MCU Phase Four

I suppose this is where it all gets interesting. Not that it hasn't been interesting. I'm using the word a bit more loosely. Up to the end of Phase Three, all of the MCU was contained within the movies and could be followed linearly, pretty much. This is no longer true. Following Phase Four is going to be a more convoluted experience.

For instance, Black Widow takes place both before Infinity War and after Endgame, but it is essentially a Phase Four story. Well, sort of a prelude to Phase Four with the introduction of Yelena as a character. The new Black Widow? I suppose we'll see.

Then there is the fact that WandaVision actually takes place, in the timeline, before Spider-Man: Far From Home, possibly The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, too.

Then there's Loki... I suppose that one starts within the action of Endgame, but it's outside of time, so it... doesn't count? I don't know. I do know, though, that I love the introduction of the TVA. [I have their first appearance.]

So... like I said, interesting. And possibly challenging to keep up with? I don't know. I'm sure it will not make that big a difference overall, not if you're taking each story as its own story.

I'm looking at reviewing Phase Four as its own separate thing and leaving my other MCU ranking list as it is. Or, maybe, I'll work only the movies onto the ranking list. I don't know. We'll have to see how it goes. I am, right now, working my way back through WandaVision and should have a review of that up soon.

One personal note about Phase Four: I have no idea what Marvel is doing in regards to the overall plot arc. This is interesting to me because I knew almost right away what the first big arc was leading to. I loved being able to pick up the clues as they went along. There's some speculation that the new arc is going to have to do with the Beyonder and Secret Wars and, I suppose, that makes some sense, but I haven't seen what I would take as actual evidence of that yet. At any rate, I'm not out scouring the interwebs trying to figure it out. I'm okay just going along for the ride and finding out as I go.

Also on a personal note: I love that they're bringing in Black Knight and Moon Knight. Those were two of my favorite characters back in the 80s. I can't wait to see what they're going to do with them.

All of this to say to be on the lookout for reviews of the various Disney+ series. But not the Netflix shows, which I suppose are being incorporated as canon now that Disney+ is airing them. Of course, we've already seen Matt Murdock and Kingpin in canon shows, so that all makes sense, too.

I'm excited to see where Phase Four is going.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (a movie review post)

 

MCU #9

The Captain America movies are a little different than the other MCU movies. They are like the through line, along with the Avengers movies, of the MCU. [It's going to be interesting to see how that changes with the passing of Steve Rogers, though I have heard that there is a new Captain America movie planned, so, maybe, it will still apply.] Iron Man and Thor are off on their own, doing things that have no lasting impact on the rest of the world (as is Hulk, thanks for killing the Hulk movies Edward Norton!), but Captain America is involved in everything going on out in the rest of the MCU world. He carries the continuity.

I really love this movie. I had forgotten how much I love it until watching it again, and I'm not sure what else to add or to explore that I didn't talk about in my previous review.

The elevator scene? I didn't mention that specifically in my last review, but it is one of the best scenes in all of the MCU.

Sebastian Stan. I didn't really talk about him in the last review because there was not enough Bucky coming out in the Winter Soldier. He was just as believable, though, as Winter Soldier as he was as Bucky. I like Stan a lot, and it's interesting, now, because of later developments, to look back and see Winter Soldier and Falcon meeting for the first time.

I think of all of the Marvel characters, Steve Rogers is probably the most difficult to... inhabit... in a believable way. He's too easy to come off as cheesy. But Evans does inhabit the role... perfectly. I am sad, now, again, that he is gone. I want to see what's coming in the MCU, but I will miss Chris Evans and Captain America. Yeah, I'm sure I will be saying something like this again when we get to Endgame, but I am thinking it now. It's all embodied in Cap asking the guys on the elevator if anyone wants to get off before he kicks all of their asses. Of course, none do, because he's just one man, right? So they get their asses handed to them.

Anyway... I'd say that you should click the link for my previous review and go back and read that. I don't think I can do a better job on this one than I did on that one. So let's just throw this into the rankings instead...

The new MCU rankings!
1. The Avengers
2. Captain America: The First Avenger
3. Captain America: The Winter Soldier
4. Iron Man
5. Thor: The Dark World
6. Thor
7. Iron Man 3
8. Iron Man 2
9. Incredible Hulk (I already got my Norton dig in up in the review, so we'll let this one sit.)

I Am Not My Own Demographic

My wife and I went to an Oscars event at a local theater not because we wanted to actually see the Oscars, this year -- both of us were rather underwhelmed with the nominations -- but because we (especially my wife) wanted to see Neil Patrick Harris host the Oscars. In that, we were not disappointed. He made it worth it to me with his opening line, "We are here to honor the best and the whitest..." That followed by his opening number made the expense of going to see the Oscars at a special venue completely worth it even if it was all downhill from there, though I was gratified that Birdman got best picture and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu got best director for it. Oh! The performance of "Glory" from Selma was also amazing.

However, Eddie Redmayne as best actor? Give me a break. All he did was sit in a chair and drool. John Travolta (who is not an actor I enjoy at all), did a better job of presenting than Redmayne did as Hawking. But I digress...

Yes, it was required that my wife and I go out to see the Oscars, because we don't have "TV." We could have followed the results online, but we couldn't actually watch the show without going out... somewhere... to do that. But it was a charity event, so that was kind of cool.

But here's the thing: It was full of people that are of the demographic I should belong to... but really don't. My wife and I were among the youngest people there. Well, maybe there were some people in their late 30s but, mostly, it was white people in the 40s and up. This is the group of people that I should theoretically belong to. And, I suppose, the fact that I was there at all means that I must overlap a some points other than relative age and race, but it certainly didn't feel that way.

For one thing, my wife and I reacted to a lot more of the political talk than pretty much anyone else there in terms of agreeing with it. We laughed at more of the jokes and, I think, appreciated more of what was going on. Especially when it had to with inequities within the Academy itself. [Just to point out, the Academy is more than 90% white and nearly 80% men. Rich, old white guys with OWDS.]

But it was the ongoing disdain from the host and the crowd against super heroes and comic books that really allowed me to see how I just don't fit in with "my" crowd. There were multiple comments about how glad we should all be that no super heroes were nominated for... anything. I just want to point out that super heroes have never been nominated. For anything. However, Guardians of the Galaxy and Captain America: The Winter Soldier were better than at least half of the nominees. Seriously, Whiplash? What a piece of crap. The Theory of Everything, too. Both worthless movies.

Benedict Cumberbatch, though, shined the brightest light on the issue. The host, a little Susan Sarandon number (seriously, if she had said, "Hey, I'm Susan," I might have actually believed her), had a serious thing for Benedict. During the commercial breaks, she was asking trivia questions (for prizes), and she got to this one:

What Marvel character is Benedict Cumberbatch signed on to play in an upcoming movie?

And there was... silence. Which was quite a contrast to all of the other questions which had had people immediately yelling answers. After enough of a pause that it was obvious that no one was going to say anything (and I think she was about to tell the answer), I shouted, "Dr. Strange!" And, see, she was surprised that I knew that. She had not expected an answer. Then, she said, "I don't even know what comic book that is," (or something like that), and I said, "Dr. Strange!" And she was surprised again. Seriously.

There were a couple of hundred people there, and no one else knew that. That's as basic as water to me. Or air. But it's not that I have a specialized knowledge set that that group of people didn't have; it was the reaction to my specialized knowledge set that was the issue. The host was both disdainful and dismissive of it, and she was fairly representative of the class of people that were there. It made me feel as if I was an anthropomorphized raccoon sitting there in the theater.

Okay, so not really.

Because I really am an anthropomorphized raccoon.

Okay, fine! I'm not.

I am Groot.

>sigh<
Fine!

Anyway, the point is that I don't really fit into this group of people I'm supposed to fit into, and I probably do a lot better job of it here in California than I ever would have done in the South. I'm sure that's why I don't live there anymore. According to my wife, anyway. It might help if I wanted to fit in with the group of "white dudes" or "rich, old white dudes" or whatever. Not that I wouldn't take "rich," I suppose, at least up to a point. But, my gosh, when the only recognition a movie like Selma gets is for the song, then something is wrong. Granted, it's a great song. Again, I'm just going to say, at least Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu got acknowledged for Birdman.

You Can't Have It Both Ways

Most of you reading this can probably remember back to September 11, 2001. You remember the shock and horror that we -- and I use that term globally, because the whole world was shocked and horrified -- all felt. Shocked because no one could understand why anyone would do such a thing. Horrified because we couldn't understand how it had happened. Why it had happened...

Why did it happen? Why did our government let such a thing as terrorists attacking the country happen? Or, an even better question, how did our government allow the Japanese to bomb Pearl Harbor. Surely (as conspiracy theorists have been saying for decades), the government knew. And, to bring it up to date, how did the French government allow the Charlie Hebdo massacre? I mean, they had had one of those guys in jail not all that long before. They had to have known!

Someone, somewhere, failed to act and allowed these things to happen because, you know, they could have stopped them. Should have. They should have proactively stopped the bad guys before they had done anything wrong. You know, like in Minority Report. Surely, the government has future-reading psychics hidden away somewhere and know about all the bad things before they happen and are just picking and choosing which atrocities to stop (hmm... and that kind of sounds like what the British did during World War II once they had cracked the Enigma machine).

Look, it would be great if we could see the future and know, for sure, who was going to do what bad thing and when, but that's just not how the world works. Some people will do bad things and some people will only talk about doing bad things, and it's difficult to tell which is which. It leaves us with two options:
1. Catch the bad guys after they do the bad things.
or
2. Toss people in jail (or worse) just because we think they might do a bad thing.

There's this conversation in Captain America: The Winter Soldier about this topic -- actually, the whole movie is about this topic, but there's one particular exchange that really captures it -- between Nick Fury and Captain America:

Nick -- "We're going to neutralize a lot of threats before they even happen."
Cap -- "I thought the punishment usually came after the crime."

I think this is the central conflict not just in the United States but in all of Western culture, right now. How do you balance the need to feel secure against the need for something that is actual just (as in justice) treatment for all people? I mean, it's one thing to shoot a man down who has pulled a gun on you, but it's another thing entirely to shoot a lot of people down for no other reason than you think they might have a gun on them. Or might be thinking about getting a gun.

In general, I think we, as a people, really do believe in the idea of justice, the idea that no one should be persecuted or punished before s/he's done anything wrong. Punishment comes after the crime. However, when something like the Charlie Hebdo massacre happens, we immediately start up with, "Why didn't you stop them?" And that supposes that we should, somehow, not only know that the person(s) was going to do something but that we should also catch and punish that person before the crime has been committed.

Sometimes, it's the same person crying foul over assassinations and drone strikes one day then demanding to know why some terrorist wasn't put away before killing some people. It's not a thing you can have both ways.

And the truth... well, the truth is that some people are going to do bad things, and there's nothing we can do to stop all of them... that is unless we stop everyone that we even slightly suspect. That means, well, that means you, because virtually everyone I have ever known has gotten mad at some point and threatened someone else. So we either have a society with no freedom but total security, or we have a society with freedom and risks where we do the best we can and allow people the opportunity to do the right thing. Yeah, it's a hard choice, especially after an extreme act of violence, but you can't have it both ways.

It's time we make a choice and stick to that choice and uphold that choice. Me? I choose freedom.
Every time.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (season one thoughts)

I know that most of you are way past season one of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. at this point (meaning you're watching season two), those of you that are watching at all, at any rate; however, since we have to wait till shows are out on DVD, we're only just now finishing up season one. But, since the DVDs did just recently come out, I suppose this is actually a decent time for a review of the season.

Basically, last year, when the show debuted, I heard a lot of whining about it. Yeah, I'm just going to call it whining, because it all had to do with misplaced expectations. People expected The Avengers on TV, but that's not what they got. No, what they got was something more along the line of Whedon's Dollhouse, another show people didn't have patience for and piled on misplaced expectations (because they were hoping for another Firefly). I'm just gonna say, when you're dealing with Joss Whedon, it's never a good idea to come into anything with expectations. I'm sure that the actual reason that Firefly failed was because Whedon fans (who mostly rejected Firefly at first) were expecting something more along the lines of Buffy and Angel. So did Fox, by the way, and marketed it as such, because that's where Whedon's fan base was at the time.

So SHIELD comes in as a slow build, because it kind of has to. It has to introduce us to a whole new cast of characters, which was something Avengers didn't have to do because Marvel had already done that with all of the individual movies. It was slow, but it was solid. My kids loved it from the first episode, including my daughter who has been known to just get up and walk out of the room if something isn't exciting enough to hold her attention.

The biggest issue with SHIELD is that it's greatest strength -- Clark Gregg as Agent Phil Coulson -- is also its biggest weakness. Gregg's Coulson is great as a side character, like he was in the movies. He's the unassuming guy on the fringes who occasionally delivers a very dry, witty line. But that Coulson is not the kind of character that can be the lead in a show. There's just not enough energy and charisma there. The only reason it worked at all is because, as the side character, we'd all come to love him from the movies and were suitably upset when he... well, you know. [I don't want to spoil it for anyone who may not have actually seen The Avengers, though I find that hard to imagine.] However, he's not the kind of guy we want to spend all of our time with. He's not commanding enough. I mean, it's fine to have Coulson along for the ride, but it's really Nick Fury or Captain America or Iron Man we want to be hanging out with.

The other real issue with the show is that Skye, the character who is supposed to be our "average Joe" window into the Marvel universe, isn't quite normal enough for us to connect with. Not in that way, at any rate. It doesn't take long to know that Skye really isn't a normal and, thus, our connection is lost, leaving Coulson as our only link, which would be okay if he wasn't the team leader.

Beyond that, though, the show is quite good. It has good dialogue and interesting characters. Even the characters who start out as those quintessential emotionless fighting machines turn out to have more to them than they seemed to at the beginning, but we have to work our way into them to find that out, as it should be. And, best for me, the show really doesn't have any one-offs. Even the episodes that seem to be one shots tie into the overall story. That it tied directly in with the events of Winter Soldier was also quite superb.

Other good things:
J. August Richards -- It's good to see him again, and I hope that the appearance of Deathlok heralds something more.
David Conrad -- I'd completely forgotten about him, but he's well cast as Ian Quinn.
(grudgingly) Bill Paxton -- I am not a fan of Paxton's, but he's done a great job as John Garrett. So good in fact... but that would be telling.
Saffron Burrows -- She did a great job making me not like her and hoping that Hand was... that would also be telling.

The final analysis is that we, all of us, really like the show. My kids love the show. I think it's great that they've centered the plot around the thing I was talking about in my Winter Soldier review, specifically the Nick Fury vs. SHIELD thing. I can't wait to see what's in store in season two... next year, after it's released on DVD.
>sigh<

The Winter Soldier (a movie review post)

Let's have a discussion. Well, sort of. This is not going to be a typical movie review for me, because I want to talk about a lot of stuff that doesn't actually pertain directly to the movie but is stuff that is brilliant about the movie. If I had my way, this would be all of us going out after the movie and sitting around talking about the movie. So not a review, but a discussion. Like my wife saying, "Oh, I'm sorry. Did I just step on your moment?" was her favorite part and my daughter responding with, "On your left. On your left. On your left." Not that I probably won't wrap it up with a bit of a review at the end, but, first, let's talk about some things.

Like the Winter Soldier.

Comic books were a big part of my life for a long time. Something like 20 years. But I've, now, been out of comics for something like a decade, and the Winter Soldier was introduced after I quit reading and following comics. I had no idea who or what he was, so that whole part of the movie was pretty cool. And I'm glad I didn't know anything about it, although it caused problems for members of my family who wanted to ask me questions (because if it's about comics, I almost always have an answer), and all I could say was, "I don't know anything about the Winter Soldier."

Then there's the whole Nick Fury vs. S.H.I.E.L.D. aspect of the movie.

Nick Fury is one of those divergences from the comic books. In the comics, Nick Fury, also, fought in World War II and is still alive today because he takes something resembling the super soldier serum that keeps him alive. The Howling Commandos actually ran with Fury during the war, not Captain America. But they've done a great job so far of twining the Fury/Captain America stories into something that works for the movies, and they did that again in Winter Soldier by bringing in major elements of the vs. SHIELD story. Being someone that read that story back in the 80s when it came out, I really appreciated that they worked it in here. And what they did makes me really want to see what's coming next (and makes me really wish I could watch the SHIELD television series and see what they're going to do with all of this there).

I was also gratified with the reveal on Arnim Zola, because I wondered about what they were going to do with him after the first movie. It will be interesting to see how that will play out in the future, too.

Possibly, the best thing, though, was the introduction of the Falcon. I have issues of Captain America going back to when the Falcon was Cap's partner. Or sidekick. Or whatever you want to call him. It's great to see them (Marvel) bringing in characters like this. It gives the Marvel Movie Universe so much more depth. Which brings me to what was probably my favorite line in the movie, "I do what he does... only slower."

That's about all I can talk about without giving actual spoilers, which is why it's too bad that you guys didn't go see the movie with me and are sitting around at a Round Table (pizza place) with me eating Parmesan twists and talking the movie. Maybe next time, right?

So, now, the movie:

Captain America: The First Avenger is one of the best super hero movies in terms of capturing the essence of the comic that has ever been done. Of course, Marvel is making it harder and harder to say "one of  the best" because they keep doing that over and over. Captain America: The Winter Soldier is easily of the same quality as its predecessor. I hesitate to say that it's better, but it might be. If nothing else, Chris Evans is as much Captain America as he's ever been and I'm beginning to think he may actually really be Steve Rogers.

One of  the things Marvel seems to be exploring is who their heroes are just on their own. Of course, Thor starts out that way, with Odin taking his hammer. Iron Man 3 asks the question of just who is Tony Stark without his armor. And The Winter Soldier not only poses the question, "I heard you're more than just the shield," it puts Cap up against a villain that is able to dismiss the shield as nothing more than a piece of equipment, forcing Cap to be just Steve Rogers. Of course, there's more to it than that, but, again, spoilers.

As I mentioned, Chris Evans is excellent. If nothing else, Marvel has found actors to be the perfect embodiment of their heroes, and it wouldn't actually surprise me to find out that Evans is just a cover for Captain America.

Samuel Jackson continues to be Nick Fury. He's more Nick Fury in this one than in any of the other Marvels so far. Not only is he more in this one than the others (except, maybe, The Avengers), but he really shows us who Fury is.

Scarlett Johansson is everything that you could hope for alongside Cap. And her goal of finding him a date adds humor throughout the movie and comes off completely naturally.

It was great to see Robert Redford in this. His physical presence on camera is just as strong as ever; he was excellent as Alexander Pierce. He oozed politician, and it was great.

But the greatest addition was Anthony Mackie as the Falcon. He was... well, perfect. Just a hint of young Will Smith cockiness but with his own maturity. He's another example of great casting, and I hope we see more of him in the future movies, both Captain America and the Avengers.

If you've liked (loved) the other Marvel movies, I don't see that there's any way that you will not enjoy The Winter Soldier. If you've found that the Marvel movies aren't your style, well, I think you should go home and re-think your life.
And, yeah, sure, I know that line is from a different franchise, but I mean it all the same.