David Harbour Says His Avengers: Doomsday Line Is a Countdown, Not Tony Stark

David Harbour is walking back the Avengers: Doomsday line that became a huge story, but he isn't leaving us empty handed. He now says his real line from the film is a countdown from five to one, and that "something very important happens" when he says it. I think that countdown could connect to Doctor Doom's rumored plan for saving the Earths.

The quote that started all of this was a big story. Apparently, in an interview, Harbour revealed one line he says in Avengers: Doomsday, and that line was "You're Tony Stark." Now he says he never said it and puts it on the interviewer.

David Harbour denies the Tony Stark line he was quoted as saying in Variety

For context, the original quote appeared in Variety, of all places, a trusted Hollywood trade. That had obvious implications because of who is playing Victor von Doom, and it pointed to a reveal that we don't expect until Avengers: Secret Wars. It would also be wild if Harbour were the one saying it. I've argued before that on a short list of characters for whom Doom looking like Tony Stark would matter, Red Guardian isn't anywhere near it. So while I covered the quote as a spoiler, I also said it was very unbelievable at the time.

Harbour has now walked that back, or at least clarified it. In his words: "I think you guys make this stuff up. The guy asked me for a line from Avengers Doomsday and my line was 5 4 3 2 1. That's my line that I gave him. I don't know about the Tony Stark thing." He added that Wyatt Russell sent him an article suggesting he had ruined the movie, and that his reaction was, "I don't think I said that. If I did, I'm sorry. I don't say that in the movie."

As someone who has been interviewed and has conducted interviews quite often, or at least used to, I find it hard to imagine how this happened. Marvel quality controls its interviews by pre-screening questions, and it then generally goes over the entire article or the questions before they're published. How this was somehow fabricated, slipped through the cracks and made it into a publication as big and widely trusted as Variety, I have no idea.

Still, it's good to know, and it makes a lot of sense that he doesn't say that line in the movie. I think we can safely rely on the industry insiders indicating that we won't get that twist or reveal until Avengers: Secret Wars.

Harbour's five to one countdown points to something important in Avengers: Doomsday

Harbour's new line is the countdown, and he says that during it, something important happens. The operative word there is important. Without any context, it's impossible to know how important it is to the plot, but it's important enough that he describes it that way.

When you count down from five to one, it implies some kind of sequencing. Either somebody is doing something simultaneously, which is why you count down, or there's a launch of some kind. With the imagery we've already seen for Avengers: Doomsday, the Fantastic Four will be coming and going, and the 616 heroes will at least be traveling to the 828, to Earth-10005 and who knows what other universes. So it could be a countdown for a launch.

But it doesn't seem like the Fantastic Four's technology will require that, at least by the time they get to the 616. Sure, the Fantastic Four were doing traditional launches on the 828, but they're way past that with their tech now. They don't need a countdown. It seems like their ship would take off the way we've seen ships take off in the 616.

The countdown could be for Doctor Doom's rumored repulsor cannons

So more likely than not, I think this countdown has something to do with Doctor Doom's proposed plan for how the 616, Earth-10005 and the 828 can work together to stop the Earths from drifting into each other and causing incursions. That rumored plan is said to involve huge repulsor cannons: cannons on the surface of each Earth, firing into the other Earths and repelling them from each other, staving off the incursions completely.

That's probably why the 616 ends up traveling to Earth-10005 after the 828 comes to the 616. Doom will tell them they need to work with these other Earths, because all the Earths need repulsor cannons. And it could be that Harbour's countdown is the countdown to actually firing the cannon.

In that moment, I think that's what we're seeing in the shots of Franklin Richards being held by Johnny Storm. I think it's a lot more likely that they aren't fighting for existence in a last stand against the incursions. Johnny Storm is holding Franklin and they're embracing whatever their future holds, meaning they're launching the cannons. That's what I think we see there, and that's what Harbour could be referring to: a countdown to sequence the cannons, not the launch of a spaceship.

Reed Richards' Galactus plan already felt like a plot hole to me

While I'm on the topic of plans, Reed Richards' plan for dealing with Galactus was to move the Earth out of its own orbit instead of transporting Galactus in the first place. I feel like that was an enormous plot hole.

I'm not going to turn this into a full critique of Pedro Pascal's Reed Richards, because we don't need to do that. Fingers crossed he grows into the role. What he needs is some of the sure footing he brought to playing the Red Viper of Dorne in Game of Thrones, which is a topic I've already talked about at length elsewhere.

Doctor Doom's cannon plan seems silly, but desperation could sell it

Doom's plan seems silly to me. He's proposing to save these Earths by building huge versions of what are typically referred to as weapons, and to fire them at each other, all while his name is Doom. He's probably aware it wouldn't work in the first place. I've had my gripes with this plan since we first heard that this is what Doom may be trying to sell the Avengers and the X-Men on.

Still, if none of them has a better option and we're in the eleventh hour, I think the heroes may have no choice but to side with Doom out of desperation, unless they have a better idea. The movie is called Doomsday, after all. We know the 616 has limited knowledge of the multiverse, and last we saw Earth-10005 with Beast, they didn't even know about the multiverse. They're probably getting caught up on the situation, not in a position to dictate how to get around it.

Any plan will be better than none, and I think that's what Doctor Doom is seizing on for manipulation. He knows the peril these heroes are in. To go back to Game of Thrones a second time, Littlefinger said chaos is a ladder. The chaos of the multiverse collapsing, even though Doom is the reason for it, is enough for them all to buy into a plan that sounds utterly ridiculous: build massive cannons and shoot them at each Earth to stop an incursion.

Avengers: Doomsday will probably have plot holes, but the heroes should spot this red flag

No Avengers film has been without its plot holes. There are enormous plot holes in both Endgame and Infinity War. The movies are generally very enjoyable, and you can still get past those holes and buy into the story.

This film carries a lot. Marvel pivoted off Kang, and Doctor Doom is the big bad now. Avengers: Doomsday has to establish his character, bring the loose threads of the multiverse characters together, try to end what may have seemed like very weak arcs for some of the protagonists, and land on a huge cliffhanger that drives anticipation for a year leading to Avengers: Secret Wars. Add the multiverse complications on top of that, and there's probably going to be one or two plot holes in this movie. We should be prepared for them.

However, if Doom's plan of building massive cannons, combined with the fact that he's called Doctor Doom, doesn't set off some red flags with these heroes right at the beginning, I'm going to be shocked. I think we may end up seeing some heroes go along with it and others stop and say, wait a minute.