Seven years after the first “Avengers” movie hit screens worldwide, “Avengers: Endgame” completed what is known as “The Infinity Saga” of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “The Infinity Saga” consists of the first 22 movies in the MCU, starting with “Iron Man” in 2008. 

“Endgame” broke several box office records in its opening weekend. The movie had the highest domestic opening weekend of all time with $357 million, trumping the previous record holder “Avengers: Infinity War” by nearly $100 million. “Infinity War” also held the record of highest worldwide opening weekend with $640 million before being beat by “Endgame’s” $1.2 billion opening.

In the past week, many students and staff members at Maize have been enraptured by the epic blockbuster. Senior Nick Reiswig is one of the many students who saw “Endgame” at a Thursday night preview when the movie came out worldwide. Although he said he had high expectations as a Marvel fan, Reiswig said they were easily met.

“I thought it was a masterpiece, plain and simple,” Reiswig said. “The action made me want to get out of my seat, and I did that a couple times.”

The students weren’t the only people excited about the phenomenon. English teacher Wayde Watkins also saw the movie opening weekend and has prevented his class from giving any spoilers to anyone who has yet to see it.

“We don’t talk about it in class, because there are people in classes that haven’t seen it yet,” Watkins said. “We all want to talk about it, but we can’t.”

With the high box office numbers, the weekend was busy for the many movie theater employees at Maize. Senior Riley Stegmaier worked at the Warren West 18 & IMAX Thursday night and said it was hard to serve a packed house.

“It was stressful,” Stegmaier said. “I was working with a really good staff so that definitely helped alleviate some of the stress.”

Stegmaier said the long lines and busy lobbies compounded stress for customers and staff alike.

“We had these collectible tins we were giving out for the ‘Avengers’ [movie],” he said. “They all had different characters on them, and I had a grown man cry about the tin that he got and beg that his Captain America tin be swapped for a Thor tin”

Reiswig said he’s happy with how the movie wrapped up the story Marvel put in motion 11 years ago, but is still excited for the future movies yet to come.

“It was amazing,” Reiswig said. “I cried, so big thumbs up.”