On the way back from my friends’ weekend, on Tuesday morning, while I was on my flight to Austin, Avengers: Endgame tickets went on sale.
This was not ideal.
I have long been established as the opening night, ticket buyer, on top of her shit, go-to friend when it comes to big releases. My hatred for spoilers and love of looking forward to new movies has pushed me to opening nights whenever possible. Usually dragging a handful of friends with me.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been at the top of the list in recent years. There are a lot of pros to loving mainstream fandoms (the swag, the volume of fanfiction, the references every day) but the main con seems to be getting movie tickets. Everyone wants to see these movies. And my mental argument of but I love it more doesn’t get me far. Turns out having a Spider-Man tattoo isn’t a VIP pass, though I think it should be.
All this to say, my anxiety was high about getting Endgame tickets. This was the biggest movie in the MCU, ever. A culmination of a decade of story coming after a devastating cold close to last year’s Infinity War. I obsessively checked my ticketing app to see if they were on sale. I checked it that morning. And then I got on a two-hour flight, phone in airplane mode.
Of course, they want on sale mid-air. I wanted it too much. The universe is funny that way. I landed to messages from my brother and my friend separately letting me know tickets were up and asking me if I’d gotten them. The next half hour was frantic – navigating what I could from the plane while we taxied to the gate and then pulling out my computer in the terminal to take advantage of the wifi. The Alamo Drafthouse website and app had crashed when tickets went on sale so buyers were being rerouted through different sites. Seats were mostly gone for the opening night. It wasn’t going to happen.
I ended up grabbing an 8 am Friday screening, two tickets for me and my brother. And then drove home from the airport, feeling the stress still balled up in my body. I almost pulled over at a gas station to browse the other theaters, it felt like every second counted. I had to tell myself out loud to stop, relax, this is really not the end of the world. It would be a stupid way to get in a car accident because I was too worked up about movie tickets.
It sounds superficial, writing it down like this, but parts of my identity are strongly wrapped up in being this person. Who cares deeply about superheroes. Who goes to movies opening night. Who gets tickets for her friends. These are parts of my identity that usually feel in my control. These are parts of my identity that have stayed the same while other aspects of my worldview were flipped upside down the past few years.
It’s all okay, of course. I called my brother when I got home after finding a potential opening screening in 3D. He calmed me down by caring just as deeply as I did and making a plan. The 8 am Friday screening was fine. (We both don’t really like 3D movies). We’d watch Infinity War together on Thursday night to prepare and do a social media blackout. The important thing was to avoid spoilers and early morning Friday was still one of the first showings. He also suggested we book tickets a couple of days later to see it again together. Bless my brother. He gets it.
I spent the rest of my afternoon off processing my stress. Eating, watching Iron Man, going for a walk.
I wasn’t planning on doing a rewatch of the MCU movies in preparation, but I am now. For how strongly I reacted to the ticket nightmare, it was clear to me I wanted to do this right. Iron Man was the first movie so I’m working my way through the rest of them (although admittedly I’m going to skip the not great ones: Incredible Hulk, the Ant-Man movies, Doctor Strange…).
What can I say? I’m me and I like being me so I have to occasionally deal with anxiety tied to fictional things. I also get to really, really enjoy those fictional things. It’s worth it.
With Love,
Natalie