@Catmanlives - true, I definitely respect that they didn't unnecessarily split it with the intention of making more money.

However, I think the difference with the examples you mentioned is that Hunger Games and Harry Potter were pretty much direct adaptations of pre-existing literature so dragging them out did feel a bit forced (the worst example has to be The Hobbit trilogy).

On the other hand, while Infinity War and Endgame, definitely adapt characters and borrow narrative bits and pieces from the comics, they're mostly original narratives, meaning Feige, Markus, McFeely, and the Russo Bros more or less had complete free reign over what they could've done with those movies narratively and structurally, so long as the end result respected what came before.

So for someone like me, who loves Infinity War but thinks Endgame was a bit overstuffed and had a few pacing and structuring issues, I feel like reworking it to either be more lean and concise, or reworking it into two more parts and letting it breathe a bit more (while expanding aspects that may have felt a bit rushed or left out), might have helped.

@GoldGuy - He wouldn't have to last a minute. The battle was so chaotic that a lot of heroes had brief runs at Thanos before the scrum moved on. Drax could have quickly popped in, punched the Mad Titan in the nards, then gave way while someone else blasted the bastard. Easy peasy.