Avengers: Endgame has been out for two weeks now, and with its release has come a slew of articles highlighting all of the small details that you may have missed, or that “only true Marvel fans noticed.” However, as I read through many of them, I realized that there was not a single thing listed that I had not noticed. As a huge Marvel fan myself, I took the liberty of investigating the cinematic experience that is Endgame to find the less obvious things that you may have missed. Below is a full list of details and less obvious things you may have missed in Endgame, so this goes without saying but just in case: ✪ There are Endgame spoilers ahead ✪
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When Clint is teaching his daughter how to shoot with a bow and arrow, you can clearly see the ankle monitor on his ankle, because he is on house arrest after the events of Captain America: Civil War.
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When Natasha, Scott, and Steve visit Tony’s house to see if he will help them with the “Time Heist,” Natasha is wearing her arrow necklace that she wore in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It was already previously confirmed that the actress who plays her character, Scarlett Johansson, chose to include the necklace as a reference to Hawkeye. Given the scene on Vormir, the addition of the necklace is a nice touch to again reference the relationship between the two characters.
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The location that New Asgard is based on, Tønsberg, Norway, is a direct callback to previous MCU movies from Phase 1. The first Thor movie references the town as a place where the Asgardians and Frost Giants fought, whereas Captain America: The First Avenger reveals that Odin had hidden the Tesseract there, where it was faithfully guarded until it was stolen by the Red Skull. Iron Man 2 referenced Tønsberg again, as a location that S.H.I.E.L.D. still monitors.
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Speaking more to the cinematography of the film, during Steve’s speech that he delivers to the team prior to their “Time Heist,” the camera shots correlate directly between what Steve says and the character that the camera is on when he says them. For example, when Steve says the famous “Whatever it takes” line used throughout many of the trailers, the camera lingers on Tony. This is possibly foreshadowing his death later on in the movie, as he literally did whatever it took to defeat Thanos, even if it meant sacrificing his own life. The hands of the Avengers together also bear resemblance to the original arc reactor.
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Steve curses a significantly higher amount in this film than the previous ones, which shows his character development from Avengers: Age of Ultron when he called Tony out for his “Language.”
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When Steve is fighting his past self in New York, the choke hold that his past self uses on him is a similar, if not the same move that he will use on Bucky during the helicarrier fight sequence at the end of The Winter Soldier. This is ironic considering Steve uses the phrase “Bucky is alive” in order to cause his past self to release him.
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When Thor travels to Asgard in the past, he sees his mother Frigga walk past with some of her handmaidens. In a short, quiet piece of dialogue you can hear her ask one of them to bring Loki some soup, which is in reference to Loki being in prison in Thor: The Dark World.
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Both Tony and Bruce reference Back to the Future at separate points in the movie, criticizing the logic of it. However, there is another largely overlooked pop culture reference when Rhodey and Nebula are on Morrag. When they find the Power Stone, Rhodey comments that when going into the “Temple of the Power Stone,” it probably has a booby trap such as spikes. This is referencing the film Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, as when they are in the Temple of Doom the ceiling as spikes that emerge and come near to killing them.
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When Steve goes back in time to the army base with Tony, the music that plays when he sees Peggy is the same score that played in The First Avenger when Steve spoke to Peggy for the last time before going under into the ice.
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During the same scene at the army base, Tony’s glasses are red with gold trim, similar to his Iron Man suit.
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Natasha’s outfit on Vormir has her iconic red hourglass symbol on the belt from The Avengers, as well as the blue electric details on her wrists from Age of Ultron.
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Red Skull mentions the “Everlasting exchange” that is needed to retrieve the Soul Stone, which explains why the team was unable to bring Natasha back after her sacrifice.
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On Vormir, Clint’s quiver appeared to be modified in order to account for his new blade.
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The dialogue between Natasha and Clint on Vormir was directly referencing Clint bringing in Natasha, as she says “I don’t judge people on their worst mistakes,” to which Clint replies “maybe you should.” Natasha replies “You didn’t,” which is a nod to Clint introducing her to S.H.I.E.L.D., and not to mention sparing her life.
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The suit that Bruce is wearing when they create the new gauntlet has a faint purple hue to parts of it, which is a nod to the character’s iconic purple pants that the Hulk wears throughout the comics.
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Steve’s suit during the same scene also has the trademark Avengers “A” symbol on both shoulders, which is a small detail that was not on his suit in Civil War.
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When Bruce puts on the gauntlet that they created and the power appears to be too much for him to handle, Thor shouts to “take it off,” to which Steve replies “Wait…are you okay Banner?”. The scene has an uncanny resemblance to The First Avenger when Steve was being injected with the super soldier serum and Peggy yelled to “shut it down,” but Steve said, “No, wait, I can do this.”
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Rhodey wore his Iron Patriot suit during the final fight sequence, after previously wearing the War Machine suit, because when Thanos blew up the Avengers compound Rhodey was trapped and yelled “Canopy,” taking the War Machine suit off of him so that he could escape.
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Steve said “Hey Queens” to Peter Parker during the final fight, which is a reference to Civil War when Steve said “You got heart kid,” and asked him where he was from, to which Peter replied, “Queens.”
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T’Challa addressed Clint by his first name, “Clint,” in the final fight. This showed that T’Challa actually paid attention to Clint in Civil War, despite replying “I don’t care” after Clint introduced himself.
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Janet van Dyne called Steve “Cap,” again in the final fight, which was a nod to how she has previously made fun of Scott for calling him that.
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A more obvious detail, Tony hugged Peter Parker after denying him a hug in Spiderman: Homecoming.
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Steven Strange’s hand was shaky when he raised his finger to Tony, showing the minor detail of the result of his car accident in Doctor Strange.
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Hank Pym was at Tony’s funeral, despite disliking the Starks, which shows the respect that Hank has for Tony now.
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Peter Parker told Tony that “We won” after he took the stones and snapped his fingers, which is parallel to the scene in The Avengers when Tony survived sending the missile through the portal and Steve told him the same line, “We won.”
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Peter Parker also called Tony by his first name at the same moment, despite always referring to him as Mr. Stark prior.
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Valkyrie ran her spear clear through a Leviathan during the final fight, despite Tony establishing that they have an impenetrable shell in The Avengers, showing just how strong she (or her spear) must be.
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When Steve gives his shield to Sam at the end of the film, the music playing in the background is in the same iconic score from The First Avenger.
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When Peggy and Steve finally get their dance, Peggy is wearing a red dress similar to the one she wore in The First Avenger when she walked into the bar to speak with Steve.
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The song that Peggy and Steve dance to is the same song that Nick Fury plays on the record player when he breaks into Steve’s apartment in The Winter Soldier. The name of the song, however, is “It’s Been a Long Long Time” by Harry Jones and His Orchestra, which is fitting considering how long they had to wait before getting their dance. It also is very similar to Peggy’s line that she says to Steve in the same film, “It’s been so long.”
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When Steve leaves to bring the stones back, Bucky says “I’ll miss you,” alluding to the fact that he knew exactly what Steve would do. (This has been confirmed by the writers of the film, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, who said that there was a conversation off-screen when Steve explained his intentions to Bucky.)
I grew up alongside the formation of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, watching all of the movies as they came out. As such a huge Marvel fan, I love rewatching them to find details that I missed. It seemed only fitting to do so with the film that brought the entire era to a close.