God dammit Feige why did you have to make my two favourites fight each other! Yes that’s right ladies and gents we have officially kicked off Phase three. This for me is the peak of Marvel and has some of the best movies. There are a few that divide the audience, but alas I love them. In fact we are starting with Captain America: Civil War. This is one that can differ from person to person. Many will make the point that its just another Avengers movie. Yes while there are a lot of Avengers in it, in fact more than there was in AoU, it’s still a Cap movie.
Civil War starts us off by looking back at the MCU for a moment. We sit down our heroes and say “look at all this destruction you’ve caused.” This begins to effect them all, but especially Tony. Tony Stark has always been a man of guilt. His entire origin movie was built around him seeing first hand, the destruction his legacy was causing. He made it his first priority to correct this mistake and make the world a safer place. In present day he has began to concern himself with the future safety of the planet that he hasn’t considered the collateral damage. Due to his heartfelt nature, all it takes is one boy’s life to motivate him to change.
Steve however is still the main character of this adventure. He’s not a huge fan of signing the Sokovia accords but has a sense of understanding at the start of this. But then he finds out that Peggy Carter has passed away in her sleep. This is devastating for Steve, and you can really feel it. He goes to the funeral looking like he’s about to cry the entire time. I hate seeing him this way, Captain America is supposed to be this giant man of muscle. But he’s Steve Rogers, a man of dedication and love. This is his personal lesson though, Peggy would have never given up in what she believed.
This divide is pushed further as a bombing has took place with Bucky Barns and the primary suspect. Steve makes it his job to take him alive and in a sense protect him from the Avengers. This continues on the relationship that they started in The Winter Soldier which we all fell in love with. I was quite upset that it took Steve a good two years to go out and try and find him. But I am especially happy to see how much Steve will go out of the way to protect him here. Steve gains the trust of his closest friends, ensuring them that we can trust Bucky.
However a particular king of Wakanda was killed in the bombing. This invites our first surprise guest of Civil War to join the stage. T’Challa, otherwise known as the Black Panther makes his on screen debut here. He’s got a personal plan to kill Bucky and avenge his father. Of course Steve isn’t to happy about this and what commences is a pretty awesome chase scene through an underground tunnel. It’s crazy watching T’Challa as he pretty much runs as fast as the cars. While it was amazing to see Black Panther in this film it wouldn’t be until later where his solo film would shoot him into stardom.
As the movie progresses from this point the Avengers begin to drift further apart. Cap has angered the government and his friend Tony. They begin to have a little disagreement between themselves but nothing too major. When Bucky is sent back into his Winter Soldier mode however the gang has to act fast. Cap ends up leaving with him and Falcon with a plan to get the guy who woke up the Solider. They make their way to the airport where Tony has assembled his own little gang in order to stop them. However Cap has also brought some little friends. We now have the most superheroes on screen we’ve ever had so far, and they’re here to get each other.
But the main surprise comes in the form of Tony Stark’s secret weapon. Spider-Man. Being portrayed by young Tom Holland, Spider-Man busts his way into the MCU with a “Hey everyone.” This felt like a really amazing moment to see, like the character was finally home were he belonged. I do have a certain nostalgic love for the Raimi movies but the Amazing Spider-Man was a tragedy. Now Sony finally gave up his rights to the people who deserve it. We will eventually get onto Homecoming so I won’t go much more into Tom Holland while we are here.
We have a huge fight now between our two teams. This is both a good and sort of mixed scene from the film. It’s great because it’s allowing our heroes to have a really good vent of feelings, and of course it’s visually impressive. However it doesn’t feel like it’s going anywhere, as everyone is holding back their punches. So no one is getting killed her unlike the actual events of the Civil War comic series. I personally don’t mind this as we get War Machine injured which is enough to effect Steve and Tony’s relationship at this point which would only fracture to be worse later.
That’s the part we get to now, the end of the film. Tony Stark puts everything behind him in order to help his friend find Zemo, the real bad guy of this movie. Only when we get there do we find out that Zemo’s plan was actually to splinter the Avengers. His plan conveniently relied on a lot of things happening by chance. Which again is another reason that people have a gripe with this film. Zemo’s plan didn’t make any particular sense and relied on a lot of luck and chance. But once again I’m just happy enough to enjoy the rest of the movie to look past it.
I especially love the three-way fight with Iron Man against Steve and Bucky. Mainly because I feel the motivations for both of these teams. Tony just found out his parents were murdered by the guy in front of him, I think he’s going to be a little pissed. This point of the film really leaves our Avengers separate and beyond repair for the time being. However Steve leaves a note for Tony saying he’ll always be there for him as a friend. While it’s sort of unclear what the relationship is right now, Steve is living away after freeing all his team members from prison. Bucky has also been left in Wakanda to try heal his mind from the Nazi juice floating around in there.
This movie really is a huge set up to Infinity War in terms of where the Avengers are. We would still get to meet the new guys in phase 3 but this is the one that really tells us where this team is at. Also proving that now is one of the best times for Thanos to make his move on the Earth with the planets greatest heroes split up and angry at each other. I really do love this movie a lot, I like rooting for both Cap and Steve and having my opinions change between every single scene. I understand why some people don’t like it as much but I will always enjoy the events and the characters at play here.
Either way now we are into phase 3! The greatest phase ever as far as I am concerned and the one which will contain Infinity War in a few days. But before we get there we next have to meet another new face and the Infinity Stone he is protecting. I’ll see you again for Doctor Strange!