Captain America: Civil War
Fun things first, then the comparisons that bring the heat.
The case could be made that Black Panther is the Wakandan Captain America. Both men represent the sensibilities, ideologies, and style of their home land. Cap is a Star Spangled, front lined, toe-to-toe punch swapper with big smiles. He breaks rules when he thinks they are wrong and is still considered a rule follower and ideal soldier. Oh, and he was born on the east coast. Black Panther is subtle, quiet, dangerous, frightfully strong, but surprisingly so because it remains hidden. Wakanda is the most technologically advanced society on the planet, a history so deep it deserves its own comic, and until Bruce mentioned them in Age of Ultron, no one had ever heard of them. When they fight, it usually ends in a stand still and usually has a tremendous amount of mutual respect.
The action was incredible. There were several moments in the fights that caused genuine cringes with stunt coordinators, stuntmen, camera men, and CGI reaching a peak that makes gritty, punishing fight scenes so seamless that disbelief never happens. Whether its the running through the car tunnel scene, the great hero clash, or the serious darkness at the end, I find I could keep my critical mind asleep and enjoy the ride.
One thing that I would have liked to have seen would have been Tony (or anyone pro registration) making the point that the Winter Solider drama is irrelevant. Maybe next time, Hawkeye’s family is in danger or maybe Bruce’s old girlfriend finds a treasure map. It will always be something. It’s bad luck that Cap has ties to the first problem and that it happens so soon. In other words, this movie is entitled “Civil War”. It should be the center of the plot, but really, without Bucky and Zemo, Cap would never have warred. The audience is going to be swayed into Cap’s side only because he had to go fight for a friend, and that can side step the issue. Not necessarily, but without the points being made, it gets buried beneath the emergency of the whole “my old best friend has come back to life and is programmed to black out and assassinate with extreme prejudice if you know the password” deal.
That was quick and painless. Now, here are three unfair comparisons I’m going to make. First, most obviously, is Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice. The other, also pretty obvious, is the comic books. Finally is rather unexpected, but obvious after a moment of thought, Daredevil on Netflix.
Civil War from Marvel vs. Dawn of Justice from DC
A CW vs. BvS post has to go deeper than just CW is good where BvS was not as good. A large part of it is what Kevin Fegie said in a recent interview about why Deadpool did so well and what our own Caped Persuader Chris has posted: they respected the source material and presented an authentic representation of the character. Even the newest characters presented were done in a way that wasn’t just inspired by the comic book characters, but tried to be as true as possible to their core identities. This is the most important part for fans where CW succeeded and BvS failed. Sure, the first time Superman killed in Man of Steel, we all thought “Okay, I go it. Spur conversation, challenge the notions, blah blah blah”. It got Chris and me to argue for years. Then in BvS, Batman just racks up the body count and everyone pretty much just felt like,”Wow. LAAAME”.
Also, even though there was a lot going on in CW, we all knew where everyone was in the story line. T’Challa wanted to kill Bucky. Iron Man wanted to keep the Avengers together under the Sokovian Accord, Captain America wanted to do it outside of the Accord. Bucky wanted to find out who framed him. Scarlet Witch was considering her identity after failing when she was tasked to act like a super spy and perfect fighter after having her powers for, what, a year? The Vision was considering his identity after having been created as the perfect being while looking like a human with an Infinity Stone on his head for, what, a year?
On the other hand, BvS had a Batman who had it in for Superman because… he was powerful? Because his enemies were powerful? He thought him evil, or at best a well intentioned fool? Superman was after Batman… at the very end, but wasn’t really, he just wanted to talk to him, but then he decided to fight him to make him listen, but never really took it seriously enough to fight to live? Then there was Wonder Woman. I guess. Lex wanted to mess around with Kryptonian stuff cause he was crazy and his dad was abusive, but not so crazy because he was still able to build a billion dollar agency? Like, the way that it was presented, would Lex have done evil stuff if Superman wasn’t around? What was up with Lois? I will say with that point, though, at least Lois has the excuse of being historically understood as dumb.
They remind me of an Top Chef competition I saw once. Two different moments. One chef was challenged to make a low cholesterol dish. Another was doing her championship finale and had to make 5 different plates. Both took a risk: The low-chol chef had immunity and risked it by going full blown high cholesterol dishes with lobster and scallops and other stuff he knew he could do really well then sell it with the message “you shouldn’t be afraid of cholesterol at all and embrace life!”. The finale chef was told to make 5 different dishes with same ingredient, and she decided to risk it by making each dish a “two-ways” dish, essentially doubling her work load with 10 legit entrees within the same time frame. The low-chol chef was called in front of the judges who sat in awe and said “I know you had immunity, but come on man, we were hoping you would have at least tried”. The double plate chef was called before the judges who sat in awe and said “I can not believe you would double your work on an already exhausting challenge, but man, you pulled it off”. The guy took a dumb risk. The gal took the smart risk.
The reason the Marvel DC comparison is unfair is because, at this point, Marvel has succeeded many times and failed a few, too. Its fan base knows what it wants and Marvel knows what they want. They take risks based on too much material and too many characters knowing what their people really want. It was a risk to have so many huge personalities and actions and stories all at once. It was the right risk. It was a smart risk.
DC is new at this (in terms of a multi-character focused, continuous universe across multiple releases in a cinematic format). They took the risk of changing the core of the characters, in overlapping known story lines, in setting in a more modernized world. They (I mean Zack Snyder) ignored the challenge of what people wanted and instead risked it by presented something that he knew he could do. He took the wrong risk. The dumber risk. Seriously, it could have been a sequel to Sucker Punch… hmm… now I wish I could redo my BvS UIR.
Civil War the Movie v. Civil War the Comic
It’s unfair to compare the movie to the comic books since they are drastically different mediums, drastically different histories and depth of histories, and also that the demographic is different (though not as much as was once thought). So I will try to bear in mind that it is silly to compare these things. As I had pointed out in a previous post, Tony Stark is an alcoholic in the comics and not in the movies (interesting call by Marvel and Disney, but whatever), and as such, his decision making reflects those tenets in the comics, but need a new direction for the big screen. In the movie, the reasoning for him to choose his side is weaker, though not viciously so. They play up a sort of powerphobia he’s been falling into as the reason for his willingness to give up his powers. Works for me, honestly. I like the idea of an increasingly agoraphobic Iron Man retreating deeper and deeper into his armor until he is all Iron and no Man (so did Jim Krueger and Alex Ross, it seems).
Not to mention, I feel like the SHRA was more interesting and nuanced than the Sokovia Accords in terms of legalities. Both said you either join up, quit, or get arrested, turning what they do into a sort of federal monopoly on super hero protection/ legitimate paying work, but the movies made them an international team, whose actions are controlled by the UN? There was only one non-American on the team and her city was destroyed in Avengers 2. Seems a bit bounds “over-stepping”y to me. War Machine worked directly with the United States military, beteedubs. Not to mention when S.H.I.E.L.D was around, they were a branch of the military of America themselves, and the Avengers are a team within S.H.I.E.L.D. Seems weird that our government would be accepting of terms that would diminish that unique power at all. So, as pretentious purists tend to, I thought the book was better.
However, I think the movie did a great job going out of its way to get this story to work well. They had their characters, sure, but the roster was small. They didn’t have 66 children killed, but they did have a city. They managed to separate Hulk and Thor, introduce Spider-Man in a Stark created suit, and even have freeze frame cell-to-screen moments where they could, and introduced chemistry organically and managed to tell a believable story with what they had built. So, kudos there.
Civil War in Theaters vs. Daredevil on TV
Now, the Daredevil (the Netflix one) comparison. This one seems odd, but hear me out. It is often talked about how the MCU is so light and friendly compared to DCCU and really DC in general. Netflix MCU does not suffer from such a problem. In fact, they have gone to such dark places that every time I go to write a Jessica Jones UIR, which has been more than once, I wonder how much I can get away with saying even though they have already said it. Now, all that aside, the real reason I want to do the comparison has to do with the fight choreography. Daredevil, after only 2 seasons, has a developed a reputation for having an extended uncut fight scene that doesn’t just have amazing moments of athleticism, but also actual acting at the same time (season 1 and season 2). For me, Philip J Silvera, the stunt coordinator for Daredevil (and Deadpool, too), created a bench mark that I now compare most fight scenes to. Having to act exhausted and hurt while having to keep on fighting and knowing the styles that match each individual involved. James Young is the man who headed up the fighting for CW as well as Age of Ultron, Winter Solider, and even Guardians of the Galaxy. While most of the fighting in Civil War was pretty great, the points I wanted to hit have to do with what they have in common with Daredevil.
While there are many fight scenes in Civil War, let’s just look at the main two: the airport scene and the Winder Solider complex. The airport scene marked the acting that Daredevil was doing in terms of maintaining character notes. Ant-Man and Spider Man were funny and talked a lot. There was even a quick Spidey-Sense moment. Black Widow did a lot of studio wrestling moves. Iron Man was all mad. Captain America was all noble. The final beat with Iron Man blasting Falcon while holding War Machine had people wondering if they should laugh or share in the mourning and I love those moments. People were actually upset that no one died at the end of that fight. I can’t decide if it was because of Goliath’s death at the cloned hand of cloneThor in the comics or because they used the term “War” in the title and war should have casualties. Bare in mind, this particular group of people have spent a lot of time practicing how to fight without raising a kill count too high. They certainly won’t turn lethal on their friends over an arrest.
The other was the final showdown at the compound. That fight was no longer friends trying to work past an inconvenience, it was about vengeance and rage. It was intimate and brutal and extremely personal. It flexed Robert Downey Jr.’s acting chops. In fact, there were no greater moments of true acting than what happened in that bunker.
So the comparison goes like this: in Daredevil, as incredible as the season two stairwell fight scene was, as much as it upped the bar in terms of what they were capable of and creative the fighting could be, I prefer the season one hallway fight. In the exact same way, I prefer the fight in the compound over the airport. Now, this is exactly like saying I prefer pepperoni pizza over bacon pizza. I want those intimate moments where each punch is fueled by a visual, burning hatred or useless, emphatic pleading. I like the hallway fight in Daredevil because you could watch him have take several breaths before he kept on fighting or the grimace when he would stretch out for a punch that pulled on his fresh stitches. Now, I laughed a lot when Scott Lang looked shocked at the fireball created from the exploding truck and said “I thought it was a water truck!”. I gaped in awe while Matt Murdock kept fighting down the stairs more and more and the bad guys just didn’t end. But man, you can sink your teeth in scenes that strip themselves of all the extravagance and pomp. “Stripped of extravagance” being a relative term here.
Conclusion
I think a win for Marvel was inevitable for Captain America: Civil War. Dawn of Justice tanking (“tanking” also being a relative term here) how it did could not have set up comic movie fans for it any better. It was great in all the ways BvS failed. The introductions of Black Panther and Spider-Man only whetted the appetite of fans for their upcoming solos. It was fun, easter-egg filled, moved forward a now 8 year, 13 movie long story in a successful way. While I can write words that make it sound like I have problems with the movie, I have bigger problems with better movies. While it promises to be on Netflix this year, I think I’ll probably still buy it.