Elizabeth Olsen Offers Blunt Warning About Avengers 4

Always heed a warning from a witch. 

It's been a weird time in the months leading up to the release of Avengers 4. When fans haven't been sobbing over the events of Avengers: Infinity War, holding pseudo-vigils on social media for all the heroes we lost in the Marvel Studios ensemble movie, they've been crafting intricate theories about how the surviving crew might find a way to reverse Thanos' (Josh Brolin) universe-decimating snap and bring our fallen Marvel favorites back to life. 

Though it's a lovely thought to have, dreaming of the moment Spider-Man (Tom Holland) and Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) and the rest of the turned-to-dust gang will return, it may not actually come to fruition. According to Scarlet Witch actress Elizabeth Olsen, things aren't going to get better in Avengers 4. 

Speaking at ACE Comic-Con in Chicago over the weekend, Olsen offered a blunt warning about the future of Earth's Mightiest Heroes. "It's only going to get worse," she said (via ComicBook.com). 

Loki actor Tom Hiddleston joined Olsen on stage for the convention panel, during which he noted that both his character and Olsen's Scarlet Witch had to make the ultimate sacrifice in Infinity War: trading a life for the greater good. 

"The thing you have to do at the end of Infinity War is a kind of sacrifice," Hiddleston said to Olsen, "and arguably Loki makes a similar one."

As fans will recall, Loki died in the very first scene of the film. After he gave Thanos the Tesseract (also known as the Space Stone) and then pretended to double-cross Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), playing it like he genuinely wanted to join Thanos and the Black Order to hunt for the Infinity Stones, Loki whipped out a dagger and lunged for Thanos' thick neck. Sadly, Loki's desperate attempt to kill the Mad Titan was one made in vain, as Thanos swiftly grabbed Loki by the throat, squeezed the life out of him, and threw him to the ground like an old banana peel. Loki sacrificed himself, though initially unintentionally, and the Tesseract so that his half-brother and the not-so-jolly green giant he grew closer to in Thor: Ragnarok could have a chance at survival. 

Scarlet Witch's sacrifice came at the end, when she had to kill Vision (Paul Bettany) in order to extract the Mind Stone from his forehead and destroy it so that Thanos could never get his hands on it, power up the Infinity Gauntlet, and snap his fingers in an act of mass genocide. Successfully murdering Vision, the man-droid she deeply loves, and demolishing the Mind Stone was one emotionally traumatic thing — but watching Thanos use the Time Stone he obtained from Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) to reverse Scarlet Witch's actions, revive Vision, and steal the Mind Stone for himself (thus killing Vision all over again) was too much for Scarlet Witch to bear. To make matters even more devastating, Scarlet Witch didn't even survive Infinity War. After killing her true love and then seeing him die a second time, she — along with Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman), Groot (Vin Diesel), Drax (Dave Bautista), and more — floated away into space dust, completely erased from reality. 

The upside to Olsen's grim comments here is that both she and Hiddleston will appear in Avengers 4 in some capacity, despite biting the literal dust in Infinity War. 

Insiders previously spotted Olsen in Atlanta, Georgia, filming reshoots for Avengers 4. The actress herself also shared a since-deleted post to her Instagram story that revealed a bruise she got while shooting the film. Olsen wrote in the caption of the photo that the bruise came about while Scarlet Witch "took flight," which suggests that her character will be alive and well enough to take to the skies for some epic action sequences in the fourth Avengers flick. 

As for Hiddleston, he isn't 100-percent confirmed for Avengers 4, but set photos have shown him filming what looks to be a flashback or time travel sequence for the film.

It's hard to imagine that, after all the pain the Avengers and co. suffered in Infinity War, things are going to get even bleaker. But might the intense doom and gloom only last a short while before the heroes taste sweet success? 

Fan theories have it that Avengers 4 will feature time travel, with the surviving heroes banding together, taking a journey through the Quantum Realm, and visiting the past to defeat Thanos before he can collect the Infinity Stones and slash the universe's population by 50 percent. 

Leaked promotional art for Avengers 4 shows Thor, Captain America (Chris Evans), and Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper) wearing silver-white, red, and black suits — ones that look similar to the costume Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) wore when he was searching for Janet Van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer) in the Quantum Realm. Many have taken this as proof that Earth's Mightiest Heroes will visit the past in Avengers 4, and will utilize the Quantum Realm to get there. 

Additional pieces of evidence that support the time travel theory are the photos of Evans, Ruffalo, Rudd, and Robert Downey Jr. in character as Captain America, Ant-Man, Hulk, and Iron Man on the Avengers 4 set, filming a scene that looks a lot like the Battle of New York from 2012's The Avengers. According to CBR, Marvel built "an almost perfect recreation of the moment from [2012's The Avengers] where Nick Fury warns Tony Stark that a nuclear bomb is on the way to Manhattan." In the pictures, Evans is even wearing his Battle of New York costume.

We've also seen leaked concept art that depicts Captain America in what looks like his suit from Captain America: Civil War and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) rocking red hair — the same shade she wore in The Avengers and its sequels – rather than the blonde bob she sported in Infinity War. 

All this considered, it seems highly likely that Avengers 4 will start off super dark before it turns back the clock and takes a trip to Big Apple for Thanos-versus-Avengers Showdown: Round Two. With a little luck and a whole lot of butt-kicking, maybe the heroes truly will be able to defeat Thanos and revive their fellow vigilantes so that everyone can live happily ever after. (Hey, Marvel is owned by Disney, so it isn't that much of a stretch.)

While fans should definitely prepare themselves to ride another emotional rollercoaster when watching Avengers 4, they should also expect to be blown away by the upcoming film. Elsewhere at ACE Comic-Con, Captain America actor Evans promised that Avengers 4 co-directors Joe and Anthony Russo "really stick a flag in the ground on this one and pull out all the stops," and that the movie is "an incredible culmination of this unbelievable tapestry of ... six, seven individual parts coming together" (via ComicBook.com). 

"There's just nothing that I can say but there's so much good stuff ... there's so many good things," said Evans. "You won't be disappointed."

Avengers 4 is set for release on May 3, 2019.