How Thor's Part In 'Avengers: Endgame' Was Almost Different

Avengers: Endgame pulls the characters of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in a variety of interesting directions. Not only does it challenge them in ways they've never been tested before, but it enhances the origins of Earth's mightiest heroes. And when you have such a wide breadth of characters and an endless array of directions to take them, there are a lot of changes in the writing process where certain ideas get scrapped or changed as they go along. That's exactly what happened with Thor's place in the plot for Avengers: Endgame, but in order to explain that, we have to get into major spoiler territory.

In Avengers: Endgame, Thor's character arc is fueled by his journey back in time to Asgard in 2013, on the day that his mother died at the hands of dark elves trying to get their hands on the Aether, otherwise known as the red Reality Stone. Thor is accompanied by Rocket Raccoon on this trip through time, but he almost had a different sidekick. Co-writer Stephen McFeely explained to Fandango:

"Our first draft was a version where Tony and Thor go to Asgard, because I like the idea of Tony going, like, in theory going to Asgard and seeing science versus magic, and stuff like that. And then he fought Heimdall, who could of course see him even though Tony had an invisible stealth suit on or something."

The reasoning behind this team-up was that there was an instance where the Reallity Stone and the Space Stone (the Tesseract) were both in Asgard at the same time. Ultimately, The Avengers ended up being a more exciting and convenient place in time to go because the events of the movie provide a much better backdrop for the time heist. However, the original draft for the events on Asgard almost had another key difference that could have allowed for some fun.

Captain America comes face-to-face with himself during the heist in New York in 2012. The Cap from the past thinks it's Loki in disguise trying to make an escape with the scepter, and the two duke it out. But Cap wasn't the only one who originally ran into his other self. Co-writer Christoher Markus revealed:

"We may have at one time had Dark World Thor catch sight of Endgame Thor and go, you know, "What the hell happened?" But it got too complex and it distracted from things."

There's already so much going on in Avengers: Endgame, that adding another instance of two versions of the same character interacting with each other just seems like overkill. Though the idea of Thor being so confused by why he's so disheveled in the future is an amusing concept. But as McFeely notes, because we already saw the other version of Thor from Infinity War earlier in the movie, "That would have been a third version of Thor in this movie," and that's just excessive.

Natalie Portman has been away from the Marvel Cinematic Universe since Thor: The Dark World, though she did have some references made to her in both Avengers: Age of Ultron and Thor: Ragnarok, the latter signaling the end of their romantic relationship. But she comes back for a brief bit in Avengers: Endgame, and that was always part of the story on Asgard. McFeely explained:

"It was very hard to find a way to not do that, seeing as one of the Infinity Stones is inside her for primarily the only time we've ever seen it. It's literally inside her arm, so there weren't too many variations that didn't have Natalie Portman in them."

McFeely also noted that there were some longer versions of the scenes that played out in earlier drafts of the script, but all of the stuff between Thor and his mother Frigga ended up being "so rich and so on point in terms of what he needed to learn" that they couldn't send much time doing anything more significant with Jane as a character. It would have been nice for Thor to have some kind of moment with Jane Foster one last time, but it probably ventured too far off from the most important part of this sequence, which was Thor coming to terms with his place in the world.

Speaking of which, now that Thor has relegated the crown of Asgard to Valkyrie and is venturing off on his own, will he really be part of the Guardians of the Galaxy? At the end of the movie, Thor boards the Benatar and he and Star-Lord have a hilarious little back and forth about who is really in charge. It's an argument without there really being an argument, and it sets the stage for what would be an awesome dynamic for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (slated to shoot next year). But Markus and McFeely aren't saying anything about whether Thor is really part of the Guardians of the Galaxy now:

Markus: Ask Peter Quill.

McFeely: Yeah, you might have to ask James [Gunn] or Quill.

That's pretty much the answer we expected. Avengers: Endgame is in theaters everywhere now.