Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

Director:

Anthony Russo

Joe Russo

Starring:

Chris Evans

Scarlett Johansson

Samuel L. Jackson

Cobie Smulders

Robert Redford

Anthony Mackie

Sebastian Stan

Plot:

As Steve Rogers struggles to embrace his role in the modern world, he teams up with a fellow Avenger and S.H.I.E.L.D agent, Black Widow, to battle a new threat from history: an assassin known as the Winter Soldier.

Review:

Steve Rogers aka Captain America, Chris Evans, is no longer fighting aliens bent on taking over the world, so now he is a man out of time trying to figure out his place in the world. He buries himself in work and ignores Black Widow’s, Scarlett Johansson, attempts to set him up on a date.

When Nick Fury, Samuel L. Jackson, shares with him the next phase for S.H.I.E.L.D. he feels even more lost because it goes against everything he believes in. Cap is doubting himself, wondering if he’ll ever fit in, when things return to something he’s much more familiar with. Poorly shot action scenes, Hydra, and intrigue.

Winter Soldier marks the point in the MCU when I realized I was never going to get well shot action scenes. I’m a bit bitter about that considering I feel like the amount of work the actors put in and the skill of the stunt people involved means their work should be clearly showcased. Instead, we get shaky cam, quick cuts, and extreme close-ups. According to the Wikipedia for this movie”

“In contrast to the quick editing and moving cameras of modern action films, The Winter Soldier aimed to feature longer action scenes that felt more visceral and dangerous.”

I did not get those feelings from these scenes. Time and time again we’d be put in a situation where Cap was about to kick ass, he had great quips, and then boom, you couldn’t see shit. It was beyond frustrating.

Anyway…We got to see more of Cobie Smulders in this movie, which had me excited. She once again is ridiculously capable and acts as Fury’s right hand needing almost no communication from him to know exactly what to do. She takes care of business coolly and calmly and she was barely in the movie.

This might have my favorite Black Widow scenes. She is actually, sort of, human here, though, I have a hard time trusting it and wondered throughout if she was just giving Cap what he wanted to see. She had to come to terms with the fact that Fury doesn’t or didn’t full trust her, and that actually seemed to hit her hard.

Bucky, Sebastian Stan, and Cap’s scenes were easily the best. The flash back to before the super soldier program was emotionally impactful even with the bad scrawny Steve CG. So much emotion between the two and for the first time since he came back Steve seemed to realize he wasn’t alone.

Poor Falcon, Anthony Mackie, didn’t get to beat his bad guy in the end and had to watch his new best friend chase after another. At least he got to fly like a bird till his wings were destroyed.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier didn’t really set up much for future movies. It brought up a lot of history for Cap and did bring us Bucky, and eventually Scarlett Witch, but Hydra doesn’t play a huge role in future movies. You’ve got the little bit in Avengers: Age of Ultron at the beginning but the dismantling of Hydra is mostly handled by Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Ultron could have used someone else to do what he did. Cap did seem to get a purpose at the end of the movie, but it’s another short term one, find and help Bucky. Clearly, it’s not one of my favorites, but I know I’m in the minority with that opinion.

Original Review

3/5