Captain America: Civil War
By this stage of the continuation of Marvel’s movie mission,
Captain America was a well-seasoned superhero. He started it all in 1945 as The
First Avenger, was crucial in the formation of The Avengers, and showed he
could hold his own against The Winter Soldier. It’s been eight years since Tony
Stark announced to the world he was Iron Man, and the planet had been forever changed.
The good citizens of planet earth were no longer strangers to the existence of
super-enhanced humans running around, and as much as the world was thankful for
their heroes, the damage from their efforts was starting to pile up.
This is the set up for “Captain America: Civil War”, which
brings our heroes together, and for the first time, will divide them all. Watching
the film feels like a reunion of all the Avengers, although two of its biggest
players – Thor and Hulk – sit this one out. The show belongs to Cap of course,
but even Iron Man gets in on the action, and the stage is set for a battle
between these two very different heroes.
With each phase and each film entry in the ongoing series,
the talent behind the Avengers related films were just getting better and better.
The real game changer was bringing in the Russo Brothers to direct The Winter
Soldier; they elevated that film to a level not expected, and showed they were
the masters of action and high stakes drama in the superhero playing field. They
return again here on directing duties, to continue to flesh out the character
of Steve Rogers, and raise the stakes even higher for the ultimate hero smackdown.
From the opening scene were Captain America and a few of his
team take down some baddies, but accidentally kill a dozen civilians in the
process, General Ross from “The Incredible Hulk” returns on the scene to issue
The Sokovia Accord; a policy willing to be signed by 117 countries calling the
Avengers out for their actions, which although have saved the world on several occasions,
are also causing damage beyond repair; buildings can be replaced of course, but
the toll on innocent bystanders was starting to mount up. When Tony Stark is
approached by the mother of a college student skilled in the Sokovia attack (from
“Avengers: Age of Ultron”), Stark has an attack of conscious and tries to
convince the whole team to sign the accord. Naturally, Steve Rogers/Captain
America sees it differently, and ever defiant, disagrees to sign the forms. He splits
for Europe on personal business, and the team begin to decide which side of the
Accord they sit on.
This conflict is what drives the action forward in Civil
War, as well as a sub-plot involving the return of The Winter Soldier who is
accused of killing the King of Wakanda. This brings out his son, T’Challa, and
here you will have your first introduction to the Black Panther ahead of his
solo film. The premise of the film, and all the characters it includes, means
the film is epic in scope and similar in size and feel to the previous Avengers
films. Although it’s not one of the Avengers films itself, the events that transpire here will play more of a part on
the unity of the team than they first realise, and the actions of all involved
will determine how effective the Avengers can be when Thanos comes knocking on
Earth’s door in a few movies time.
There is so much going on in this film, with a wide canvas
of locations, characters and dramatic tension to sort through, its running time
is longer than most of the previous films in the series. But you won’t be
thinking about the films length; from its smash-bang opening, the story movies quickly and doesn’t stop,
taking the audience halfway around the world, into the past and back to the
present day, where even more characters
are revisited (Ant-Man) and introduced, including a friendly neighbourhood
Spider-Man, who is recruited by Stark to join the fight. This was certainly the
moment in Civil War fans were waiting for, as the trailer showed the web slinger
make his entrance ahead of his first solo film (and third reincarnation) with “Spider-Man:
Homecoming”.
The technical precision of each action scene, driven purely
by the characters motivations is the biggest strength of this film. You have characters
running away from attack, running towards each other to help out, and running
away from each other as loved ones are avenged, and pollical tensions mount. Each
encounter tears our Avengers further apart, and when it all comes to a
confrontation at an airport, the stage is set for the biggest Avenger fight in
history, where you won’t find any aliens, robots or terrorists involved – it’s
Captain America and his team versus Iron Man and his cronies. Although they
fight to what appears to be the death, none of them wish to kill each other –
rather just stop them in their tracks, so each side can emerge triumphant. But with
each character on the battle field, fighting for their view point on the new
world they live in, their strengths will come out, as well as their weaknesses,
and it creates one fantastic action scene after another.
Captain America: Civil War is another stellar entry in the
series, and by this point the regular Marvel audience were so deeply invested
in these characters and the story line, that we couldn’t wait any longer for
the next instalment. In fact by this point, we were seeing at least 2-3 Marvel
films a year, as our new characters took the spotlight and our original
Avengers became divided and scattered around the world (or the Universe in Thor
and Hulks case) to sort out their own issues.
If you haven’t seen any Marvel /Avenger films at the time of
reading this review, I recommend you don’t watch Civil War, as you will be lost
in the depth of the story and complexity of the characters and their interactions
at this point. But, I’m guessing if you’ve read this then you have seen the
film, and probably loved it like I did, and have seen it more than once. I
enjoyed watching it for the third time to write this view, and as we get closer
to Avengers: Endgame, my excitement for the finalise is just getting bigger.
Post Credit scenes – things were now
getting bigger and bolder in the world of Avengers, and as audiences realised
part of the film was to stick around for the credits and see the reveals, the
scenes got juicier. The two post-credit scenes following Civil War are no
exception, with the first showing Bucky and Steve Rogers talking about him
going back under until he can control his mind. Bucky (Winter Soldier) enters a
cryo-freeze chamber, and is covered in ice and mist for what we assume is a
suspended sleep. Then Cap and Black Panther talk about protecting Bucky for as
long as they can, as they look out a window to a misty jungle, where an
enormous statue of a black panther is perched at the top of a mountain. The
second scene shows a young Peter Parker – introduced in Civil War as the new
Spider-Man – resting on his bed, being looked after by his Aunt Mae. Once she
leaves the room, he pulls out an electronic bracelet on his wrist he was hiding
under his sleeve, turns it on, and we see a holographic Spider-Man mask
projected onto his ceiling. Ooohhhh….
This review was originally part of a special review of films
called "The Movies of Marvel" which you can check out
here
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