Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) (2 Viewers)

[Sean Bryan]

The weekend estimates are giving Cap the top spot again for its second weekend with an estimated $41.3M (narrowly beating Rio 2's $39M).After just two weekends, The Winter Soldier is only about $15M away from the final domestic take of The First Avenger. And it's world wide take is currently at $476M which has already blown past the $370M world wide take of the first. Nice job, Marvel Studios! More please.

 

[Nigel P]

Not bad for a skinny kid from Brooklyn.

 

[Brian Dobbs]

9/10

 

[Sean Bryan]

The Winter Soldier held the top spot for the third weekend in a row with 25.6Mhttp://www.boxofficemojo.com/news/?id=3825&p=.htmIt hit $200M on Sunday and currently stands at $585M world wide. It should pass Thor: The Dark World's domestic take of $206M sometime this week. Looks like there is a good chance that it will beat Thor's world wide take of $644M, and Man of Steel's $668M haul wouldn't be that far off either. It may not make it with the competition from The Amazing Spider-Man 2, but it'll probably at least be close which is pretty awesome.

 

[Sean Bryan]

Thought this was cool.

I believe President Ellis was also targeted. It will be fun to see what names can be see in a few months when Blu-ray screen captures can be analyzed.

 

[DavidJ]

Yeah, Ellis was definitely there. Bruce Banner too, but I don't see how that would work since Banner couldn't end his own life with a gun.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Yeah, Ellis was definitely there. Bruce Banner too, but I don't see how that would work since Banner couldn't end his own life with a gun.

Bruce knew that bullet was coming, though. If they could catch him totally by surprise, they might be able to kill him before his subconscious has a moment to Hulk out.

 

[Sean Bryan]

Yeah, I think the combination of surprise and the level of firepower is what they were hoping would kill him. Of course, just because he was targeted doesn't mean he would have been killed. Hydra likely didn't even know that Banner has that kind of resilience (he told the Avengers and Fury/Romanov). And even if they did, why not at least try to get him?I'd be interested to see if they were targeting Thor. We know he is now staying on Earth, but is that public information at this point (or at least known to SHIELD/Hydra)? And would they be able to track him? Either way, I doubt they'd be able to kill him. But again, that shouldn't stop them from trying.

 

[Jason_V]

I'd be interested to see if they were targeting Thor. We know he is now staying on Earth, but is that public information at this point (or at least known to SHIELD/Hydra)? And would they be able to track him? Either way, I doubt they'd be able to kill him. But again, that shouldn't stop them from trying.

The other question would be...do they really want to kill Thor? Sure, Hydra doesn't want to destroy the world, but rule it. By killing Thor, they risk unleashing the fury of Asgard on the Earth. And is that the best idea they've ever had?

 

[RobertR]

Just rewatched the first Cap movie. Seeing this one made the first one more enjoyable for me. I really like how Marvel handles this character--showing him as the true blue, straight arrow hero he is. So much better than the idiotic nihilism of the makers of the recent Lone Ranger movie.

 

[Sean Bryan]

The other question would be...do they really want to kill Thor? Sure, Hydra doesn't want to destroy the world, but rule it. By killing Thor, they risk unleashing the fury of Asgard on the Earth. And is that the best idea they've ever had?

Good point. It probably wouldn't be a good idea to provoke Asgard in such a way. I would think Thor would represent a threat to Hydra's plans for ruling after the murder of 20 million people, but maybe they hoped they could remain hidden inside of SHIELD. Thor's power wouldn't do much good if he didn't know who to go after.

 

[Sean Bryan]

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/captain-america-winter-soldier-sails-698422

Directors Anthony and Joe Russo's Captain America: The Winter Soldier marched past the $600 million mark at the global box office Tuesday as it continues to outpace the first film by nearly 160 percent. The movie is destined to take in more than $700 million by the end of its run, likely making it the No. 9 superhero title of all time.

With the sequel on course to eclipse the $668 million earned worldwide by Superman pic "Man of Steel," sources reiterate Disney has no intention of moving the next "Captain America" in order to avoid a direct showdown with "Batman-Superman."

 

[mattCR]

My son and I went last night, he had avoided it since he felt sick and didn't like big theaters. He pointed out that his favorite parts were things like:

Captain America getting everyone off the bus
Or when Black Widow saved all the people and used a 'fake out' to trick the Winter Soldier.

I too thought those moments were neat watching them, and I think I commented on it here.. but listening to him talk about it afterwards, I realized this is why these marvel films work so well (And why after seeing Spiderman2 I think it doesn't) - they manage to put superheroes in a place not just to be super, but to show that they want to help the average guy on the street.
It's the thing I hated most about Man of Steel, where people were just waiting to die.

Maybe they are small moments, but I think it adds a lot to a superhero character to show they aren't just super heroes by stopping other super villains, but they are superheroes by saving the average guy.

 

[DavidJ]

I agree with that sentiment 100% Matt.

 

[Chris Will]

I also agree. That was one thing I hated about MoS as well. He had time to save Lois 100 different times and he saved a few army guys, then proceeded to level half of the city without even stoping to think of the people. I mean, he didn't even try to make the world spin backwards to help a few folks. Not very Superman like. Say what you will about Superman Returns but at least Singer got the spirit of the character right, something Snyder completely missed. As far as Cap 2, I think it is my favorite of the Marvel universe movies so far. It may even be one of my favorite superheroes movies period, up there with the original Superman and Batman Begins. It's funny, back when the first Cap move was announced, I didn't have much hope because the character had always seemed kind of campy to me but, but I've enjoyed both movies immensely.

 

[Sean Bryan]

Captain America: The Winter Soldier has now passed the world wide gross of Thor: The Dark World with $645M (TDW was $644). I'm reading that it is a given that it will pass Man of Steel's $668M and is likely to finish around $700M! That's pretty impressive considering the first film made only $370M. Due to the critical and box office success of Cap 2, and with Avengers out next May, I wouldn't be surprised if Cap 3 earned close to a billion. There's certainly a sound argument for moving Cap 3 up one month to early April since its now been proven that it can perform well in that month. Then again, WB/DC still has more riding on the success of Sups/Bats. The DC team up movie would likely take the top spot, but there's no question that it would suffer going up against Cap 3. Both would suffer, but I think Marvel ultimately has less riding on the success of Cap 3 than WB/DC has on Sups/Bats. Will WB try the early April slot or move back to their later summer traditional dates? Someone's gonna move for sure. We'll just have to see how this game of chicken plays out.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Road to Endgame Revisit #10:
This movie is so nice, I watched it twice today. Most of the revisits I've done have been with the audio commentaries on and the dialogue as English subtitles. But for Captain America: The Winter Soldier it had been four and a half years since I'd last seen it, and I didn't want to deprive myself of the experience of watching it as a film. Afterwards, I was even more impressed than when I'd seen it the first couple times and wanted to hear the Russo brothers and Markus & McFeely discuss how they accomplished it. I am not a compulsive rewatcher, and very few movies would hold up to two viewings in one day, but this one did. The first time through, I was just swept up in the ride. The second time through, I noticed so much more.

Trent Opaloch is the cinematographer for this film, and all of the Russos' Marvel films. I feel like The Winter Soldier is the first MCU film to get a handle on digital photography. It doesn't look like the Phase One movies shot on film, but it's the first one to look as polished as the Phase One movies shot on film. There is no grain, obviously, but the use of longer lenses, handheld camerawork, a neutral color palette, and natural lighting and imbue the movie with a feeling of realism. Like The Dark World, the movie was shot using Arri Alexa cameras in 4x3 mode with anamorphic lenses. The visual design of the film is such that the use of color, while not desaturated, is pretty subdued for most of the running time. Only once Captain America puts on a variation of his World War II uniform with its vibrant reds for the final act does color really make a statement in the picture.

Henry Jackman's score is very different from Alan Silvestri's score from the first film, but very effective. I don't think anybody's going to walk away from the movie humming any of the themes like they did with the Captain America march from the first film, but it underpins the suspense and helps build the sense of unease that carries through the whole movie.

The movie opens in Washington, D.C. with a new character, Sam Wilson, jogging around the tidal basin just South of the White House. A very familiar man passes him "on your left". As Sam reaches the Jefferson Memorial, the same man laps him, "on your left" again. By the time he reaches the reflecting pool of the National Mall, the same man laps him "on your left" yet again. The scene ends with Sam gasping for breath on the ground, leaning against a tree in Union Square. The familiar man casually jogs up, not even breathing heavily, and introduces himself as Steve Rodgers. This whole sequence is so important; Captain America: The First Avenger ended with Steve waking up in the modern day. The Avengers kept him in a bubble for a very specific mission against an extraterrestrial threat. This scene picks up where that Times Square scene left off, in terms of his progression as a character.

Sam Wilson's status as a veteran gives him a point of commonality with Steve; even though they're from very different times, and fought in very different conflicts, there's a shared ethos of service. I also love that Wilson works for the Veteran's Administration (VA), leading support groups for returning soldiers with PTSD and TBIs. In Rogers's time it would have been called combat fatigue or battle neurosis, and they would have been much less equipped to address it. Steve only gets a glimpse of what Sam does now, but it has an impact on him and he instinctively understands the value of it. The movie is headed into some dark and murky places, so it's important to have this peek at something decent and morally sound.

Steve has become an agent of SHIELD, which gives him a purpose but doesn't provide him an avenue to reintegrate with the world. When he and Natasha later show up on Sam's doorstep with the entire weight of an international intelligence agency after them, it's only plausible because Steve doesn't have anybody else in the twenty-first century to call upon.

After that brief glimpse of wider world, we're in mission mode -- with Captain America leading an assault team to liberate a satellite launch ship full of SHIELD personnel and technology that has been seized by hijackers. It's a stunningly effective sequence that establishes an immediate tonal shift from the first Captain America movie. From this point forward, Henry Jackman's score doesn't quote from Alan Silvestri's First Avenger score at all. Captain America has been unfrozen for 2-3 years at this point, and he's been trained by SHIELD in modern combat. As a hand-to-hand combatant going up against lots of men with guns, he is brutally effective. The first movie presented a small weakling being enhanced to the peak of human ability. While Captain America can't do anything than regular humans can't do, this sequence builds upon that opening jog to establish that Captain America is well in excess of the peak of human ability. He can run faster than the fastest human, he stronger than the strongest human, his endurance exceeds that of the most physically fit human, and he's able to withstand injury better than a normal human. It also demonstrates his efficiency as a team leader. He doesn't just hit things; he strategizes and deploys his available resources carefully. The Battle of New York at the end of The Avengers captured that a little bit, but it's on full display here.

He believes the Black Widow is a member of his assault team, and one of those available resources. But, true to form, she has her own agenda. This may be the film that gives Natasha Romanoff the most development out of any of them. She is the clear second lead of the picture, and goes on this journey right along with Steve. But whereas Steve stands resolute in the face of rapidly shifting circumstances, Natasha really evolves over the course of the film. Her time with Steve really has an impact on her. In the ship sequence, she enjoys Steve's company, but she's also manipulating him. By the end of the film their relationship has developed into a genuine friendship. He is the first person to get to see the real Natasha, especially because the events of this film force her to figure out who the real Natasha actually is.

The movie has two very different halves with a clear point of demarcation. The first half is very grounded, and mostly confines itself to things that are found in the real world. But there are moments, specifically when Steve rides down the elevator with Nick Fury and sees the helicarriers, that foreshadow the pulpier, more fantastic second half to come.

The Smithsonian sequence is a masterclass in efficient, multipurpose storytelling. It only lasts probably two minutes, but it accomplishes so much. It does two main things:

1. For those who haven't seen The First Avenger, it provides a broad strokes recap of the events of that movie and Cap's backstory.
2. For everybody, it reintroduces Bucky Barnes so that the Winter Soldier's big reveal in the second act has weight and feels earned.

But my favorite part of the scene is a couple of brief moments beautifully speak to Cap's journey. The Captain America exhibit has video screens with lifesize depictions of skinny Steve pre-serum and Captain America post-serum. In front of one of the pre-serum screens are three siblings. The girl (probably 12 or 13) and and the older boy (probably 13 or 14) are the same height that skinny Steve was. The old boy lifts their little brother, wearing a Captain America costume, up so he's eye to eye with skinny Steve. A nice reminder that Steve started as an everyman, that anybody had the potential to be Captain America. As the camera pans across the exhibit, another boy wearing a t-shirt with Captain America's shield on it spots Steve visiting the exhibit incognito. Steve smiles at the boy and motions for him to keep quiet. This boy stares at Steve and nods, capturing current Steve's natural authority. In about 5-10 seconds of screentime, the movie encapsulates Captain America's entire journey to date.

The emerging conspiracy drives the first half of the movie, and the falling dominoes are what propel things forward. Nick Fury's car chase through DC is when they start to fall a lot faster. The entire sequence has real impact; with the way its shot and edited, you really feel every impact. This is a PG-13 movie, and obeys all of the rules of the PG-13 rating, but the chase feels like it came out of an R-rated picture. The Russos do a great job of constantly changing things up as the sequence goes on so it never feels repetitive or boring. And the payoff of Fury escaping one trap after another is that all of the escalating tactics are like a red carpet leading to the Winter Soldier's grand entrance. It gives the Winter Soldier instant credibility, because Fury just ran the gauntlet and prevailed, but he doesn't hold his own against the Winter Soldier for very long.

Once they decided to tackle this storyline, and once they committed to keeping the Winter Soldier's identity from the comics, they were locked into Sebastian Stan as their main physical antagonist. When Marvel cast Bucky Barnes for The First Avenger, did they know they were going to be telling this story? Or was it just a lucky coincidence that Stan was able to step up to the plate in such an amazing way?

The USB drive, and the program that Natasha copied onto it from the satellite launch ship early on in the film, is a very simple but very effective MacGuffin. Once a critically wounded Nick Fury hands it to Steve in Steve's apartment, it removes Steve's choice about whether to go on this journey. From that point forward, he no longer has the option to walk away from SHIELD. On the audio commentary, one of the directors or writers states: "Everybody in this movie is a liar except him." And it's such a perfect summation of the situation Steve Rogers finds himself in. Even the people on his side, like Nick Fury and Natasha, lie to him.

The elevator fight and Steve's escape from SHIELD is another one of those iconic moments that's remembered by everybody five years later. It's the point of no return for Hydra; once they attack Captain America, there's no putting the genie back into the bottle. From that moment forward, they're committed to their plan and failure means the collapse of decades of preparation. The sequence features great physical feats, but also captures how Steve outthinks his opponents. He reads their body language and knows ahead of time that the betrayal is coming. It's a key moment for Brock Rumlow as well; he really admires Cap as a soldier and combatant. He's genuinely enjoyed serving under him and fighting alongside him. But he's also fully committed to Hydra's goals and worldview. So he knows that whatever the outcome in that elevator, he's never going to be fighting alongside Captain America again.

Once Captain America makes its out of the Triskelion in spectacular fashion, he is confronted with a Quinjet blocking the old road out. What follows is a terrific David and Goliath moment as a man with a motorcycle and a shield takes out an advanced aircraft weighing several tons and uses its destruction to propell himself over the final barrier.

Fugitive Steve returns to the hospital to retrieve the USB drive, only to realize that Natasha has beaten him to it. He angrily confronts her, but finds him tentatively sure of her loyalties. The jump drive points them to Camp Lehigh in Wheaton, New Jersey -- the place where Steve went through basic training in preparation for Project Rebirth. Along the way, Steve and Natasha get a little personal. During that conversation, Natasha sums who she is -- or at least who she's been -- in three concise sentences: "The truth is a matter of circumstance. It's not all things to all people. Neither am I."

The overgrown abandoned husk of Camp Lehigh, in addition to bringing back memories for Steve, leads Steve and Natasha to a secret bunker from the early days of SHIELD, which in turn leads them to an even more secret underground Hydra facility. I mentioned earlier that this movie has two very different halves with a clear point of demarcation. This scene is that point of demarcation. Up until now, which a few very important exceptions, this has been a very grounded movie. It's taken place in the real world, or a version of it, and the threats have taken on real world forms. This Hydra facility is where the movie switches from Three Days of the Condor or Seven Days in May to something pulpier and more rooted in the fantastic.

The old facility is still active, and it contains the digitized consciousness of of Arnim Zola, the Red Skull's henchman from The First Avenger. He was recruited by SHIELD after World War II and set about recreating Hydra as a criminal conspiracy within SHIELD. As SHIELD grew and expanded, so did Hydra. When Zola became terminally ill in the seventies, his mind was preserved using the technology of the time, requiring the massive facility that Steve and Natasha find themselves in. Digital Zola has guided Hydra's plans for a new world order based on control rather than freedom, and now he has lured Captain America and Black Widow in to neutralize them -- even if it means sacrificing himself in the process. SHIELD launches a massive attack against the facility, destroying Zola. But Steve and Natasha, no longer in the dark about what they're up against, narrowly escape.

Getting audiences to accept that reveal is a big ask, and lays the groundwork for a back half of the film that movies the more comic book elements into the foreground: Sam has an exo-suit that allows him to fly like a bird; Nick Fury is alive, having used a toxin developed by Bruce Banner to slow his heart rate to one beat per minute and fake his own death; and those three massive Helicarriers that Fury had parked in the Triskelion's basement are about to take flight.

I want to discuss briefly the brilliance of Robert Redford's casting as Alexander Pierce. For the movie to be effective, as much of the audience as possible needs to be unaware that he is the Big Bad for as long as possible. Even those who figure it out ahead of the reveal need to believe that very smart people like Nick Fury and Natasha Romanoff wouldn't have figured it out ahead of the reveal. Just the weight and history of Redford's onscreen persona does a lot of that work for you. Forty years earlier, Redford would have been the one playing Captain America. In Three Days of the Condor, he was the noble man who uncovered the conspiracy. Even Pierce's hair in this movie is so reminiscent of the pre-Ultimate Nick Fury's look from the comics. When it appears that Nick Fury is really dead, there is the possibility that the movie is pulling a Skyfall and that Alexander Pierce will be filling Nick Fury's role in future MCU films. He is not a mustache-twirling villain; he is someone who has come to certain conclusions about how the world ought to world, and has no compunction about taking any necessary actions to accomplish his goal. The scene with the housekeeper is a perfect depiction of that; he doesn't plan on killing her, he doesn't want to kill her, but he doesn't hesitate or dwell on it when it becomes necessary. His character' position takes the logic behind the kill lists and disposition matrices currently used by the U.S. military to weigh drone strikes and extrapolates it out to its most absurd and horrifying extreme.

I really like the old dam where Steve, Natasha, and Sam link up with Fury and the small contingent of SHIELD whose loyalties Fury still felt confident in. The decrepit environment visually conveys how diminished Fury's power has become, and the remoteness of the location gives Steve some breathing room to process the revelation that Bucky is the Winter Soldier, and reflect on their shared past from before the war.

The final confrontation itself is thrilling, a sequence unlike anything we've seen before or since. The setup confines events to the Triskelion and the skies immediately above it, not trying to compete with the scale of an Avengers finale. The screenplay and the editing do a great job of clearly establishing the stakes and providing the audience with the necessary information to determine how well our heroes are doing.

There is a version of this that could have played like a heist movie, with Captain America, Black Widow, and the Falcon using stealth to slip in and compromise the helicarriers' targeting systems. But while that might have worked tactically, this is a movie about two clashing ideologies. To borrow from a different superhero from a different publisher, Captain America needs to stand up for true, justice, and the American way.

He does that by announcing Hydra's plot over the intercom to all of SHIELD's operatives in the immediate vicinity. He doesn't threaten or cajole. Instead, he makes a moral argument for the messy virtues of freedom over the sophisticating stability of imposed order. And he asks everybody present to choose sides. Captain America likes to know who he's fighting.

What follows is two story threads: Black Widow's infiltration of the Triskelion, to reach the head from which all other heads of the Hydra grow, and Captain America and the Falcon's infiltration of the carriers to compromise their targeting systems.

After a spectacular Mission Impossible-esque reveal involving a 60-year-old Jenny Agutter pulling off some mind-blowing fight choreography, Natasha is forced by Pierce to decide who she is, and who she wants to be. Is she the spy who wields secrets and deceptions like daggers? Or has Steve turned her into an idealist who is willing to trust that the world is better off with transparency, and willing herself to step out of the shadows into the harsh glare of the light?

Captain America and the Falcon's pursuits provided more visceral satisfactions, as they find themselves engaging in exhilarating aerial combat as their pursue their goals. It feels like Top Gun or an old War War II fighter plane movie, except neither of our protagonists have a plane to avail themselves of. There's a wonderful three-dimensionality to all of the fight scenes, where up and down play a huge role that we're not accustomed to seeing. Much like Avengers Tower replacing the Pan Am building in the MCU version of Manhattan, the Triskelion is placed on Theodore Roosevelt Island, in the middle of the Potomac River, surrounded by the actual real world Washington D.C. and northern Virginia of 2014. It gives the sequence some much needed verisimilitude, even as costumed heroes are battling atop flying aircraft carriers.

The writing choices for Captain America's climactic battle with the Winter Soldier are revealing of Steve Roger's values and mindset. He very much wants to save his friend, but he won't let his affection for Bucky prevent him from completing his mission; he won't prioritize his own personal allegiances over the lives of 20 million innocent Americans.

But once he's completed his mission and knows that the threat of the helicarriers has been neutralized, he's willing to let the Winter Soldier kill him, because he won't kill his friend just to save his own life. And when the helicarrier is being destroyed all around them and plunges toward the Potomac, he strains to free his friend rather than running for safety. His faith that his friend is still in there somewhere is rewarded when Bucky pulls a badly injured Steve out of the river. Much like Steve at end of The First Avenger, Bucky Barnes's contemporary story is just beginning at the end of this picture.

Connections to other parts of the MCU:

• The decision to destroy SHIELD has massive ramifications for the Marvel Cinematic Universe as whole. Even though the movie's message was targeted pretty specifically at the War on Terror, and the compromises that post-9/11 America has made in the name of security, I think I the movie resonates even more now -- at a time when both American institutions and governing institutions around the world are under immense strain that is unprecedented in the post-war world order. And in terms of corporate politics, if I had to pinpoint the moment of schism between Marvel Studios and Marvel Television, I would say it's this movie. Marvel Television has a show called "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." And Marvel Studios made the decision to blow up SHIELD anyway. It ended up being creatively rewarding for the show, but ever since then it's been pretty much a one-way street: Events in the movies impact the various television properties, but events in the television properties are never reflected in the movies.
• Senator Stern and Jasper Sitwell, both having been threaded through previous movies, are revealed as Hydra sleeper agents. Stern is arrested and Sitwell is killed, brutally.
• This is Crossbones's origin story, which pays off in the opening action sequence of Captain America: Civil War.
• Hayley Atwell reprises her role as Peggy Carter twice: First in a talking head interview from the early fifties that is part of the Smithsonian exhibit, and later in person as a bedridden nonagenarian just starting to experience the first symptoms of dementia. The later scenes are very effective; we're used to seeing young actors aged up using makeup, to varying degrees of realism. This movie instead used the same Lola technology used to shrink Steve and deage actors to instead age Peggy up. The scene was performed twice for each take, once with Atwell in a wig with dots on her face, and once with an older actress. The footage was combined in post production, and various techniques were used to age Atwell's body. The end result is that you never doubt that you're actually looking at an elderly woman, rather than a young woman in makeup.
• Sharon Carter is a character that the MCU movies have never quite found time for. Amanda Righetti appeared briefly at the end of The First Avenger as a SHIELD agent who it was hinted might be Sharon. But her Emily VanCamp is introduced as the genuine article. The platonic relationship between Captain America and Black Widow is the spine of this movie, so there isn't really time to do more than set the character up for future movies. She does appear in Captain America: Civil War, but that movie is basically Avengers 2.5 so there's not a lot of room for her there, either. I've been a fan of the actress since she starred in "Everwood" alongside Chris Pratt. She's an interesting physical pairing for Steve Rogers; most of his female co-stars are a marked contrast to him, but VanCamp is tall and blonde in a way that mirrors him.
• Iron Man 3 introduced William Sadler as President Matthew Ellis. President Ellis is quoted in the Smithsonian exhibit on Captain America.
• The little postscript glances are mostly just moving chess pieces around the board for future movies, but Natasha's testimony before the congressional committee is revealing, because it sets up the ideological conflict for Captain America: Civil War. She admits partial culpability for the devastating events of this movie, takes a measure of responsibility for the destabilizing consequences of revealing so much classified intelligence to the world and shattering a key institution that had saved the world previously and served as a stabilizing for in very unstable times. But she asserted that she should face no culpability for any of it, because she simply has too much utility that would be wasted with her locked up in a cell. In many ways, the ending of this film is much more of a setup for Civil War than it is for Avengers: Age of Ultron. Captain America's rejection of governing institutions in that movie is a direct result of SHIELD's failure and inner rot in this film. While Steve's principles don't change in this movie, it does take him on a journey from loyal soldier to autonomous individual.
• The one exception is the mid-credits scene, which introduces Baron Von Strucker and the Maximoff twins. It's a great little scene.

 

[Sam Favate]

Road to Endgame Revisit #10:
This movie is so nice, I watched it twice today.

This was the one that really won me over to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Everything in this picture works very well and I still think it's the best Marvel movie yet.

 

[Tommy R]

Tied with The Incredible Norton for my least favorite MCU film. I just didn’t get it. I didn’t understand what was going on most of the time plot wise and I was bored throughout. It continuously amazes me how much everyone seems to love this movie. I know I’m in the minority but this movie make Thor The Dark World look like Thor Ragnarok.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I really like the majority of The Winter Soldier, but I find that the end battle with the helicarriers just goes on too long -- once the punches start being thrown and Redford is down for the count, I begin mentally checking out. I try not to, it's not a conscious thing, but I find that the fight sequence just goes on much longer than I'd need it to. I'm more interested in the plot machinations at that point than seeing things go boom.

But that's my only serious criticism of the film. It's otherwise a fantastic adventure, with strong nods to Redford's 70s thrillers. My favorite Captain America film is still the first one, but I understand completely why Winter Solider is at the top for many viewers.