In my first post I spoke about Captain Marvel and the continuity issues that it creates. The second major continuity error is the movie Eternals (2021). Before I explain why the movie is one big continuity error, I need to give a brief synopsis of the movie.
Eternals is about a group of aliens from the planet Olympus that were sent to earth by a godlike figure known as Arishem. The members of this team are shown fighting off these animalistic beings known as Deviants throughout human history. Early in the movie they make it clear that their only objective is to defeat Deviants and not affect the course of mankind’s development. Then the Eternals are shown partying with the humans they helped… but I will come back to this point later. Eventually, the Eternals defeat all Deviants. With their mission completed the Eternals travel the world together, but after ideological differences on how to treat humanity, they split. Many years later the Eternals need to team back up and fight off the Deviants that somehow returned. At the end of the movie, it is revealed that the leader of the Eternals, Ikaris, brought the Deviants back and betrayed the team. It also comes to light that Eternals were not born on Olympus, but were actually created by a being known as Arishem and he wants to use the life force of humanity to create more beings like him.
The first major continuity error is one that I alluded to earlier. The movie makes it clear that the Eternals were not supposed to be involved in any human conflict. Then one of the Eternals, Phatos, is shown giving the humans technology which would eventually lead to the creation of the Nuclear bomb. Whether Phatos created the Nuclear bomb for mankind, or just helped them along the path of creating it, it is pretty heavily emphasized that the creation of the deadliest weapon known to mankind was created thanks to Phatos. If Eternals were not supposed to interfere in conflict, why didn’t anyone stop Phatos or Phatos destroy/sabatoge his research before it could be used? It just seems like this story thread was put into the movie to try and give Phatos some character development.
While we are on the topic of non-interference, another Eternals member Druig, literally brainwashed a group of people to stop fighting and live in a community with him. That is pretty evil, but no one stopped him. I can understand bigger powers in the MCU not stopping Druig because it was in a small isolated area, but not even the other Eternals tried to stop him. Also they completely ignore the fact that Druig was brainwashing people.
The second issue is their memories. The movie makes it clear that the Eternals minds were wiped and altered and that they were never from the planet Olympus. In the movie, Kingo states that Thor followed him around when Thor was a child. Everyone in the MCU knows Thor is from Asgard, so when did this occur? Also given the fact that Kingo is masquerading as a famous Baliwood actor and has been for almost 100 years, how did Thor not recognize him? Unless this is a fake memory… why would Arishem give him a fake memory like that? It's almost as if they just wanted to reference a popular MCU character. The movie also ends with some members of the Eternals going to space to look for other Eternals. If they know their memories were altered,why do they believe other Eternals exist?
The last continuity error that I am going to mention is the one that bothers me the most. At the end of the movie, a few Eternals meet an Eternal they never met before named Starfox. Starfox is introduced as the brother of Thanos. How can these beings that were created for one purpose have biological brothers? Before someone asks how I know the term brother is meant biologically, it's because nowhere else in the movie do Eternals refer to each other as brother and/or sister. Some Eternals even have physical and romantic relationships with one another. So the fact that Starfox mentioned this must mean a familial relationship. Secondly, how can Thanos be an Eternal? In Avengers infinity war and Endgame, Thanos’ motivations are made clear. He wants to erase half the universe to conserve resources because his planet, Titan, was destroyed due to fighting over a lack of resources. The whole universe knew his goals and they verified his story. In Avengers Infinity War, the Avengers even fight Thanos on Titan. This makes no sense! If the MCU allows the Eternals to be cannon then it would retroactively undermine Phase 1 through Phase 3 of the MCU and make Thanos a much less appealing villain. That would be a shame because in my opinion, Thanos is the best movie villain since Darth Vader.
