Our review of the second Captain America movie of the 21st century…not counting The Avengers or the Ultimate Avengers cartoon duology. Not that anyone remembers those little pictures. It’s so much better than the last one I can barely believe it was written by the same people. I suspect the use of a Cosmic Cube or three, by someone, somewhere.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier is almost the perfect modern-day Captain America movie. It also does what no Marvel movie has done since Iron Man and have at least some social relevance. The difference between entertainment and art are simple to me—one has a relevance beyond creating joy in the audience. Captain America: The Winter Soldier has plenty of that, even if it’s dissonant to me we have a heroine of the movie leaving a morally ambivalent and corrupt spy agency to join the CIA. CA tackles issues of drones, pre-emptive strikes, and the Skynet-like military industrial complex all with aplumb. Could it have gone farther? Probably. However, I think the REVELATION everyone now knows is actually pretty well done. If your morality tracks with Nazis, you probably should check yourself.
Still, I can’t say TWS is a perfect movie to my Marvel-loving heart. The social commentary isn’t problematic—I’ll take what I can get there. No, my problem is that it’s got a little too much going on under the surface. It’s hard to really give 2 figs about Sharon Carter when the Black Widow is right up against the Captain and Colbie Smulder’s Maria Hill is also absorbing screen time. Falcon is wonderful in the movie but I’m reminded we still haven’t fixed his horrifically maimed backstory in the comics. Likewise, I want to know why we haven’t had a headlining black main character in the Marvel Universe since Blade. Are Falcon and War Machine Avengers? If not, why so? Thank God for Nicholas J. Fury’s Ultimatization.
And you totally need to do either a spoiler-version of this review to discuss the REVELATION or a “Agents of Shield” season one review because that show is ACHING to be deconstructed with its weird 80s G.I. Joe meets 24 view of our modern surveillance state.
If I’m going to talk about TV, I’m going to talk about TV that I like, as opposed to TV that endlessly frustrates me with expositional spoon-feeding and the occasional wink at something, someday, down the road, maybe. (“Hey, did ya hear the one about Johnny Horton? Dude gave himself lion’s paws for hands?”) It’d probably devolve into a long-ish rant about Jeph Leob and the slow-drip mode of storytelling he seems to like, along with a lot of other TV luminaries…like everyone’s favorite writer, Damon Lindelof. And if I’m going to do that, I might as well go all the way back to Heroes. And I don’t want to talk about Heroes. You couldn’t pay me to talk about Heroes…well, that’s a lie, but I since I’m confident no one will, I feel confident saying it anyway.
Hey, if you’re taking requests for money, I’m willing to cash out on the bad superhero stuff!
🙂
I honestly thought the way Justice League War ended your next video would have been the Animated Wonder Woman movie
LOL! Nope. That comes later…possibly as part of a duology with 1974’s Cathy Lee Crosby Wonder Woman movie, letting everyone know Just How Bad Things Were At One Time…and then point to WW2009 as the Ultimate Counterexample. “See? There is a way to do this well.”
In the meantime, I’m dead seriously about wanting that apology.