Captain America: Civil War
May. 10th, 2016 06:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rainwatersparkSort of liveblogging my thoughts.
After the first 50 minutes:
- People complain about Batman v Superman being "poorly edited" (a complaint I don't get, by the way), but honestly, in my opinion, CA:CW is actually poorly edited. By which I mean the pacing is weird, since "poorly edited" is kind of a vague and strangely worded complaint. The pacing is pretty clunky; one scene actually cuts in the middle to go to what Zemo's up to (and I found myself thinking "I don't f**king care") before returning to the same, still ongoing scene. Also, Steve departs while the other Avengers are debating the Sokovia Accords because he gets a text that Peggy died and he's like "I gotta go to her funeral right this second, BYE GUYS." I mean...seriously? And then while he's in London, he sees the news about the Vienna bombing and then gets to Vienna right after the bombing. I mean...I guess it's possible? But it felt so weird from a pacing standpoint, like he teleported there or something.
Peggy's funeral scene lasted like two minutes and I thought was kind of pointless; there were other ways to introduce Steve to Sharon Carter and reaffirm his motivation not to sign the Sokovia Accords.
I ragequit the movie when, after a tense action scene that resulted in the arrest of Steve, Bucky, and Sam, it cut to Vision trying to cook for Wanda. The mood whiplash was so severe it actually pissed me off.
- There were like...five location jumps in the first 50 minutes? Some of which were extremely abrupt. Also, I started to get sick of the establishing shots with the name of the city plastered across the screen in huge capital letters. It just felt incredibly clunky and inelegant. Show us a British flag and we know it's London, etc.
- I was initially very confused when the movie showed a flashback from Tony's youth. I also found the cinematography for that flashback really...aesthetically not pleasing (tech demo or not).
- So Tony didn't care about the death toll from Age of Ultron...until a woman tells him he killed her specific son, then suddenly he cares a lot. Gotcha.
- On Peggy's funeral: I feel very ambivalent about giving one of Steve Rogers's most iconic comic quotes to Peggy. It just...feels weird to me.
- I really, really did not care for all the scenes with Zemo, particularly with the order in which those scenes were inserted into the overall plot.
- Once again, a Russo-helmed MCU movie places action scenes in the middle of densely populated areas and ignores the fact that significant collateral damage probably happened. It's really mind-boggling how no one seems to care that a fight, with guns, in the middle of a crowded marketplace in Lagos probably led to at least someone getting hurt, if not killed. Why the hell does no one realize that yes, the Avengers are a scary force when they can do things like this?
- Why make Wanda the one who screws up in Lagos? Wanda, who in the comics is one of the most powerfulmutants superheroes ever???
- The magical code word thing makes no sense. If they can control Bucky with code words, why bother with the whole memory wipe thing? Also, why even have this as a plot device? In the comics, there were code words, but all they did was knock Bucky out, not make him susceptible to mind control (which is, by the way, extremely scientifically dubious).
- I will say that T'Challa is cool.
- "I'm not going to kill anyone," says Bucky, right before he starts beating people up in the same brutal, accidental-death-risking way BvS's Batman beat thugs up.
After 1 hour and 50 minutes:
- There is so much property destruction that no one in the movie cares about.
- Vision and Tony's treatment of Wanda is infuriatingly patronizing.
- Tony's comments about Aunt May in front of Peter are incredibly creepy. Also, Tony recruiting Spider-Man is like literally recruiting a child soldier. It's pretty gross.
- The airport fight scene, which I've seen basically everyone praise to the high heavens, was ruined for me because I could not stop thinking about how there are combat-trained, lethal adults fighting a 15-year-old kid.
- This movie is narratively incoherent. First, it's about collateral damage and the Sokovia Accords. Then it's about Bucky. Then it's about finding 5 other "Winter Soldiers." These plotlines make no sense when mashed together and the Sokovia Accords are basically forgotten about. Most of the conflicts are due to a complete and total communication failure, which would have been solved if people just freaking talked to each other.
And why is the plotline about the other "Winter Soldiers" a thing? What's supposed to be the theme/message of that that's relevant to Steve? Why???
- Sharon Carter got utterly shafted, again. I'm a big Sharon Carter fan and a Sharon/Steve fan, and yet I didn't like it when they kissed because there was no build up whatsoever. We know very little about Sharon aside from the fact that she's related to Peggy, she's good at her job, and...she's loyal to Steve for some unexplained reason. Please, Sharon Carter deserves so much better.
- Some lines of dialogue came off as condescending? Like when Wanda is hesitating and Clint tells her to "get off her ass"—no, she's hesitating because last time she accidentally blew up a building and she's still dealing with the guilt from that! Also, when Bucky says he doesn't remember anything about Zemo and Steve says "you have to do better than that"—dude, your pal just got mind-controlled (sort of) and is struggling to remember who he is, have some sympathy??
And now for the discussion of events that happen later in the movie:
- The treatment of Bucky at the end is incredibly ableist and dehumanizing. "Nope, let's not help this mentally ill abuse victim recover, let's freeze him!"
After the first 50 minutes:
- People complain about Batman v Superman being "poorly edited" (a complaint I don't get, by the way), but honestly, in my opinion, CA:CW is actually poorly edited. By which I mean the pacing is weird, since "poorly edited" is kind of a vague and strangely worded complaint. The pacing is pretty clunky; one scene actually cuts in the middle to go to what Zemo's up to (and I found myself thinking "I don't f**king care") before returning to the same, still ongoing scene. Also, Steve departs while the other Avengers are debating the Sokovia Accords because he gets a text that Peggy died and he's like "I gotta go to her funeral right this second, BYE GUYS." I mean...seriously? And then while he's in London, he sees the news about the Vienna bombing and then gets to Vienna right after the bombing. I mean...I guess it's possible? But it felt so weird from a pacing standpoint, like he teleported there or something.
Peggy's funeral scene lasted like two minutes and I thought was kind of pointless; there were other ways to introduce Steve to Sharon Carter and reaffirm his motivation not to sign the Sokovia Accords.
I ragequit the movie when, after a tense action scene that resulted in the arrest of Steve, Bucky, and Sam, it cut to Vision trying to cook for Wanda. The mood whiplash was so severe it actually pissed me off.
- There were like...five location jumps in the first 50 minutes? Some of which were extremely abrupt. Also, I started to get sick of the establishing shots with the name of the city plastered across the screen in huge capital letters. It just felt incredibly clunky and inelegant. Show us a British flag and we know it's London, etc.
- I was initially very confused when the movie showed a flashback from Tony's youth. I also found the cinematography for that flashback really...aesthetically not pleasing (tech demo or not).
- So Tony didn't care about the death toll from Age of Ultron...until a woman tells him he killed her specific son, then suddenly he cares a lot. Gotcha.
- On Peggy's funeral: I feel very ambivalent about giving one of Steve Rogers's most iconic comic quotes to Peggy. It just...feels weird to me.
- I really, really did not care for all the scenes with Zemo, particularly with the order in which those scenes were inserted into the overall plot.
- Once again, a Russo-helmed MCU movie places action scenes in the middle of densely populated areas and ignores the fact that significant collateral damage probably happened. It's really mind-boggling how no one seems to care that a fight, with guns, in the middle of a crowded marketplace in Lagos probably led to at least someone getting hurt, if not killed. Why the hell does no one realize that yes, the Avengers are a scary force when they can do things like this?
- Why make Wanda the one who screws up in Lagos? Wanda, who in the comics is one of the most powerful
- The magical code word thing makes no sense. If they can control Bucky with code words, why bother with the whole memory wipe thing? Also, why even have this as a plot device? In the comics, there were code words, but all they did was knock Bucky out, not make him susceptible to mind control (which is, by the way, extremely scientifically dubious).
- I will say that T'Challa is cool.
- "I'm not going to kill anyone," says Bucky, right before he starts beating people up in the same brutal, accidental-death-risking way BvS's Batman beat thugs up.
After 1 hour and 50 minutes:
- There is so much property destruction that no one in the movie cares about.
- Vision and Tony's treatment of Wanda is infuriatingly patronizing.
- Tony's comments about Aunt May in front of Peter are incredibly creepy. Also, Tony recruiting Spider-Man is like literally recruiting a child soldier. It's pretty gross.
- The airport fight scene, which I've seen basically everyone praise to the high heavens, was ruined for me because I could not stop thinking about how there are combat-trained, lethal adults fighting a 15-year-old kid.
- This movie is narratively incoherent. First, it's about collateral damage and the Sokovia Accords. Then it's about Bucky. Then it's about finding 5 other "Winter Soldiers." These plotlines make no sense when mashed together and the Sokovia Accords are basically forgotten about. Most of the conflicts are due to a complete and total communication failure, which would have been solved if people just freaking talked to each other.
And why is the plotline about the other "Winter Soldiers" a thing? What's supposed to be the theme/message of that that's relevant to Steve? Why???
- Sharon Carter got utterly shafted, again. I'm a big Sharon Carter fan and a Sharon/Steve fan, and yet I didn't like it when they kissed because there was no build up whatsoever. We know very little about Sharon aside from the fact that she's related to Peggy, she's good at her job, and...she's loyal to Steve for some unexplained reason. Please, Sharon Carter deserves so much better.
- Some lines of dialogue came off as condescending? Like when Wanda is hesitating and Clint tells her to "get off her ass"—no, she's hesitating because last time she accidentally blew up a building and she's still dealing with the guilt from that! Also, when Bucky says he doesn't remember anything about Zemo and Steve says "you have to do better than that"—dude, your pal just got mind-controlled (sort of) and is struggling to remember who he is, have some sympathy??
And now for the discussion of events that happen later in the movie:
- The treatment of Bucky at the end is incredibly ableist and dehumanizing. "Nope, let's not help this mentally ill abuse victim recover, let's freeze him!"
