Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-1031724-20170607203709/@comment-1031724-20170612061947

Well, if Avengers 4 was the actual fight with Thanos, it would still be a Part 2 to Infinity War, which would be the prelude to the fight if all it is is Thanos getting the Infinity Stones. Besides, it wouldn't take long for him to get each one, with all his power, so it's all scenes probably no longer than 5 or 10 minutes in a two-hour film: He'll steal the tesseract from Asgard, setting the Avengers after him; he'll steal the Aether from the Collector (rather quickly, I assume), he'll steal the Orb from the Nova Corps, who will likely send the Guardians of the Galaxy after him, thus leading them to the Avengers; he'll steal the Eye of Agamotto likely after a fight with Doctor Strange.

Not sure where the Soul Stone is or will be, but hopefully at least 3/4 into the movie will be when Thanos kills Vision to get the Mind Stone, likely after an epic battle. This gives Thanos the full power of the Infinity Gauntlet, and it makes sense Thanos doesn't get this power until NEAR the end of the movie, but not quite - this can be immediately followed by the final battle, where the Avengers and Guardians fight Thanos and he has the upper hand the entire way through. Until Ant-Man turns small and steals the Infinity Gauntlet and gives it to someone who uses it to destroy him.

And probably Loki to become the villain again in Avengers 4, coz he'll likely survive Thor: Ragnarok.

Of course, the first 3/4 would not only be Thanos getting the Stones, but also the Avengers reuniting and meeting up with the Guardians.