Captain America: Civil War- Movie Review

So I watched the civil war movie last weekend. What a film! So much action and violence yet so much to be learnt from the great personalities. You know, like Lincoln, Jefferson and so on.

What? Not the American civil war, but Captain America Civil War? Oh poop, let’s start again.

*rewind*

So I watched the Civil War movie last weekend. What a film! So much action and violence yet so much to be learnt from the great personalities. You know, like Captain America, Iron-man, Scarlet Witch, Black Widow. Ok, the names sound weird in that context, but trust me the movie is great.

The plot follows the events of the last Marvel movie Avengers 2. No wait, it was Ant-Man. Actually it may be important that you watch all Marvel movies released so far (except Guardians of the Galaxy) to make full sense of this movie and appreciate the character development being done here. Or you can read their plot summaries in Wikipedia like Sheldon Cooper, but where’s the fun in that? The seeds for this Civil War had been sown in many of the earlier movies, and I’m glad it turned out good enough.

In addition to most of the Avengers cast, there’s Ant-man included, and two refreshing new entries- Black Panther and Spider-Man (come on it’s not a spoiler; they showed them in the trailers!). Ant-man needs no introduction since we had his origin story last year only.

Black Panther’s entry in the Marvel cinematic universe was a tad too late. He’s actually the first ‘black’ super hero in the American comics, but unfortunately for him Falcon showed up early in the Marvel movies and the erstwhile white Nick Fury swapped skin with Michael Jackson and became black for the movies. I liked how much you can empathise with this character in the small time he’s onscreen even if you’re not familiar with him (as there isn’t a standalone movie yet). Black Panther’s costume is remarkable as it stayed true to the comic book design AND looked super cool in the movie.

Those paying attention to this space would know that I’m a huge Spider-Man fan, so I was apprehensive of this reboot of Spider-Man yet again. But boy, did I love this friendly neighborhood web slinging potato head, or what? Not only staying true to the comic book costume design (I didn’t mind the scaly reptilian texture of the previous movies either), the character was actually a teenager this time, was actually funny wise cracker during fights, and preserved the shy nerdy persona of Peter Parker when not in the costume. Only thing that bothered me was this line he said (I don’t consider this a spoiler but an Easter-egg since most people won’t notice its significance) -

“If you can do what I do but you don’t do it, and someone gets hurt… it’s your fault”

Sounds to me like a really convoluted beating- around-the-bush way of saying “with great powers comes great responsibility”. What happened Marvel, didn’t get back the copyright for this trademark Spidey quote?

Of course Captain America and Iron-man are the main players, the leaders, because one is called ‘Captain’ (also the movie is in his name) and Iron-man has lot of money. Despite this we never feel that any character was given a small role. The hardest task in writing the story for such a movie is that all characters need to be given equal importance, lest they feel neglected. (Are you listening, writers of Batman V Superman? You had two heroes. Two!). Everyone has good memorable scenes and have their own reason to be in the fight as well. Regarding the fight… wondering why the hell all the good guys turn on each other? Why should they fight their own friends? Half the movie is dedicated to slowly building up the discord and tension between the factions and it’s done brilliantly. Before the movie I thought whatever reason they gave won’t be satisfactory, but I was impressed. This movie proves that people don’t get bored when there’s too much talking, and also mind numbing action (read Avengers 2) isn’t necessarily the best way to build up a plot. Some gurus who have attained Nirvana might say “Why fight their own friends? Any problems they had could be solved by talking it out. Like Batman and Superman did”. Well, what do you expect from a bunch of grown kids who joke even while fighting? I’m kidding; most of the fights are pretty intense. This might be the most mature story in the Marvel Universe yet.

With such a huge cast this movie should’ve been called Avengers 3, right? Maybe they realized that the ‘Avengers’ brand name has much bigger expectations than ‘Captain America’ brand, and from the lukewarm reception of Avengers 2 we know that satisfying such sky high standards of the former is harder than meeting the expectations for the latter.

But wait, there has to be negative points too right? Nothing can be truly perfect. Several stunt scenes look like they were lazily done with old time camera tricks.  The biggest negative, however, in my opinion would be the underwhelming CGI. Many scenes look poorly done. I was surprised when I first found out that RDJ doesn’t actually wear the Iron-man armor during filming but it’s added later. In this movie you don’t have to be told that information. Marvel, please find that guy causing the bad effects and take a reverse-KT to see if he knows anything at all.

If you can adjust with that minor distraction the movie is actually pretty good. It successfully uses events, elements and character chemistry from previous movies and builds on it admirably to usher in a new era in the Marvel cinematic universe- Phase Three. A must watch movie for any Marvel fan.

P.S: Elizabeth Olsen though <3