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In Avengers: Endgame, the Avengers decided to

jump back to 2012 New York because they could find three Infinity Stones there.

Why didn't they simply jump back 5 years just before Thanos destroyed the Infinity Stones? This way they could get all six Infinity Stones at once.

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  • 22
    Because Thanos had them.
    – OrangeDog
    Commented Jun 29, 2019 at 13:16
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    @OrangeDog - "Excuse me, Mr. Thanos, sir. Can we have the Infinity Stones so we can kill you, please? What do you mean 'No'"?
    – Valorum
    Commented Jun 29, 2019 at 15:52
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    So basically you are asking why this didn't happen in the movie.
    – Muntasir
    Commented Jun 30, 2019 at 6:36
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    Similarly, they could have just gone back in time to right before the snap, then tell Thor to aim for the arm, not the chest.
    – Thunderforge
    Commented Jul 1, 2019 at 15:53
  • To be fair Tony invented the technology they used, what he says goes and he didn't want to lose his daughter. Think about it, would you take the flux capacitor out of the DeLorean? You're going to do what the science man wants!
    – E_McAndrew
    Commented Jul 5, 2019 at 15:02

2 Answers 2

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They need to get the Infinity Stones before Thanos has even one of them because there's absolutely no way in hell that he's going to hand them over, let alone taking him on when he's expecting a fight and has all six(!).

Don't forget what Banner said to Strange

Bruce Banner: No telling. He has the Power and Space Stones, that already makes him the strongest creature in the whole universe. If he gets his hands, on all six Stones, Tony...

and what Maw said to Thanos

Ebony Maw: My humble personage… bows before your grandeur. No other being has ever had the might, nay the nobility, to wield not one, but two Infinity Stones. The universe lies within your grasp.

It's important to note that Thanos (in Infinity War) was basically holding back for the entire film, at least until the very end. He's only really trying to get the stones and has little or no interest in killing those who're opposing him.

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    @iloveyou3000 That's out of sheer despair. Why bother to deal with a top notch Thanos for acquiring the stones if there's a way to avoid that?
    – Philip Klöcking
    Commented Jun 29, 2019 at 14:11
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    @ILoveYou3000 “Avengers were ready to confront Thanos after Thanos used the Gauntlet second time” — with Captain Marvel, and peak-condition Thor. Against Thanos alone on a planet, with no satellites, no army, just him. Little bit different to re-entering the Battle of Wakanda and trying to safely extract him from Thor’s axe-y embrace.
    – Paul D. Waite
    Commented Jun 29, 2019 at 16:53
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    @PaulD.Waite Not to forget about not meeting their other selves while doing so...
    – Philip Klöcking
    Commented Jun 29, 2019 at 17:04
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    Just throwing this out there but Ebony Maw wasn't exactly correct when he claimed Thanos was the first to wield 2 infinity stones. Loki simultaneously wielded the scepter (mind stone) and the tesseract (space stone)
    – user1
    Commented Jun 30, 2019 at 14:14
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    @Valorum There's no indication in the MCU that the Tesseract or scepter did anything to reduce the energy of the stones. They merely harnessed their power much like a certain shiny glove.
    – user1
    Commented Jun 30, 2019 at 15:37
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One possible answer is that they were never planning on having to deal with Thanos again. Remember, Thanos came to the present sort of by accident. It wasn't exactly part of their plan. Their plan was to snap everybody back, not necessarily fight Thanos for the gauntlet. Fighting Thanos was kind of just a consequence of their actions.

If they went back to any time when Thanos had them, they were gonna have to fight him for it again. It's not like he was just gonna hand them over so they could snap everybody back again. And, if they lost (again), they'd be back where they started, maybe worse. Much safer, and more likely to be successful, is the idea of going to a time where he didn't have them all. Then they wouldn't have to work as hard for the stones themselves, and they could snap everybody back no problem.

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  • They litteraly went to fight him 3 week after the first snap, knowing for sure that he still have the stones and the gantlet and that he might have an army with him.
    – Dhon Joe
    Commented Jul 5, 2019 at 9:31
  • This plan was conceived 5 years later though. I'd think they would have had much cooler heads on them then. If half the universe had just been erased you'd be pretty mad about it, 5 years down the line you're concentrating on trying to bring them back, not get revenge. Also when they went to fight Thanos on that planet they had nothing to lose.
    – E_McAndrew
    Commented Jul 5, 2019 at 14:51

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