Avengers: Infinity War was built up as a galactic showdown between the heroes of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the Mad Titan, Thanos, and it mostly delivered on that promise. We see the Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy engage with Thanos at various stages throughout the film, to the point where everyone gets their shot at the big bad (even if most of those shots amount to getting easily tossed aside by Thanos and his powered-up Infinity Gauntlet). However, there’s one hero who never actually goes up against Thanos.
First, let’s take a quick tally of everyone who fights Thanos. There’s Thor, Hulk, and the Asgardians at the beginning of the film, then the brief fight with the Guardians on Knowhere. After that, there’s the epic showdown on Titan featuring Iron Man, Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, Star-Lord, Drax, Nebula, and Mantis. Finally, there’s the last stand in Wakanda, in which the remaining Avengers all try and stop Thanos, to no avail. What you may not have noticed is that Rocket never meets Thanos face-to-face, meaning he’s the only hero in Infinity War (with the exception of Wong) who doesn’t fight Thanos and there’s actually a pretty good explanation as to why.
Marvel Studios