Movie Review: Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 4/5 stars

Bottom Line: Possibly the best Marvel offering since the original “Ironman” movie.  A decent plot with lots of action and a stunning amount of violence.

There’s just something about Captain America that sets him apart from your everyday comic book superhero movie fare.  It certainly helps that there is none of the gross nationalism that you’d expect from someone named Captain America.  He doesn’t fight for America, he doesn’t fight for SHIELD, he just fights for what he believes is right.  When you do that, things can get messy, but you do the best you can with what you have as you navigate the grey areas of superherodom.  All that to say that Captain America has a humanity that isn’t really present in any of the other superheroes.

Those of you that watch the ever so mediocre “Agents of SHIELD” television show probably were able to catch the tie-in between the last episode of the show and this movie.  They did something similar with the last Thor movie but after the fact.  This time, the events of the TV show predict the opening scene of “The Winter Soldier” and the movie looks to actually drive the plot of the TV series.  This is the only time that something like this has ever been attempted as far as I know and it’s an interesting set of bonus material for the fandom without getting in the way of either the TV show or the movies.

Now to finally get to the movie itself.  It was thoroughly enjoyable from start to finish.  The plot was well crafted with twists that I did not expect, though the Winter Soldier reveal kind of fell flat for me.  It was probably one of those things that you have to be a fan of the comic books to really get.  The action in the movie is top-notch and well choreographed.  And, in a surprising turn for a Marvel movie, there is a gratuitous amount of violence in it, with a kill count that would make “Game of Thrones” proud.

If you like the comic book movies, you’ll love this one so don’t delay.  I believe “The Winter Soldier” would even be enjoyable for those that aren’t really into the whole comic book scene.  It works pretty well as a solo project.  Also, if someone could explain what the heck the ending credits preview was all about I’d appreciate it.

8 thoughts on “Movie Review: Captain America: The Winter Soldier

  1. Matt Bernhardt

    per usual, they’re just teasing more people for future movies. The ‘twins’ were Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch. The bizarre thing is that Fox owns the rights to them too (somehow) and they’re going to be in the next X-Men movie in a month, with different actors and I assume different backstories. So all that considered it was kind of a letdown of a credits scene.

    1. Jean-Paul Post author

      That would certainly explain why they seemed so X-Men-y… Any idea who the villian was or for what superhero they’re for?

    2. Steven Scott

      I thought the only let down was that the CGI didn’t look all that good (IMO). As you say, they do this for all the movies so how can you be let down?

      1. Jean-Paul Post author

        I read somewhere that they very specifically kept the CGI to a minimum. I’m not entirely sure how that’s possible given the exploding heli-carriers and such, but that’s what I read.

  2. Steven Scott

    I should have clarified that I was talking about the scene buried in the credits. I thought the effects throughout the rest of the movie were really good, and I’m glad they kept the CGI to a minimum.

  3. Jaime

    The bad guy was Baron Strucker, a long time villain (and fellow WWII survivor) of Capt America.
    As Matt Stated above, the twins are Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch. In the Comics, they are the children of Magneto and will be appearing in the next X-men movie for Fox Studios. They will be in the next Avengers movie as both have long history with the Avengers in comics. Marvel is not even allowed to use the word Mutants in their movies, so Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch’s back story in Avengers 2 will be very different than in the upcoming X-men: Days of Future past. In the comics world, Quicksilver is a Super Fast mutant (like The Flash), While the Scarlet Witch has the ability to “Hex”. (And by Hex I mean she can alter the probability of something happening and make it be 100%, for example if she needs a chandelier to drop on Random Bad Guy X head, she just “Makes” it happen)

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