The only battle that matters during CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR is deciding which character is the most fun to watch. With relative newbies—such as Ant-Man (Paul Rudd), Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman), and Spider-Man (Tom Holland)—running amongst nearly all of the current Avengers roster, the film is a testament to Marvel’s casting process, if nothing else. All of the performers are impressive in their own ways, whether their focal point is heroism, anxiety, guilt, vengeance, or humor. We’ve either grown to care about these characters or at least enjoy the hell out of their company. Marvel has actually gotten to the point where you could remove the action set pieces, and you’d still have a completely entertaining work. But let’s not get any bright ideas…
For example, there are few dynamics I enjoy more in the Marvel universe than that between Steve Rogers/Captain America (Chris Evans) and Sam Wilson’s Falcon (Anthony Mackie). They’re great together because they’re cut from the same military cloth, but they also see America for what it really is—broken, but worth fixing. And when they see the potential for a great injustice—such as over-surveillance and eliminating potential threats, rather than actual ones, in WINTER SOLDIER—they act instinctively.
In CIVIL WAR, the surface danger is government micromanagement of the heroes themselves. After the massive destruction and casualties we saw in both AVENGERS films and WINTER SOLDIER, Secretary of State Thaddeus Ross (William Hurt, returning to his role in THE INCREDIBLE HULK) and other world leaders are concerned that superheroes are policing the world under no one’s authority or supervision, and any death and damage they cause has no consequences. An incident in Nigeria at the top of this film (which also closes out Frank Grillo’s Crossbones storyline from WINTER SOLDIER) serves as a reminder that heroes are just as likely to kill innocents as villains. That, coupled with a not-so-chance encounter that Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) has with the mother of a young man who died in Sokovia, pushes Iron Man in line with the newly drafted Sokovia Accords, an agreement stating that the United Nations would be in charge of dispensing heroes to the world’s trouble spots, rather than having powered people act on their own.
Captain America’s rejection of the Accords partly stem from knowing that the UN would likely send heroes after his old friend Buck Barnes (Sebastian Stan), whose brainwashed assassin identity, Winter Soldier, is slowly regaining his memory of his childhood friendship with Rogers. After a terrorist attack on the signing ceremony for the Accords by someone who appears to be Winter Soldier, lines are drawn among the heroes, with Captain America and Iron Man, dividing up the Avengers and recruiting a few new faces as they beef up their teams for the biggest showdown Marvel has ever staged.
A common criticism of even the best Marvel films is that the villains are never nearly as interesting or compelling as the heroes (with Loki being the exception, and they’re saving him for the next THOR movie). But by making the primary adversaries in CIVIL WAR characters we already care about, in some cases deeply, there’s a remarkable shift in the feel of the big battle scenes. Each punch, crunch, and explosion hurts a little bit more because it’s happening to people we like. There is something like a conventional villain in CIVIL WAR as well, and while Daniel Brühl’s Zemo is a familiar name to comic book fans, screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely (working mostly from the original Civil War storyline by Mark Millar) have given this character a completely different backstory that actually ties him more to the movies than you might expect. And the genius of his plan isn’t that he’s setting some new type of evil upon the world; he’s far too clever for that. The reveal about who he truly is and what his motivations are might be the film’s weakest element, but it certainly drives home the bigger ideas CIVIL WAR is embracing.
With such a large cast, you might think some characters get short changed, but honestly, that isn’t the case. Certainly, some characters have more screen time than others, but when the time comes to choose sides, everyone has their moment to ponder the question and go with their gut (except Paul Bettany’s Vision, who seems to be playing the odds—which leads to a great deal of internal conflict for him). CIVIL WAR couldn’t be more topical in our current political climate. The film is about the use of force, government intervention, and allowing emotion to rule over reason when it comes to conflict.
We dig deeper into the minds of lesser-known characters like Scarlett Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) and Emily VanCamp’s Sharon Carter (whom we find out is the niece of Captain America’s old flame Peggy Carter, who has a presence here as well). A few familiar faces don’t really get much by way of character development—such as Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), who comes out of retirement to join the fight—but they do report to center stage when the time comes for a blowout action sequence to make up for it. I will admit, I felt a bit bad for Don Cheadle’s War Machine, who gets the least amount to do in terms of action or growing as a person.
As for the newest faces to the Avengers world, Paul Rudd gets to keep being funny, small and slightly criminal, and his introduction to these characters (who his Scott Lang clearly idolizes) is charming and amusing. If you think Boseman’s main objective was to get us excited for the stand-alone Black Panther film, then he does a bang-up job at that and then some. His T’Challa, the new ruler of his homeland, the fictional African nation of Wakanda, is a mighty character who has the greatest reason to want Winter Soldier dead, but is also the most willing to admit when he’s wrong and needs an emotional reset. Black Panther’s inclusion here is far from just a commercial for a future film; in many ways, he’s the heart and soul of WINTER SOLDIER, and Boseman reaches deep to make that happen.
And then there’s Spider-Man, who I’m going to say very little about, except that he is in this film a lot more than you think, and Tom Holland is already the greatest Spidey we’ve ever had, if only because he’s the right age and can banter with the best of them. I should also mention that it’s great to see Martin Freeman on hand as Everett K. Ross (apparently not related to Hurt’s character, although that’s never explained), a fairly substantial player from the Black Panther comic book universe, although that’s not apparent in this film. It’s a little unclear what such a high-profile actor is doing in a seemingly inconsequential part, but I’m guessing we’ll be educated on that down the road.
CAPTAIN AMERICAN: CIVIL WAR is a gloriously executed superhero film that could have just as easily been a complete trainwreck, with so many stories and characters to take into account. But somehow, returning directors Anthony & Joe Russo (who will also be at the helm of the upcoming, two-part AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR films) have managed what seems to be the impossible: having every piece fall into place. And they do so without making this feel like it’s all set-up for whatever is next. Sure, we get previews of what’s to come in the SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING and BLACK PANTHER films, but they don’t sacrifice the story being told to wedge in the teasers of will be told in future movies. CIVIL WAR isn’t just better than most other superhero films; it’s far superior to most other films of its size and scope. It’s lengthy, but nearly every minute is loaded with great details that keep us moving and invite us to look at the social commentary embedding in the entertainment. You know, like the best comic book always do.
