also just going to go ahead and have a Captain America: The Winter Soldier thread

Photos from first day of shooting. Downtown Cleveland was NYC for The Avengers, now we're Washington, DC for this. (My office is about 2 blocks from this location.)

http://www.newsnet5.com/gallery/news/news_photo_gallery/photos-captain-america-filming-begins-in-downtown-cleveland

First trailer out today -- looks great, imo.

http://www.newsarama.com/19376-captain-america-the-winter-soldier-trailer.html

Woo Cleveland filming locations represent all over that trailer

This fucking RULED.

The 70s paranoia-thriller vibe worked great, with some neat 21st-century updates. The action sequences are CRUNCHY - they really made Cap insanely-but-convincingly athletic and capable. They did a great job of putting some of the best aspects of Ed Brubaker's comics on the screen, and set up some interesting stuff for future Marvelverse movies.

dunno wtf agents of shield is gonna do now tho

Oh, that's so good to hear. I loved the first one. I might make an effort to watch this one as soon as it comes out!

The words '200,000 feet of magnetic tape' have never been as entertaining as they are in this movie.

WHAT MORE RECOMMENDATION DO YOU NEED

i need no more recommendation. i will be there.

Also, there's a really awful Sam Jackson metajoke right at the end.

oh, this just opened? maybe i should see it. where can i see a version w/o scarjo?

opens next week I think.

really looking forward to this. Capt. America 1 is probably the best of the Marvel films aside from maybe one of the Iron Man movies. I liked Avengers well enough but Thor 2 was terrible (I like Thor 1).

I liked Captain 1 ok but it totally sold out the climax to launch avengers. he sacrifices himself to...NOPE HE'S AWAKE ITS MODERN DAY SEE YOU NEXT SUMMER!

def psyched for this though

You know, I really like these Marvel movies, generally, but I think this one was a generic dud, so generic that with every predictable non-twist I kept thinking, hah, clever of them the try to throw people off the scene of the real twist, or the real plot, or the real bad guy or whatever. And then that never came and I had trouble staying in my seat. I liked Iron Man 3 and Thor 2 much better, because they had some wit and good ideas. This one, I wish I had taken notes, because, man:

In a general sense, I thought the movie was crappily directed. Like, how it looked, where the camera looked, how the cast was made-up, etc. No surprise, sort of flat and TV-like.

And then:

SOME SPOILERS

Every single of the dozens of bad guys that sneak into SHIELD looks like a swarthy villain from Die Hard, and no one notices?
[New hero] just happens to have a file with his secret program sitting around his apartment?
They manage to secretly build basically three Death Stars right under Washington, DC?
The secret base in New Jersey is a long elevator ride down , but they climb right out of the rubble?

So much lazy bullshit. And the acting was pretty poor. I did like the official first mention of Dr. Strange, though, albeit in passing (as if everyone knows the dude). No idea how they're going to explain away the presence of Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch in a world without mutants without messing up fan conception of this whole thing. Going to have to start mutating the canon in major ways.

Also, really liked Mackie in The Hurt Locker, nice to see him here.

important question: is hayley atwell in this one.

Had to google her. Apparently she is in this, but I still don't know who she was in this. Oh, wait, she's there in essentially a newsreel cameo, and/or beneath tons of old age make-up.

I think there's video footage of her that plays for about two seconds

oh yeah, she's there as an old person too! Quite good makeup

Everyone else in this looked the way newscasters and actors who have been airbrushed for HD look in anything but HD. Totally painted, guys and gals alike.

Now that you mention it, there was something slightly off about the way they looked. Scarjo was all washed out

Because she is an alien, iirc.

One more thing: nobody remembers Captain America's close friendship with Bucky Barnes from the first film. Literally - no one.

The close friendship that is celebrated in a major display in a national museum?

I just saw this. Obviously it's a minor pleasure at best, but I wasn't bored.

I remembered Bucky, Josh!

I could watch Robert Redford read the phone book tbh

thought this was much much better than it had to be, and def better than the first one

• Mackie steals it
• the washedoutness was good and right and appropriate to the paranoid-thriller throwback genre. see also: redford's wide tie.
• namechecks: Batroc Zee Leaper! Steven Strange!
• Brubaker cameo!
• Winter Soldier subplot completely immaterial to major arc but that plus lost-in-time hero gave it just enough emotional ballast to overcome the Dark World who gives a fuck problem

Teaser was okay, bring on the next. Love more and more that each [non-X, non-Spider] Marvel pic is an issue in the big story. It's a highwire act and they're pulling it off well enough that I'm not about to complain. Bring on Guardians for humorous interlude.

excited to see this. sf chronicle savaged it predictably, I don't think MIck Lasalle appreciates superhero films though. if this is better than the first one I'm particularly excited.

I don't think it was better than the first one -- saw it this afternoon. I have to finish up a zine but will come back later with thoughts.

oh and the epitaph on A CERTAIN PERSON'S gravestone was a little on the nose but I lol'd anyway

gonna see this in the theater, can't be more leaden than Thor 2

Does it have anything as stupid in it as Captain America staying on the plane for convenient freezing purposes even though there was a glaringly obvious out?

going by this, he seems to have a fetish for going down with the ship

Every single of the dozens of bad guys that sneak into SHIELD looks like a swarthy villain from Die Hard, and no one notices?

They worked there! There was nothing unusual about them being there!

[New hero] just happens to have a file with his secret program sitting around his apartment?

Don't recall anyone on screen ever saying "secret."

They manage to secretly build basically three Death Stars right under Washington, DC?

It was SHIELD headquarters! It was a program approved by the Secretary of Defense! (In this universe - as established by The Avengers - the USA is obviously a signatory to and member of something called the World Security Council that has UN-like powers and more.) It wasn't a secret, its purpose was obscured by the bad guy!

The secret base in New Jersey is a long elevator ride down , but they climb right out of the rubble?

"Maybe" on this one.

No idea how they're going to explain away the presence of Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch in a world without mutants without messing up fan conception of this whole thing. Going to have to start mutating the canon in major ways.

Thought it was pretty obvious they had been experimented on by Hydra just like everyone else in this version of the Marvel Universe, with some combination of Hydra technology and some derivation of the super-solider serum that also created the Red Skull, the Hulk, et al. On-screen dialogue refers to "volunteers," i.e. Test subjects.

One more thing: nobody remembers Captain America's close friendship with Bucky Barnes from the first film. Literally - no one.

Do you mean in-universe or in the audience? Because neither of those is even remotely true.

You are bad at watching movies.

Thoroughly enjoyed this, but have to admit that after seeing them shutting down streets and filming this around town last year, it was a little jarring to see how it was cut together. I fell victim a couple of times to both "hey, that geography is impossible" and "oh, hey, it's the library/this building/that street!"

(A great example of "movie geography" - The beginning and end of Nick Fury's car chase are right around the corner from each other on the same block IRL. )

(And also a car chase taking place in "Washington, DC" has a clearly visible sign for OH-6/OH-322, which is Superior Ave. in downtown Cleveland.)

The more I ponder this film, the more I like it. It's a good chunk of CMU* exposition moving towards Avengers 2, but also not bad as an espionage and political paranoia thriller. I still think Cap 1 was the better film by a slim margin.

oh and the epitaph on A CERTAIN PERSON'S gravestone was a little on the nose but I lol'd anyway
― resulting post (rogermexico.), Friday, April 4, 2014 11:41 PM (Yesterday)

I got a good cackle out that.

Mackie as Sam Wilson was really good, and they caught the mid-70s Cap-Falcon cameraderie so perfectly from the very start that I wish he was going to be in the Avengers films as well as Cap films, but I understand not wanting to put too many ingredients in the soup.

*Cinematic Marvel Universe -- Rascally Roy

going to the 10 a.m. show. Ta!

SPOILERS!

Thought this was okay, but a bit too predictable... And not just because everyone who's read recent Captain America comics knew the biggest plot twist from the movie title alone, but because every other plot turn was so easy to guess as well... Of course the Black Widow isn't gonna turn out to be a traitor (you gotta think of future Marvel movies). Of course Nick Fury's death was faked (though at least they didn't use a Life Model Decoy). Of course the Robert Redford "patriotic" politician is gonna turn out to be the Big Bad (who else could it have been?). Of course in the final battle between Cap and the Winter Soldier the latter's memory would come back and he'd spare Cap. And so on... Given that this movie tried to be more of a spy thriller than a superhero romp, I wish they'd put more effort into the script, because the premise of straight-arrow Cap taking down corrupted SHIELD had a lot of promise. Basically the only plot turn that wasn't immediately guessable was Zola living inside a vaccum tube computer, and that was one of the coolest parts of the movie.

I wasn't super impressed by the action pieces either, they were professionally done, but not particularly innovative. The only really cool part one was Nick Fury driving through Washington and running away from HYDRA, the climax with Winter Soldier appearing on the middle of the road was hella intense. The final battle, on the other hand, was merely a variation of the typical Bond movie "infiltrate the bad guy's lair and plant a bomb there" finale, so it was hard to get super excited about it. A smaller scale one-on-one fight between just Cap and Buck would've worked better, because the psychological aspect of that battle at least made it a bit more interesting than your typical action movie fireworks.

Basically what I think saved this movie from being utterly mediocre was the character work. Cap has always been a blandish character, and thus it's hard for an actor to make him interesting, but I thought Chris Evans reached a decent balance between boy scout idealism and post-War On Terror doubt. And this was the first time I found Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow to have some intrigue in her, her "atone for my dark past" character motivation actually made sense in this context. Also, I really liked that they didn't add any token romance between her and Cap, but instead she was matchmaking him with Sharon Carter (i.e. his canon love interest in the comics). And the guy playing Falcon was of course excellent, give him a movie of his own already!

Oh yeah, and I was really disappointed they didn't give Batroc ze Leaper a comedy French accent and a waxed moustache. They missed a chance there. In general I'm not fond of how Marvel movies have toned down and grittified so many classic villains (possibly following the lead of the Nolan Batman movies). Supervillains should be larger than life, not these washed-colour scowlers.

i was totally pleased with batroc. his savate style was just "french" enough for a wink in the CMU.

I dunno... If you're gonna make him a generic mook whose only connection to the original character is that he kicks a lot, why call him Batroc in the first place?

I mean, the reason the comic book Batroc is memorable is because he's so (intentionally) corny and over-the-top. Take that away, and it could be anyone.

I mean, the reason the comic book Batroc is memorable a shitty character is because he's so (intentionally) corny and over-the-top.

My favorite of the Marvel films to date: clean, a couple good crackling exchanges between ScarJo and the Cap'n, and some tension. Shrewd Toby Jones and Garry Shandling cameos. Good of Robert Redford to whore out his poached-salmon face to play a colorless bureaucrat who never raises his voice. The movie wants to have its cake and eat it too (the big bad world those awesome SHIELD toys made has to be destroyed...so that another acronym can take its place) but any movie that makes Chris Evans interesting to watch for once deserves a medal.

and yeah Batroc the Leaper! I only know his name from the Marvel board game issued in the seventies (through which I also learned MODOK).

Do you mean in-universe or in the audience? Because neither of those is even remotely true.

I mean not from the comics, from the first movie. Obv. comic nerds know almost every soapy beat of these things. I just meant as a major character from the first CA movie.

I'm not bad at watching movies, btw. I was trying to watch the movie from the perspective of someone unfamiliar with the decades-old stories, just in the context of the previous (9?) films.

I should say I really like all these movies, at least a little. But I thought this one pretty perfunctory. I think all the positive reviews are related to the Real World themes, but as a superhero movie it was pretty eh.

The first section of the first film was about Steve being 4F and his friend Bucky shipping out. The entire reason Captain America went into combat and ducked out of the USO show was because his friend was behind enemy lines captured. Did you watch the first movie?

Also, whatever review or comment I read saying the title was a misnomer because the Winter Soldier character is barely present has no idea wtf a "winter soldier" is. Hint: it's not just Bucky

in other words Bucky done gone

think I'm gonna see this today. didn't care for the first one but the trailer looked positively dope oh fuck the dog I was watching just moved out of view brb

Cap's cultural catch-up list also included the 1966 World Cup, so I wondered if it was a different list for different territories

Nick Fury just looks uncannily like Sam Jackson.

http://cdn.themis-media.com/media/global/images/library/deriv/705/705450.jpg
http://wpc.556e.edgecastcdn.net/80556E/img.site/PHvTwzsGPwpHzB_1_m.jpg

xp yes, yes it was: http://io9.com/captain-americas-catch-up-list-is-different-in-differe-1555534018

Instead of I Love Lucy, he's learning about the British show Sherlock. And instead of the Berlin Wall, it's the Beatles.

And Cap's list is different in other countries, too. According to Slashfilm:

Aussies have AC/DC, Skippy the Bush Kangaroo, and Steve Irwin added to the list, while Koreans get Ji Sung Park, Dance Dance Revolution, and Oldboy. French fans see the 1998 World Cup and The Fifth Element, among other things.

That's pretty awesome actually.

Heh, in the comments:

Monty Python's Flying Circus
Moon Landing
The British Invasion (not an act of war)
Punk Rock (genre)
Benny Hill
Thai Food
Star Wars/Trek
Ramones (band)
Rocky (Rocky II?)
Troubleman (Soundtrack)

That's the suggested "improved" UK list, btw.

I believe they took suggestions from test screening audiences as to what should be on the UK list. Hence Sherlock

I like that Star Wars is crossed off the US list. Wonder what he thought?

Star Wars/Marvel crossover will def. happen now.

I enjoyed this.

Got a kick out of the Marathon Man set-up scene in the beginning, and Redford's All the Presidents Men costume ref. Apparently the Shield HQ bldg is located where the Watergate actually is.

The heavy contrast of ending titles was a great summary of the two different genres they went for: the 1st is a rah-rah WWII film and so they used propaganda art, vs the 2nd is a 70s paranoid spy thriller and has something between Maurice Binder and Saul Bass designed titles.

I dug that they explicitly namechecked "the Howling Commandos".

Nick Fury torching his storage locker is a nice bit of imagery but doesnt really work when the establishing shot of it shows nothing but fire-proof metal cases.

The upgraded helicarriers were death star in function, but Battlestar/SDF1 in design.

I don't think they could do much about the Bucky reveal, seeing as how the comics had decades of emotional impact with the running joke that everyone comes back from the dead, except Bucky.

I think a lot of the deeper refs I missed, since I grew up obsessed over the xmen, not the avengers.

And the product placement was annoying.

Watched the first film last night, so a lot of stuff was fresh in my mind, like the fact that the first shot of Toby Jones' Zola is thru a lens/screen:

http://cdn.screenrant.com/wp-content/uploads/Arnim-Zola-East-Egg-in-Captain-America-The-First-Avenger.png

Falcon has his own Lego minifig now:

http://marveltoynews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/LEGO-Marvel-Falcon-Minifigure-with-Serious-Face-Expression-640x480.jpg

gary shandling reveal was so great, glad they didn't cut it for dvd extra.

I have no idea how I didn't guess the Zola angle in the second one after I'd noticed the foreshadowing in the first one!

Cool to see Redford play a fascist in his own conspiracy movie. Also, “wtf is with garry shandling's face” has “About 2,200,000 results”

I like that they foregrounded Jenny Agutter from the shadowy Council

I was disappointed it wasn't actually her doing all that asskicking

I thought, "wow this lady is a badass too eh?" then it turned out to be some Tom Cruise Mission Impossible shit.

still it was a pretty fun movie. I liked how many doors were blown off in this move.

http://x1.fjcdn.com/thumbnails/comments/4071127+_358b6267776b0c7c70f562774b630280.gif

Watched this on the plane. I mean watched half of it because it was phenomenally boring. Avengers had its problems but Whedon, at least, knows how to write a line of text. "We needed a quantum surge in threat analysis." Who writes this shit? Really? They are going to READ PEOPLE'S DNA FROM A SATELLITE? Why do they put the longitude and latitude of locations in the establishing shot? Just to emphasize how much watching this is like watching a mid-season episode of a third-tier action show on USA Network or FX? The action setpieces, at least the ones I saw, were just dull. Anonymous figures bouncing off walls and punching each other to little effect.

Thor 2 at least was funny in places. This, at least in the first half, was not. Johanssen seems to wince at some of the "snappy" lines she has to read. They should have put Madcap in this movie and gone all-out wacky/bleak.

Johanssen actually wrote some of those snappy lines

I guess she figured she couldn't do any worse than the actual screenwriters.

this was appallingly stupid and inept.

Thank you.

darraghmac hates America

one of his best qualities

jaysus the glare of the three magi all at once

http://wp.streetwise.co/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/hocus-pocus.jpeg

"ello, we're maggie"

I had heard going in that this was arguably the best Marvel film to date, and it's hard for me to disagree. It's very good as an action film, above average as a paranoid thriller type homage, though still probably a bit overstated on that point in terms of what actually is happening in the story. Again the casting is really key; Chris Evans is good in the role but more crucially he's extremely likable in a part that could be a lot more boring and not very interesting, this extremely good and righteous moral hero who doesn't have much if anything in the way of dark shading. It could fall completely flat, cf any post-Christopher Reeve Superman, for example. But it's been executed really well in both of the CapAm films I've seen.

It does remind me to a certain extent of The Dark Knight, in a lot of it seems to be taking from genre thrillers rather than superhero films, but it's not nearly as morose and the Hydra plot is more interestingly diabolical.

this is however another Marvel film in which the climax involves large craft blasting away high in the sky and eventually falling slowly to the ground in a smoking ruin while people battle onboard and try to escape before it crashes....

apart from the brief appearance of Toby Jones, I snored through this

Well but what did you think of the 3.5 minutes you saw of the film?

pretty good!

it was just one of those things where the stakes seemed nonexistent and the "conspiracy" pretty obvious

If anyone, three or four more Marvel movies down the line, remembers a single solitary detail from this movie with any affection, I'll ... no, that will not even remotely happen. This is placeholder serialized franchise filmmaking at its most useless.

― Eric H., Sunday, April 6, 2014 12:11 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Posts that didn't age well

" this is however another Marvel film in which the climax involves large craft blasting away high in the sky and eventually falling slowly to the ground in a smoking ruin while people battle onboard and try to escape before it crashes...."

I think this has happened now in every Marvel movie since.

I haven't seen Endgame yet, but out of the 12 movies between Winter Soldier and it, it happens in 3: Guardians of the Galaxy, Age of Ultron, and Homecoming.