It’s also EXTREMELY in-character for her to die this way. She’s all about redemption, and in superhero stories, what better redemption is there than to sacrifice your life so your friends and family can live?

I would even say it leans in the opposite of this unfortunate trope by leading to the de-fridging of lost loved ones.

Agreed.

Right there with you.

Exactly. We have a long tradition of heroic and tragic narratives in which the characters deaths are part of what makes them iconic. While fridging women in this genre is very much an issue, I’ve never seen this as an example of it.

Ummm....nope. I disagree.

This describes my problem with this version precisely. You aren’t sacrificing anything if you are literally just dying 1 minute earlier.

It’s not subtext, this is straight-up said out loud by Natasha and Steve and maybe Clint too in this movie.

When watching the movie the first time, I interpreted the scene as very progressive/pro-Natasha, because she was the one who got to make the sacrifice. They were both heroes, and in effect, they were basically having a “who is the bigger hero” fight. In the end, Natasha won, because she actually is the bigger hero.

I think the subtext is that Natasha loves the Avengers as her family, and is sacrificing herself for them. She is doing the opposite of what Thanos did, which was a selfish act.

I mean.... is it really a sacrifice if you’ve already got 15 holes shot through your body?

Space sharks? Jawsome!

Trying to parse Matt Reeves’ statement here. I THINK I understand what he’s getting that, but I would argue that the stakes in just about every Batman movie to date have been largely emotional. Also trying to come up with in-universe metaphors now:
“Her kryptonite-green eyes pierced through the Blackest Night and sent…

At the Season 1 Finale, they temporarily fix Donald’s voice and it turns out that without his speech impediment, he sounds like Don Cheadle. It lasts for a grand total of 2 episodes and the joke is that Donald is constantly saying incredibly ridiculous-sounding things, but since he’s so hard to understand, no one knew…

Jesus fucking Christ, yes. That scene was positively unnerving, more so because it was partially played for laughs. The scene referred in the article was bad, but not as bad as I was dreading.

A pretty good film that starts to fall apart near the end.

Your first criticism may be true for Arwen and Rose Cotton.

I literally don’t understand how one can read the tone of LotR to be “comforting”.  It is literally the opposite of that.  Even in victory, our heroes have lost almost everything or are incapable of truly enjoying what that victory means.

YES!

No one really changes or has any meaningful catharses.