**Warning Spoilers for Thanos #18 Below**
Donny Cates and Geoff Shaw’s Thanos run has been quite a bit of fun, but with Thanos #18 it looks like it is coming to an end.
Thanos has killed the entire universe. He’s killed Captain America. He killed the Hulk. He’s destroyed Norrin Radd. He has won.
However, there’s a catch. In order to kill everyone he had to recruit his younger self using the Time Gem. That leaves two people left alive in the Marvel Universe. Thanos and Thanos. But there is still one other being remaining, Lady Death.
While Lady Death does not utter a single word, Thanos believes they must fight each other to the death in order to claim her as his bride.
The two viciously attack each other with the younger Thanos eventually gaining the upper hand. He breaks the older Thanos’ arm. Smashes his face into the floor and even rips out his left eye. It becomes a brutal, savage beat down as the younger Thanos pulverizes his older self. After being beaten into a bloody pulp the older Thanos begs for the younger Thanos to kill him.
The younger Thanos seemingly obliges as he wraps his thick hands around the older Thanos’ neck and begins to squeeze.
However, the younger Thanos realizes how weak and pathetic this Older Thanos has become. He embarks on his own plan to prevent this Older Thanos from ever coming into existence. He rips the Time Gem from the Older Thanos and charges with the now dead Norrin Radd and travels back in time leaving the Older Thanos to wallow in his misery.
Thanos succeeds in defeating the older, weak, and mewling Thanos by erasing him from existence. And just after the older Thanos is erased from existence, Lady Death answers his last question asking “What did Thanos do?” She responds, “He won.”
And that’s how Thanos is defeated. His younger self actively works in the present in order to ensure the weak and older Thanos never comes into existence. and as Lady Death says. Thanos wins.