What all do we know so far about Thanos before Avengers: Infinity War is released on April 27?
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is always building toward something, and in Avengers: Infinity War, we are finally going to see the culmination of an endeavor that started all the way back in Iron Man 2 with the addition of a drawing of the Tesseract in Howard Stark’s notebook.
Infinity War will be fairly straightforward, as our favorite heroes attempt to stop Thanos from collecting the Infinity Stones, placing them in the Infinity Gauntlet and destroying half the universe.
But who really is Thanos?
We really do not know very much about the villain at all based on just the information provided in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The first glimpse we ever have of Thanos in the MCU is a brief appearance in the mid-credits scene of The Avengers. After Loki fails to retrieve the Tesseract thanks to the intervention of the Avengers, the mysterious “Other” who gave Loki his Scepter speaks to his master. As the light goes up, the scene reveals the Other’s master to be Thanos.
The next time we see Thanos is in Guardians of the Galaxy, as he is attempting to use Ronan to retrieve the Orb (which contains the Power Stone). After that, the Mad Titan’s only appearance is in a post credits-scene from Avengers: Age of Ultron during which Thanos puts on the Infinity Gauntlet and decides to go after the Infinity Stones himself.
All of his appearances up to this point have been hinting and building at Infinity War. We know Thanos wants the Infinity Stones, we know he is extremely powerful and, thanks to the trailer, we know he wants to wipe out half the universe. We also know that he is a pretty terrible father to Nebula and Gamora, but that’s a given.
Next: Where you can see every Infinity Stone in the MCU so far
Of course, Thanos is a character with a rich history in the pages of Marvel Comics, where he was created 45 years ago and has menaced just about every superhero around at one time or another while attempting to romance Death itself (or herself). What we will learn about Thanos, at least in terms of the MCU, will be laid out in Infinity War, which hits theaters on April 27.