In further one-sided criticisms:

So remember back when we talked about how great Avengers: Infinity War wasn't? Well, I talked about it, you just let me go on and on. I know that a blog is kind of a one way conversational exchange, but still, that's no excuse.

Nope, nothing. Maybe if you try shouting even louder?

Which, incidentally, was a better
movie than Infinity War. Yeah,
I'm like a dog with a bone.

I'll take your silence as tacit agreement that Infinity War was a bloated, stakes-less mess that shows that the series and maybe even the MCU in general has gone on long enough. Well...? Still nothing? Great, I'm glad you see it my way. Well, mine and enough other people's way that the directors-yes, directors. It took two people to direct that movie. Brothers in fact, which by Pacific Rim logic should have made it work better, but here we are. Huh? Yeah, I should warn you that I'm going to spoil the movie if you're one of the eight people who haven't seen it yet.

Couldn't he just reshuffle the discards?

(note: same plot hole, different joke)

Still there? Anyway, the Russo Brothers, Anthony and Joe, gave an interview to Huffington post in which they defended one of the bigger complaints people had with the movie. That complaint being that it ends on a cliffhanger that is in no way a cliffhanger. Specifically that Thanos, in a fit of malthusian super-villainy, uses the magic rainbow wish glove to vaporize half the universe in order to reduce the strain on resources. And no, we're not talking about how he could have just wished more resources, everyone's sick of people making fun of that glaring plot hole.

No, instead they addressed the fact that the movie asks us to believe that all the superheroes that got vaporized are totally dead you guys. Like, for real. Even though Disney already has already announced a stand alone sequel for vaporizees Spider-Man and Black Panther, whose movie earlier this year was the most successful superhero movie like, ever.

"No please, we know you loved Black Panther, but he's been exploded by Thanos
and we're just too damned committed to our artistic integrity to make a sequel."

-Some Disney executive

"The fans are corporeal. Adversarial.
Linear. Time? What is this...time?"

(+10 nerd points)

According to Anthony Russo, some of the sequels get around this by taking place before Infinity War:

"...people have become accustomed to time moving linearly in the MCU. That doesn't necessarily have to be the case."

-Anthony Russo, on how 

we're just too attached too 

the concept of linear time

"Um...hurray? They uh, made it. Briefly."

-me, at the end of Aliens

Ok cool, I can accept that we're getting these sequels out of chronological order or whatever, but doesn't that kind of cast pall over them? Like if we bought for a minute that Spider-Man really did die in Infinity War, wouldn't Spider-Man Homecoming 2 be kind of a bummer? Knowing that whatever happens in it, whatever odds he surmounts or character developments occur, he's doomed to perish along with half the universe? Sort of like watching Aliens knowing that everyone but Ripley is going to die of freezer burn, off camera before Alien 3. It's a bummer.

Not anything. I mean, not even a
reality-warping gauntlet could've made
off-brand X-Men seem interesting.

But ok, fine, let's say half the population of the universe just got raptured by Bran from The Goonies, and we're in for some prequels. Russo also said something else that I think totally undercuts whatever assurances he was trying to make about his film's ending having any narrative weight whatsoever:

"Here's the thing, I think it's important to remember anything is possible in the MCU."

-Russo, un-making his point

Maybe I just want to be negative here because everyone else like the movie and I didn't, but insisting that Infinity War's ending had dire, world-changing ramifications for the MCU and then explaining that anything is possible in the MCU feels a little like saying nothing matters in the MCU. The problem with Infinity War 2's inevitable conclusion it has to undo the first one's ending so these characters can go on to do sequels. And that's fine, I like those characters, but when 'anything is possible,' there are no stakes.

"Excellent, my victory is total! Unless of course someone steals my gauntlet
and uses it to undo everything I've accomplished...but that'll probably never happen."

-Thanos, jinxing it

"You make some good points, but what
we're saying is that it was actually great."

-The Russos

Look, I don't mean to bag on the Russos, I mean, lots of people liked the movie. I think more liked it than didn't, and even those who agree with me about the ending being lame still liked the film overall. And that's cool. It just seemed a little like the directors were given the weird marketing task of explaining to fans why they should have liked it more, and I call bullshit on that. They tried ending their part 1 on what was supposed to feel like a shocking twist, but it felt neither shocking nor twisty. It felt like a fake out.

Of course Iron Man or Captain Marvel or whoever is going to un-vanish Black Panther and Drax and everyone in part 2. And of course that's going to further weaken this movie's ending. I think that's a fair criticism. On the other hand, while it doesn't make for a suspenseful cliffhanger, but I suppose it does bring it more in line with the source material. Like, think of a Marvel character. Got one? Great, chances are you just named a character who's died and come back to life at least once.

"Holy shit, I know, right?"

-Jean Grey