Coming out of this year's San Diego Comic Con, one of the big-ticket trailers to hit the floor was the first look at Avengers: Infinity War. If you were at the convention, there was a chance that you got to see the footage for yourself, and went home raving about the images newly burned into your mind. But for the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe fans who weren't lucky enough to be in that room at that moment, your options are limited and more than likely your patience is running out. Which naturally poses the question, "Should Marvel Studios release the Avengers: Infinity War footage to the internet?" In the opinion of this author, there's only one answer to that question: yes, and as soon as possible.
Now before diving into the big reasons why, let's talk about the footage from a top level view of understanding. It's a short video that shows our favorite avenging heroes teaming up with absent friends, like Thor, and new friends, like Doctor Strange and the Guardians of the Galaxy. The coup de grace, of course, is some of the first footage of Josh Brolin's Thanos, making his MCU return after debuting in Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014. End your footage with the mad titan calling down some sort of planet to crush our heroes, and you've got a crowd of cheering Comic-Con fans. Interestingly enough, this description is probably not new, as you've either read it from items coming out of Comic-Con coverage, or you've seen the footage on the internet. Both of these methods leave something to be desired, and ultimately annoy the fans.
When it comes to reading the description of the footage, it's interesting to see how someone else reacted to the Avengers: Infinity War trailer, but it still doesn't change the fact that you haven't seen it for yourself. Sure, you could avoid reading the descriptions and reactions, but even if you do that, there's a chance that other people will be talking about it in open public settings. It's a news story that's hard to avoid, so odds are you won't be able to stay away from whatever other people are saying, and hearing that description is just going to make you want to see it all the more. Though if you thought that was annoying, try actually seeing the footage, albeit in much poorer quality.
Those problems complement each other, as they link into one gigantic whole. With tons of sub-par camera videos that are hanging around on the internet, and write-ups that are probably inspiring fans to watch said videos, people are already going to watch the Avengers: Infinity War trailer. So why not release the footage in the highest quality for all to see? Practically everything else from Marvel's Comic-Con run is already online, except for The Avengers' latest adventure, and the longer the studio waits to release the footage, the more of an effort they'll have to put into stopping all of the illegal copies hitting the internet. Marvel Studios should be doing the same thing they did when the Avengers: Age of Ultron trailer leaked to the internet: they should release the hi-def version, so they can stop the pirated spread of their material.
If the studio were to release the Avengers: Infinity War footage to the masses, that's another wave of press that'll help the studio talk up the release of next summer's massive event. Not to mention, fans will be happier to be able to see the film the way it's meant to be seen. Best of all, Marvel Studios will have a chance to impress fans with a bigger, better look at Infinity War in the future. The cat may be partially out of the bag now, and our own Matt Wood says it should stay in the bag, but letting the feline out completely just leaves the studio with another chance to impress. In the end, this could be beneficial to Marvel Studios in ways they'd never dreamed of.
Avengers: Infinity War busts into theaters on May 4, 2018; though you might get a glimpse of this footage with Thor: Ragnarok on November 3rd, if the studio doesn't decide to play ball with our humble suggestion.
