The Winter Soldier What you didn't like about Captain America: TWS - Flaws/Critiques

[CB Fan]

The only real issues I had (outside of some of the dialogue) was the Peggy scene. I felt it needed much more time to breathe and have the emotional impact it should have.

 

[Webfoot Hero]

I thought the plot was a nicely updated Nazi genocide type deal. Mass killing to iron out people they don't like or may pose a threat to them in the future. Their intent didn't change, just the technology.

I was wondering if that was ever going to be pointed out. The plot in TWS is actually pretty similar to what the Red Skull was planning with the Valkyrie, just on a much larger and complex scale with much more advanced technology.

 

[Webfoot Hero]

Agreed. They tied this film into the history of the MCU very well. You can see what they meant when they said this would unravel many dark secrets within the MCU. Love all the characters they brought back, and when you see this and rewatch those movies, ou can picture Hydra in the background, and it makes them far more menacing. Bravo to the Marvel crew!

They unraveled a lot of SHIELD's history and mystery but there still felt like quite a bit that could be explored there.

 

[DA_Champion]

Now with those things in mind, explain why it's a stupid plot.

This has been well-explored by myself, The Question, and others, but here is an expanded version of my post from a few days ago.

I've given this more thought in the past few days, and have read a dozen or so reviews, my conclusion is that the reason TWS stops short of being a masterpiece is probably the villain and the drudgery of the final 20 minutes.

Spoiler

The politics in this movie reads like an Alex Jones conspiracy theory. It's very problematic and unfortunate. In an exposition dump from Zola, we're told that Hydra slowly took over the US government after world war II, and that it is responsible for all of the instability in the world... and that it needs a crisis to have more control. That's a bit of a contradiction: if Hydra is responsible for all of the instability in the world, why do they need more control? It sounds like they already have total control.

Note that Alex Jones conspiracy theories have the same problem: on the one hand the CIA controls everything in the world, on the other hand they are engineering crises to accumulate more control. However, within the Alex Jones worldview, unlike the Marvel worldview, the CIA engineers more crises because it is losing control (for whatever reason), whereas here Hydra engineers crises because it wants more control... yet it already has control.

It does seem that Hydra was shoehorned onto the plot and totally unnecessary to the movie, and in fact makes for an inferior narrative. You could tell the entire movie without Hydra. They could have told the same story, a better story, by simply having rogue bureaucrats and Colonels, etc, wanting to take over the US government, there's nothing about the Alexander Pierce arc that says "this movie needs to have Hydra". You could just have Alexander Pierce come to that conclusion on his own and build a network within the US government, and that story would work just as well or better.

Have the ideological cancer be indigenous to the US government. Instead, the ideological cancer came from a gang of rogue Nazis ( Nazis !!!), who infected the otherwise noble US government like a virus, and took it over. When the virus is removed at the end, the host is back to normal, all shiny and glossy.

Contrast this to Nolan's TDKT, where in each of the movies, the villains took advantage of and were related to key problems that were intrinsic to Gotham. Even without those villains, Gotham would still have problems, and in fact would likely have had different villains emerge in their place. In BB, Gotham has been sick for decades, and the league of Shadows has infiltrated the city at every level. The Joker emerges in TDK because the city's already-present criminal elements turned to him in order to survive. In TDKR, Bane takes advantage of city diseased due to the Dent Act. In contrast to Nolan's Gotham, there's nothing wrong with the US in CA:TWS. The US was simply so magnificent and so powerful that they were an irresistible host for the rogue nazi parasite to latch onto. Once the virus was dealt, the host was fine again.

This is the way things happen in actual human history. There are no exogenous problems other than natural disasters. If you look at Hitler, for example, the most famous 20th century "villain", his rise to power was a direct consequence of events that came before, like the Treaty of Versailles. It was not simply an evil charismatic guy taking over because he could -- things don't happen that way. If there is evil in the world, it can ALWAYS be traced back to underlying sociological problems, except for natural disasters which are random.

The climax implies trillions of dollars in economic damages, tens of thousands of lives lost, and maybe 50,000 people now unemployed, but everything seems ok in the final two minutes. The bad guys are going to jail and the US government is moving on. That's kind of a lack of depth there... think of how US public consciousness erupted when an airplane crashed into the Pentagon, and extrapolate that to Shield headquarters being destroyed along with all the other damage. The country was completely different, and 13 years later America is still not back to normal.

Alexander Pierce's motives and history were poorly developed, and the way he was outsmarted in the climax scene just made him look weak.

Not take that much away from the movie. I think most of the other aspects, like the core character arcs, the humour, the cinematography and action choreography, work well. If the villain looks weak here it's only because everything else looks better; and in fact it's not as though Hydra was any weaker than some other CBM villains we've seen like Abomination, Iron Monger, Parallax, etc. And though it lacks depth in the political area where it's trying to be deep, it is at least fun.

I read some of the negative reviews. They seemingly acknowledge that this film is technically superior, but they're disappointed that it doesn't do anything new, which could be interpreted in a similar vain to what I just wrote above. A few complaints that the MCU films are repetitive.

 

[The Endless]

It's a bit different than Nazi ideology. Nazi's wanted to exterminate what they thought were inferior races. HYDRA want control, but during WWII they realised you can't gain that kind of control by having a straight up war. So decided to use shadier tactics, like creating a sense of fear and paranoia in the people, so that they willingly give control to security agencies and then governments.

 

[Webfoot Hero]

The only real issues I had (outside of some of the dialogue) was the Peggy scene. I felt it needed much more time to breathe and have the emotional impact it should have.

I was actually disappointed they didn't do any follow-up at the end. It seems like they felt one scene was enough and that they didn't need to touch on it again. Just feels like some kind of closure is still not there for Steve and us.

 

[Heretic]

The government wasn't infiltrated?

I thought Gary Shandling's character was a high ranking senator...

 

[DA_Champion]

And the idea is, what if the CIA are actually operating separate of the US government. Creating threats themselves to breed fear and paranoia in the people, making the government believe that things are worse than they are, thus stepping up "security". Which of course means spying on our google habits!

It might seem far fetched to some. But honestly, it wouldn't surprise me if it had some basis in truth.

Who armed and trained the Taliban again?

I am sure that the CIA is responsible for a lot of the trouble in the world. However, this is not because the CIA has been taken over by a foreign virus, but it is due to problems intrinsic to the USA's status as a privileged world power. Further, if the CIA were destroyed tomorrow, there would be huge aftershocks.

 

[Webfoot Hero]

The government wasn't infiltrated?

I thought Gary Shandling's character was a high ranking senator...

But he's the only one shown being arrested. Even if more members of the government were secret Hydra members, I'd still say they're more concentrated in SHIELD than anywhere else.

 

[The Endless]

This has been well-explored by myself, The Question, and others, but here is an expanded version of my post from a few days ago.

I've given this more thought in the past few days, and have read a dozen or so reviews, my conclusion is that the reason TWS stops short of being a masterpiece is probably the villain and the drudgery of the final 20 minutes.

Spoiler

The politics in this movie reads like an Alex Jones conspiracy theory. It's very problematic and unfortunate. In an exposition dump from Zola, we're told that Hydra slowly took over the US government after world war II, and that it is responsible for all of the instability in the world... and that it needs a crisis to have more control. That's a bit of a contradiction: if Hydra is responsible for all of the instability in the world, why do they need more control? It sounds like they already have total control.

Note that Alex Jones conspiracy theories have the same problem: on the one hand the CIA controls everything in the world, on the other hand they are engineering crises to accumulate more control. However, within the Alex Jones worldview, unlike the Marvel worldview, the CIA engineers more crises because it is losing control (for whatever reason), whereas here Hydra engineers crises because it wants more control... yet it already has control.

It does seem that Hydra was shoehorned onto the plot and totally unnecessary to the movie, and in fact makes for an inferior narrative. You could tell the entire movie without Hydra. They could have told the same story, a better story, by simply having rogue bureaucrats and Colonels, etc, wanting to take over the US government, there's nothing about the Alexander Pierce arc that says "this movie needs to have Hydra". You could just have Alexander Pierce come to that conclusion on his own and build a network within the US government, and that story would work just as well or better.

Have the ideological cancer be indigenous to the US government. Instead, the ideological cancer came from a gang of rogue Nazis ( Nazis !!!), who infected the otherwise noble US government like a virus, and took it over. When the virus is removed at the end, the host is back to normal, all shiny and glossy.

Contrast this to Nolan's TDKT, where in each of the movies, the villains took advantage of and were related to key problems that were intrinsic to Gotham. Even without those villains, Gotham would still have problems, and in fact would likely have had different villains emerge in their place. In BB, Gotham has been sick for decades, and the league of Shadows has infiltrated the city at every level. The Joker emerges in TDK because the city's already-present criminal elements turned to him in order to survive. In TDKR, Bane takes advantage of city diseased due to the Dent Act. In contrast to Nolan's Gotham, there's nothing wrong with the US in CA:TWS. The US was simply so magnificent and so powerful that they were an irresistible host for the rogue nazi parasite to latch onto. Once the virus was dealt, the host was fine again.

This is the way things happen in actual human history. There are no exogenous problems other than natural disasters. If you look at Hitler, for example, the most famous 20th century "villain", his rise to power was a direct consequence of events that came before, like the Treaty of Versailles. It was not simply an evil charismatic guy taking over because he could -- things don't happen that way. If there is evil in the world, it can ALWAYS be traced back to underlying sociological problems, except for natural disasters which are random.

The climax implies trillions of dollars in economic damages, tens of thousands of lives lost, and maybe 50,000 people now unemployed, but everything seems ok in the final two minutes. The bad guys are going to jail and the US government is moving on. That's kind of a lack of depth there... think of how US public consciousness erupted when an airplane crashed into the Pentagon, and extrapolate that to Shield headquarters being destroyed along with all the other damage. The country was completely different, and 13 years later America is still not back to normal.

Alexander Pierce's motives and history were poorly developed, and the way he was outsmarted in the climax scene just made him look weak.

Not take that much away from the movie. I think most of the other aspects, like the core character arcs, the humour, the cinematography and action choreography, work well. If the villain looks weak here it's only because everything else looks better; and in fact it's not as though Hydra was any weaker than some other CBM villains we've seen like Abomination, Iron Monger, Parallax, etc. And though it lacks depth in the political area where it's trying to be deep, it is at least fun.

I read some of the negative reviews. They seemingly acknowledge that this film is technically superior, but they're disappointed that it doesn't do anything new, which could be interpreted in a similar vain to what I just wrote above. A few complaints that the MCU films are repetitive.

I get where you're coming from. But again i think you misunderstand. The government has not been infiltrated. The CIA have been, let's just say. And it's like the CIA are secretly creating these threats, assassinating these key political figures (maybe including JFK) and whispering in the governments ear "yea it's really bad out there, you should give us more power for the peoples security".

It's like some top CIA suit is going to Obama or Bush and telling them the world is going to ****, that a certain a country has WMD's even though it doesn't (remind you of anything?) so they, the CIA, can get more power.

The government is also a target of HYDRA, is what i'm saying. Like Pierce says whilst looking over Washington, to build a new world you first have to tear the old one down. HYDRA's ultimate plot is to take over the government aswell. They haven't gotten there yet.

I understand what you're saying about everything going back to normal when SHIELD is destroyed. I'd agree with you. But who says it is? We didn't get to see the after effects yet. I'm sure the ramifications in this movie universe will be huge.

 

[Webfoot Hero]

I am sure that the CIA is responsible for a lot of the trouble in the world. However, this is not because the CIA has been taken over by a foreign virus, but it is due to problems intrinsic to the USA's status as a privileged world power. Further, if the CIA were destroyed tomorrow, there would be huge aftershocks.

I'd say the Soviets and their KGB were up to some of the same stuff during the Cold War as the CIA, MI6, and many other intelligence agencies.

 

[Spider-Fan]

They unraveled a lot of SHIELD's history and mystery but there still felt like quite a bit that could be explored there.

I think they did more than enough in this film explaining SHIELD's backstory and such. The movie had to do this, while maintaining a certain pacing and achieving other goals as well. We learned what we needed to know about SHIELD in the confines of THIS movie. We have AoS and other areas to learn even more. AoU will probably teach us even more. But, I think we got a sizeable chunk of backstory in this one.

 

[The Endless]

I'd say the Soviets and their KGB were up to some of the same stuff during the Cold War as the CIA, MI6, and many other intelligence agencies.

Yea i don't think SHIELD/HYDRA is just an allegory for the CIA. But all the major intelligence agences like KGB, Mi6, MOSSAD etc.

 

[CB Fan]

I was actually disappointed they didn't do any follow-up at the end. It seems like they felt one scene was enough and that they didn't need to touch on it again. Just feels like some kind of closure is still not there for Steve and us.

That's because the scene just wasn't done properly. I wanted to see Cap finding the strength to open that door and see the woman who he probably is still in love with, because even though it's been many many years since they were last together it doesn't feel nearly as long to Steve. There is a lot they missed on emotionally when it comes to that scene.

 

[DA_Champion]

I get where you're coming from. But again i think you misunderstand. The government has not been infiltrated. The CIA have been, let's just say. And it's like the CIA are secretly creating these threats, assassinating these key political figures (maybe including JFK) and whispering in the governments ear "yea it's really bad out there, you should give us more power for the peoples security".

It's like some top CIA suit is going to Obama or Bush and telling them the world is going to ****, that a certain a country has WMD's even though it doesn't (remind you of anything?) so they, the CIA, can get more power.

The government is also a target of HYDRA, is what i'm saying. Like Pierce says whilst looking over Washington, to build a new world you first have to tear the old one down. HYDRA's ultimate plot is to take over the government aswell. They haven't gotten there yet.

Why does this plot need Hydra, as opposed to it simply being rogue elements within the US government?

What are the failings of the US that allowed it to be taken over by Hydra? Just some isolated corruption with one or two senators that nobody likes anyway?

What are the consequences of the fact that Shield has been completely destroyed? Shouldn't the United States be devastated?

Contrast to Batman Begins. Does that movie need the league of Shadows? No. However, it's perfectly clear that Gotham was on a collision course with death regardless, and that the League of Shadows was merely accelerating that death and taking advantage of the weaknesses within Gotham.

 

[DA_Champion]

That's because the scene just wasn't done properly. I wanted to see Cap finding the strength to open that door and see the woman who he probably is still in love with, because even though it's been many many years since they were last together it doesn't feel nearly as long to Steve. There is a lot they missed on emotionally when it comes to that scene.

I was wondering if Steve would inject Peggy with super-serum to bring her back.

 

[The Endless]

Yea i would have liked more with Peggy. It was well acted and believable enough. But i would have liked more. It would have been really touching if the last scene of the film was Steve taking her out for that dance they missed.

 

[Webfoot Hero]

I think they did more than enough in this film explaining SHIELD's backstory and such. The movie had to do this, while maintaining a certain pacing and achieving other goals as well. We learned what we needed to know about SHIELD in the confines of THIS movie. We have AoS and other areas to learn even more. AoU will probably teach us even more. But, I think we got a sizeable chunk of backstory in this one.

I agree with you there. I'm only saying that there felt like more stuff for future films to mine for connections to SHIELD's history. While Feige and Co. are saying that SHIELD is no longer there, I still feel that some other government organization will take SHIELD's place and impact future MCU films.

 

[Spider-Fan]

I was wondering if Steve would inject Peggy with super-serum to bring her back.

That would have been an awful idea. Totally out of character for Cap to do, as well.

 

[DA_Champion]

That would have been an awful idea. Totally out of character for Cap to do, as well.

I agree. I was still wondering if it would happen.

 

[Spider-Vader]

I didn't really have any problems with Winter Soldier as a film. But from a fan standpoint, I'd like to have gotten a line about Hawkeye or Coulson.

A Black Panther/Wakanda reference would've been golden alongside the Dr. Strange reference too.

 

[Spider-Fan]

I agree with you there. I'm only saying that there felt like more stuff for future films to mine for connections to SHIELD's history. While Feige and Co. are saying that SHIELD is no longer there, I still feel that some other government organization will take SHIELD's place and impact future MCU films.

I think the next organization (or maybe a revamped SHIELD) likely will handled in Agents of SHIELD. Not sure how much AoU is going to deal with Hammer, Sword, or whatever the next entity is called. But, I think we will see those building blocks in the remaining episodes of Agents of SHIELD. I do agree, there will be SOMETHING there. Just not sure how it will materialize.

 

[The Endless]

Why does this plot need Hydra, as opposed to it simply being rogue elements within the US government?

Why not? Why not use something from the comics in a comic book movie?

What are the failings of the US that allowed it to be taken over by Hydra? Just some isolated corruption with one or two senators that nobody likes anyway?

Because any dick head with the funding and a silver tongue can become a Senator? It's the American Dream turned against them. You wouldn't be able to do that in Russia or even the UK.

What are the consequences of the fact that Shield has been completely destroyed? Shouldn't the United States be devastated?

I'm sure it will be. Enter Ultron.

Contrast to Batman Begins? Does that movie need the league of Shadows? No. However, it's perfectly clear that Gotham was on a collision course with death regardless, and that the League of Shadows was merely accelerating that death and taking advantage of the weaknesses within Gotham.

And HYDRA is taking advantage of the weakness in the US system. Like i said, any ******* with funding and a silver tongue can become a Senator. You could say they are using one of America's positives, the idea that you can become anything you want, against itself. There is also a lot of criticism concerning the amount of power and how much sway the CIA holds over the government in real life.

The US is an institutionally corrupt country anyway. It's basically a conglomerate, not a country. The ideals someone like Steve Rogers holds dear is what makes America great though.

 

[Webfoot Hero]

Why does this plot need Hydra, as opposed to it simply being rogue elements within the US government?

What are the failings of the US that allowed it to be taken over by Hydra? Just some isolated corruption with one or two senators that nobody likes anyway?

What are the consequences of the fact that Shield has been completely destroyed? Shouldn't the United States be devastated?

Contrast to Batman Begins. Does that movie need the league of Shadows? No. However, it's perfectly clear that Gotham was on a collision course with death regardless, and that the League of Shadows was merely accelerating that death and taking advantage of the weaknesses within Gotham.

I think that they put Hydra in the film as a connection to TFA. Making it just random government guys doesn't give Steve or the audience any emotional tie to what's going on. Plus, it follows a tradition in the comics of SHIELD being infiltrated by Hydra.

 

[Heretic]

But he's the only one shown being arrested. Even if more members of the government were secret Hydra members, I'd still say they're more concentrated in SHIELD than anywhere else.

Yeah, of course most of them are in SHIELD. My assumption is that...continuing on the conspiracy train...some are in top positions in business...and some were scattered around the government.

Personally, I'm starting to think that Iron Man 3 and The Winter Soldier are connected...since Agents of SHIELD deals with Extremis and the SHIELD conspiracy. If that is the case, then they at least had gotten to the vice president in a way. I tend to think that when the Extremis plan failed, they simply decided to use force.