Deleted Avengers: Infinity War Scene Pits Happy Hogan Against TMZ
Avengers: Infinity War had the biggest cast of any Marvel Cinematic Universe movie yet, from the superheroes who banded together to fight Thanos and his minions to the supporting members of their respective casts. But not every notable MCU character was able to participate in the galaxy-spanning event. In Jon Favreau's case, he briefly reprised Happy Hogan in Infinity War, but his scene was taken out of the theatrical cut. Fortunately for fans of the character, Happy's deleted scene has been included on the Infinity War home release, and it sees him running interference with TMZ on behalf of his longtime boss/friend, Tony Stark.
Happy Hogan's excised Avengers: Infinity War appearance is part of the extended scene between Tony Stark and Pepper Potts during their walk in Central Park. As those who saw the movie will remember, Tony had brought up a dream he had with Pepper about her having a baby, and Pepper strongly denied that she was pregnant. But in this version of the scene, Happy then rides up in a golf cart and tells Tony and Pepper to just get married already, as he's tired of having to fend off paparazzi and the media circus surrounding the couple. Happy brings up that he traded paint with a TMZ reporter, but then he spots a photographer in the distance trying to snap a picture and rides after him to chase the man (named Bert) away. From there, presumably that's when Doctor Strange would have shown up to bring Tony back to the Sanctum Sanctorum.
Jon Favreau was instrumental in launching the MCU by directing Iron Man and Iron Man 2, and even with his time behind the scenes on the franchise done, he's still maintained a foothold in front of the camera by reprising Happy Hogan on several other occasions. Before Avengers: Infinity War's release, Favreau's last Happy appearance was in Spider-Man: Homecoming, where he was supposed to be keeping an eye on Peter Parker, but didn't care for that duty whatsoever. Happy also oversaw the transfer of Avengers equipment from Avengers Tower in New York City to the new facility, and when Peter foiled The Vulture's hijacking, Happy gained newfound respect for the teen superhero. Despite being cut out of Infinity War, Happy is expected to appear next year in Avengers 4. Assuming he isn't cut out of this movie either, whether that means he was part of the half of the universe that survived the Thanos snap or that he'll return to the land of the living when the Mad Titan's genocide is undone remains to be seen.
Avengers: Infinity War is now available on Digital HD, but those of you wanting to purchase the movie on Blu-ray/DVD, those copies hit shelves on August 14. The next MCU movie up is Captain Marvel on March 8, 2019, but then on May 3, 2019, Avengers 4 will wrap up the Phase 3 era.
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Connoisseur of Marvel, DC, Star Wars, John Wick, MonsterVerse and Doctor Who lore, Adam is a Senior Content Producer at CinemaBlend. He started working for the site back in late 2014 writing exclusively comic book movie and TV-related articles, and along with branching out into other genres, he also made the jump to editing. Along with his writing and editing duties, as well as interviewing creative talent from time to time, he also oversees the assignment of movie-related features. He graduated from the University of Oregon with a degree in Journalism, and he’s been sourced numerous times on Wikipedia. He's aware he looks like Harry Potter and Clark Kent.