Captain America Sequel The Winter Soldier

As usual, I belatedly got to see this and without covering too much ground already mentioned by others, I enjoyed Captain America 2 more than expected to. The main reason for this was because it didn't really feel like a superhero film - and I mean that in the nicest possible way. It came across more like a Jason Bourne film, mixed with paranoid spy shenanigans from the 1970s, infused with modern-day concerns of surveillance via Person of Interest. A techno-thriller basically. That the cast members were larger-than-life superheroes and villains was broadly irrelevant to proceedings.

Captain America was always going to be a tricky act to portray, particularly given how old-fashioned he is, and to Marvels credit they used this rather than ignore or explain it away. While the first film skirted the issue by setting it in an era when America's role was broadly positive in the eyes of most, the sequel made a smart move by keeping Steve Rogers as an icon, instead using him to criticise and hold a mirror against the kind of America (and world) that exists today & worries many people. That's a much smarter approach than I would have ever given Marvel credit for in the past, especially as their latter productions have become stilted & suffocated by canon and the grand Phase 1, 2, 3 schemes.

What also surprised me was just how violent & bone-crunching the film was; it was certainly on the harder edge of PG-13 with a lot of incidental death and destruction (particularly at the hands of the Winter Soldier, who offs one SHIELD agent in a particularly grisly manner). To the extent that if someone asked if this was suitable for younger children, I'd probably say no, probably not.

If I had to grumble, then the movie still suffered from the modern-day affliction that a blockbuster HAS to have a final act involving earth-shattering stakes and over-the-top explosions. It's as if executives can't countenance a scenario where a hitherto smart, intelligent thriller couldn't end with something more modest. It's particularly annoying as many of the preceding, smaller scale set-pieces were infinitely more exciting than the finale's OTT CGI-fest; the car chase with Nick Fury was the highlight for me.

Equally, my main concern about these interlinked movies raised its head here: it's all well and good having all your characters co-exist, but when incidents such as those in Captain America 2 occur, I can't shake the constant thought of 'wait, where's Iron Man in all this? Or Hulk? Both would have been perfect help.'

The end credits scene was also a waste of my time, there was no good reason it couldn't have sat at the tail-end of the feature proper. I said it before: at first the easter-egg scene was cute & unique, now it's just irritating.

Still though, a smart, occasionally thought-provoking thriller with some solid, earthy action. Definitely not what I expected to think about this.