Why Jon Favreau Argued Against Killing Iron Man in Avengers: Endgame

Somewhere in the wider multiverse, Iron Man never gave up his life to defeat Thanos.

Jon Favreau, the man who launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe with 2008's Iron Man, actually argued against the idea of killing off Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), going so far as to appeal directly to Endgame directors Joe Russo and Anthony Russo.

Why Jon Favreau didn't want Iron Man to die in Avengers: Endgame

"I was like, 'I don't know. I think it's gonna really impact people'," Favreau recalled during a recent guest appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, echoing comments he made back in 2022. "Because there were kids that grew up with that character."

When Favreau, who served as an executive producer on the film, saw the finished product, however, he walked back his initial ambivalence.

"I have to tell you it was handled so well by them," he told Kimmel, going on to praise the performances of Downey and Gwyneth Paltrow in the moment where Tony shares one last interaction with Pepper Potts. "It added a poignancy and they did a wonderful job. I was wrong ... I was choked up because even though it was a movie, those characters have been part of my life for so long."

Of course, Downey's MCU tenure is far from over, with the actor returning to play Doctor Doom in Avengers: Doomsday, which arrives in theaters this winter. Thanks to his recurring role as Happy Hogan and involvement with The Mandalorian television series (soon to be a major motion picture), Favreau has been kept in the loop.

"I'm excited to see it," he said of Doomsday. "I get to travel around with them because Star Wars is a Disney [IP], Marvel's Disney, so we travel together. And we've known each other for so long—Kevin [Feige] and the Russos and Robert and I."

Avengers: Endgame, the second-highest grossing movie of all time behind James Cameron's Avatar, will enjoy a theatrical re-release in the fall with never-before-seen footage that sets the stage for Doomsday's December debut.

“It’s an opportunity to create a bridge from Endgame to Doomsday in a very unique way, and because the movie was so successful, we have an opportunity to re-release it," Joe Russo said (via Deadline) at CinemaCon earlier this month. "You don’t always get the chance to re-release because it costs money, so the fact that we can enhance the story of Doomsday by bridging it to Endgame and these characters that we worked with for years that we love so much, and continue their story: It’s a really unique opportunity.”