Staff Member

Captain America: Civil War is fun, smart, entertaining, open and important to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole.

I was not a fan of Captain America: Winter Soldier, though I know many were. In my opinion, the subdued half-Bourne, half-Batman fight scenes were low-key for a series where the Norse God of Thunder is a recurring combatant.

The movie’s reliance on implausible twists, plot holes and narrow scope, rubbed me the wrong way. In Captain America: Civil War, most of these issues are remedied. Sure, there is still an emphasis on fist fighting and gun fighting. However, with Iron Man, War Machine, Ant Man, Vision, Scarlet Witch and Spiderman, there is a good set of grandiose action in this movie.

The plot while not perfect is understandable, digestible and enjoyable to those who have not ever read a comic book or seen a superhero movie.

This is demonstrated in the crucial twist of the movie, which is satisfying, believable and well implemented. In my opinion, elevates this movie to a higher level. I believe this marks a turning point in the MCU, where the creators are free to craft stories based on their own lore and are not directly borrowing from the comic books.

The characters are already known to most, so special mention will go to Spiderman and Black Panther, the only true newcomers to the MCU.

One would think that after two film series any attempt at portraying Spiderman would fall flat, but Tom Holland’s performance was very fresh and unique and emphasized the 15-year-old character’s youth and inexperience in both crime-fighting and everyday life. Plus, seeing Tony Stark and Peter Parker in a scene together is a treasure and has to been seen for yourself.

Black Panther is a refined and well done performance whose arc is very important and supplemental to the film.

The film tries to honor most of its large and impressive cast equally to mixed results. The Falcon is arguably rescued from being a candidate for most embarrassing Avenger by innovative use of a falcon drone that allows to keep up with a power armor suit and integration as more or less Captain America’s sidekick.

Hawkeye, previously a candidate for most embarrassing Avenger, has become one of my favorites with his no-nonsense yet still humorous demeanor. Antman comes from his rather silly movie and acts rather silly and provides a nice contrast to the rest of the films’ general tone. War Machine goes through something major, which I will not ruin here.

Captain America and his bromance with Bucky is the heart of the conflict in the movie, though I wish The Winter Soldier’s default expression wasn’t looking like his dog died.

Iron Man, to be honest, is the soul of the film here and what prevents the sympathy from being lop-sided into Captain America’s favor is the rationale for his behavior, while clunky at times, is understandable.

His character development and study are worth that of two Iron Man films.

There are some awkward character choices, like Vision and Scarlet Witch being locked in a room together for half the film and flirting. Black Widow, the only character with substantial experience with both Iron Man and Captain America, has a diminished role, and this still makes me mad thinking about it.

The film is rather slow in its first half and at a near two and half hour runtime, it could have been trimmed up. Plus, the text that tells the location of a scene (and there is a lot) is obnoxiously large and a terrible design choice.

However, this is definitely one of my favorite superhero films ever. Go watch it.