The Zemo plot line is cheesy and ridiculous but I'm really into it. They took a one note avenge my family villain from Civil War and, in the space of one episode, turned him into a more fleshed out interesting character.
Given the MCU's habit of under developing or killing off good villains I am liking this reintroduction of Zemo. It will be interesting to learn his true motivations and if Bucky has anything planned for him.
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I somehow get the sense that at the end of this year, the big bad is going to be Captain America. The opening scene after the friendly commercial, we see Captain (Jack) smashing in and taking a very what seemed to be brutal approach in dealing with and rounding up the people in the shop. He's taking on a whatever it takes no matter how many lines it crosses and working hard to follow orders unlike the Original Captain.
As well the day and age of the 14 year old friendly fight scenes is over as the fight scenes and especially Sharon Carter were on the side of brutal, with callous head shots, knifings and execution, they haven't quite crossed the line to spurting arteries, but there was a brutal simplicity to it that I like.
I love the Zemo portrayal in this episode, originally he was like a slightly more dangerous Leo Getz from Lethal weapon that was a foil to Sam and Bucky, but they flipped a switch on him later in the episode and you realize that there's a nasty edge to him.
Overall, its interesting as you watch this episode because they're almost working hard on the idea of government bad and evil, our main characters are working outside of that sphere. But in the end we got symbolism of almost like ICE door smashing with New Cap leading the way.
Its an interesting story, but the whole super solider serum and the rebels are a smoke screen, the big bad is going to come out of left field at some point as Sam and Bucky become too dangerous to the powers that be to be left alive.
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I somehow get the sense that at the end of this year, the big bad is going to be Captain America. The opening scene after the friendly commercial, we see Captain (Jack) smashing in and taking a very what seemed to be brutal approach in dealing with and rounding up the people in the shop. He's taking on a whatever it takes no matter how many lines it crosses and working hard to follow orders unlike the Original Captain.
I don't think Walker is the big bad, but he's likely going to be a strong enemy tool by the end. I kind of disagree about the heavy handed approach though, I thought he showed quite a bit of restraint, especially compared to Cap and Falcon's Avengers team, regularly using deadly force. I think that's going to end up being the main frustration the leads him to ultimately take the serum. I felt like it became pretty apparent during that scene that this guy would like to throw someone through a wall...if he could.
Yeah I'm having a hard time getting into this. I enjoyed WandaVision a lot more - it was totally unique in its approach and kept me guessing.
This seems like lazy superhero action stuff.
I also started The Boys this week, so perhaps that's coloring my view.
I 100% with you, but just with shear volume the need to put out a lot of different content, some of it has to be within the primary genre pattern. One thing I've always appreciated about what Marvel does is building their stories around unintended consequences usually the heroes actions are half the problem, and they have to overcome themselves too. Wandavision and this show are almost explicit about that and I enjoy it. But Wandavision was a much better serial keep me hanging on for the next episode, Falcon & Winter Soldier has been a lot more high flying action with far softer cliffhangers that could have been cut together into a single story.
Both are pretty strong productions, but which one you are drawn to will reveal a lot about your taste in movies. I typically could care less about the big high flying action sequence (some exceptions the civil war airport, the far from home construction site... action scenes where it's primary character vs primary character with a lot of dialogue well integrated into the action) if you're like me, you probably liked Wandavision (also I heard the big finale action was cut back big time because of some covid related travel problems). If you like the Black Panther, Infinity War, Endgame giant armies face punching the I'm guessing you are latching onto this series more.
edit: also with Zemo as we get deeper and deeper into the twisted web of characters that comic book universes can provide, we are just going to have to start accepting that characters show up when they are needed for plot reasons, not when it makes sense for them to be there. There are just too many characters in to small of a world, some of them need to be AWOL and some of them need to be redeemed from inredeemable situations to move the plots. It's going to get worse and people are just going to have to start ignoring it to enjoy the movies.
You knew it was coming but the ending shot of Walker with the blood dripping shield was perfect. It also was well earned with Zemo’s discussion on the power corrupting and the different answers from all the characters on why or if they would take it. Then Walker continuing to take the L in fights leads him to take it and his friends death making him abuse it.
My other thought is Karli ends up with the shield and the internet loses its #### over a mixed race women being Captain America.
My other question is around the idea that Sharon is the power broker. Why would have Sharon let Zemo near her scientist if she was the power broker. Even if she works for him closely I can’t make her giving the location of the lab make sense.
Great well earned story telling.
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Episode 4 was good. The best one yet, which honestly doesn’t do it justice given the mediocre quality of the series so far. This honestly felt like I was watching a whole new show.
I said before I could over look the liberties taken in the story telling to get to this point and so far it was worth it.
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You knew it was coming but the ending shot of Walker with the blood dripping shield was perfect. It also was well earned with Zemo’s discussion on the power corrupting and the different answers from all the characters on why or if they would take it. Then Walker continuing to take the L in fights leads him to take it and his friends death making him abuse it.
My other thought is Karli ends up with the shield and the internet loses its #### over a black women being Captain America.
My other question is around the idea that Sharon is the power broker. Why would have Sharon let Zemo near her scientist if she was the power broker. Even if she works for him closely I can’t make her giving the location of the lab make sense.
Great well earned story telling.
Spoiler!
Agreed this was the best episode so far. Moved the story ahead in a reasonable way. I agree they did seem to be teasing Karli as the next Cap, and that the internet would probably explode if they did that. Isn't that character supposed to be ethnically Irish? I don't think she's black? I do think at the end of this series Walker probably dies and we get a different new Captain America. My guess would be Sam takes the shield back, and the series is his arc to accepting the shield and taking the responsibility.
I think Sharon makes sense more as a competitor to the Power Broker than as the power broker herself. Taking over Madripoor for her own uses, etc.
The discussion on whether you'd take the serum was interesting. Zemo choosing to destroy it made his motives seem more pure, imo.
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Episode 4 was good. The best one yet, which honestly doesn’t do it justice given the mediocre quality of the series so far. This honestly felt like I was watching a whole new show.
I said before I could over look the liberties taken in the story telling to get to this point and so far it was worth it.
Disney had to do a lot of reshoots on the first few episodes because they didn't want the storyline to overlap too much with COVID-19 apparently.
Probably affected those initial episodes quite a bit.
I'm still a big fan of this. It's different from WandaVision, which I really loved, but this has been really satisfying as a continuation of the 'Super hero movie as awesome stunt-based spy action movies' thing that the Captain America movies did so well.
I think that Walker is a great character and the whole development of him through the series up to the final moment of this episode ('The whole world is watching!') has been really well paced and well earned.
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I still don’t know what’s going on. I thought I had watched all of the Captain America movies but I don’t know who half of these people are so I guess not.
I really liked that episode as Zemo really carries things.
I still remember in the First Avenger why they were so careful in giving Captain America that supersolider because it amplifies the personality as well as the body.
Red Skull was driven outright by ego and saw himself as a god. Capt was the good hearted underdog. This Captain America driven by nothing but duty and an inferiority complex of being a hero with no super powers flat out murdered a surrendering enemy, How could we not see this coming. Even when he talked about Afghanistan and his three medal of honors he hinted at the things that he was willing to do to protect America basically.
So yeah, there's no doubt that he's going to go completely off the reservation.
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Agreed this was the best episode so far. Moved the story ahead in a reasonable way. I agree they did seem to be teasing Karli as the next Cap, and that the internet would probably explode if they did that. Isn't that character supposed to be ethnically Irish? I don't think she's black? I do think at the end of this series Walker probably dies and we get a different new Captain America. My guess would be Sam takes the shield back, and the series is his arc to accepting the shield and taking the responsibility.
I think Sharon makes sense more as a competitor to the Power Broker than as the power broker herself. Taking over Madripoor for her own uses, etc.
The discussion on whether you'd take the serum was interesting. Zemo choosing to destroy it made his motives seem more pure, imo.
Spoiler!
Didn't he mention that he might not be able to make any more, so what use would he be to the Power Broker except as a lose end that Sharon could betray to gain trust with the hero's.
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this show is really boring and pedestrian and I'm using the word pedestrian on purpose because 20% of the screen time both falcon and the winter soldier just walk, they walk everywhere. everywhere they go they walk. walk walk walk walk. then sit on couches, or lay on couches.
Its really poorly written. anthony mackie is annoying too, I find him to be such a grating dude
I feel like Walker taking the serum after Hoskins died would have made more sense if not been more formulaic. But if they wanted to push Walker as 'grey' and conflicted with the audience some more I think having him to take the serum as a result of failing to save his friend against super soldiers (adding to the long list of people he failed to save) would have made a lot of sense. Maybe they wanted commentary on even having super powers doesn't mean you can save everyone.
I feel like Walker taking the serum after Hoskins died would have made more sense if not been more formulaic. But if they wanted to push Walker as 'grey' and conflicted with the audience some more I think having him to take the serum as a result of failing to save his friend against super soldiers (adding to the long list of people he failed to save) would have made a lot of sense. Maybe they wanted commentary on even having super powers doesn't mean you can save everyone.
I think by having him take their serum after being emasculated works better.
He is driven by his failure to live up for the ideals he set for himself. His medals of Honor are reminders of the worst days of his life, his failures. His comment of “they weren’t even super soldiers” re-enforces he is not capable of meeting his expectations of himself. This is made worse by the expectations of the shield.
So he doesn’t only take the serum because he is out of options and it’s the only way to save his friend like the typical hero arc. He takes it because he is a failure who can’t live up to his expectations of himself. I think the latter makes more sense.
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this show is really boring and pedestrian and I'm using the word pedestrian on purpose because 20% of the screen time both falcon and the winter soldier just walk, they walk everywhere. everywhere they go they walk. walk walk walk walk. then sit on couches, or lay on couches.
Its really poorly written. anthony mackie is annoying too, I find him to be such a grating dude
Cool story.
Maybe just stop watching. If you dislike it so much why would you even bother coming all the way into this thread just to say that?
Seems like an odd choice.
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I think by having him take their serum after being emasculated works better.
But the last words spoken in the conversation before he presumably is convinced to take the serum is "imagine how many lives we could have saved that day if we had that serum" and he responds "I know, I know." Obviously it would have been a bit too on the nose for him to take it after Hoskins dies but it's appears that lives lost is the main driver. Or at least that's what Walker convinces himself it is about.
I think it would have been better with, as you suggest, if he just took it by feeling emasculated and we didn't even need to see the conversation with him and Hoskins, or he took it after the death due to the conversation with him and Hoskins, again, mostly for the reasons you said but the failure this time being Hoskins death.
Obviously he's a conflicted person who wants to be the hero but doesn't necessarily want to be the hero for all the right reasons and has his own insecurities and how ever they do it they got the point across so it's a bit of a nitpick on what I thought was a pretty strong episode.
What I did think was actually pretty bad about the episode though was Zemo escaping. I know everyone was distracting everyone but these are all like some of the greatest trackers/agents/superhero type people and all have their eyes on the same target who just casually closes a door and is gone lol. I think having Zemo have an actual plan to escape and not get so stupid plot-armour lucky would make him a more menacing villain (anti-hero if they go that route?)
