Captain America civil war review

Captain America : Civil war

Review by Zulfi

                Captain America civil war is a misnomer. You can call it avengers extended or avegners recruited. The number count for avengers has risen to the largest in this movie and by the looks of it, it may even increase. There is some section of fan on the internet who have been lamenting over the exclusion of spidey from avengers. Their agony will be sated as the little fella gets a look in and a decent look in that too. There many other fellows like Black Panther, Winter soldier, Vision, Falcon, Antman and who knows, even Sharon carter. You never know.

                You may think that the screen time won’t be ample for the whole characters to properly introduce and establish them. And probably there Anthony and Joe Russo score well. You could see all these characters getting decent amount of time and dialogue and also leisurely show their party tricks. Joss Whedon and marvel studios have probably done the best thing passing on the mantle of avengers to the Russo brothers as they are giving more definite shape to the superhero group  for the finale. You could see how vision refers to the infinity stone on his head. It is just a preamble for the sequel. I could say Russo brothers, Whedon and the writers are passionate about the franchise. Probably the makers of JL would emulate this too.

                The plot starts when on a mission captain America and his friends, who include falcon and Wanda Maximoff, stop Brock Rumlow, previous agent of SHIELD or HYDRA(you can say whatever you like) from stealing some superserum  or biological weapon. In the process, Rumlow blows himself and wanda throws the blast away from them, in turn making some Wakandan causalities. Thaddeus Ross, US Secretary of State declares Avengers aren’t a safe group operating on their own. when the UN is preparing to pass Sokovia Accords, he wants them to sign a treaty which make them a US organization fighting crime. This political move makes tony stark realize his hibernating conscience while captain America thinks it’s a step to make avengers a group of puppets with their choked freedom. He feels for the work they had done they deserve a little more respect. The conundrum of Thaddeus Ross causes a rift among our group of vigilantes. At the event of Sokovia accords when the king of Wakanda is killed the pressure on captain America and his friends increases to sign the treaty. Meanwhile a man named zemo is on a manhunt for a report which occurred in 1991. Stark and his group, which includes our iron patriot and black widow sign the treaty and in turn as they work for the government, they want the cap to do so too. But when Bucky Barnes is held as the prime suspect for the assassination of Wakandan king, cap feels the former is innocent as his gut instinct tells his friend can’t be wrong. His support to his friend makes him pit against ironman and his group, which eventually turns ugly and into war.

                Now, the problem with the story for me comes with the friendship of Bucky and Steve Rogers. At the outset, it is a friendship, which we don’t much care about. The hunch of a feeling for his pal making him stand against his friends, who will give lives for their country isn’t something easy to digest. But I feel my feelings change as I felt really fascinated by Cap’s commitment for his friend. Captain rogers on the wrong side of the law felt to me a little askew, but the whole point of the story from the tellers was that they wanted to showcase captain America as a man who would stand for that single innocent soul against the whole world if need be, which is what he really is.

 Leaving all this, the biggest issue, which stuck out to me was that Avengers are a dangerous lot than any demons we had seen in the series. Thor’s visit to earth opened the portal and the infinity stones for wars to ensue. Ironman’s A.I. got the Ultron to wreck havoc, while they later mopped all the garbage that ensued. It becomes a little thick for me to try the logics of these superheroes as they go out to save the world. Captain America though really has poor fashion sense tries to clean up for his avengers’ work ethics. But the thing is that the directors are adept at twitching the political angles to convert the previous position into a fine story.

                Barring this moral angle, civil war is a treat for fans as there are many slugfests between many of the characters. Joss Whedon has introduced to us as to what happens when a superhero is pitted against the other, which is the best sort of entertainment. Avengers of course is all about that. And when we see Wanda against vision, or Spidey against Antman or  Spidey against Cap or many combinations, you will understand the fun you are in for. The best thing about captain America, including the previous installment, is the way the directors have given a bigger floor for hand to hand combat rather than out and out VFX treatment. The action sequences with Black Panther are an example of that. What I would like for the next installment would be to trim the banter and quips of Hawkeye and a few other characters when the action is in serious flow. Though it looks funny, the issue that avengers see fun in danger is overly done.

                Russo brothers and the writers, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, ( the faithful writers of the franchise) did really a good job as they didn’t give  a single moment of boredom through the whole duration of the movie. The story which typically begins like a political step taken to create furrows inside the group turns out to be a personal vendetta with a very poignant twist at the end. And Stan Lee comes and does his cameo while pulling Stank’s, sorry Stark’s pants. What a marvelous slew of characters had he created over the years! I bet when he penned avengers, he wouldn’t have thought that they would turn out to become so politically controversial.