What is braver? Sacrificing yourself for the greater good or sacrificing someone you love?
Most of the answers recount the selfless and valiant exploits of characters in the MCU; there’s an undercurrent of self-sacrifice in them.
Whether it is the many instances of Steve Rogers laying down on the wire to let the other guy crawl over him or that gentleman in Stuttgart standing up to a god, puny as he may be.
Or Tony Stark’s one-way ticket to space. Or Quicksilver dying to save Hawkeye (Didn’t see that coming).
Or Stephen Strange risking eternal damnation on his bargaining skills. Or Ho Yinsen dying in a cave to save a billionaire playboy.
All incredible moments of bravery centred around self-sacrifice.
In Avengers: Infinity War, two characters had to display bravery of another kind.
Both Wanda Maximoff and Peter Quill had lost everything.
Wanda’s parents died in front of her eyes when she was a child. A megalomaniac robot killed her brother. Her homeland was wiped from the face of the Earth.
Then, she had to carry the burden of causing the death of hundreds of innocent lives. All the while being in an unknown land.
Amidst all of this, she found solace in her growing relationship with Vision.
Peter Quill’s mother died in front of his eyes when he was 8. Right before space pirates kidnapped him. He finally meets his father, but it turns out he’s the one who killed his mother. Peter then murders his father.
All this while, Gamora is by his side, the love of his life.
But due to Thanos’s machinations, both those characters are put in the position of making an impossible decision – murder the one you love the most, or watch the universe collapse.
Peter pulling the trigger on Gamora was one of the most restrained yet moving moments in Infinity War.
That he had the fortitude to do it after all the loss he has suffered is a mark of the person he is – a hero. That’s bravery.
If he had to die for her, the decision would have been much quicker.
And Wanda, killing the one she loves the most, while simultaneously holding back the most powerful being in the universe. That’s bravery.
Throughout the MCU, several characters have displayed their heroism through many acts of self-sacrifice; they are heroes, prepared to lay it all on the line.
Peter Quill and Wanda Maximoff would have gladly given up their lives.
But they had to do something that, from their perspective, called for a lot more bravery than self-sacrifice.
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