A SPOILER-FILLED Discussion on Captain America: Brave New World

 Once more, SPOILER-ALERT. If you haven't seen this movie and don't want to be spoiled, please look elsewhere.

All right, here we go.

Truth be told, there's very little to spoil about Captain America: Brave New World, that hasn't already been spoiled in the trailers, the foremost of which being Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross' transformation into the Red Hulk, which is all over the film's promotional materials.  That said, an in-depth discussion of the plot and its implications on the Marvel Cinematic Universe moving forward is only possible by wading into what few spoilers remain.

MUTANT DAWN

For me, the most prominent plot point worth noting here is easily the most obvious, namely the introduction of the metal adamantium, which was left out of the trailers, probably more out of a desire to cut a more brisk trailer than to avoid spoilers.  While the introduction of the X-Men into the Marvel Cinematic Universe has always been a question of "when" and not "if, there was the lingering question of how long it would take Kevin Feige to make his move towards making that happen. While the mention of mutants in the little-seen Ms. Marvel and the more widely seen Black Panther: Wakanda Forever felt like soft steps in this direction, the introduction of adamantium in this film is a much more emphatic gesture.

WOULD-BE ARCH VILLAINS INTRODUCED

There are other things worth noting, too, though. I, for one was grateful to see the MCU finally pay off the teaser involving Tim Blake Nelson's Samuel Sterns, aka Mr. Blue at the end of The Incredible Hulk,  in which his gamma-irradiated head began to swell to hint at what was to come. Such was the anticipation to see the Leader, one of the Hulk's most prominent villains, that people even got excited at the thought of him showing up in the She-Hulk TV series a couple of years ago.  

Was the payoff what Hulk fans would have hoped for? In a word, no. The Leader is one of Hulk's most significant bad guys, but he's extremely watered-down here, despite Nelson's best efforts and some nicely creepy makeup. That said, I did like that they finally paid him off, and left room for a better creative team to use him down the line.  That's the advantage of not killing one's bad guys. The same can be said for Giancarlo Esposito's Sidewinder. However poorly handled these characters are, at least they're on the table

ALL-HULKED OUT

While this movie has provided a couple of promising villains a rather muted entry into the MCU, it's also provided a bit of an exit for a longtime MCU character in Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross, who only turned into a red Hulk because he was taking meds to keep him alive; meds that, unbeknownst to him, had been supercharged with gamma radiation.  Without the gamma meds, Ross is surely not much longer for this world, and the fact that Marvel cast an 82-year-old Harrison Ford to replace the late William Hurt and not a younger actor suggests to me that they don't see themselves getting that much more mileage out of this character. I wouldn't be surprised if Ross' next appearance is in a funeral or memorial scene. 

BULLET DODGED FOR BUCKY

The movie looks poised to end its theatrical run with more or less a half-billion dollars in global grosses, which is less than half of what its immediate predecessor, Captain America: Civil War made  almost nine years ago, back when Marvel movies were unassailable at the box office.  That said, it never really was going to scale those heights, especially considering that Sam's arc of embracing his identity as Captain Ameria, a much more compelling story than what was on offer here, was already played out in his TV series, and considering that rather than set off in a new, exciting direction, the film borrowed heavily from the  best Captain America film ever, The Winter Soldier.   One section of fandom goes on about how Bucky should have been Cap after Steve Rogers retired, but the truth is he would not have done a whole lot better in this movie than Sam did, so essentially Marvel saved him for what could genuinely be a better film in the upcoming Thunderbolts*.

Anyway, those are my thoughts on this film, but I will be back to share my thoughts on the next Marvel Film coming up: Thunderbolts*!

Picking up Loose Threads: A Review of Captain America: Brave New World (Spoiler-free)

directed by Julius Onah

written by Rob Edwards, Malcolm Spellman, Dalan Musson, Julius Onah and Peter Glanz

Captain America: Brave New World is, for those keeping count, the 35th film Marvel Cinematic Universe film, the fourth one to bear the name "Captain America" and the first film in which someone other than Steve Rogers wears the star-spangled banner and the Vibranium shield, that someone being Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie).  It's a film that has provoked reactions that range from lukewarm to downright hostile. Personally, though, I enjoyed it, even in spite of its many flaws. I was pleasantly surprised by a few things, some of which I can discuss without spoiling key plot points, and some of which I will have to set aside for a separate, spoiler-laden discussion. 

The film begins with Captain America chasing down a group of thieves who have  stolen a highly-valuable asset and have now holed up in a Mexican church, where they plan to meet their mysterious buyer. Sam, aided by his buddy Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez) and the military, is able to stop the sale and retrieve the asset, which turns out to be a precious metal called adamantium, which has been harvested from the remains of Tiamut, the stillborn Celestial who almost destroyed the Earth in the film The Eternals, which is currently resting in the Indian Ocean.  Retrieving it was crucial because the United States of America, of which Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross (Harrison Ford) is now the President, is currently negotiating a treaty with Japan and other world leaders to extract the adamantium and distribute it all around the world. 

Ross invites Sam and Joaquin to attend one of his conferences in which he tries to convince world leaders to sign the treaty, but Sam only agrees to go if Ross also invites Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly) a soldier who served as Captain America in the 50s but who was locked up for crimes he didn't commit.  Just before the meeting, Ross takes Sam aside and asks him to help him restart the Avengers, which makes Sam distinctly uncomfortable given Ross' spotty history with the Avengers.  That is set aside when Ross begins his pitch to world leaders for the treaty, only for the unthinkable to occur; Bradley and several other people present at the event suddenly try to shoot Ross and other world leaders. Sam, Joaquin and the President's security detail, headed by the no-nonsense Ruth Bat-Seraph (Shira Haas) neutralize the threat, but even as Isaiah is carted off to jail again, Sam is convinced something else here is at work and tries in vain to convince Ross to let him investigate what really happened. 

Of course, someone else really is behind what happened, and Sam, Joaquin and President Ross are about to find out who it is and what a threat  he truly poses to the brave new world they are trying to create.

Yes, this movie was deeply flawed. The dialogue was unbelievably clunky at time, the seams at which the plot was taken apart and sewn back together were painfully obvious in some places, and quite sadly, the film really did feel like a lesser version of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.  I'd be interested to see the YouTube videos comparing key scenes from the two movies, because there are plenty of similarities 

It would be pretty easy to pick apart individual aspects of the production as well: Laura Karpman's omnipresent music score pales next to the work of Alan Silvestri and Henry Jackman, the action choreography, while competent enough, is sometimes all over the place, and the computer generated imagery...well, that's just a low-hanging fruit at this point when it comes to Marvel movie gripes. Roast me all you want, but I did like the Red Hulk scenes, for the most part. I thought they were pretty well-done, all things considered.

What genuinely surprised me was the earnestness of the performances. This, for me, kept the movie afloat when its many foibles threatened to sink it. Anthony Mackie hit all the right notes as a still-reluctant Captain America filled, with both unbelievable courage and crushing self-doubt, and he and Danny Ramirez have a fun, buddy-cop chemistry going on that helps keep the film light.  The most pleasant surprise for me, by far, was Harrison Ford, who at 82 genuinely acted in this movie.  I expected him to phone in his performance, the way he sleepwalked through the recent Star Wars movies and, perhaps even more embarrassingly, in the last Indiana Jones movie, but I'll be darned; he showed up and gave a rousing performance that would have done the late William Hurt proud. Considering that he did this with such a slipshod script, his performance was nothing short of outstanding. 

Finally, I appreciated that this movie picked up story threads from earlier, unloved Marvel properties like The Eternals and found something useful to do with them, and it's nice to see the MCU feeling a bit connected again.  I know it wasn't everyone's cup of tea and I completely get that, but I enjoyed myself. Yes, the MCU has a very long way to go before it reaches the height of Avengers: Endgame again (assuming it ever does) but if nothing else, this movie is at least an improvement on some of its misses of late (including the TV series). 

7/10