Avengers: Endgame was trending this week almost year after 100 million fans first flocked to movie theatres to see the culmination of more than a decade of Marvel Cinematic Universe storytelling.

Tweets sharing the film’s most memorable scenes spliced with audio of the opening night audience serve as an unexpectedly emotional reminder of the visceral joy of sitting in a packed theatre with like-minded fans. We can share Tiger King memes all day, but nothing compares to the chills-inducing magic of a movie-loving crowd.

“Just stop what you’re doing and enjoy listening to the #AvengersEndgame opening night crowd react to Captain America wielding Thor’s hammer,” fan Scott Gustin tweeted alongside a 48-second video the epic moment– first teased in 2015’s Avengers: Age of Ultron.

Just stop what you’re doing and enjoy listening to the #AvengersEndgame opening night crowd react to Captain America wielding Thor's hammer.

CHILLS. pic.twitter.com/RM8fimepxe

— Scott Gustin (@ScottGustin) April 7, 2020

Marvel Studios’ president Kevin Feige got in on the act, retweeting Gustin’s video. “A nice reminder of what we were all doing together almost exactly 1 year ago. A nice reminder of what we will all be doing together someday again.”

A second clip shows the “bonkers” audience reaction to the moment the other Avengers, previously thought dead, make their return through portals and Chris Evans’s Captain America utters “Avengers Assemble.”

And of course the theater reaction to PORTALS was bonkers. pic.twitter.com/tllxg9aqMG

— Scott Gustin (@ScottGustin) April 7, 2020

The packed theatre erupts in hoots and cheers and for social media users today, the moment has become even more loaded. “Wow, maybe it’s what’s going on at the moment but seeing that again really got to me,” wrote one user. “Maybe it’s hearing a crowd of people together… but that’s one of my fave scenes in all of cinema.”

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Wrote another: “I do not know why all of these audience reactions on opening night to #AvengersEndgame are making me cry, but they sure are!!!”

I have some theories as to why. I’ve watched the clips four times now and each time I’ve bawled. To be fair, my tear-threshold is definitely lower post-pandemic, but my reaction is over the top. As the mother of three sons, I’ve been steeped in superhero lore for years.

We’ve been front and centre on opening night for every chapter of the MCU canon. So yes, nostalgia for a simpler time sharing an experience in a packed theatre is part of it.

But there’s something else at play. It feels like the world is in the throes of a fight, and now more than ever, some superhero action would be welcome. In Marvel movie terms, COVID-19 is in the Avengers: Infinity War stage of the story arc. At the end of that penultimate movie, bad guy Thanos changes the world as we know it with the snap of his fingers.

In Endgame, our fearless heroes work together and ultimately come up with a complicated scenario to save the world. Endgame is even the terminology being used by professionals when talking about how best to combat this pandemic.

That’s what got to me. Impatient desperation for a triumphant happy ending. In a social media post that has scored 3.9K retweets and 16K likes, artist BossLogic made just that point, reimagining Thanos as the coronavirus pandemic, and The Avengers as the medical professionals working to defeat it. I’m not crying, you’re crying.

ASSEMBLE! 🏥 ❤️

@Russo_Brothers @ChrisEvans @chrishemsworth @RobertDowneyJr @MarkRuffalo @MarvelStudios pic.twitter.com/zmMVyW2s3w

— BossLogic (@Bosslogic) April 2, 2020