Thanos.  Is.  Coming.  During Marvel’s massive news dump for its fan event today, the studio announced that Avengers 3 will be two-part team-up story arc that will rival Warner Bros.’ two-part Justice League adaptation.  Avengers: Infinity War Part I arrives in theaters May 4, 2018, while Avengers: Infinity War Part II opens on May 3, 2019.  Ever since the big purple alien Thanos showed up at the end of The Avengers, fans have been wondering when he’d finally wreak havoc on the team of superheroes.  Most assumed he’d pop up in The Avengers 2, until Marvel opted to use Ultron as that film’s villain.  Josh Brolin filled the role of Thanos in what was essentially a cameo role in Guardians of the Galaxy, but even then he really didn’t have much to do.

Nevertheless, patience is a virtue, as we now have an arrival date for when this very, very bad guy will cause trouble for the Avengers team, and it’s gonna take two whole movies for him to be vanquished.  More on the Avengers Infinity War movies after the jump.

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Image via Marvel

For those unfamiliar with the Infinity War storyline, it involves a glove called the Infinity Gauntlet.  You see, Thanos has been hunting these things called “Infinity Stones” for a while now, and Marvel has been laying the groundwork to tell this story for a long time.  The Infinity Stones that we know of are the Tesseract from The Avengers, the Aether from Thor: The Dark World, and the Orb from Guardians of the Galaxy.  There are six in all, and once Thanos collects them and applies them to his glove (the Infinity Gauntlet), he essentially becomes an unstoppable force who, in the comics at least, murders a lot of the Marvel superheroes.

Marvel Studios has yet to adapt a comics storyline in full, opting instead to put their own twist on things to keep the story fresh, but we can expect this basic outline to be what sets the Infinity War saga in motion.  Marvel’s plans preceding these two films actually looks really smart in retrospect.  Captain America: Civil War pits Robert Downey Jr.’s Iron Man against Chris Evans’ Cap, throwing the cohesion of The Avengers into disarray.  What kind of event could possibly bring the original Avengers back together after such animosity?  Well, a war with Thanos of course.  Throw in the fact that this comes on the heels of Marvel launching individual franchises for Black Panther, Doctor Strange, Ant-Man, Captain Marvel, and Inhumans, and you’ve got yourself one massive team-up movie—assuming most of these characters take part in the battle, of course.

On the release date calendar, Infinity War Part I currently has the first weekend in May—which is traditionally Marvel territory—all to itself, but it will open a couple of months after Warner Bros.’ introduces The Flash in March 2018.  Warner Bros. will kickstart its own superhero team with Justice League Part One in November 2017, before Infinity War Part I, but Justice League Part Two concludes the saga in June 2019, over a year after Infinity War Part II, which will open a month after WB's Cyborg.

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With the release dates so close together, Marvel Studios will no doubt be shooting both Avengers films back-to-back.  Rumor has it that Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Civil War directors Joe Russo and Anthony Russo have been lobbying for the gig as Whedon’s contract with Marvel expires after Age of Ultron is released, and so it’s definitely possible that the Russo Brothers could be bringing both the Civil War and Infinity War sagas to the big screen.  But that's all rumor for now, as a director for either Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 or Avengers: Infinity War Part II has yet to be announced.

What do you think of all this, readers?  Are you eager to finally see the Infinity War play out onscreen?  How does this compare to Warner Bros.’ plans for its DC Movie Universe?  Sound off in the comments below.

Catch up on our coverage of all of Marvel's announcements below:

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Image via Marvel Studios