- I'm gonna be honest with you.
I tossed around a couple different ideas
of what kind of topic that I wanted to cover
with Avengers: Infinity War coming up.
I even put up a poll here on our community tab
on YouTube to see what you guys would want.
However, in my typical Scott ways,
I waited until the absolute last minute
to get this video done.
Seriously, I have like six hours to finish it
from the time I'm recording this.
Oh, I hate myself.
Clearly, I spend too much time
picking out shirt and tie combos for the camera,
but I think it's worth it.
So in a panic, this was my full
comprehensive thought process for this video.
Avengers, what are they,
what do they even avenge?
Got 'em.
Alright, jokes aside,
I think it is still a pretty valid question though.
It's heroes who swoop in to protect the world
from devastating threats,
wouldn't it make more sense
to call them something like The Defenders?
Oh, no, that one is taken.
How about the Guardians of,
no, no, that is also.
But you get what I'm saying, right?
Like what exactly are the Avengers avenging?
How are you doing you wonderful nerds?
Scott here, and if we look at the way back in 1963
when earth's mightiest heroes joined forces
for the first time,
they weren't really avenging anything.
In their opening adventure,
the team is assembled when
Ant-Man, The Wasp, Iron Man and Thor
attempted to stop Hulk from going on a rampage
provoked by Thor's brother, Loki, The Trickster God.
You know who these characters are.
I don't know why I'm clarifying.
After their victory against Loki,
Ant-Man floats the idea of forming a team,
to which Wasp adds "We need a name!"
It should be something colorful and dramatic,
like the Avengers or,
Ant-Man stops her right there.
"Or nothing," he says, "that's it, the Avengers!"
And that was indeed it.
That's all the explanation we were given.
It's almost kind of adorable
how the team picked their name
in such a silly, childish manner.
It's unquestionably the exact same way
that Stan Lee came up with the name for the team
when he was writing it with Jack Kirby.
After all, Lee has said in interviews before
that when naming superheroes,
he would usually just hit upon
monikers that sounded dramatic.
And I think The Avengers certainly qualifies.
- The Avengers.
That's what we call ourselves.
Sort of like a team.
Earth's mightiest heroes doing things.
- Thankfully, later comics that retold
the early years of The Avengers in more detail
expanded upon their namesake
to have it make a little bit more sense in context.
In 2004's Earth's Mightiest Heroes,
Captain America asked Tony Stark's butler, Jarvis,
"What can you tell me about these Avengers?
"What are they trying to do here?"
To which Jarvis responds,
"To be honest,"
Hold on, I should do like a,
like a British accent or something.
"To be honest, they've been trying to
"figure that out themselves."
I'm so sorry. (laughs)
Let's just do it normally. (laughs)
"It's not an easy thing they're attempting,
"forming an alliance whose sole purpose
"is to protect the innocent
"from whatever threats may arise."
So perhaps a name like the Protectors would be more,
oh, really, that one's taken too, apparently.
But as Thor explains elsewhere in the book
during a verbal spat with Iron Man,
the teams true goals are,
"to soundly smite the enemies of mortal man
"to avenge those who have suffered
"the evil of this world."
This sentiment of avenging people who have suffered
or are currently suffering at the hands of evil
is echoed in 2010's Avengers: The Origin.
Yet another retelling of the team's start.
Once again, it is Thor who gives an
impassioned speech on the subject
of their namesake,
with a subtle twist at the end.
"Our victory shall be the stuff of legend.
"Our triumphs shall echo throughout the nine worlds.
"'Tis endeavors such as these
"where the warrior deals of God and man
"intersect to produce something greater
"than the sum of it's parts.
"On this day, we have declared war.
"And we shall avenge the evils
"perpetrated by those who oppose us.
"We shall avenge them all."
Did you catch that bit at the end there?
So in this instance,
Thor makes the act of avenging a little bit more personal.
Vengeance on those who oppose the Avengers specifically.
It almost sounds less like a righteous retribution
on behalf of others and more like
retaliation on behalf of themselves.
So less avengers and more revengers.
- Revengers.
- Revengers?
- Because I'm getting revenge.
You're getting revenge,
and you (mumbles) you want revenge?
- I am undecided.
- Okay.
- Although this mentality does kind of
line up in the movies,
at least in the first Avengers film
when the team finally bands together.
The MCU of the name Avengers
had initially existed as kind of a
S.H.I.E.L.D code word operation.
- I'm here to talk to you about the Avenger issue.
- Now the transformation from a S.H.I.E.L.D response team
to the Avengers proper,
happens of course after, spoilers I guess,
Loki impaled Agent Coulson with a scepter
like a big jerk face.
Still bitter about it.
With his dying breath, Coulson tells Fury that,
- This was never going to work
if they didn't have something to.
- Avenge, I'm gonna guess he's gonna say avenge.
And he's right.
Coulson's death rallies the group together
to confront Loki and his army as a team.
The Avengers are avenging a fallen fellow Avenger!
And you can kind of see
how this seems to correspond
with the comics from earlier
with the team wanting vengeance
on those who oppose the Avengers specifically.
It's actually kind of selfish in that regard.
I mean, Loki killed, what 80 people in two days,
but Coulson was one of their own, can't stand for that!
But I get it, right?
Coulson may have been the catalyst.
But he definitely isn't the sole person
the Avengers are fighting for, obviously.
Rather, he's a stand-in for
all of the victims of catastrophes
that only extraordinary super people can resolve.
- The idea was to bring together
a group of remarkable people.
See if they could become something more.
See if they could work together
when we needed them to
fight the battles that we never could.
- When harm is done to the people of earth
by whatever baddies come calling,
the Avengers are there to answer that threat.
They can't guarantee protection,
they can't save everyone, they know that.
We've seen that.
In the very least.
- We can't protect the earth.
You can make damn well sure we'll avenge it.
- This video is part of a massive Infinity War collab
with tons of other great nerdy channels here on YouTube.
There are five other videos for you to watch right now
to get you hyped up for Avengers: Infinity War.
Go check out the next video in the playlist.
And if you're feeling exceptionally wild,
hit that big, sexy Subscribe button!
I'm not convinced that it does anything these days,
but it sure does boost my ego.
Usually I make much longer videos
with much more intense editing,
so if you're new here, sorry.
Anyways, thanks for watching.
My name is Scott
reminding you to read between the panels
and grow smarter through comics, see ya.