Avengers Endgame directors: ‘Robert Downey Jr had MIXED EMOTIONS about Iron Man’s ending’

WARNING: SPOILERS FOR AVENGERS ENDGAME AHEAD. After 11 years as Iron Man across nine MCU movies, Downey Jr’s Tony Stark made the ultimate sacrifice and gave his life to defeat Thanos and save the universe. An outstanding ending for the character’s narrative arc, but it turns out the 54-year-old star had “mixed emotions” about Iron Man’s death going ahead. Speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, Anthony Russo explained how they pitched the idea to him.

The director said: “We did pitch Robert his arc because he kicked off the entire MCU.

“The Tony Stark arc is the longest and perhaps fullest in the MCU.

“Once we decided we wanted this kind of ending for the character, we certainly wanted to make sure Robert was comfortable with it, just because of his enormous contribution to the MCU.

“We did pitch it out. We went over to meet with him and we pitched it out to him.”

YOU WON’T BELIEVE HOW MUCH ROBERT DOWNEY JR WILL MAKE FOR AVENGERS ENDGAME

Speaking at a screening in Washington DC this week, they said: “Tony used to not say anything in that moment. 

“And we were in the editing room going, ‘He has to say something. This a character who has lived and died by quips.’ And we just couldn’t, we tried a million different last lines.”

But then Avengers Endgame’s editor realised that the final line of the first Iron Man movie was a perfect fit.

Avengers Endgame is out now.