Marvel’s takeover of Fortnite has been inspiring for some fans, as someone with a dark sense of humor combined one of the battle royale’s challenges with a devastating moment from Avengers: Endgame. Spoiler warning for those who have not seen the movie, as this Fortnite joke is built around the film’s ending.
Reddit user flapjack626 posted their clip on the main subreddit for Fortnite, the most played game of all time, and most viewers would struggle to notice any difference at first. The clip shows the death of Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man, and the final discussion between Pepper Potts and Tony Stark.
As Tony takes his final breath after defeating Thanos and his army with the Infinity Gauntlet, Pepper places her hand on the Arc reactor in Tony’s Suit. Like the film, it goes dark as the life fades from the hero. In the clip, however, as soon as Tony dies the Fortnite audio kicks in and a "challenge complete" message appears on the screen.
The challenge in question says to "Eliminate Iron Man at Stark Industries," and seeing it flash on screen accompanied by the challenge completion audio is a great juxtaposition. While this death scene is a highlight of Avengers: Endgame and is undeniably sad in context, seeing it edited in such a way is very clever. While Iron Man is not actually dying in Fortnite's recently added Stark Industries location, the edit still works very well, and the point gets across clearly.
While Iron Man is just one of many characters in the Marvel crossover, his inclusion is likely a major draw thanks to his popularity fostered by the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Fortnite is not the only game where players can take control of the Invincible Iron Man, either, as the version of Iron Man in Marvel’s Avengers has a highly-customizable moveset. Fans of that game have yet to make any edits poking fun at his death, though it may only be a matter of time before fans take inspiration from flapjack626’s clip.
With Fortnite fans only a few weeks into Season 4, more memes will likely come as players take breaks from finding items like Wolverine’s trophy. Whether any of these future jokes will hit as hard as this Iron Man death edit remains to be seen, however.
Fortnite is available on Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.