You've seen the movies so you know the consequences. Superman and Zod mindlessly murdering the hapless citizens of Metropolois in Man of Steel, Batman mercilessly throwing rockets at wayward thugs in 'Dawn of Justice', Aliens eviscerating New Yorkers in The Avengers and then the destruction and consequent deaths of thousands via Ultron and the Avengers in 'Age of Ultron'. Something has to be done about this! There needs to be accountability! On the Marvel side of things this accountability is being designed by the Secretary of State Thaddeus 'Thunderbolt' Ross, in this film 'Captain America: Civil War', via something called the Slokovia Accords. It's simple enough… our augmented heroes work under the umbrella of the United Nations. Every relatively stable nation on the planet is on board with this thing. Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) thinks it's a good idea… Even though he should know, like we ALL know, that the former General Ross is as rotten as they come… But Steve Rogers (Chris Evans)… not so much. There will be consequences and repercussions to this.
So there we are, 'Captain America: Civil War' has been laid out for us and there is a TON of stuff that will be thrown our way for the next 150 or so minutes and almost all of it will be a joy to watch. But instead of heaping praise on this movie, which many have done and deservedly so for the most part, we're going to talk about the things that bothered me a little about this movie. Spoilers will follow.
Take Spider-Man for instance. Of course we are happy to see Spidey in this movie, and with young Tom Holland I think Peter Parker is in good hands, not to mention that Marissa Tomei makes for an uncommonly hot Aunt May. I'm just not sure Spider-Man actually belongs in this movie. I know, Marvel got word that Sony is willing to negotiate, so we have to squeeze the kid in… but other than the fact we see Stark showing up at this kids shanty shack… and we do emphasize 'kid' here, should a sixteen year old who has been a hero all of six months be exported to a Superhero beatdown starring probably the most notorious mass murderer the MCU has ever known? That being one Bucky Barnes? I don't think so. Highly irresponsible behavior their Mr. Stark.
Also, despite the fact the Russo Brothers handled it about as well as could be reasonably expected, there are still too many characters to deal with in this movie. All of our Supers have something going on that has to be dealt with, or ignored… such as Hawkeye's complete disregard for his family back on the farm… and not to mention our Normals which we also have to deal with, such as young Agent Carter who for some reason is making out with Captain America. See, if we had fewer characters, there would be a more reasonable arc as to why these two people are locking lips, outside of the fact they are both beautiful.
What we need is more Bucky and Sam. I'd almost be happy with these two getting a 30 minute sitcom, but since that's not going to happen it's up to the movies that they show up in to give us more of this very unique dynamic. The Winter Soldier has tried to murder The Falcon on numerous occasions… something that is not lost on Sam Wilson… but because of his loyalty to Cap he has to deal with this guy, and Buck has to deal with him… and they don't like each other, and it's actually kind of funny. But I didn't get enough of that either.
At what point does 'He wasn't in control' stop being a solid excuse. Talking to Steve Rogers now. Bucky has murdered a lot of people these past 70 years, and when Zemo played the video of the Winter Soldier taking out the Starks, for all to see, personally, as Captain America, I would've stepped away from that. Tony's pissed off, and rightfully so, thus I would let them work that out man to man, steel to steel. Whatever happens… happens. I already thought Cap was somewhat unreasonable in not just signing the accords in the first place, but there has to be a limit to the defense of a guy who had your back way back in '45.
Finally, my Number One complaint is that it's just not a Captain America movie. I get the opportunity was there to have all these heroes in this big fight doing all this stuff, and it sure did look great, and the airport scene will go down as legendary, but 'Captain America: Winter Soldier' was so good, and so impactful, and so well realized that Captain America didn't need the help to sell his next movie, say the way the inclusion Batman circumvented what should've been 'Man of Steel II'. Tony Stark, as per usual, and his decisions, is what drives this movie which essentially takes the movie away from Captain America. Personally, I would've preferred if Stark and all of the other heroes, including Spider-Man could've waited just one movie, and leave this one to Cap, Bucky and Sam… maybe Natasha… while still introducing the Black Panther, with Baron Zemo still as our villain. Complete with the mask and fur-lined collar. Or not. That collar was always suspect. Regardless, this way I would still have gotten a true 'Captain America III', and the next Marvel movie could just be called 'Civil War' and it would still be awesome and Marvel / Disney could print even more money!
But I didn't get that so I guess I'll have to be content with what I did get. The Black Panther being introduced about as well as I could ever have imagined his debut, replete with the world's hottest bodyguard by his side, though we could argue as why Prince T'Challa even needs one, but we are glad he has one. We got Giant Man, we got Spider-Man, and we got an ending that defied convention and went someplace that was dramatically more substantive, and even a little sad. True enough, I didn't get the Cap 3 I wanted, but this was darn good consolation prize.
