Avengers Infinity War ending: Is THIS what REALLY happened? Shock deaths NOT as they seem

WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD.

Avengers: Infinity War ended with what appeared to be vast swathes of Marvel heroes dying – or rather, disintegrating into ash when Thanos collected all of the Infinity Stones and was able to wipe out half of humanity.

Those dead included characters who are thought to be getting their own future movies: Doctor Strange, King T’Challa, Peter Parker and many Guardians of the Galaxy included.

So while many are speculating about how they could continue to feature, theorist datageek9 has theorised: “I’ve heard a few theories about what happened to the 50% of people that appeared to disintegrate and disappear at the end of the movie, particularly about them being trapped in the Soul Stone which is apparently what happened in the comic books.

“Personally I don’t buy that, it feels too much like a cliche/trope that’s been done in other movies, it would be too easily predictable by comic fans, and finally because it seems a bit mystic and magical, whereas I think Marvel will go for a more pseudoscientific/technology based resolution.

“Why? Because Strange knew that it was absolutely imperative that Stark survived, and also because the next film coming up is Ant Man 2.

“There is also the ‘fix everything with time travel’ option but that is also a bit of a tired cliche.”

They added: “So here’s my theory. I don’t think even Thanos realised exactly how his wish would be fulfilled. Rather than people disappearing into nothing, I think he split the universe into two parallel universes through a single massive quantum event.

“One universe is what we saw at the end of the movie, the other is identical but contains all the people who appeared to disappear in the first.

“What those people will see is everyone else disappear. The quest for the Avengers is now to find a way to tunnel from one universe to the other, and join them back together.

“Ant Man’s ability to enter the quantum realm and Tony’s tech (including possibly B.A.R.F ) will be instrumental to this. Not sure where Captain Marvel comes in but maybe she defeats Thanos in the end and prevents him from re-splitting the universe.”

It’s had over 1500 points on Reddit, and sparked hundreds of comments.

“I like this. I don’t care whether it’s true or not, this is just a really fun concept to think about,” said one reader.

Another commented: “I just believe that everyone who died, are the ones who will be carrying marvel for the next 10 years. The ones who survived, coincidentally all the original Avengers, will be the ones to make the big play sacrifice and die in Avengers 4. Except maybe Hulk.”

Frustratingly we still have another year to wait for definitive answers.

Avengers: Infinity War opened to a record box office haul over the weekend, setting a new high for global openings, even if Star Wars: The Force Awakens maintained the record for best single opening day.

Marvel movies due for release before Avengers 4 are Ant-Man and the Wasp this summer, and Captain Marvel next spring.

Avengers: Infinity War is out now.