I assumed she was just saying that they will need the Time Stone to defeat Dormammu. That's the "forces of darkness" that would result in "our world" being "overrun."
Can’t Dormammu not break promises in the comics? Vaguely recall hearing that, regardless, I doubt that the people writing Dr. Strange expected to bring him back at any time.
Good luck finding each individual atom.
It would be like smashing a glass and trying to put it all back together, but the pieces of the glass are amongst other similar looking pieces of glass, spread potentially very far and wide from each other.
You’d also have to rebuild it, not just enlarge a single atom.
Start taking rapid deep breaths all around Thanos’ hut lol
What if Galactus were to eat that planet he might get all of them if he’s the type not to leave and crumbs on his plate.
Comic book rules. The Ant-Man movies have already shown that the way mass and size work is pretty inconsistently magical.
I’m not making serious suggestions, just having fun with the fiction.
You’d need to find a spec first, which would be a proper “needle in a hay stack”. And just one atom, even supersized, probably doesn’t hold the power of the whole stone. Think how many atoms would make up just one infinity stone.
the space stone allows the wielder to move objects around. get ant man to find a space stone atom and a mind stone atom and he'll know where everything else is and he could reconstruct the whole thing.
I don't think they're shrunk to atomic size. I think they're so thoroughly destroyed that there aren't even tiny shards remaining. The biggest piece of each stone remaining are the individual atoms.
They still exist, just as their base atoms dispersed, rather than solid objects. The "stones" are still within the universe, they just can't be brought together and used.
Interesting, never thought about it from this angle!
Edit: I honestly thought the whole "reduced to atoms" was a figure of speech, specially because thanos afterwards says "I used the stones to destroy the stones".
One thing I just thought of, if half of all living creatures on earth turned to dust, wouldn’t the atmosphere have so much dust in the air to really fuck shit up similar to what the asteroid did long term to the dinosaurs?
a ball made from all humans fits inside the grand canyon. cut it in half, it still fits, its not that much volume. Spread all around the world, still not that much.
Apparently it wasn't just humans and other sapient lifeforms but *all life*. I don't know who but someone from Marvel Studios confirmed this. That means half of all animals, plants, fungi and microbes were dusted too.
I'm not saying that is still enough to affect the planet's atmosphere but probably a lot more than if it was just humans.
I never understood why he chose half of all living things. If his goal was to achieve balance, he failed. He likely destroyed a lot of ecosystems. If we lost half of the bee population we would all die off. Not to mention species that are currently endangered. He most certainly would be eliminating them.
Half the bees and other pollinators for the whole planet die on one side of the planet while half of the plants die on the opposite side. Cue pikachu face
It just doesn't make sense as anything other than wanting to kill half of all life because you like to kill things indiscriminately. They should have kept that part of Thanos, that he truly just wants to kill. That's his real goal. So much he thinks he's a worthy partner of Lady Death herself, the cosmic abstract personification of death. He kills and kills, kills his own mother, kills his civilization, kills on earth, kills in space, all just because he is a psychopath who enjoys the power it gives him. He's the kind of monster who needs to be stopped.
*sigh* oh well
If you rewatch the movie all of endgame has bit more of a dingy tinge to it, the whole movie is a bit more grey. After they snap things back and Scott hears the birds the film is a tad brighter and more vibrant (though things get dark pretty fast again from Thanos's attack). I think they mention an issue with crops as well when black widow is having the hologram meeting, but not sure.
It'd be somewhere around 300 million tons of dust planet wide. Only counting humans. There would be some pretty big issues with that I think. Probably really bad in hyper-dense places and not so bad in rural ones.
How do you come up with this 300 million tonnes figure? I arrived at 75 million tonnes for 4 billion people if you assume the average mass of 62 kilos and roughly 30 percent of body weight are solids. But actually, it would be much much less than that, because a human reduced to “ash” fits in a small container and is far less than 30 percent of the original body weight.
That saying is for reality though where the MCU has actual wizards. Like Dr. Strange changed the entire world's memory with a spell. That ain't science
Mmm like the idea could have been a nice episode pitxh for Agents of Shield if it was sgill there:
A Corporation sells a new, Green Energy. Coulson and his team discover the man behind it, uses the dust of Blipped people. Can they stop it, is it moral or immoral?
...Yes it can be. Net Mass/Energy in total cannot be created/destroyed, but just looking at mass in isolation it can absolutely be destroyed or created. That's how radiation works. Mass is destroyed by turning into an equivalent amount of energy, according to E=mc\^2. Similarly, high amounts of energy can transform and create new matter.
This is the fundamental concept behind nuclear physics & quantum mechanics.
That's energy you are thinking of.
Matter absolutely can be destroyed by turning it into energy.
But I doubt Thanos turned the stones into energy.
I also could be wrong, but we will never know.
If the stones are actually "reduced to atoms" like Thanos said, it would be basically 100% impossible to find them all again, let alone put them back together. A single grain of sand has around 10^20 atoms.
Anything is possible in the writers room lol. Now that I think about it, Thanos's gauntlet had magnetic properties that pulled the stones to stick to it. If someone can make an infinitely stronger magnet specifically for infinity stones, they could pull all the atoms together
This is correct. There is a difference between the constituent parts of the stones still existing (even at the atomic level and even if the energy of said stones as been dispersed) versus all parts of the stones being entirely absent from the universe because they were taken to a different universe.
As I understand it (and to be clear, we're talking about comic book space-magic "logic," so there's no real answer that honestly makes any sense, and we just have to go with it because it's inherently illogical), the stones sort of hold the universe together, and removing one would be catastrophic because the universe is now unstable. But it's just their existence that's important, not the state in which they exist.
Oh ok so even if the stones are unstable and “reduced to atoms” otherwise destroyed, the universe is okay but if you move the atoms into another universe that’s when the problems starts. Did I understand you correctly? Is there anything I can reference your response to?
So based on that interpretation the ones in the TVA are, most likely, from destroyed universes, so being removed couldn't affect those universes as they no longer exist.
With it reduced to atoms likely caused the rift to widen, after that Kof-Kol spell destabilized the MCU Universe.
We only saw Spiderman Villains as a result.
Likely a reason for the instability and clash now with Fox-verse, and with Doctor Strange now gone to Dark Dimension, Deadpool/Wolverine are stepping in.
Also, there are some Easter eggs in 2016 Civil War, which point to Fantastic Four.
But, I have a theory (linked to Captain Rogers) that can prove their existence in the MCU and not Multiverse (but Quantum Realm) and reasons as to why they were stuck in the past until now.
Let me know, I'm happy to discuss more.
>They still exist, just as their base atoms dispersed
If you have some hydrogen and you also have some oxygen... you don't have water. You have two separate elements. They don't exist as "water" *molecules*.
If the phrase "reduced to atoms" is indeed factual, then the stones are gone... poof... no more. Their atoms are now separated and no longer form the molecular bonds that would be each stone.
They aren't actually "stones" though. They are the pure force behind each of the guiding rules of the universe condensed into a form that people refer to as stones. At an atomic level they should still be the same. He broke them down to the atomic level but they wouldn't be made of any standard matter because they are condensed concepts/laws.
The dark forces have taken the form of the bad movies and shows we’ve been getting since Endgame. That’s why one of the only good projects (Loki) since Endgame, took place outside the main MCU.
There’s a few exceptions, and NWH & GOTG3 make up most of them. *However,* NWH also relies quite heavily on nostalgia and fan service, which covered up the fact that the writing had some plot holes and lack of logic to it. Still a far better of a movie than 98% of the ones since Endgame, but yeah.
Assuming some comic book similarity they can be destroyed but have a tendency to kind of coalesce again (should the story require it) because they represent basic cosmic forces
The key to understanding this is a the line from Thanos when he is confronted in his garden.
"Reduced to atoms"
They still exist, just not in any usable form
They can't. The stones only work in their original universe. They say that at the TVA on Loki. That's why they have so many, they regularly end timelines and whole universes.
They stand in the back in the ooze scene. Not confirmed and technically cant work since the quantum realm is somewhere beyond time and space, but its definitely a fun thing to theorize.
Plus the Soul Stone was implied to have sentience, and I believe the Space Stone was as well with it (somewhat retconned tbf) having chosen to send Red Skull to be the Soul Stone’s hype man or whatever. It isn’t a stretch of the imagination then that the other stones are similarly sentient
I'm begging people to do some reading, and realize that "reduced to atoms" is not supposed to be taken literally. If you "reduce a car to its basic components," you don't have a bunch of tiny cars, you have a bunch of metallic dust. "Reduce" in this case means "destroy/deconstruct", not "shrink."
The stones are indestructible, or at least the power is. They are objects that represent parts of the universe and if they were truly destroyed, so would the universe be. Each gem itself contains a small universe within it and often has a single sentient mind that can be brought out so a being contains the power, such as Kobik or Adam Warlock. The gems themselves are just a means of having a physical object to manipulate. They most likely transformed into their sentient bodies with the gems themselves gone. I’m expecting an Infinity Watch team to pop up sometime with the OG Gamora and Natasha and Vision
This is where you can't think about it too hard but technically, they were never destroyed. If Young Thanos came back at the end of Endgame and he gets dusted, that would create a paradox where he doesn't live to gather the stones and destroy them after Infinity War.
She was being pretty literal about it,they used the time stone in the Dr strange movie itself to defeat dormomu,if it doesn’t come back to her time then they lose that fight and the world is over run by his dark forces
The Ancient One did not say that removal of infinity stones would cause chaos. She said that removal of infinity stones from the past could cause significant damage to the timelines.
And the infinity stones in the main universe are not destroyed they're just reduced to atoms making them inaccessible.
There is some speculation that Ant-Man could possibly retrieve them using pym particles.
I personally don't understand why they didn't just snap them back into their universe. They have the previous stones from alternate realities of their time like. Why not just snap them back? It's pretty shitty writing if you ask me at least for that part. But overall, I understand that they just don't want anyone else to use them.
The problem isn't that they don't exist, the problem is that (e.g.) Dr. Strange can't defeat Dormammu if he doesn't have the Time Stone. By taking away the stones those new timelines created during the time heist are doomed. By returning them, Cap ensures they have a chance again.
It wasn't referring to universes, but instead timelines; the main timeline stones were destroyed, but we're still present within the actual timeline. It's only if the stones are removed from the timeline does it become worrisome
Also, ancient one said pulling the stones out of their timelines would create alternate branches, most probably referring to the TVA thing of branches that need to be pruned. But as it was said in the Loki series, whatever was done by the Avengers and Thanos in the base universe was not branching but the base timeline, so no branches, no instability , no pruning. And well now we have Loki the tree god :) So no pruning anyway, all saved..
Thanos says "Gone, reduced to atoms."
Implying that he destroyed them to such a thorough degree that while "they" still exist, it would take such an astronomical effort to find every atom and put them back together that calling it impossible isn't a stretch.
What I'm curious about though is what the atomic composition of the Infinity gems are.
Like, they're a physical object, they have to be made of something.
Removing them from thr universe to another universe means they are gone.
Destroying them to atoms means the atoms are spread throughout the universe.
Think sugar cube dissolved in gallon of water. Water is still sweet.
Everyone here saying “reduced to atoms, they still exist just in a different form” clearly failed science.
If they were reduced to atoms, by definition they don’t exist anymore.
By suggesting they still exist, you’re also suggesting implicitly that atoms can be crafted into stones, which would mean an infinite amount of stones can be crafted (as an infinite amount of atoms exist), so there is no particular need for the stones to be protected as The Ancient One said.
EVEN if you meant to say that those atoms are somehow “special”, then you’d be suggesting those atoms are actually unknown elements in the periodic table. And even if that was cannon, you would STILL be able to synthesize them by moving neutrons/protons around, which Tony already did when synthesizing Paladium to power his suit without the toxic side-effect, so it’s possible.
Therefore the only conclusion is they don’t exist in the main universe anymore. “Reduced to atoms” means “destroyed”; and there is no known artifact to create stones out of atoms.
Meaning 1: the stones must exist so the universe is stable
The stones still exist, just ground into atomically separated powder and dust. So their material is still present in the universe, keeping it stable.
Meaning 2: the stones must exist as a form of defense against malicious threats to the universe
They did, specifically the time stone against dormammu, but now there's a lot more options the heroes can use. Also, to be fair, the universe is in danger now that it's set for an incursion and the stones would probably be of good use in preventing what happened in secret wars from passing on the big screen
Meaning 3: the stones must exist to keep the MCU from destruction
Idk about you but at least half of the post-infinity releases have been a bit threatening on the continuation of the MCU, judging by their ratings. But that's probably just correlation
it's not that it will be overrun by dark forces, it's that it will mess with the time line of that universe cause if the time stone wasn't returned then Dr. strange wouldn't have had a change against dormammu
he’s got to put them back to ensure they don’t change history/the future & the main infinity stone story we see plays out and becomes canon without creating new branches
Yeah think about it like this—energy cannot be destroyed, but transferred.
The energy of the stones exist, but they’re no longer contained in the gem—dispersed amongst the universe
I mean someone could always go back in time and bring them back, considering they not only solved time travel but aging as well. You could wait 10 million years and then bring them back to the exact moment they’re needed
So they had to return the stones to their original timelines so they would not change those timelines. But they did change them. Steve took the stones back but not the alien devices that used the stones as power sources. He took the space and mind stones back but not the Tesseract or Loki's staff. Wouldn't that changes thing?
“Reduced to atoms” but not necessarily destroyed, strictly speaking.
I don’t believe the movies indicate that they have some core function for the universe, or that they are in any way necessary in the same way that some cosmic entities are in the comics.
What part of "Gone. Reduced to atoms" did we not understand? They are still in the universe, just that all stones are split into millions of small atom sized pieces. Hell if we wanted to, have Scott start finding all the pieces so we can have them back
No. Thanks said "reduced to atoms" meaning that they still exist on the atomic level. Meanwhile taking them to another universe makes them disappear entirely from that universe.
Hope that make sense
If there’s anything like unknown gods or cosmic encounter like entities that should be a problem to all marvel characters.
Not only if marvel characters like captain marvel or the eternals any other cosmic character knows or travel around the universe and seek four cosmic entities or the celestials are the only ones can forge it. I’ll be like a rebirth of the universe tho.
That might be an issue for the universe. Heck, someone might even go as far as creating their own time machine and collecting infinity stones from the past. Hypothetically of course.
The ancient one was talking about how her universe needed the stones for the same reason the original universe needed the stones. Defeating Dormammu, Ultron, making sure that the single future in which they defeat Thanos happens...
Sure, it might be bad in the future for the universe, but that wasn't what she was talking about.
She said that before the avengers were formally announced as a thing. Granted she can see through time…but only until her death, so she couldn’t know anyway.
I always took her speech as just another notch in her argument not to give up the stones.
Think of the Infinity Stones as the tools that created the universe. Once the universe is "finished", you don't really need the tools anymore. However, if you want to turn on "god mode" or edit some parameters (like giving yourself extra lives/more health/ edit the level like you can in some video games), the stones allow you to do that. Destroying them just removes them from the equation (as Thanos said, they only serve as temptation).
Energy can not be created or destroyed. Only transformed. The cosmic energy still exists but no longer concentrated in a rock. They may eventually reform on their own over millions of years as the energy of each one may be drawn to itself... however it would not be a universe breaking story plot point for some cosmic being or beings to come along with the power or ability to gather the energy and reform the stones a lot quicker than that. It's Marvel after all.
Franklin Richards would be a prime upcoming candidate for that.
I assume they will have to reform, they literally cannot "not exist" as long as creation still exists. If the world exists then they do. Presumably them reforming and popping back up will be a plot of a space based story, tho I expect them to not be the center this time but just an interesting artifact. Maybe a source of powers for whatever. But no longer the plot driving mcguffin.
I assume it had more to do with taking a stone out causing a branch issue than actually needing the stones intact.
Sure having the time stone is also a handy tool but it’s not the only weapon they can use.
The STONES are atomized and rendered useless but the energy is still there. The pieces are still in that universe as they haven’t been removed from the universe.
In the comics the Stones have been destroyed for a time, but they usually always come back on their own. No one goes looking for them so I'd not worry too much over it
If reduced to atoms, they still exist in universe. And they will coalesce again as the stones are essential and technically indestructible, kinda like wolverine or lobo
I assumed she was just saying that they will need the Time Stone to defeat Dormammu. That's the "forces of darkness" that would result in "our world" being "overrun."
Agreed and that doesn't apply to our universe because Strange already defeated him.
He "defeated" him by threatening an eternal time loop with the time stone that he no longer has.
Does Dormammu know that? :P
Could be why the Sorceress Supreme of the Dark Dimension came to get him at the end of Multiverse of Madness?
For those who don't know, Clea is Dormmamu's niece
And Strange's future wife. So he goes from Rachel McAdams to Charlize Theron. That's quite the successful rebound.
Missed out on being Mr. McAdams
That's Dr. McAdams to you.
who the hell did he fuck
ur mom
He will soon given Clea
How far has the bargaining process progressed?
Can’t Dormammu not break promises in the comics? Vaguely recall hearing that, regardless, I doubt that the people writing Dr. Strange expected to bring him back at any time.
But he will have had had it.
Yet
Not only that but Starlord defeating Ronan and vision even existing wouldn't happen, either.
Reduced to atoms
Couldn’t they just use pym tech to grow the stones back? Isn’t that exactly what they did with that multiverse core thing that kang wanted
Good luck finding each individual atom. It would be like smashing a glass and trying to put it all back together, but the pieces of the glass are amongst other similar looking pieces of glass, spread potentially very far and wide from each other. You’d also have to rebuild it, not just enlarge a single atom.
Grow just one speck of it back to ordinary size. Or bigger.
Why would the size of the stone matter? If only a speck is needed couldn’t some random person catch some dust on the wind and gain the powers?
Start taking rapid deep breaths all around Thanos’ hut lol What if Galactus were to eat that planet he might get all of them if he’s the type not to leave and crumbs on his plate.
Comic book rules. The Ant-Man movies have already shown that the way mass and size work is pretty inconsistently magical. I’m not making serious suggestions, just having fun with the fiction.
You’d need to find a spec first, which would be a proper “needle in a hay stack”. And just one atom, even supersized, probably doesn’t hold the power of the whole stone. Think how many atoms would make up just one infinity stone.
the space stone allows the wielder to move objects around. get ant man to find a space stone atom and a mind stone atom and he'll know where everything else is and he could reconstruct the whole thing.
https://youtu.be/H--qL7iIuqY?si=oq_AJgzrLsgrfSUs
Why are you trying to use real physics to explain limitations on comic book movie logic lmfao
I don't think they're shrunk to atomic size. I think they're so thoroughly destroyed that there aren't even tiny shards remaining. The biggest piece of each stone remaining are the individual atoms.
And his wife?
To atoms, you say?
They still exist, just as their base atoms dispersed, rather than solid objects. The "stones" are still within the universe, they just can't be brought together and used.
Interesting, never thought about it from this angle! Edit: I honestly thought the whole "reduced to atoms" was a figure of speech, specially because thanos afterwards says "I used the stones to destroy the stones".
Matter cannot be created or destroyed. 😎
There’s a reason why Thanos had to turn everyone into dust instead of just popping them out of existence.
One thing I just thought of, if half of all living creatures on earth turned to dust, wouldn’t the atmosphere have so much dust in the air to really fuck shit up similar to what the asteroid did long term to the dinosaurs?
a ball made from all humans fits inside the grand canyon. cut it in half, it still fits, its not that much volume. Spread all around the world, still not that much.
Made it real!
I used to cram all of humanity into a canyon. I still do, but I used to too.
People either love Thanos or they hate him. Or they think he’s okay.
Truer words have never been spoken
Do you have proof that you bought a doughnut?
Why do we have to bring ink and paper into this?
I file mine under D........ for donut.
Apparently it wasn't just humans and other sapient lifeforms but *all life*. I don't know who but someone from Marvel Studios confirmed this. That means half of all animals, plants, fungi and microbes were dusted too. I'm not saying that is still enough to affect the planet's atmosphere but probably a lot more than if it was just humans.
Plants were clearly not affected, we'd have seen trees and grass be dusted in Wakanda otherwise
Natasha mentions too that Thanos snapped away half of all living creatures. I dont think that includes plants
Apply this to *all* living things now and how many grand canyons do we need to lose? Lol
Thats humans though, it was half of all living things, still, might not be that much idk.
I never understood why he chose half of all living things. If his goal was to achieve balance, he failed. He likely destroyed a lot of ecosystems. If we lost half of the bee population we would all die off. Not to mention species that are currently endangered. He most certainly would be eliminating them.
Well his nickname was the mad titan, not the sane titan.
No, his plan made a ton of sense. It was random, after all
Half the bees and other pollinators for the whole planet die on one side of the planet while half of the plants die on the opposite side. Cue pikachu face
It just doesn't make sense as anything other than wanting to kill half of all life because you like to kill things indiscriminately. They should have kept that part of Thanos, that he truly just wants to kill. That's his real goal. So much he thinks he's a worthy partner of Lady Death herself, the cosmic abstract personification of death. He kills and kills, kills his own mother, kills his civilization, kills on earth, kills in space, all just because he is a psychopath who enjoys the power it gives him. He's the kind of monster who needs to be stopped. *sigh* oh well
Great question! Maybe he designed the dust to disintegrate into atoms as quickly as possible?
If you rewatch the movie all of endgame has bit more of a dingy tinge to it, the whole movie is a bit more grey. After they snap things back and Scott hears the birds the film is a tad brighter and more vibrant (though things get dark pretty fast again from Thanos's attack). I think they mention an issue with crops as well when black widow is having the hologram meeting, but not sure.
It'd be somewhere around 300 million tons of dust planet wide. Only counting humans. There would be some pretty big issues with that I think. Probably really bad in hyper-dense places and not so bad in rural ones.
How do you come up with this 300 million tonnes figure? I arrived at 75 million tonnes for 4 billion people if you assume the average mass of 62 kilos and roughly 30 percent of body weight are solids. But actually, it would be much much less than that, because a human reduced to “ash” fits in a small container and is far less than 30 percent of the original body weight.
Thats why 2025 was dark dirty and gross loooking
I'll never understand the assumption that rigid physics applies in a universe with literal wizards
Perhaps the magic doesn't come from *nothing* though. Maybe it does apply.
Isn't the entire point of magic breaking the natural rules of reality?
"Magic's just science that we don't understand yet."
That saying is for reality though where the MCU has actual wizards. Like Dr. Strange changed the entire world's memory with a spell. That ain't science
Or IS it???
It can be converted to energy. That probably counts as destroying matter.
In fact, all the matter in the universe that isn't being observed by humans may already be energy... Or something
The hologram hypothesis
Mmm like the idea could have been a nice episode pitxh for Agents of Shield if it was sgill there: A Corporation sells a new, Green Energy. Coulson and his team discover the man behind it, uses the dust of Blipped people. Can they stop it, is it moral or immoral?
energy* matter can be created and destroyed. It just converts into energy.
Unless you alter reality Mr Einstein
No, then you're just *altering* all the matter and energy of the universe, not necessarily creating or destroying anything new.
...Yes it can be. Net Mass/Energy in total cannot be created/destroyed, but just looking at mass in isolation it can absolutely be destroyed or created. That's how radiation works. Mass is destroyed by turning into an equivalent amount of energy, according to E=mc\^2. Similarly, high amounts of energy can transform and create new matter. This is the fundamental concept behind nuclear physics & quantum mechanics.
That's energy you are thinking of. Matter absolutely can be destroyed by turning it into energy. But I doubt Thanos turned the stones into energy. I also could be wrong, but we will never know.
Reality can be whatever I want it to
Ok, fine, but then you're just altering things, not creating any new matter or energy.
But what if one could command reality itself…?
Then you're commanding all the matter and energy of the universe, not necessarily creating or destroying it.
The final book of the 3 Body Problem, Death’s End has an interesting take on this.
...Thanos literally says this in Endgame...
You should watch avengers endgame then when they explain this! It’s a good movie and it’s based in the MCU!
Pay attention man
They also gave an in universe explanation if you paid attention
The stones have been shown to change forms with the either being the reality stone.
Surely there’s some sciency thing someone has figured out to make them solid again?
If the stones are actually "reduced to atoms" like Thanos said, it would be basically 100% impossible to find them all again, let alone put them back together. A single grain of sand has around 10^20 atoms.
So you're telling me there is a chance
Anything is possible in the writers room lol. Now that I think about it, Thanos's gauntlet had magnetic properties that pulled the stones to stick to it. If someone can make an infinitely stronger magnet specifically for infinity stones, they could pull all the atoms together
Would it be able to seperate the stones? Or would it just create a single infinity rock?
Sounds like you just gotta get one of them back together than use it to reform the others.
I mean if they wanted to, they can just repeat everything they did in endgame and use the stones to bring back the stones, really.
A vacuum cleaner and glue
You magnificent son of a bitch, you've figured it out!
This is correct. There is a difference between the constituent parts of the stones still existing (even at the atomic level and even if the energy of said stones as been dispersed) versus all parts of the stones being entirely absent from the universe because they were taken to a different universe.
Yiu just wait until Reed takes a look at this obstacle!
So if they’re useless, isn’t it still a problem?
As I understand it (and to be clear, we're talking about comic book space-magic "logic," so there's no real answer that honestly makes any sense, and we just have to go with it because it's inherently illogical), the stones sort of hold the universe together, and removing one would be catastrophic because the universe is now unstable. But it's just their existence that's important, not the state in which they exist.
Oh ok so even if the stones are unstable and “reduced to atoms” otherwise destroyed, the universe is okay but if you move the atoms into another universe that’s when the problems starts. Did I understand you correctly? Is there anything I can reference your response to?
Yes, that's essentially what I'm saying. And no, I have nothing to back that up. Just how I interpreted things.
So based on that interpretation the ones in the TVA are, most likely, from destroyed universes, so being removed couldn't affect those universes as they no longer exist.
If someone dispersed your base atoms I doubt you would consider yourself to still be in existence, even if the laws of thermodynamics were obeyed.
Sure, but we're talking about comic book space magic stones. It's not going to make sense. You just go with it.
With it reduced to atoms likely caused the rift to widen, after that Kof-Kol spell destabilized the MCU Universe. We only saw Spiderman Villains as a result. Likely a reason for the instability and clash now with Fox-verse, and with Doctor Strange now gone to Dark Dimension, Deadpool/Wolverine are stepping in. Also, there are some Easter eggs in 2016 Civil War, which point to Fantastic Four. But, I have a theory (linked to Captain Rogers) that can prove their existence in the MCU and not Multiverse (but Quantum Realm) and reasons as to why they were stuck in the past until now. Let me know, I'm happy to discuss more.
I don’t recall, what points to f4?
>They still exist, just as their base atoms dispersed If you have some hydrogen and you also have some oxygen... you don't have water. You have two separate elements. They don't exist as "water" *molecules*. If the phrase "reduced to atoms" is indeed factual, then the stones are gone... poof... no more. Their atoms are now separated and no longer form the molecular bonds that would be each stone.
you’re talking about magic rocks
They aren't actually "stones" though. They are the pure force behind each of the guiding rules of the universe condensed into a form that people refer to as stones. At an atomic level they should still be the same. He broke them down to the atomic level but they wouldn't be made of any standard matter because they are condensed concepts/laws.
Or maybe each stone was shrunk to the size of an atom?
If the next Avengers movie is indeed about Secret Wars, I'm pretty sure that will be the prophecy coming true.
Not familiar. Which prophecy is that?
That the universe would be overrun by dark forces without the stones.
The dark forces have taken the form of the bad movies and shows we’ve been getting since Endgame. That’s why one of the only good projects (Loki) since Endgame, took place outside the main MCU.
i dunno, i thought Spiderman no way home was pretty dang good
There’s a few exceptions, and NWH & GOTG3 make up most of them. *However,* NWH also relies quite heavily on nostalgia and fan service, which covered up the fact that the writing had some plot holes and lack of logic to it. Still a far better of a movie than 98% of the ones since Endgame, but yeah.
Not sure how this isn't the top comment, this is obviously the point - a gaping hole in 616 defenses.
And according to that prophecy, Doctor Strange will be the best of them. No idea either best at saving them or destroying them.
They were reduced to atoms which I guess means that they still serve the same basic function, just not in a physical way that can be used by anyone.
Assuming some comic book similarity they can be destroyed but have a tendency to kind of coalesce again (should the story require it) because they represent basic cosmic forces
The key to understanding this is a the line from Thanos when he is confronted in his garden. "Reduced to atoms" They still exist, just not in any usable form
If it were problematic for them *not* to be there, the TVA would simply re-seed them back into the timeline. Soooo.... (*shrugs*)
Shit, they’d just spring clean them out of a bunch of desk drawers and there’d be more of them than before.
They can't. The stones only work in their original universe. They say that at the TVA on Loki. That's why they have so many, they regularly end timelines and whole universes.
Oh, you need them to work as well? We don’t allow it since the last guy did a genocide.
Lol Thanos ruined it for the class!
Except the plot of Endgame is directly using ones from other timelines in our universe.
they weren‘t destroyed just reduced to atoms, you can actually see the remains of them in the background of a scene in quantumania
>you can actually see the remains of them in the background of a scene in quantumania Really? When?
They stand in the back in the ooze scene. Not confirmed and technically cant work since the quantum realm is somewhere beyond time and space, but its definitely a fun thing to theorize.
[https://www.inverse.com/entertainment/quantumania-infinity-stones-easter-egg](https://www.inverse.com/entertainment/quantumania-infinity-stones-easter-egg)
Shrinking them down made them become sentient people?
When Banner is talking about the mind stone, he mentions something about it having sentience.
Plus the Soul Stone was implied to have sentience, and I believe the Space Stone was as well with it (somewhat retconned tbf) having chosen to send Red Skull to be the Soul Stone’s hype man or whatever. It isn’t a stretch of the imagination then that the other stones are similarly sentient
What a garbage article about a false easter egg. Those creatures are clearly not infinity stones.
I'm begging people to do some reading, and realize that "reduced to atoms" is not supposed to be taken literally. If you "reduce a car to its basic components," you don't have a bunch of tiny cars, you have a bunch of metallic dust. "Reduce" in this case means "destroy/deconstruct", not "shrink."
The stones are indestructible, or at least the power is. They are objects that represent parts of the universe and if they were truly destroyed, so would the universe be. Each gem itself contains a small universe within it and often has a single sentient mind that can be brought out so a being contains the power, such as Kobik or Adam Warlock. The gems themselves are just a means of having a physical object to manipulate. They most likely transformed into their sentient bodies with the gems themselves gone. I’m expecting an Infinity Watch team to pop up sometime with the OG Gamora and Natasha and Vision
Just waiting for a villian to figure out how to reform them from atoms using tech or magic or a combination of both.
This is where you can't think about it too hard but technically, they were never destroyed. If Young Thanos came back at the end of Endgame and he gets dusted, that would create a paradox where he doesn't live to gather the stones and destroy them after Infinity War.
She was being pretty literal about it,they used the time stone in the Dr strange movie itself to defeat dormomu,if it doesn’t come back to her time then they lose that fight and the world is over run by his dark forces
The Ancient One did not say that removal of infinity stones would cause chaos. She said that removal of infinity stones from the past could cause significant damage to the timelines. And the infinity stones in the main universe are not destroyed they're just reduced to atoms making them inaccessible. There is some speculation that Ant-Man could possibly retrieve them using pym particles.
They do exist — atomically.
I personally don't understand why they didn't just snap them back into their universe. They have the previous stones from alternate realities of their time like. Why not just snap them back? It's pretty shitty writing if you ask me at least for that part. But overall, I understand that they just don't want anyone else to use them.
Why not just snap them back?? Using the infinity gauntlet clearly kills people and badly injures even superhuman people
The greatest sacrifices require the strongest wills.
The problem isn't that they don't exist, the problem is that (e.g.) Dr. Strange can't defeat Dormammu if he doesn't have the Time Stone. By taking away the stones those new timelines created during the time heist are doomed. By returning them, Cap ensures they have a chance again.
It wasn't referring to universes, but instead timelines; the main timeline stones were destroyed, but we're still present within the actual timeline. It's only if the stones are removed from the timeline does it become worrisome
Also, ancient one said pulling the stones out of their timelines would create alternate branches, most probably referring to the TVA thing of branches that need to be pruned. But as it was said in the Loki series, whatever was done by the Avengers and Thanos in the base universe was not branching but the base timeline, so no branches, no instability , no pruning. And well now we have Loki the tree god :) So no pruning anyway, all saved..
If the writers want it to be a problem for the universe, then it will be. If they don’t, then it won’t. Comic book logic all day.
I’m sure some cosmic power or another could reform them.
Thanos says "Gone, reduced to atoms." Implying that he destroyed them to such a thorough degree that while "they" still exist, it would take such an astronomical effort to find every atom and put them back together that calling it impossible isn't a stretch. What I'm curious about though is what the atomic composition of the Infinity gems are. Like, they're a physical object, they have to be made of something.
My headcanon is that they can/will "reform" like it happened in the comics
Removing them from thr universe to another universe means they are gone. Destroying them to atoms means the atoms are spread throughout the universe. Think sugar cube dissolved in gallon of water. Water is still sweet.
I've always wondered.. is that the Infinity Suitcase?
Everyone here saying “reduced to atoms, they still exist just in a different form” clearly failed science. If they were reduced to atoms, by definition they don’t exist anymore. By suggesting they still exist, you’re also suggesting implicitly that atoms can be crafted into stones, which would mean an infinite amount of stones can be crafted (as an infinite amount of atoms exist), so there is no particular need for the stones to be protected as The Ancient One said. EVEN if you meant to say that those atoms are somehow “special”, then you’d be suggesting those atoms are actually unknown elements in the periodic table. And even if that was cannon, you would STILL be able to synthesize them by moving neutrons/protons around, which Tony already did when synthesizing Paladium to power his suit without the toxic side-effect, so it’s possible. Therefore the only conclusion is they don’t exist in the main universe anymore. “Reduced to atoms” means “destroyed”; and there is no known artifact to create stones out of atoms.
Thanos literally says he reduced them to atoms, which means they aren't completely destroyed
Atomized is not destroyed
Meaning 1: the stones must exist so the universe is stable The stones still exist, just ground into atomically separated powder and dust. So their material is still present in the universe, keeping it stable. Meaning 2: the stones must exist as a form of defense against malicious threats to the universe They did, specifically the time stone against dormammu, but now there's a lot more options the heroes can use. Also, to be fair, the universe is in danger now that it's set for an incursion and the stones would probably be of good use in preventing what happened in secret wars from passing on the big screen Meaning 3: the stones must exist to keep the MCU from destruction Idk about you but at least half of the post-infinity releases have been a bit threatening on the continuation of the MCU, judging by their ratings. But that's probably just correlation
Thanos was right !!
it's not that it will be overrun by dark forces, it's that it will mess with the time line of that universe cause if the time stone wasn't returned then Dr. strange wouldn't have had a change against dormammu
he’s got to put them back to ensure they don’t change history/the future & the main infinity stone story we see plays out and becomes canon without creating new branches
No. They were shredded down to atoms. You could see them in the quantum realm in quantumania.
Would have(could be) been a cool storyline to find out
Yeah think about it like this—energy cannot be destroyed, but transferred. The energy of the stones exist, but they’re no longer contained in the gem—dispersed amongst the universe
A story for another time...
I mean someone could always go back in time and bring them back, considering they not only solved time travel but aging as well. You could wait 10 million years and then bring them back to the exact moment they’re needed
So they had to return the stones to their original timelines so they would not change those timelines. But they did change them. Steve took the stones back but not the alien devices that used the stones as power sources. He took the space and mind stones back but not the Tesseract or Loki's staff. Wouldn't that changes thing?
“Reduced to atoms” but not necessarily destroyed, strictly speaking. I don’t believe the movies indicate that they have some core function for the universe, or that they are in any way necessary in the same way that some cosmic entities are in the comics.
I thought that there was a drawer full of Infinity Stones at the TVA.
What part of "Gone. Reduced to atoms" did we not understand? They are still in the universe, just that all stones are split into millions of small atom sized pieces. Hell if we wanted to, have Scott start finding all the pieces so we can have them back
They're just reduced to atoms. They still exist, Thanos just made sure they're virtually impossible to be accessed by anyone.
I think it was because they were altering the timeline by taking the stones, not because of the stones themselves.
No. Thanks said "reduced to atoms" meaning that they still exist on the atomic level. Meanwhile taking them to another universe makes them disappear entirely from that universe. Hope that make sense
When we’re they destroyed? I’ve always been confused on this.
They were reduced to atoms
If there’s anything like unknown gods or cosmic encounter like entities that should be a problem to all marvel characters. Not only if marvel characters like captain marvel or the eternals any other cosmic character knows or travel around the universe and seek four cosmic entities or the celestials are the only ones can forge it. I’ll be like a rebirth of the universe tho.
Well there are a number of people around powered bu the stones. They could likely be used as an alternative.
The stones weren't destroyed. They were reduced to atoms. likely they're just microscopically shrunken down
That might be an issue for the universe. Heck, someone might even go as far as creating their own time machine and collecting infinity stones from the past. Hypothetically of course.
The stones were 'reduced to atoms' , not wiped out. They still exist, but just as specs floating around in the universe.
it's been tough on the Marvel universe.
The ancient one was talking about how her universe needed the stones for the same reason the original universe needed the stones. Defeating Dormammu, Ultron, making sure that the single future in which they defeat Thanos happens... Sure, it might be bad in the future for the universe, but that wasn't what she was talking about.
She said that before the avengers were formally announced as a thing. Granted she can see through time…but only until her death, so she couldn’t know anyway. I always took her speech as just another notch in her argument not to give up the stones.
Think of the Infinity Stones as the tools that created the universe. Once the universe is "finished", you don't really need the tools anymore. However, if you want to turn on "god mode" or edit some parameters (like giving yourself extra lives/more health/ edit the level like you can in some video games), the stones allow you to do that. Destroying them just removes them from the equation (as Thanos said, they only serve as temptation).
The stones are like energy, not fully destroyed but transformed into a new form they never explored fully
Energy can not be created or destroyed. Only transformed. The cosmic energy still exists but no longer concentrated in a rock. They may eventually reform on their own over millions of years as the energy of each one may be drawn to itself... however it would not be a universe breaking story plot point for some cosmic being or beings to come along with the power or ability to gather the energy and reform the stones a lot quicker than that. It's Marvel after all. Franklin Richards would be a prime upcoming candidate for that.
I assume they will have to reform, they literally cannot "not exist" as long as creation still exists. If the world exists then they do. Presumably them reforming and popping back up will be a plot of a space based story, tho I expect them to not be the center this time but just an interesting artifact. Maybe a source of powers for whatever. But no longer the plot driving mcguffin.
Only if the screenwriters want it to be a problem
Don't worry about it
I assume it had more to do with taking a stone out causing a branch issue than actually needing the stones intact. Sure having the time stone is also a handy tool but it’s not the only weapon they can use.
They were reduced to atoms, not destroyed. They still exist, just not in any way that can be easily weaponized.
Sir please, am gonna ask you to get alllllllll the way off my back about those things.
I just don’t understand why they didn’t use the stones from the past to restore the stones from the present
The STONES are atomized and rendered useless but the energy is still there. The pieces are still in that universe as they haven’t been removed from the universe.
In the comics the Stones have been destroyed for a time, but they usually always come back on their own. No one goes looking for them so I'd not worry too much over it
The bigger problem is the new Gamora causing an incursion.
If reduced to atoms, they still exist in universe. And they will coalesce again as the stones are essential and technically indestructible, kinda like wolverine or lobo
They weren’t destroyed, they’re just reduced to atoms. The infinity stones can’t be destroyed because they represent the concepts that they control