Anyway, you know the drill by now. Watch the trailer, then read on...
Now, anyone who's been following my blog for a while, or who knows my general disposition towards Marvel Comics, or has a shred of common sense will know that I'm not a fan of the comic book storyline Civil War.
Short recap: The government wants register superhumans after an incident that killed a few hundred civilians. Iron Man says yes, Captain America says no, they fight and so do a bunch of other superheroes in the Marvel universe. In the end, Iron Man does a lot of illegal things, but in the end Cap and the Anti-Registration side are the bad guys so Tony Stark doesn't spend the rest of his life in solitary confinement at a maximum security prison.
Oh, and Spider-Man makes a deal with Satan. Charming.
Needless to say, I don't have a very high opinion of the event and I don't know a lot of people who do. However, I've decided to not treat this film on the merits of the adaptation. After all, stupid ideas have been made to work in the hands of good writers. And even ideas that were good have been brought to new heights in adaptation - such as in Captain America: Winter Soldier. So, could that potentially happen for Civil War? Let's have a look at what we have so far.
First off: the bad. There's no Spidey in this trailer. Yeah, I was disappointed, too. Especially since this is going to be his first appearance on the MCU scene, I figured there'd be at least something to show of him. Not showing their hand on him isn't a bad choice, however, especially after the previous two film adaptations of our friendly neighborhood snarky joke machine that have gone over as polarizing at best.
The final scene where Cap and Tony have the exchange about Bucky. "He's my friend" "So was I", doesn't...really work.
One of the very, very few things I will give the comic event Civil War credit for is in the fact that it used the long established friendship of Steve Rogers and Tony Stark as a point of conflict. Sure, they were now dire enemies, but they had been friends and respected one another a great deal. In any other situation, as they had demonstrated many times in 616 canon, they would have stood back to back against any foe. Mind you, that friendship was used as a way to try to pull at our heartstrings for what was one of the stupidest Marvel crossovers in recent memory, but still, it was there.
In the MCU...they've know each other for all of two major events. While that's a big deal to some, it's not really when you compare it to the (at the time in the comics) 40 years worth of storylines that they had fought alongside one another in. The line "So was I" comes across as Tony trying to put himself up on the same level of Bucky...which is really just offensive when you break it down. Bucky, in the MCU, had been Cap's best friend since before he was ever Cap. Tony is a guy who, while he's fought in two major conflicts alongside Cap, does not have the same bearing with him as a man who he had known since boyhood and fought alongside for years in war against the Nazis/HYDRA.
Needless to say, I was immensely satisfied with the scene where Tony is getting wailed on by Cap and Bucky.
However, since we've gotten through the bad, let's get into some good: Black Panther. Sure, he has no speaking lines, but we do get our first good look at him and I have to admit, I do like how he looks. It's a problem in superhero comic movies to see translations of superhero outfits not come over so well. This has been seen in some films and television shows, as well as been made a joke in others (such as the recently released and quite excellent Jessica Jones). However, Black Panther doesn't seem to have suffered that fate, having a very sleek look to his black armor that is very fitting of the comics version of the Wakandan king.
And so far, that's really all there is to talk about. No Spidey, a little of a very good-looking Black Panther, and a conflict that literally no party involved is going to look good coming out of. Given the "realistic" version of the Marvel world that the MCU wants to present, perhaps we will actually see some consequences to people's actions.
Then again, somebody might want to bring up that whole "Stark's AI tried to drop a city on the world" thing...might help to paint things in a different light.
Captain America: Civil War will be released to theaters from Disney and Marvel on May 5, 2016.
For the latest from the MadCapMunchkin, be sure to follow him on Twitter @MadCapMunchkin.
No comments:
Post a Comment