing with any spoilers from Endgame though there will
be some for Infinity War.
If you haven't watched it, I'd highly recommend doing so if you're keen to avoid spoiler talk.
Thanos has been built up as the biggest threat in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, or MCU for
short, for around 6 to 7 years now and finally we see him take a prominent role being portrayed
by Josh Brolin.
In this video I want to focus on how Thanos became one of the most endearing Marvel villains
and how he became such a dominant force within the MCU on fufilling his ambitions, but also
why it's dangerous empathise with him and how to identify character traits that are
to be questioned in real life.
Just before we head into his endearing qualities, if you enjoy this video, please drop a like,
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Right, so let's understand why Thanos has come to be one of the most popular and dominant
personalities in the Marvel Universe.
1) He displays incredible confidence and conviction
The first trait that Thanos showed that's endearing is confidence and conviction.
The way he deals with situations, without appearing emotionally triggered, even when
things appear to be desperately close to the end for him, is a quality of a strong leader.
People want to follow those with a cool head and well thought out decisions.
Thanos oozes this in spades and shows it at all times, he never seems flustered or unsure
about his choices.
This helps him appear as a strong character, someone who personifies traditional alpha
traits.
2) He shows feelings towards individuals
Thanos on occasions showed feelings towards others, most notably in the events where he
spared the life of his adopted daughter, Gamora.
This is exemplified numerous times throughout the course of Infinity War as part of his
character development.
However, this feeling is not limited to this single relationship, for example as he talks
about his plans for genocide being instant and painless as an act of mercy.
Now while twisted in the eyes of most people, it's still a sign that he's not completely
evil and uncaring and however little it helps, it does help make him just that little bit
more appealing.
The fact is, Thanos believes he's on a mission to save life before overpopulation causes
acts of self destruction leading to all life being lost.
We can sympathise with him too, as in his backstory this is precisely what happened
to his people on the planet Titan.
The reality is, while most of us will struggle to look past genocide as anything but an act
of evil, his reasoning and motivations behind it make it significantly easier for viewers
to sympathise with his character.
3) He follows through on what he says
Next the most endearing quality about him is he does what he says.
He takes action to get the Infinity Stones and he gets them.
He says what he will do, and he does it.
There's usually little to no doubt about whether he'll follow through with what he says and
for most people, someone that dependable is a sign of a quality leader.
Think about it, if most leaders in the world followed through with their promises, how
much more respect would you have for them?
That is assuming you agreed with what they promised in the first place.
From this you can see that Thanos naturally displays traits of a strong leader, being
confident, garnering sympathy and being reliable.
This can be both positive and endearing, hence the popularity of his character in the MCU,
but at the same time very few would find his vision and purpose in line with their values.
It's easy to understand whether Thanos is a "good" or "bad" guy, given in Infinity War
his mission was to wipe out half of all life in the Universe.
For anyone unsure....that's bad.
However, that's not always the case with people in our lives and it can be easy to get duped
into following the wrong leaders for their personality or promises.
So what are some of the character traits that need to be considered before following someone?
Well, in the case of Thanos, some questionable personality traits include:
1) His confidence and conviction might be admirable, but his unwillingness to see other
viewpoints is an issue
Let's face it, there's a number of questions Thanos raises that might actually convince
people that his absurd plan is actually justifiable.
His confidence and absolute faith that he's doing the right thing is actually an attractive
quality in leaders.
However, the major issue with Thanos is that his conviction is so strong that he's unwilling
to hear out what others might feel or think.
Great leaders usually hear other viewpoints to get a variety of perspectives before making
a decision, ultimately with the good of those they're leading at heart.
This isn't the case with Thanos, whose viewpoint is you're either helping him or the enemy
trying to stop him.
This attitude is one that bears resemblence to dictators, as they enforce their will onto
others regardless of the feelings or views of the other person.
Like Thanos, many dictators that have often come into power initially had support for
their movement before it became that they had an oppressive nature.
2) He shows feelings, but lacks empathy
Similar to the previous point on not acknowledging the views of others, Thanos shows a lack of
empathy towards others, where he simply considers others as expendable and has no feeling or
remorse of taking a life to fulfill his vision.
What's vital to note is I'm calling Thanos non-empathetic, but not psychotic which people
might assume here.
The key difference being that Thanos doesn't relate to the feelings of others, but unlike
people with psychopathic tendencies, he does have strong feelings towards others.
This is most prominent in his father - daughter relationship with Gamora, who he has strong
feelings for as acknowledged in pivotal moments in Infinity War, but at the same time showed
no compassion towards her feelings or wishes.
This attitude can't be described as anything more than selfish from a person trying to
portray something otherwise.
It's something to be wary of when following someone's vision.
They may say all the right things, but when push comes to shove and they're in a position
to take action, what are they doing and at what cost?
On the flip side, there's reason to argue the opposite.
Entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk springs to mind as an example, who often on first impression
gives off the feeling that he's self absorbed and an egotistical, yet testemonials from
people who follow him or have had contact with him suggest quite the opposite is true
and he's fully committed to the wellbeing of those around him.
Put simply, it's easy to get first impressions wrong, but dig deep and it's usually clear
what the true nature of any leader is.
3) He is a destructive, rather than constructive force
This one might seem obvious, Thanos has built his mission on the premise of destruction
in order to allow survival in his viewpoint.
While his argument might be one that's convincing, as he identifies the issues facing the Universe
in terms of resources, his purpose is ultimately one to kill and very few will be able to empathise
with that.
However, we see similar traits in the modern world with our leaders today.
Take Trump, whose election in 2016 was built on breaking his opponents by attacking them
time and again to build himself up.
In the UK, Brexit was sold by Johnson and Farage on the premise of perceived issues
with immigration, portraying foreign nationals coming into the UK as part of the problems
within the nation.
While there are circumstances that might need some level of deconstruction to rebuild stronger,
in both of these examples we see that the individuals used destructive means to achieve
for personal gain.
While Thanos can be argued for not acting solely out of personal gain, which can ironically
be argued as being a less selfish endeavour than the aforementioned real life leaders,
his actions will wipe out half of all life and with it a huge amount of innocent lifeforms.
Simply put, that's mass genocide on a scale beyond anything we can comprehend in real
life and there's simply no way to justify such destructive actions with such massive
costs.
We've also seen from real life examples how forced population control can cause significant
issues in a given place.
Take the one child policy from China that has left a serious issue with gender imbalance,
as well as significant concerns around human rights.
With Thanos' mission, who knows what long term effects it could have.
The best villain of the Marvel Universe has finally been given significant screen time
and had his story told.
Something fans have clamoured for a long time and a momentus occasion in modern cinema.
In this video, you can see why this character proved to be every bit as popular as hyped
and how this can be used to identify and question the leaders in our lives.
How have you found Thanos' on screen interpretation?
Let me know in the comments section below.
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