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| Image Courtesy marvel.wikia.com |
When I first started this Retro-Review
series, I think this was the movie I was most excited for. After all, before Captain America: Civil
War completely changed the status quo and elevated the MCU to a whole new
level, this movie was changing the game and elevating the MCU to a level it
hadn’t reached since The Avengers—and arguably it even exceeded the
level of The Avengers. Just about
every aspect of this movie works perfectly, from the character development and
relationship elements to the stunt work and choreography. This movie doesn’t make nearly as much use of
computer-generated effects as most other MCU movies, but it really doesn’t need
CGI to create convincing effects (other than the helicarriers and Falcon’s
flight effects). On the whole, there is
really nothing in this movie that doesn’t work spectacularly.
Much of the credit has to be
given to the tone of the movie. The
Russo brothers worked all the best elements of the espionage/political thriller
genre into this movie, and it is fantastic.
The first time watching this movie, the twists and turns and changing
loyalties keep you guessing almost to the end.
The nurse across the hall turns out to be S.H.I.E.L.D., S.H.I.E.L.D.
turns out to be Hydra, Fury had his own ship hijacked, Zola is alive, Bucky is
the Winter Soldier (okay, that one was pretty obvious to anyone familiar with
the comics, but still…)… Even after
multiple viewings I still enjoy the journey of Steve’s discovery of just how
corrupt S.H.I.E.L.D. really is. Ultimately
the only characters that you can feel confident in are Steve, Sam, and Natasha. However, early on Pierce positions himself as
a presumptive ally of both Fury and Steve who is simply misguided in sending
S.T.R.I.K.E. against Steve.
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| Image Courtesy www.facebook.com/AgentsofShield |
The Hydra reveal is such an
incredible and unexpected moment, especially after we had been led to believe
from the beginning of Iron Man that S.H.I.E.L.D. is a benevolent government
agency that wants to keep everyone safe from the unknown—even if their World
Security Council does have a tendency to “Nuke first, ask questions
later.” Considering that I really got
into Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. from the beginning, it was a huge shock to
discover that S.H.I.E.L.D. had been infiltrated by Hydra. And watching the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents fighting
each other because they weren’t sure who was on which side was a good
inclusion. The movie can’t focus too
much on the regular agents’ reactions to Hydra, but it gives just enough to
make us curious—and want to watch Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., of course!
None of this would work without
Steve Rogers, of course. Steve’s firm
moral center and innate “goodness” are what really keeps the movie grounded. Steve is still very much a “man out of time”
who does not understand the modern world.
This starts off as a clever joke when Steve reveals his list of things
to learn about in order to get caught up on what he missed. However, the joke wears off very quickly when
the World War II-era Greatest Generation icon comes face-to-face with a
post-9/11 America’s national security “needs.”
Steve’s firm moral center declares Project Insight to be “fear” instead
of “freedom,” while Fury sees it is nothing more than the natural progression
of the events started by The Avengers.
I love that Steve’s response to
Project Insight is to visit his own Smithsonian exhibit. It’s not that he doesn’t know any of it; he
simply needs the reminder of who he really is and what he really stands for, in
contrast to the shifts and changes in society since his era. His two reminders of who he is are that
Smithsonian exhibit and Peggy Carter, so it makes sense for his to return to
those constants in a moment of confusion and soul-searching. And the moment with Peggy is especially
touching for the bittersweet tinge to it:
in his first movie they were very slowly drifting toward each other up
until he went into the ice. She had to
move on (which we saw in Agent Carter season1), but he never got that
opportunity. So he is still dealing with
the regrets and missed opportunities, while she has learned to accept her fate
(as evidenced by her eventual marriage).
And yet, this is also the movie which starts Steve on the path of accepting
that he can never be with Peggy and moving on with someone new. At first this is played off with a laugh as
Natasha suggests about half the female S.H.I.E.L.D. agents as potential dates
for Steve. However, when he asks Sharon
(not knowing she’s a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent assigned to protect him) for a coffee,
that’s the first indication that he is himself ready to move on. And I think the best part of that
relationship is how little of it there actually is. Though it is hinted at, they are content to
save it for the next movie instead of pushing another love interest on Steve so
quickly.
The relationships between all the
characters are explored very well. This
begins with Sam and Steve “running together” around Washington D.C. before
bonding over the shared experience of returning home to war. At first Steve is ready to cut and run as
soon as Sam mentions waking up from the ice, but Sam slowly brings Steve out of
his hesitancy, to the point that Steve trusts him enough after 2 interactions
to seek sanctuary at Sam’s house when they are on the run from Hydra. About the only thing in this friendship that
I have to question (nitpicking) is why Steve decides to trust him to much so
quickly. I have no problem accepting
that Sam would trust Steve—I mean, who doesn’t trust Captain America???—but
after even S.H.I.E.L.D. turned on them, why would Steve trust someone he’s only
met a couple times?
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| Image Courtesy www.thefilmchair.com |
Steve’s friendship with Bucky
also gets a lot of good development, both expanding on the history and pushing
it forward into the future. We find out
just how close they were growing up (to the point that Bucky invited Steve to
live with them after his mom died). And
at the same time we see Steve’s reaction to learning that Bucky is now a
brainwashed Hydra assassin. His
brotherly love for Bucky is so great that he absolutely refuses to kill
him. When Bucky interferes with his
mission, Steve fights him enough to complete the mission, but he would prefer
to leave Bucky able to shoot him over completely incapacitating him. And after Steve completes the mission, he
refuses to leave without Bucky. In fact,
their friendship is so powerful that it is even able to cut through some of
Bucky’s programming. This friendship
really gives the movie a lot of heart and depth.
From a technical standpoint all
of the fight sequences and effects come off very well. I love how well this movie displays what it
means for Captain America to be a “super-soldier.” His overall health and strength are greater
than a normal man. Couple that with
years and years of training and he can cut his way through a boat-full of
hostiles in a matter of minutes, and an elevator-full of Hydra agents in a
matter of seconds. He also has the
intelligence and experience to recognize the Hydra ambush in the elevator
before they can spring it. The fights
are all choreographed beautifully—even the one at the beginning when Steve
takes out “Batroc the Leaper.”
I also absolutely love all the
new technology that they show off. The
“lightsaber” (Fury’s cutting tool) and facial mask are both expanded on by Agents
of S.H.I.E.L.D. Fury’s SUV has a ton
of awesome features. The one that I
liked the most, however, is the one they didn’t show: Fury actually tells the SUV to take off (but
the VTOL capability has been damaged).
In other words, Fury is actually driving a “hover-car,” something of
which S.H.I.E.L.D. made extensive use in the comics. I’m a little disappointed that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. hasn’t used this
at all yet. Maybe they will in season 4…
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| Image Courtesy www.comicbook.com |
One of the biggest concerns with
the MCU movies is always in how they manage to integrate the shared universe
elements. However, The Winter Soldier
does an excellent job of this. By and
large the references to other MCU properties are done in passing or played up
for laughs (Iron Man stopping by for a child’s birthday party is one, and Iron
Man getting an “up-close” look at the original helicarrier’s turbines is
another). The HISHE [] for this movie
(among others) did make the argument that they should have called in the
Avengers, but it actually makes a lot of sense to me for them to avoid
the Avengers after discovering that Hydra had infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. Considering how well Hydra had placed its
operatives within S.H.I.E.L.D., there was no guarantee that Hydra wouldn’t be
watching the Avengers. If they went to
Tony or contacted Thor, it’s a pretty good bet that they would have been
tracked and captured almost immediately.
Instead, they go to someone they hardly know who is completely
unconnected from S.H.I.E.L.D. (Sam).
There really aren’t any negatives
to this movie. Everything works
extremely well. In fact, the only
negative comment I could find while rewatching the movie for this review was
“There are an awful lot of coincidences.”
And that is absolutely true:
Steve just happens to go running with the one guy with a skill set that
will be useful later on, the Winter Soldier anticipates Fury’s escape well
enough to ambush him after he lost the rest of the assault team, Steve and
Natasha somehow find Zola, Bucky’s mask falls off just in time for Steve to
recognize him, Hill just happens to position herself in the capture team to be
one of 2 guards on the prisoners, the van holding the prisoners is at the back
of the convoy so they can escape without anyone seeing, Sam manages to jump
headfirst out of the building and miraculously land in the helicopter hovering
several floors below without getting chopped up or cracking his skull… and
those are just off the top of my head!
There’s no escaping the number of coincidences that happen to keep the
plot moving forward. At the same time,
any movie is bound to have a lot of coincidental circumstances which must
happen for the plot to move forward.
All told, Captain America: The Winter
Soldier is probably my favorite MCU movie prior to Civil War. It is arguably the one with the least flaws,
and just as arguably the one which propels the narrative forward the most. It certainly set the bar high for the future
movies!
Is this your favorite MCU movie? What is your favorite part? Let me know in the comments!
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