Episode 165 - Captain America: The Winter Soldier with Nicolas Cattelan
For America’s 250th birthday, Men of Steel is looking at another red, white, and blue icon: Captain America. Nicolas Cattelan (Below Deck: Down Under) joins Case and Jmike for a deep dive into Captain America: The Winter Soldier, from Steve Rogers as a low-powered Superman analogue to the movie’s themes of freedom, control, trust, and doing the right thing when the world tells you not to.
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Men of Steel Full Episode
Originally aired: July 3, 2026
Edited by Sophia Ricciardi
Scored by Gen Moonen
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⏱️ YouTube Chapters
00:00 Cold Open
00:52 Introduction
01:51 Nicholas Cattelan and Below Deck
09:43 Why Captain America: The Winter Soldier?
12:26 Captain America as Marvel's Superman
14:48 Jmike Explains the Plot
18:29 Why The First Avenger Still Matters
22:35 Captain America as the Heart of the MCU
25:59 The Super Soldier as a Metaphor
30:26 Why This Is the Best Captain America Movie
41:43 The Lemurian Star Opening
50:00 Steve Rogers' Personal Journey
01:01:01 Why This Story Is Personal
01:13:00 The Politics of The Winter Soldier
01:35:33 The Third Act and Bucky
01:51:24 Peggy Carter, Sharon Carter, and Natasha Romanoff
02:02:25 Sharon Carter's Missed Potential
02:08:15 Final Thoughts
Transcription
00:00
Jmike
Lot.
00:00
Case
A lot of Gatling guns in this movie. They really like that like, chain fire kind of weapon in this. Nick Fury's got one, this Quinjet has one. And then like on the street fight when they're on the highway, there's a dude that has like one this movie really likes like big chain guns.
00:14
Jmike
They never work when you need them to, though. Like, they always miss. It's like a stormtroopers.
00:20
Case
Well, yeah, totally.
00:23
Jmike
Did you guys hit him?
00:52
Case
Hey, everyone, and welcome back to the Men of Steel podcast.
00:55
Case
I'm Case Aiken and as always, I'm joined by my co host, Jmike Folson.
00:59
Jmike
Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the show.
01:02
Case
Welcome back indeed. We are unearthing, defrosting a character that we have talked about on this show before because today we are looking at what I think is my favorite MCU movie, frankly.
01:13
Jmike
Really?
01:13
Case
Yeah, yeah. This is high up there. And if it's not my favorite, it's in the top three for sure. And that is we are talking about Captain the Winter Soldier, which is a fantastic example, I think, of the Superman analog, which is really worth for us to talk about. And if I've timed this right, this is coming out in July, so Ideally it's our July 4th episode. Yay to have that conversation. We are having it with someone who's not American. We are joined from Below Deck Mediterranean by Nicholas Cattelan.
01:46
Jmike
Hi there.
01:46
Nicolas
Thank you so much for the warm welcome. And I'm so excited to talk about one of my favorite films too.
01:51
Case
Yeah. Excellent, Nicholas. For listeners at home who are not into the Bravo sphere, you were on Below Deck Med the last season. Currently one going on right now, which I think will still be airing. Maybe not. They're shortish seasons. But anyway, so you were what about two years ago and you filmed probably what, three years ago?
02:11
Nicolas
We filmed in 24, aired in 25. Around Feb. To Feb to May.
02:17
Case
Okay. Yeah, man, there's so many seasons of those rushing through.
02:20
Nicolas
They always air concurrently. There's always one airing. So it's like my stuff is already old news. I had a really great time and I'm excited to talk a little bit about it with you. Yeah.
02:30
Case
So just for the sake of J. Mike and I, because like, while, like I've had friends who were producers on reality shows, I've like, I've never known anyone who actually, I take it back, I knew someone who was on the original Bug Juice, which was like the Disney Channel real world equivalent back in the 90s before the Writers Guild strike that made reality TV like the biggest thing. Now thinking back, I'm like, no, I've known of a couple of people because I also knew Andrea from Survivor, so I've heard some of these stories. But it's always fun to chat with people who have had these experiences. So one of reasons why I reached out to you was because. Because frankly, you came off as a nerd on the show and I, I really enjoyed that.
03:07
Case
Like, so much of this is like, we're going to talk about boats and steps of service and these are things I really like there. There's a workman quality to Below Deck that makes it a show that I really appreciate. And it's become like the show I share with my wife. But what was it like getting on there and then like how, you know, like you had a lot of your personality come out? What was that for? Like the producers, in terms of coaching you in terms of like the. Was just sort of natural. Like what, you know, how much is you and then how much is like a producer kind of editing you?
03:41
Nicolas
Right, well, yeah, no, absolutely. And just to preface everything I'm saying, I am no longer contractually obligated by Bravo, so I can actually speak completely freely. So everything I'm about to say is we're getting the juicy stuff, it's fine to be on record and they'll be happy with this because it seems like I'm media trained because I have mostly good things to say. Honestly, like aside, like, I also know a few people from the other realms of reality tv. And I think the most unique element of Below Deck is that it's much, much closer to a documentary than reality tv. It's obviously like they amp up the drama. That's what the editing is for. That's the only real storytelling mechanism they use as well as like the. The interviews to kind of like clean up pieces so they can just explain things more quickly.
04:29
Nicolas
But ultimately it's really hon portrayals. And if I'm being honest, the only real magic that is behind the show besides just brute forcing their way through filming loads and loads, is in the casting. It's a very extensive casting process and it starts probably well. It's different for everyone, but for me, it started about six months before I went on to film.
04:53
Case
Right, because you weren't at the start of the season. Right. You came in like an episode that you in.
04:57
Nicolas
Yeah, I replaced the guy who got fired, which did actually. It actually calmed my nerves because then I thought, oh, I'd be compared to whatever this person's done. I'm coming in to save the day somewhat, you know, And I sort of. In my narrativization of the whole thing, I thought, well, that means. That means they're going to be a little bit on my side. And, yeah, so it's about six months of, like, casting, and so they really get to know you. It's like hours and hours of, like, interviews. A bit like this, to be honest, with, like, studio heads and stuff like that. And that's the real magic of the show. That's the only constructed element, is they find people, and they've gotten really good at this over the years, who will either get along really well or get along really badly.
05:39
Nicolas
And understaffing a very large boat in the middle of nowhere, very stressful circumstances. And unlike a normal boat, which obviously I have a fair bit of experience on, when you're off on the job of the boat, you're not off on the job of the TV show. So the stress builds up, and that's where the. That's where the juice comes in. And so it's 99% real, like, everything that you see. Some people like to claim that a lot of it was much more edited than it was.
06:09
Nicolas
And, yeah, of course it's edited to make emphasis, but there were also times in the interview process, like, afterwards, like, you know, when they're doing this kind of thing against the green screen, where they'll ask me, like, a kind of leading question and I could reply in a juicy way, but I was also just allowed to go, okay, not really. So maybe let's try and work through, like, a way that I would be happy to say that, you know, something quite salacious or gossipy or something a bit mean, for example, and you don't have to. That's why when I see these shows, it's crazy that I think, bro, you did not have to say that. Like, it's not. It's not written, it's not scripted.
06:45
Nicolas
You are writing your own script, and that is the version of you that you want to present to the world. And even though there is certainly a sort of distance, like, even while you're filming, it's intense, but there's. When there's a camera operator in the room, everyone's just a little bit more funny. Everyone's trying to be a little bit more witty, you know, but, you know, it's not constructive to that degree.
07:04
Case
You can.
07:04
Nicolas
You can decide what your character is. And I'm very proud of mine. I Wasn't intending on going on the show in the sort of revealing that part of myself necessarily with that much emphasis. But obviously I'm proud of that side of myself. I've ever since I was, I think, mental age eight. Sorry, real age eight. But I made a mental note at age eight that, like, storytelling and adventure was my thing, because my dad asked me on my 8th birthday, what do you want to do on day? And I said, I want to be Indiana Jones. And he said, well, that's a bit dangerous. And then as it went on, I realized, oh, well, maybe I'll try to be like Harrison Ford. And then storytelling became my sort of main outlet. I was. I was a pretty nerdy, solitary kid.
07:41
Nicolas
And so storytelling became a very strong backbone, sort of modality of thought and understanding the world, you know, being a solitary guy. Raimi's Spider man movies really, really appealed to me in that way. And as I grew up, 2008, with the first Iron Man, I was 10 years old, so I was the absolute prime age to grow up with this particular sort of golden age of superhero media. And I'm very excited to talk about one today as well.
08:09
Case
Excellent. Yeah, no, I think you sort of covered it all, and it's just so wonderful knowing that there is this authenticity there. It's one of the things. I swear I'm not shilling for Bravo, although if Bravo wanted to pay me right now, I wouldn't say no.
08:22
Nicolas
I'd be happy to accept another check as well.
08:25
Case
But I do find Below Deck is a really good example because I. So I work in the spirits industry, and for years I worked as a waiter and as a bartender. A ton of service industry back or experience. And so this was always the show that sort of struck me as being very authentic to the experience of. Of waiting on guests, of having these sort of events that we would work. I also worked in events in theater. So, like the running around, trying to make the logistics kind of work, it all speaks to me very well. And so it's very fun watching. Watching you all, like, engage in this and having it edited in sor of the way to make it as salacious as possible. But it's.
09:01
Case
It was really great, like, having you come on because I felt very seen is the long story short on that one, because again, you started whipping out Star Trek references. I have a Star Trek fan film series that I work on. Like, I'm like, yes, this is.
09:14
Jmike
This is my.
09:14
Case
This is my boy. So I reached out to you on Instagram. I slid into your DMs to come on and talk about something, because you also had posted on, I think, a real, like your favorite superhero movies. And I was like, all right, perfect. We can. We can work with this. We can find something to talk about. And so with the timing, it's all kind of working together that this is our July 4th episode. We're talking about Captain the Winter Soldier. So why don't we. Sorry, J. Mike, do you have any questions about reality shows? I didn't mean to cut you off.
09:40
Jmike
No, you're fine. Let's get right into it. Okay.
09:43
Case
All right. Yeah, let's get into talking about Captain the Winter Soldier. So this movie I freaking love. I said that it might be my favorite MCU movie. It's probably. If it's not like there's Captain America the First Avenger in conversation with it, and then there's the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, I think are the really high up there ones. Maybe the first Iron man might be in that conversation too.
10:05
Jmike
I don't know. I just took some psychic damage. When Nicholas said he was 10. When Iron man first came out, I.
10:12
Case
Was like, you know how I feel, J. You know how I feel.
10:14
Jmike
I was in college. Oh, God.
10:17
Case
I was out of college.
10:19
Jmike
Whoa.
10:20
Nicolas
Well, we're going to have a variety of. Of. Of perspectives on this then. It's great.
10:23
Jmike
Yeah, it's like, oh, crap, my heart.
10:28
Case
But this like the Captain America. So we talked about Captain the First Avenger a while ago for a Fourth of July episode, and so this is actually working out pretty well now. It's been many years since that happened. We're returning to this corner of the MCU because I think this is a really worthwhile corner to talk about when we're talking about the Superman analog and how that's sort of explored in a movie. While the First Avenger does a good job of having Captain America be superhuman to all the areas that really matters. Like, we got that great chase scene when he first becomes Captain America, when he first gets infused with his abilities. We get that awesome jump, that cut, you know, smash cuts to the explosion when he's freeing everyone from the. From the HYDRA base.
11:07
Case
So we've got moments of him being really strong, really tough, and so forth. But, man, this movie really goes, like, all out in saying, like, no, this is. This is a impossible person. Like, the. The shtick for Captain America is that the Super Soldier Serum makes you, quote, unquote, whatever the human body can theoretically make to the maximum for all. All aspects of the Super Soldier Serum. And Cap is the. The best recip this so far. Arguably in the same class with the Red Skull. And then all the other super soldiers that we see are. Are either truly crossing into the spectrum of being a superhuman the way the Sentry does in.
11:42
Case
In both the comics and in Thunderbolts, or they're slightly less strong the way that we see with characters like the Red Guardian or like with the Winter Soldier who we are introduced to in this movie. They're. They're all superhuman. But Captain America is explicitly like the. The ur example of this all, which I. I think works really well for our conversation here. I think that we. We get a like. So the. The writing team stays the same. It's Marcus and McFeely coming over from First Avenger. But this is where the Russo brothers come in. And the Russo brothers are big junkies of action movies. And this is the movie that like sets them on the track to do all the big MCU movies. But the way they do it is by saying Captain America has arguably the most boring power set of any superhero.
12:26
Case
And I'm saying arguably, it's obviously an amazing power set that any person would. Would desperately have. But it's just. You're better than everyone by about 50%, you know, like that. That's what Captain America shtick is for all things. That includes him having a photographic memory, as we saw in the First Avenger, where he like quickly looks at a map and is able to replicate it. This is in terms of all of his physicality. But that's Superman right there. The Russo brothers deciding to do this. Like, we get the great opening sequence with the Lemurian Star, where I've watched the. The special features for this movie a billion times and they talk about the choreograph it where the whole goal is let's have the character just run through as fast as possible doing knockout shots for everyone.
13:10
Case
And they talk about how the choreography was to make sure that every single hit is just perfect. And I think throughout the movie, we get Steve Rogers, we. We get Chris Evans as Captain America. Being a Superman, it's a scaled down Superman, but he's being a Superman, he's like. And I think that this is going to just be a fun conversation because, man, it's. It's nailing exactly the archetype, just like I said, just scaled down.
13:37
Nicolas
I cannot agree more. And I think as every piece of media is in conversation with every other piece of media that exists, I do completely agree with you that the sort of the superhero archetype is most readily expounded on in Superman and Captain America. They were. Both origins were very similar in terms of the way that they created it at World War II comic books for the soldiers. And the thing that you rightly point out is it's a very fundamental thing that I think we don't really grasp in the modern characterizations of these characters is the fact that they are. Their physical abilities are not what make them super. It's their human. It's the super human element. They are Captain America. And Superman and Clark Kent are both examples where it's their. Their demeanor that is what actually makes them super.
14:32
Nicolas
It's not necessarily the power set. It's that they are the most human. Like you say with Captain America, with a super soldier, he becomes a superhuman. He is the nth degree of what humanity in its good can accomplish and be.
14:47
Jmike
Yeah.
14:48
Case
And now it's time for our favorite segment within the show, which is J. Mike awkwardly explains what we're talking about today. So, J. Mike, we gotta talk about Captain the Winter Soldier happened in this movie.
15:01
Jmike
Awkwardly. It's a stretch. Artistically, it's more like it. So Cap, fresh off of his adventures, and I think it's. Is it the Avengers movie? Yes, they reference that a lot. In the beginning, he is off trying to figure out where he belongs in this world by throwing himself immediately into all the SHIELD missions and stuff going on. Where he reconnects with. With Black Widow. I forgot the guy's name. What's the guy's name? Rutger Rumlow. There you. Boom.
15:31
Case
Yeah, he's actually Crossbones from the comics. And he'll be wearing the crossbone outfit in Civil War when he shows up again. So, yeah, it's a comic book reference. He wears a lot of like in the movie to sort of like illustrate that he's Crossbones. He wears like dual holsters, like straps, like going across his chest a lot. Yeah.
15:50
Jmike
So he reconnects with Nat, they get together, do a whole bunch of SHIELD missions. And I don't know if it's just be spoilers for a long very. This movie's been out for a long time now. But he runs. Eventually he comes into contact with this guy who looks like a Terminator called the Winter Soldier, who kind of sort of kills Nick Fury. Spoilers. He does it. But later on he comes to kind of Winter Soldier, comes to find out, oh, my gosh, it's Bucky. From him a long time ago. I thought he was dead. Nat automatically recognized him because she's Come in contact with him multiple times.
16:29
Case
Well, Nat recognizes him as the Winter Soldier. Not at.
16:31
Jmike
Well, as the Winter Soldier. Yeah, she didn't know she gives the foot.
16:34
Case
Yeah, exactly.
16:36
Jmike
She knows him as a Winter Soldier. Thus begins the huge, like, spy thriller part of the movie where Nick Fury's last words to him are like, hey, don't trust anybody. And he dies, quote, unquote. Everyone after that point is trying to come after them because they're all part of hydra. Everything comes to a head. By the way, they. They also bring along Falcon, who's played by Sam Wilson. Falcon from the comics, all the great stuff. Later on, he comes along as part of the team and wraps up the adventure by ending the sheet that the HYDRA threat inside of SHIELD and they figure out a Nick Fury's alive too.
17:18
Case
Yes.
17:19
Jmike
Oh, by the way, Nick Fury's spoilers.
17:22
Case
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think you. You nailed the. The bulk of it.
17:25
Jmike
The.
17:25
Case
The big detail is that HYDRA has taken over SHIELD and theoretically is infiltrated a lot of, like, the intelligence agencies of the world. And so they. The big project that they're running. That cat that Nick Fury was like, on. Yeah, that Nick Fury was on board with, like, he. He thinks it's a good idea is. Is actually going to elimina threats that HYDRA sees coming. So they've got this thing where it's these three helicarriers that they send up that they're sending up into the air that can basically, like, snipe people, and they have an algorithm that predicts all the people that are good targets. Cap solves the problem, but the pro. What the problem is that a lot of people are going to die. Yeah, but. But yeah, that I think sums it up pretty well. Nick, Is there anything that we're missing that.
18:08
Case
That you think are crucial details of the. Of the movie?
18:11
Nicolas
And then Steve Rogers as Captain America has to save the day in the end.
18:16
Jmike
Captain America swing to the.
18:18
Nicolas
Will he manage to do it? Tune in next time on the Continuing Adventures of Steve Rogers.
18:24
Case
Yeah, so, yeah, no, I think that's a pretty good summation, J. Mike.
18:29
Nicolas
Oh, and also, I just wanted to. Sorry, I just want to jump in and also say unequivocally, the First Avenger is my favorite MCU movie. I love that movie. I kind of like, obviously it's got its. Its detraction elements, but I think those only contribute to the idea that it's. It's not a period piece. I kind of look at it as a movie made. Then it's like this, like, with like Rear projection. That's why it all looks a bit, you know, artificially and stuff like that. But I really love the sort of Spielberg light or Spielberg extreme elements of the sort of direction and storytelling of that. Because obviously it's. The first half is very Raiders of the Lost Ark, and the second half is very. Is very. There's a lot of influences in the first one that kind of formulate.
19:09
Nicolas
And as well as the director being Joe Johnston, having it's. He's got an extremely classical style. And like you said with the Russos in this one, these two films, when viewed in conjunction with one another, I think that the Avengers doesn't really serve many of these characters very well in terms of, like, the reintegration. I feel like if you watch this movie straight after the First Avenger, it actually. The characterization is. Is more interesting in a way because these two movies, in their style as well as their characterization as well as the subject matter, represent the times in which they are set as well as the times in which they are both created. In 2014, that was when the Snowden Files and all that stuff.
19:46
Nicolas
This is stuff that was often spoken about at the time of its release, but they are both about the concepts of American idealism and exceptionalism embodied in the human spirit. What they are supposed to be. That's why Captain America, the First Avenger, is. It's like the nth degree of, like, what we want, what we look for in a hero separate from when he talks about, we used to stick our hands in the muds, but so you could keep yours clean kind of thing. Whereas this one is the sticking the hands in the mud, and it's shaky and it's gritty, and it has the sort of born, you know, like Mission Impossible elements to it. It's more of a genre piece. Yeah, I'm very excited to talk about those. The way it thematically resonates with our times.
20:30
Nicolas
And also on a day like today that's being released, I think almost more than even the first one, it is an example of the human. The individual themes of freedom which are expounded upon by the American spirit. I think it's what we all want the American spirit to be, and that's what we feel it can be is in Captain America in this film. Because it's not always about listening to blind. You know, just going along with whatever you think your tribe wants you to believe. It's about. It's about following what you believe in and being willing to fight for that.
21:10
Case
Yeah, extremely well said. And that I would argue is one of theses of this movie. Like, the whole point of taking. Taking orders that are illegal and saying no. Currently, we are. We are filming. And by the time this comes out, it will be. It'll be released. We are filming a series called the Word From Tomorrow, which is a reread podcast for Trans Metropolitan. And I keep on saying, oh, this. This book is so prescient because it's a cyberpunk journalism piece about a corrupt president. And so, like, there's all these things where it's just, like, predicting, like, Bluetooth earbuds and so forth, and also a president that is insanely corrupt in manipulating police power. So I keep saying the word prescient. And I don't want to say that about this because it's not that this is prescient.
21:54
Case
It's just that this is very aware of how systems of power work. And it's looking. I think Marcus and McFeely don't get enough credit as the writers on this. I think that, as you said, there's a really good through line coming from the First Avenger to this one that is kind of skipped by the Avengers, I think, between the two. Because I honestly will get into, like, a mode where I just need to watch this movie a bunch. This movie probably edges out the First Avenger for me, but I love the First Avenger. I think the First Avenger is the best of Phase One by far. I think that it does a really elegant job of knitting together all of the disparate elements of Phase One into a singular universe before you get to the Avengers in the first place.
22:35
Case
Like, the reason it's called the First Avenger is that Captain America is this linchpin that brings everything together. And the fact that they do it by way of. Not exactly a period piece, because I think, like you said, Nick, that it's a. Like, it has this vibe of being made in the time. There's the serial quality to it that Joe Johnston's really a big fan of, that feels very nostalgic and reflective of the period creating it. And so it does a really good job of setting up Captain America as this World War II hero who holds the position of being the moral beacon of being the Superman of this world. Nicholas, are you familiar with the Amalgam comic series that came out? This was in the 90s, so it might before your time. Just in general.
23:15
Nicolas
I haven't read it myself, but I'm within the world. I've heard of it, and I know a bit about it.
23:20
Case
Yeah, so the idea is that DC and Marvel did as a publicity stunt, they combined characters and so they combined Superman and Captain America into Super Soldier. And so from that, like, from the point where that was created, it always like, made sense to me that, like, oh yeah, the Super Soldier program is very similar to like, what. But like, it's different than what Superman is, obviously. But like, you could see how World War II would shape that same kind of hero in that same kind of way. And so it, like, it's always created this like, parallel for me for Captain America. And it's made it so that Captain America has been a lens that I kind of look at the Jack Kirby esque world that Marvel created in the 60s comic. Captain America is part of that, like, lifeblood of it.
24:00
Case
Like, that's the early creativity of one of the key creators of the series. Like Stan Lee in the first issue of Captain America had like a little blurb at the back and that was his first like, published written work. So like, we're talking about like a series that is foundational to Marvel. And then the first Avengers does a great job of combining. It combines the. By way of the Tesseract, it combines the world of Thor into the universe of the Captain America stuff. By way of explaining the hydrotech being based on the Tesseract and then hinting that is the technology that Howard Stark uses to build the ARC reactor, it combines Iron man into the world of integrating this seamlessly with the early version of the Super Soldier serum, which is what would create the Hulk and would later create the Sentry, but.
24:47
Case
But would create the Hulk. We're combining the bioengineering aspects of the MCU into one universe. And so having the Red Skull be this thing that is out there looking for this ancient technology to use it to create super science, you're. You're like, you're getting a synopsis of what the core problem of Earth in the mcu, at least for Phase one and Phase two, is dealing with. And Captain America is this shining beacon of what is possible to achieve. It's that scenario where you get it so right the first time that even though you're never able to get it right again afterwards, you just keep on trying. That's Captain America. The government's like, can't we do a Super Soldier again? Can't we do Captain America again? He was so goddamn good. And the public responds to that.
25:32
Case
And, and yeah, I mean, they tried multiple times.
25:37
Jmike
It just never really came out the same result because then we get like, right, what was the other guy? The fake Captain America that we see in Thunderbolts?
25:45
Case
U.S. agent.
25:45
Jmike
U.S. agent and a couple other guys. But it never really comes out because Steve Rogers is one of a kind. And like Nicholas was saying earlier, it's the humanity that, like between both these characters that sets them apart from everyone else.
25:59
Nicolas
I think there's a really interesting sort of meta parallel with this whole thing, which may not come across as a super positive take on the current mcu, but I think it kind of makes sense, is that it's almost like they are doing with this kind of story to some degree what they did with the super soldier serum. It's like they didn't realize that it was the heart that made the real thing before. And they're trying to replicate and replicate and I think just to sort of bring it into like a more like individual, like internal sort of theming. I think that's also something that within. Within our lives, it's. It's also about. It's important to recognize what is special and not to get all incredibles for you.
26:42
Nicolas
If everything's special, no one is, but it's just like because everything in life is fleeting and in order for something to have meaning, you have to sacrifice something else. You know, if you're going to go out and do something really be amazing and extreme, you have to potentially risk sacrificing your inner peace or whatever it may be. And the whole idea that it's an appreciating what was actually there and in realizing that if you keep on trying to recapture in your own life and even when we zoom out into larger civilization, society, if we're just trying to recapture, I think that's where a lot of media has gone since the rise of the mcu. Nostalgia, everyone's favorite word.
27:28
Nicolas
I think that this kind of has a meta level of realizing that there's something intangible that we need to cherish and it's not in replicating it forever and ever. Like what they do in the sort of plot of this film in terms of control over individual freedom. But individual freedom leads to risk and we have to accept risk in order to have a beautiful, fulfilled existence. And that's what Captain America sort of represents to me, I guess as well. Well,.
27:56
Case
Yeah, I. I mean like if we want to get into the. The meta component of this all. So the first Captain America was produced like after the Disney buyout, but it was like fully in production before the Disney buyout occurred. And so it came out and then Avengers had a lot of Disney notes going into it. And you could argue that this is the writers being like, There is an element of saying, like, what if we don't want Captain America to be. I like the first Avengers movie. Avengers, Earth, Mightiest Hero, whatever. The movie, the Avengers, not Captain, the First Avenger. I like that movie a lot. I think it does a lot of good things in terms of being a faithful sequel to Iron Man, a faithful sequel to Thor.
28:40
Case
I think it gives you a good check in with Captain America, but I don't think Captain America is served particularly well by that movie. I think that I don't like his costume that much in it, particularly the helmet. We've all talked about that. The helmet. The helmet especially because he looks fine in Endgame when he's not wearing the helmet. I think that he is too much a man out of time in that movie. And so he's kind of played as the butt of the joke for a lot of it. And it's the Weedenish kind of stuff that people talk about with that.
29:10
Nicolas
Yeah, I understood that reference.
29:12
Case
Well, yeah, I mean, like, it was a funny line. And like, so those are good. But like, when he's like, teamed up with Iron man and Iron man knows all the tech about the, you know, the helicarrier and so forth, it's like, I, I believe it's powered by electricity, you know?
29:28
Nicolas
Yeah, ridiculous. I, I, I do have a bone to pick with the Avengers in its, like, dialogue, because a lot of it is like techno babble that doesn't actually mean anything at all. And then it, I don't know, like, a lot of the dialogue. I mean, this is a note that's been bandied about all the time. Is that in Whedon's work, every character is just Joss Whedon. They all speak the same. They're all just as quippy and intelligent. But I think that a lot of it doesn't get rooted in character like the comedy in this film does. I think that the man at a time stuff is perfectly handled here when it is played for jokes. I think it's also. Natasha has some fun lines. I think Fury has fun lines. I think, I think Falcon gets a.
30:09
Case
Lot of good lines. And part of that is Anthony Mackie's charm, just makes lines that would have been kind of throwaways, actually really land.
30:17
Nicolas
And this is the introduction to Falcon, a beloved character who's gone on to great things in this franchise.
30:26
Case
So like I was saying, The Marcus and McFeely of it all, I think really they nail the Steve Rogers kind of character. And I think that the Russo brothers do such a great job with the directing that coming off of Avengers, which, like I said, feels more like a check in with Captain America as opposed to like, this is the next Captain America movie. The way that I think the Avengers feels like the next Iron man movie. You know, this is a, a great like, okay, now we're back with the character. We can, we can kind of focus on him. And they do such a good job of establishing this much larger world that Captain America inhabits in a way that is. Is very logical. Like, we get references to Stark without necessarily needing to see Stark. Natasha's there. That makes sense.
31:07
Case
Like, you know, I, I understand that there was a scene that got cut. I don't think it got shot that had Hawkeye in it, which would sort of be like, yeah, that makes sense. He's the street level character or not street level. He's like the government spy character also. He, he fits into this movie as just a character. But yeah, it would be really difficult to fit the Hulk or Thor or Iron man into it all. This is a good kind of bigger world.
31:30
Nicolas
But.
31:30
Case
But it makes sense. The scale levels that we're getting at. Like, we're seeing the infrastructure that Captain America is. Is dealing with. We're seeing shields infrastructure a lot more. Like we get the Triskelion, which is straight out of the Ultimates comics. So that's nice to like get that established in the, the mcu. Like I said, we get Captain America just doing really cool stuff from start to finish. Like the movie opens with us being introduced to the Falcon, but with Anthony Malk actually running. Yeah, the on your left scene and that on your left scene one has obviously like so much resonance. People just remember it to the point where it became the, like such the winning line in Avengers Endgame. But it's established just by virtue of Captain America just being a really fast runner and being again, that Superman kind of archetype.
32:19
Case
He's going out for a workout and he is just crushing this guy who's doing a great job. He's a superhero. He's just not as super a hero as Captain America.
32:28
Nicolas
I always really appreciate in these kinds of, in superhero movies when the mundanity of life also gets explored. That's one of the reasons that I love the Raimi Spider man movies because he's still dealing with Rent, you know. And what does Captain America look like when he's out on a jog? And there is ripe storytelling to be done there. And I really like it. Also, like, I think I. It's one of my favorite sort of scenes in the movie, actually. The opening. It's the only scene that uses the Captain America theme, which I do have a bone to pick with this movie about. It's a really beautiful sort of. It really. I think it has a great way of establishing Washington D.C. as a. As the location for this movie because it's the center of politics and ideology and freedom.
33:11
Nicolas
And it's like the link of moral behind it. And the pools are glassy. This is his life. But does he really belong there? Because it's almost metaphorical. He's overtaking everyone else. Does he really belong in this time? And that's the real. That's the character. That sort of journey he goes on is feeling very uncomfortable with. With where he's at in life and because of his environment.
33:36
Case
Well, so this gets into thesis that I have about this movie, or rather my argument of what this movie's thesis is like, the big thesis. Because there are several sub theses, like we talked about, like the relationship of freedom versus control and safety and things like that. But I think that the overall arc for Captain America is finding fraternity, finding brotherhood in people. And maybe you could downplay that to friendship. But I really think that throughout this movie we're seeing a person who is out of time, looking for someone who can be his true confidant.
34:12
Jmike
Yeah.
34:13
Case
And I would argue that we get the opening of this because it ultimately turns out to be the Falcon as his true squire in his nightly sort of efforts here, like the. The on your left sort of exchange there, which is just sort of a funny detail that Anthony Mackie, like, makes very compelling. And Chris Evan does such a good job of being like, kind of like ashamed that he has to say on your left. But it's so like he has to be polite and say it every time he passes. Like, is great. Like, the scene itself works really well because they do the like, wonderful trick photography with like, multiple stunt people, like, positioned out. Like in like when they walk by the pillars of the. Of the Lincoln Memorial, for example.
34:52
Case
Like, one will run and then another one will like, relay race, like, trade off. And they do that to like, let this person just like go super fat. Or like when the camera, like, flips around, it's actually just a different actor at a Different spot running. But they do, like, a really good job of just doing trick photography to, like, sell super speed, which I think is really cool. But then we get the. The scene where afterwards where they introduce themselves to each other and Falcon goes, it. It's your bed, isn't it, that it feels like you're sleeping on a pillow. And that sort of camaraderie.
35:23
Case
There is the first point where Captain America sees this in Falcon, and this will build over time, that Falcon is very much the empathetic, the heart type of character, that Captain America is ultimately looking for someone who can be a brother to him the way Bucky was before Bucky was lost. And so Bucky becomes the counterpoint to that. But I think that all the characters play roles in this. Natasha is very much so. I say fraternity because I think Captain America is looking for a brotherly figure. But I don't think he has a romantic connection with Natasha, despite the fact that the kiss in this movie. I think that she. She is as much a sibling to him by the end of this movie and is what he's looking for in that.
36:01
Case
I think Rumlow is a character that he sees a lot of friendship in at the beginning of the movie. I think that. That the elevator scene feels like a betrayal for Captain America. That's why he says it kind of feels personal. It's not just that it was an attack on him in the elevator scene, which we'll. We'll talk about the elevator scene in a second because we'll talk about all the action because it's so fucking good. But the fact is that Rumlow is part of this sort of like, they're, like, chatting of having, like, workplace banter as they're on, like, on the plane out to the Lemurian star. And he's like, all proud of Cap when he jumps off without the air, without the parachute, which, by the way, one straight out of Ultimates.
36:40
Case
And while Mark Millar is complicated writer to talk about these days, there's a lot of stuff from the Ultimates that I really enjoy them bringing into the mcu. And Captain America just being kind of a badass. And like, jumping out of a plane without an air without a parachute is just like one of those, like, very fun details there. I like that, by the way, that we get Frank Grillo as. As Rumblo. And then I forget the actor who plays his, like, second in command, but that guy who played the second in command, then it was in the DCU as the cagey beast playing basically the exact same Part. And then Frank Grillo is now in the DCU playing Rick Flag Sr. Yeah, so just like the typecasting that this movie put on some people, it's just amazing. But get the.
37:20
Case
The big point is that Captain America is looking for that friendship. He finds it first with. With Falcon, but he doesn't know how close he's going to be to Falcon. Ultimately, he's just. He's kind of looking for it.
37:30
Nicolas
He's.
37:30
Case
He's looking to assimilate into this world and he's feeling. Filling the holes that he was missing. He's. He's missing his family. He's missing his best friend.
37:38
Nicolas
He's.
37:38
Case
He's missing this world and the ultimate conference.
37:43
Jmike
Sorry, was that Peggy too?
37:45
Case
Yeah, Peggy too also. We'll talk more about Peggy in a second. But the nature of his relationship with Bucky is so obviously the movie's named after Bucky's character. It's the Winter Soldier. That relationship with Bucky is so important to this movie because he's missing him at the start of it and he needs to find someone like him in this modern role. And that's what we ultimately find in Falcon. But you can see it throughout. Like, Captain America's trying to trust a person and it hurts that he can't trust a person. Like it hu. That he has reasons to doubt Fury and it hurts that Pierce is a character that he can't trust fully. Now it's good that he doesn't trust Pierce fully, but like, you can see that like the fact that's Robert Redford.
38:27
Jmike
Yeah.
38:27
Case
Like, is that we're sell. We're trying to sell like the, like someone who just feels like you're like your granddad, you're dashing, handsome. Like you can trust this guy, right? Like, he's. He talks about Iron man coming to his grandkids thing. Like he tried. He talks about. About world peace. He talks about like the pragmatism of world peace and so forth.
38:47
Nicolas
Like, you.
38:48
Case
You think that this is another guy that you can trust, but you can't. And like that lack of trust, that inability to have people that are in your. Your inner circle, like, that is the thing Captain America is dealing with in this movie. The hydra reveal is that the inner circle being broken for him. And so I think that's thesis of this movie that like needing. Needing to have those sort of like plate those safe spaces with people around you and looking for them and how they can be broken, but at the same time, like, are when you.
39:15
Nicolas
Find them I completely agree. Actually, I think a term that I would resonate more necessary with this particular is maybe sense of belonging, because I think it's also, I think, to like something like the Hurt Locker or something like that, because remember, Captain America is a super soldier, and so it obviously explores those sorts of elements. And part of the reason that Sam is introduced in the way he is, like, what happens when the soldier comes home and doesn't feel like he belongs. And Steve tries to do the best with what he can. He goes back to work. He tries to keep busy. He tries to be where he thinks he's useful or thinks he can feel useful, but he still doesn't have that. So all the characters do feel that in some way.
40:00
Nicolas
I think Natasha, her being an ex KGB means that she doesn't. She says, I really thought I was going straight, but turns out the. I was just listening to the wrong people or something to that effect. I think Sam, you know, he's been out. That's part of the whole thing, is that he also doesn't feel like he belongs, and he has almost zero reluctance to go back into it. It's almost like he's been itching to get back. It takes one line, and it's kind of a bit of a throwaway joke line, and he's back. And when Nick Fury says, that's why I can't trust anyone. I lost an eye. Which turns out to be something very silly.
40:37
Case
But I know it's such a badass line in this movie, and then it is terrible payoff. Captain Marvel. I also like Captain Marvel was one of our first episodes. One of the reasons why we got the show out when we did was that we wanted to do a primer on Captain Marvel before that one came out. And I like the movie overall, but you can feel that there's so many writer hands involved in that one, and it's just not. Not. It doesn't do a good job as being a prequel to all these movies. And the Nick Fury eye thing is just like one of those things where it's just like, that was such a badass line. You either don't show it or you. Or you give it the. The clout that it deserves. Like, come on, man.
41:19
Nicolas
I completely agree. And also for the opening as well, when he's, like, talking shop with Rumlo and Natasha.
41:25
Case
Yeah.
41:25
Nicolas
It's like the sort of mundanity of their conversation, like, oh, what about the Stacy from across the hall? Or whatever they're talking about? And then combined with. And this is something I just love in Chris Evans performance. I think Chris Evans is really underrated in this role. I think he's rated, but I think he really deserves a lot more flowers than he tends to get, especially compared to the rest of the cast that.
41:43
Case
He's surrounded and compared to the rest of his performances. Like, Chris Evans normally plays a douchebag.
41:48
Nicolas
Exactly. It really is very different to his normal typecasting. But, I mean, they got it right. And one of the things that I literally. You do it all the time. Is the way he opens the back door of the Quinjet. He, like, smashes it with the side of his hand. Well, the guys in my barbershop quartet are dead, so nothing. And then it just opens up. I smash every single button I press nowadays. Like, that's those badass way you could do that. I think there's something also in, like, along with the Lumerian star, like, it does a really effective job of recharacterizing Captain America and Steve to make him cool like he is in the Ultimates. He's badass, but he's not. At no point is he not Steve that we know him.
42:29
Nicolas
It feels like a sequel in the sense that we're discovering a new side of him and in the physicality of the Lumerian star sequence in particular. It really does change your perception of him. He's updated his tactical style, and it's really cool and covert. And the way he kicks that guy off the boat. And when they do that other trick where he's running along and then arrives later on, later down the corridor, like, way earlier than he should. I think that really is an awesome way to sort of introduce us, reintroduce us to his character and the sort of his perspective on the world as well.
43:03
Case
Yeah. Let's talk about the Lemurian star scene. We've talked a bit about it because I want us to pivot into, like, cool action beats and just, like, kind of go through those, because I think these are the strengths that the Russo brothers really brings to this movie. And the Lumerian star scene is such a good explanation of where Cap is now in the world. You know, like I said, we get this great scene with the Falcon where we establish his character. We get the great shot we should mention of him opening his notebook, and we. We see all the things which are different in different parts of the world, which I think is a really fun detail. So that's like. That's just, like, cool like that they. That they were really considerate of like the culture of everyone around there.
43:40
Case
And it's not just like, here's the American hegemony in terms of what they're presenting. But then, yeah, we get the Lumerian star and we get him having, you know, workplace banter with Natasha, with Rumlow, with the rest of the people there. We get the badass scene of him just jumping off without a parachute and then he just bolts in there. And they do all kinds of trick photography to make him run super fast. And every hit is just like, super effective. They do wire work so that when he kicks a person, they go flying. We get the shot, the awesome shot of someone going for the alarm and he throws the knife from the guy, which I like as a detail because Captain America is, is a moral paragon. But he's also a soldier. Like, he's okay with doing violence.
44:19
Case
He's just not going to like he won't commit war crimes. You know, like, that's Captain America. He's. He's still a soldier. He, like, he'll do, do a kill shot, but he'll avoid it if he can because he's, you know, he's.
44:32
Jmike
Not going for kill shot. He's just incapacitating everybody except for that one guy or two or three he kicked off the side of the boats. They might be checked on to drown in the ice. He kind of pulled a Batman.
44:43
Case
It's the Indian Ocean, so I don't know how. You would know better.
44:47
Nicolas
Yeah, if it's off the coast of India. I mean. No, you'd probably survive for sure, actually, but the ocean is big. It's usually not a good sign to fall off a boat at night. Not a good at all.
45:00
Case
Yeah, it depends on how many people were actually captured on the Lumerian Star, because I don't think they had enough people on the jets that flew in to fish out the people that were knocked over. But you would prefer hostages in that scenario. Anyway, moving on. So we get this awesome sequence of him just, just being badass. But we do get some counterbalances to it, like when he actually faces off against Batroc, which, by the way, holy shit. They made Batroc the Leaper an effective character in the mcu. Like, like fully. Like if you look at what the character looks like in the comics, you would never believe that this could be translated into, like a real movie and have it be like a realistic super villain character. And they made Batroc the Leaper like he won. He's wearing his.
45:49
Case
It's just like muted colors and then he's got a couple extra straps on it and then he's not wearing the mask. But they have a real MMA fighter doing like cool acrobatic like kicks and so forth so that we can sell that. Captain America is like I said, he's a superman, but he's only like 50% stronger than everyone. He's not like in the ballpark that like you. That, that you shouldn't bother. Like a person could actually fight him. It just would be really unlikely that they'd win.
46:14
Nicolas
I didn't know that he was a character from the comics until you just mentioned that. I can't believe I didn't realize.
46:20
Case
Yeah, yeah, like old school character going back to the 60s. Like Captain America villain truck, the leaper. Yeah. Cause he's an acrobatic kind of combat guy and so he's translated really well and so that works really well. We need to mention that this is by the way, where we're introduced to Captain America's stealth suit, which is so fucking cool looking.
46:41
Jmike
Yeah.
46:42
Nicolas
What's your guys top three cap suits? Because he has a bunch of drips throughout this franchise.
46:47
Case
He has so many drips throughout this franchise. And it's rough because I do really like most of costumes. It's like Captain America is a costume that is very difficult to make work in the real world and somehow they have succeeded most of the time. This probably edges out as my favorite just because it's a little bit different from the others and it's not quite as rah patriotic. But I. It's hard because like the Civil War, like for. For one thing he has a lot of subtle changes because going from Age of Ultron to Civil War, there is a subtle difference between the costume and then obviously the Civil War costume is then like muddy, like dirty costume.
47:26
Nicolas
When he was. When he's Nomad.
47:28
Case
Yeah, when he's infinity War, like he's wearing like the Civil War costume. It's just like really like weathered. But I also really like the costume.
47:36
Nicolas
For Man I count loses two different looks.
47:38
Case
Well, yeah, that's the. So yeah, the. Yeah, I probably like this costume the most out of all them. But damn, I do really like a lot of the costumes in it. I do prefer the First Avenger look over the costume he wears at the end of this movie.
47:51
Jmike
Really.
47:52
Case
Just because that extra stripe is. Is not functional. And I like how in the First Avenger his co. Like the red Stripes of the USA are. Are the.
48:01
Jmike
The.
48:02
Case
Are like part of the belt system that he has that like, holds the outfit together.
48:07
Nicolas
Okay. No, I see. I see what you're talking about. I see what you're talking about. When I first saw it, I thought that it's like, it's funny because it's slightly anachronistic because it's obviously a replica right from the Smithsonian, so. Oh, they got it wrong on purpose. And I always thought that it was just like a kind of update. And at the time when I watched it, I thought it was like a more balanced look, but I actually see what you mean where it kind of. I suppose it's supposed to look a bit more like a show offy kind of balance.
48:29
Case
It's closer to the comic.
48:31
Nicolas
Yeah, yeah.
48:32
Case
It's just that like, I kind of like the practicality that they have introduced into the Captain America uniform. Like, the magnetic backing for attaching his shield onto is really nice. The sort of like cargo kind of pants style that he has, especially in this one. Like, he. He has a very casual kind of waist down and then like very tight kind waist up kind of design for all of his looks. And I. I dig those here. Yeah. This one probably wins the. It's probably this one, then Civil War. No. Pardon me. This one, then Infinity War, then Civil War. No, this one. This one. Infinity War first Avengers. Civil War in game Age of Ultron, Avengers and Avengers is easily my least.
49:21
Nicolas
It's easily my least favorite too. But I think it does get significantly better once the helmet's gone and he's covered in dust.
49:27
Jmike
Yeah.
49:28
Nicolas
Kind of adds texture to it because obviously the lighting of that movie is one of its biggest problems, and so it makes everything look flat. But so the texture I think really does help in that movie. But I think my favorite personally is when he's Nomad infinity War. I love the sort of tattered look. I kind of almost wish we had a movie set during that time with that little crew. But. But yeah, to digress, I mean, the stealth suit's absolutely badass. That's my number two.
49:56
Case
Yeah, it's just. It's just so good looking and like, it's such a nice update of like they have a comic look that when Steve Rogers was briefly head of SHIELD this is based on the. The outfit he wore in that. But it.
50:07
Jmike
It.
50:08
Case
I think they. They do a really good job of streamlining it even more. I think that it still reads Captain America, same time being not su. Super over the top. Like it. It looks like something that people would practically wear. I, I think it's just a really good look for the character and it also speaks to like the moral quandaries like that he's going through in this movie. You know, it feels like he is being suppressed. Iconography of patriotism that he's supposed to represent is being restricted from him in favor of being the more modern CIA. America is out there like in the Shadows, you know, solving your problems before they actually happen kind of thing. So I get it feeling like the compromised look, but it's also a really good look. It's just a really good look.
50:51
Nicolas
I love it, I love it.
50:53
Case
Natasha has a, an updated outfit, but like her outfits are always just like basic like black jumpsuits. So it's like hard to really speak too much to them. It's not particularly over the top as opposed to like Age of Ultron where she has like a lot of like light up details, particularly on her gauntlets. Like they're still there, but. But yeah, like it just like it looks more like a spy suit in this one. Just because this is more of a spy movie.
51:14
Jmike
I mean, she's only in the suit for a little bit though. But the rest of the time she's in the jacket and the jeans and stuff, isn't she?
51:20
Nicolas
That's true, yeah. And so is Steve. And I almost think that they must have looked a bit to Smallville.
51:26
Case
Reminded me a bit of that where.
51:27
Nicolas
It's like, it's sort. It gets the vibe of the iconography of the character across while still being in casual clothes. I think it's quite clever. He's always in blue or white or with the baseball cap.
51:37
Case
Yeah, yeah. Smallville had they always wanted to have him be in the red and blue color coding of Superman. And so yeah, you get a little bit of that which gets into like when we actually get him in like stealth mode, like when he's in the mall and so forth, where it's like, what do you mean? You can't identify the 6, 3 like Adonis.
51:57
Nicolas
Just by making out with an absolute stunner, right.
52:02
Case
The redhead that you know that he's on the, on a run with.
52:04
Jmike
I can't find them, sir.
52:06
Nicolas
How?
52:08
Jmike
Don't know, sir.
52:10
Nicolas
I feel like people would have just been taking pictures of those two because they're just so good looking.
52:14
Case
Right, Exactly.
52:16
Nicolas
That would have just been a general thing occurring.
52:18
Case
But so we have the awesomeness of the Lumerian star scene that really sells Captain America as being this physical force, then move on to. The next real big action scene is the elevator scene, which. Holy shit. Or I guess we get the Winter Soldier stuff. Sorry. So we've got the assassination, or we have the extreme badass car chase scene with Nick Fury, which is. Is very cool. I love the joke in there where it's like, what isn't work? What isn't damaged? And it's like, air conditioning is working fine. Is great. It's existing in the same world as agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. So, like, flying cars and stuff are established in this world. And this is before the Marvel movies had fully diverted. Like, this movie is the closest that agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
53:02
Case
The TV show, is to being like, official MCU canon, because it is observed. Like, for what? One thing, the Agents of SHIELD TV show became good. When this movie came out, it was having a hard time because it had the secret that it was building up to, which was the Hydra reveal. But it couldn't do it until this movie came out. So I remember watching the episode of agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Right before this came out, and it was like, oh, something's going to happen next time. We'll see. And then it's like, oh, fuck, they're all Hydra. And then all of a sudden, Agents of SHIELD Turned into GI Joe, and all of a sudden it became a great show.
53:34
Nicolas
Believe it or not, I actually watched Agents of SHIELD in time, in 2014, when, like, the Dark World, Iron Man 3. And then. Well, I think it was Iron Man 3, Thor, the Dark World.
53:43
Case
Yeah.
53:44
Nicolas
And then this. And I remember being blown away at the time, I thought, because I wasn't sure how much it was actually going to connect. I thought it was, like, barely canon because Coulson coming back felt weird. Yeah, I thought it was like a sort of fringe thing at that point. But then when that happened, I was like, holy cow. And unfortunately, it doesn't quite get that close again. But I think it's. Because then at that point, Ike Perlmutter then became in charge of. Of Marvel Television, and that's when the Daredevil and the Jessica Jones stuff started happening. So I think that's when TV broke off more. More distinctly.
54:14
Case
Yeah. So, like, it's. It's such a weird situation where, like, the first half of the. Like the first half of the first season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Feels like it's kind of happening in its own space. And then this ep, this particular crossover occurs, continuity wise, and it feels super close. And then. Then it's splits off. But, yeah, so we have the awesome car chase with Nick Fury. I love that he's got just a machine gun in his glove box in his console. That's so goddamn cool. He is so paranoid about everything. And that car chase is great. It sets up the Winter Soldier in a really effective way because he comes off as the Terminator.
54:52
Nicolas
Yeah, completely agree.
54:54
Case
Small tangent. So on my other show, Another Pass, which is a movie analysis show, we talked about Black Widow recently on that episode. One of the complaints I had was that T. Taskmaster is set up to feel like the Terminator and that it's very much the. Like, the role of Taskmaster in that in the comics was played by the Winter Soldier. And the Winter Soldier just does a better job of being that character and was one of my gripes about it and like, does such a good job in this movie of being this like unstoppable killing machine that's coming for you. Like, we get awesome stuff with that. We get the Winter Soldier sniping Nick Fury in Captain America's apartment. And this is actually a great sequence for a Superman type character where it's like, tell him I'm in pursuit.
55:32
Case
And then he's like in full sprint and just like going through walls, going through doors, just at. At a full bit like a full bore after. After the Winter Soldier. And I think that does a really good job of. Of getting the. The movement of Captain America really well. And again, like what a superhuman kind of feels like where it's like, oh yeah, normal.
55:52
Jmike
The. The.
55:53
Case
The world of cardboard that he lives in doesn't necessarily hold him back as he like travels through and like rips through the space to. To get at the Winter Soldier. But then we get the elevator fight and the elevator fight. Man, it's so good. It's. It's so good that they. They call it out in Endgame because it's so good like the, like that they. That it's. It's such a great sequence. Captain America gets on the elevator and then slowly all of his friends get on the elevator that we've been seeing throughout at this point. And like, and he noticed like the sweat beads on some of them and like he gets like such a badass line because they all come on and they all are pushing different but well, they're saying different floors because it's a voice thing.
56:34
Case
And we have the establishment of those elevators already because we established them for when Captain America went down to see the helicarriers. These elevators are established. They're these big iconic things that we've seen, and then gets the badass line of before we start, does anyone want to get off? And it turns into this incredibly well choreographed, like, extremely dense fight scene where it's. I mean, it's what, like, 12 people in there?
56:58
Jmike
Like, more.
57:00
Case
I don't know. It's. It's a. It's a dense elevator full of people. People watching the special features. You see them, like, rehearse this, and it is such a. It's such a dance to Just to move around because there's just so many people in there.
57:11
Jmike
They're.
57:11
Case
They're like, swaying back and forth. It's like. And one, two. And they're, like, going back and forth and, like, you know, hitting. Hitting their beats. Like, as all good fight choreography, you know, starts off as the. The tightness of it and the ingenuity to have the elevator be a glass elevator so they could shoot it from different angles, I think makes it work really well. Like, it's. It's this very tight space, but we can see from all angles, so it's not. So It' not visually tight. We get the cool mechan, the. The mechanism of the magnetic, like, armbands that they're. That they're trying to put on Cap that were part of the suitcases that they were using as, like, disguises. So we get more of the super spy tech that's part of this world, which is really fun. And.
57:50
Case
And then, like I said, I. I think that the. That Rumlo saying, I just want you to know, Cap, this isn't personal. And then Cap saying, it kind of feels personal. I think that's really emphasizing that this is the betrayal of rlo. And this is before Cap even knows that it's Hydra.
58:04
Jmike
He.
58:04
Case
He just feels. Feels that something is going on and that things are. Are working against him and that he is, at this point, like, as far as he knows, Pierce is above board and Rumlow is above board like that. That whatever. That the Winter Soldier could have been just like, a rogue agent doing something. He doesn't know how infiltrated SHIELD Is. He just was told, don't trust anyone. So he hasn't even been fully betrayed yet. But the fact is, like, he. It's immediately obvious that, like, everyone's against him in this. This whole scenario. So we get the elevator fight. I don't know if either of you have anything you want to say about the elevator fight. I've just gushed the last five minutes about it. Yeah.
58:44
Nicolas
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, listen, I. I have a. In my notes, I just wrote elevator 10 out of 10. But I do have a fair few things to say. Yeah, like in the. When they were making it, I remember that the elevator fight was actually at the time quite heavily centered in the. In the marketing. And also I think they shot it first. They always said that they shot the elevator scene first over two weeks, I believe. I'm just going off memory and that was like a sort of almost like proof of concept that this. That their take on the spy action superhero movie could work. And I think it's such a strong statement of intent that very clearly carries through the rest of production and the rest of the creative process going forward of how it's.
59:23
Nicolas
I guess, you know, the Bourne Identity kind of like popularized the sort of shaky cam action story style and that we're bringing. It's like, it's. It's almost like when. Like when James Bond did the same thing with Daniel Craig. It's like we're modernizing this, and we're modernizing this 1940s character into the modern day, and we're making him cool and badass, and it's going to be extremely, well sort of put together and so elegant in its construction. Remember 2014. Obviously we'd had, like, strong action films before this, but John Wick came out the same year, And we hadn't had this sort of balletic, hyper frenetic thing. It was. It was still quite a new sort of thing at the time for it to also be so well executed because shaky cam was around all the time.
01:00:11
Jmike
But.
01:00:11
Nicolas
But this is just such an excellent format. And to your note on the line, I also wrote that down. It's like it sort of almost feels like a thing. Thesis statement for Captain America. In his position with all this, it's like, even though this and the film as a whole, like, even though themes and the setting is very large and big and cultural and sociological and political, this story is personal because we're exploring all of those things through his perspective on it and how, like you say, with, like, that sense of belonging with all these other characters, it's about him coming to realize who is actually there for him, truly. And it's about him internalizing that.
01:00:46
Nicolas
And this was the start of his entire world, his entire structure that he's been a part of, seemingly crumbling to pieces and feeling like maybe there's actually no one out there for me and with me and standing for the same thing as me.
01:01:01
Case
Yeah, I think the more we talk about it, the more I come to that, it kind of feels personal becomes the point of this movie. It's a Captain America movie, it's not an Avengers movie. It's like he's dealing with a potentially world ending threat or certainly a world changing chilling. Yeah, it's a world changing threat and he's dealing with it not completely alone, but mostly alone. And it's within his sort of sphere because this is a personal battle. Ultimately the thing that really matters is the fight that we get between him and the Winter Soldier at the very end. And everything else is just sort of the set dressing and even the threats are his personal threats. It's his personal enemies that are coming for him. HYDRA is a thing that he personally dealt with. So it's not just some sort of space villain.
01:01:46
Case
And from coming from the sky situation, this, these are personal grievances for Captain America. So then we get the escape from the elevator, which I think is really cool just because it's one of those moments where like the super like once you allow for the super science of the world to exist, like that Vibranium absorbs all vibrations from impacts, then you and that Captain America is a super soldier that has a healing factor in all this. You can allow for a character to jump out of window and fall like you know, umpteenth stories and be fine because he landed on the shield. He blocked the ground with his.
01:02:20
Jmike
Shield.
01:02:23
Case
Just for a little 8 bit theater reference there. But yeah, he blocked the ground and he's. And he's able to get up and he's fine because Vibranium is a thing. And they established in the first movie that it absorbs all vibrations and all impacts. And so he's like clearly hurting, but he's able to run. And then we get one of the coolest goddamn sequences that is so fast, which is him taking down the coolest Quinjet. Yeah, it's like 10 seconds he hits the brakes on his motorcycle after it starts firing a Gatling gun at him. A lot, a lot of Gatling guns in this movie, they really like that like chain fire kind of weapon in this Nick Fury's got one. This Quinjet has one.
01:03:00
Case
And then like on the street fight when they're on the highway, there's a dude that has like one this movie really likes like big chain guns.
01:03:07
Jmike
They never work when you need them to though. Like they always miss. It's like sweet Stormtroopers.
01:03:13
Case
Well, yeah, totally.
01:03:15
Jmike
Did you guys hit him? No, sir.
01:03:19
Case
Yeah, so they're not able to hit Cap. He's able to use the brake on his motorcycle to fling him up on top. And he flings his shield in such a way that it first jams into one of the engines, and then he bounces it off to, like, take out. It explodes. I was watching this one this time, and I was like, oh, there's a lot of explosions for the shield bouncing off of like.
01:03:38
Nicolas
Like the.
01:03:40
Case
I want to say rudders. I don't know what the.
01:03:42
Jmike
What. Whatever.
01:03:43
Nicolas
Turbines.
01:03:44
Case
Turbines, may. I don't know. No, well, it's not turbines. It's not the engine part.
01:03:47
Nicolas
It's the.
01:03:47
Case
It's the steering part. Yeah.
01:03:49
Nicolas
Tail wings.
01:03:50
Case
Yeah, yeah. Tail wings.
01:03:51
Jmike
Yeah.
01:03:51
Case
Like, they. They explode when his shield hits them. And I was, like, kind of surprised at that. I was like, oh, that's more kinetic of it all. But then he does a superhero landing coming off of it, and he's so badass right there. And that's like the spot where you're like, oh, yeah, Captain America. You put a jet in front of him, and he will take it down in 10 seconds flat. Because he's. He's that cool. And that's where we're talking about him, like, really being, like a Superman type character. Like, it doesn't. Like, I. I've espoused that. I think Superman flying isn't necessarily the best choice. I kind of wish that it was still like the Earth's gravity thing for Superman and that he could leap an eighth of a mile.
01:04:25
Nicolas
Leap tall buildings in a single bound.
01:04:27
Case
Exactly. Yeah. And so, like, having a slightly turned down Superman power set, I think works really well and makes these scenes so cool. Like, it's such a good sequence of him. Of him taking down this plane. It's just. Just awesome.
01:04:40
Nicolas
I think one of the sort of structural golden nuggets of this particular film in terms of its action and choreography, is that it's. I can't. The action scenes are actually legitimately tense. People could die. And people do get shot in this movie. And while, you know, like, not everyone is. Not everything's fatal. And I think it turns out if we go a long enough timeline, nothing is fatal or something I can't remember right now for this movie. Like, you know, like the Winter Soldier being such a Terminator. Like, he's legitimately scary with the score and how imposing he is. And even Steve, I think that's what makes him such a cool character as well, just cinematically, is that his power set is bounded and understandable. It's not just Magic all the time. It's very specific and sort of science based. And also within human.
01:05:32
Nicolas
When he gets shot, he feels it. And I think that ups the tension. Whereas, like, sometimes I think I find in Iron man action scenes, it's just a suit doing a thing. And if the suit gets injured, I don't really feel it. It's when the wishy person inside. But then with Cap, it's, it's acrobatic, it's human, and it's more like tactile. We know what it. We know, you know, we've like tried to do a backflip on a trampoline. We know how much effort that takes to do it. Like off of. Off the Coin Quinjet's rear wing and then land on his knees. It has a sort of like, crunchy quality to it that I think really grounds this movie when you're watching it in a very tactile feel.
01:06:12
Case
Yeah. And the fact of the matter is, him taking on a jet at this point in the movie is appropriate for the level of scale that he takes on as the movie progresses because ultimately he's going to take on three helicarriers, not by himself, but pretty close to by himself and win, which is kind of insane. And so, like, if we didn't have Captain America at this point in the movie already being expressed as being like that level of a badass, it would be. It wouldn't be as effective there. So just because we're. We're talking action scenes at the moment, I believe the next major action scene is actually, is the highway fight, if I remember correctly, because we then go, they pick up Natasha, they go, they find out about the Hydra Base situation. Situation. Like, they go to Jersey.
01:06:54
Case
They go to Jersey. And then I think there's a minor.
01:06:57
Nicolas
Action scene I'd like to discuss. Within that section is when they go to the military base and he sees himself young and small again.
01:07:03
Case
Oh, yeah.
01:07:04
Nicolas
I think that's a very poignant moment because it's almost like a moment of him remembering, like, feeling somewhere at home. Like he recognizes it. This is like a semblance of comfort for him. I think that's what I read that moment as. And then once they find out that Zemo's been there, it's almost like this element of this one element that he's like untouchable.
01:07:23
Case
Sorry, Arnim Zola, not Zemo. Yeah, I know. Evil Nazi supervillains.
01:07:28
Jmike
Yeah.
01:07:29
Nicolas
Zemo is there and it's been infecting. Sorry, Sorry, Zahola is there. He's been infecting this whole thing that, in his mind had been pure up until this point. So that's like a moment of desolation for him. And then the whole building comes down because there's a. There's a missile strike that comes in. And I wrote this down. It's actually right in the middle of the runtime, and it's kind of like. It's the all is lost moment because that's his moment of realizing. You know, it's a cool action scene because the whole thing explodes and he manages to use the shield to, like, stop the rubble falling on him. And then he saves Nat and then they have to run away quickly.
01:08:03
Nicolas
It's a small one in the grand scheme of things, but I do think it's actually a very important one to discuss because that's like a visual metaphor for where he. He's at and how much of his world has come crumbling down. Because that is the symbol of him. That's how he sees himself.
01:08:16
Jmike
Yeah.
01:08:17
Nicolas
And now it's.
01:08:17
Case
No, you're right. It's exactly at the halfway point. And that's where we get the Hydra reveal. It's Zola as infiltrated Hydra. And, yeah, if we're going to stop and talk about Zola for a second, because I don't know if we need to circle that much back to him. What a design for the character. I don't know if you're familiar with how he looks in the comics. He looks almost the exact same in the comics. He just has arms like, he's. He's a big computer screen with a tiny little camera head, and he just has, like, robot arms and legs. So, like, they did an incredible job of making this character that is just goofy as fuck look really interesting. And. And I love, like, the Matrix kind of like, code look.
01:08:56
Jmike
Yeah.
01:08:57
Case
That is going on for. For his face. Like, I think that's really good. What is the Toby Keeble Kibble.
01:09:01
Nicolas
Toby Kebbell.
01:09:03
Jmike
Yeah.
01:09:03
Nicolas
No, no, sorry. Toby Jones.
01:09:05
Case
Toby Jones.
01:09:06
Jmike
Sorry. Yeah.
01:09:07
Case
So Toby Jones is. Is so, like, it was so fun establishing him in the first movie, like, and we got, you know, a similar kind of introduction where in the first movie, like, the first time we see him, he's, like, peering through a big magnifying lens so that it's. It's sort of doing the same screen kind of thing, because that's just like, what the character's known for. For the comic. He works so well in this movie because he's attached to the Winter Soldier. He was set up in the first movie. The look is really good. He's got this, like, great, like, it's like 1970s kind of computer technology, like, keeping him together. So he's like, you are inside my brain, which is wonderful. Just great.
01:09:41
Case
And just such a good use of an established villain and making him not look crazy again, just like Batroc character that, like, should look insane if you brought him into a movie. And somehow he looks like, kind of plausible in this. All I, I, I think is great. You brought up the covering Nat with the shield thing. And I, I think this is a, how there's a really good spot in the lunar and star scene where when Batroc throws the grenade, Cap whacks it with a shield, covers Nat, and then Nat shoots the gun at the window or at the glass of, like, the next room so that they can jump through. And it shows them as a team. And Cap is very good at being the tank for them as a team. Like, Nat's the striker and Cap's the tank.
01:10:25
Case
It, it's the rogue fighter situation if this is D and D. And so like, Cap is very good at using his shield to block for people. And, and I, I, I note that throughout the movie that he does a lot of spots where he uses his shield very effectively. And that's again, getting into the Superman, like, I can block anything kind of thing right there. But one thing I love in the fight choreography, and this picks up into the next fight scene on the highway, is that when Cap is without his shield, he still instinctively raises his arm to his head to block shots. Always, like, when they're firing the minigun at him, he's got his arm up as if that's going to do anything.
01:11:01
Case
And then when he's fighting the Winter Soldier without his shield, he's still blocking hits the same way that he would if he had the shield. Like, his muscle memory is trained to, like, raise his arm, his left arm up in the sort of like, triangular pattern as if he's like, trying to cover the bulk of his body with his arm, which isn't necessarily a bad choice in a fight, even without, but like, is just really interesting that's like a Captain America choreography thing.
01:11:26
Nicolas
That's very clever, isn't it? I mean, yeah, there's a lot of very elegance, a deep elegance of construction in this film, which I think did end up typifying the mcu Going forward, I think their concentration on sort of character first in choreography. Now there's obviously the sort of larger discussion as to who's actually doing that. Is it the directors or is it the visual effects supervisors who haven't finished the movie before the directors come on board? But it's like things like that where I don't know who came up with that particular thing, but whoever they got, they knew what was going on. Like, they understand the character and how they've set him up. And that's just. There's just a sort of congruency, and there's lots of things, even details that you've mentioned in this podcast earlier.
01:12:09
Nicolas
Like, as to Steve's sort of canonical power set, I didn't actually realize until you said that he's supposed to have a good memory, but now, like, oh, yeah, of course. Like, he remembered the date when he woke up in the Fort 40s cube thing and of the baseball game, and he remembered the map and. And these. It's like all that. It. I did. It wasn't. It didn't stand out, but it. It just made sense intuitively. And I think that's such a beautiful thing that they've managed to do. They don't need to sit and say, he's got this and that and this and that. You'd imagine in, like, an early 2000s comic book movie, there'd be a scene where they describe, he's got adamantium bones, so he. And has lost his memory.
01:12:50
Nicolas
You know, like, obviously those movies are quaint and beautiful in their own way, but it's like things are explained through just them existing. And that's really cool, I think.
01:13:00
Case
Yeah. Like, it. It's not like an espn, like, pop up for his stats, you know, where it's just like, power, super strength, super. Because. Because the ESPN pop up would be like, Steve Rogers, really good guy, pretty good at everything. Like, would be the list right there.
01:13:18
Jmike
Speaking of his memory, there is a cool point when they get to the base where he's reminiscing and everything, and then he automatically sees the bunker and he knows that something's off because I forget, like, how it's.
01:13:27
Case
That it's too close. So a. It's a. A munitions bunker, and it's too close to the barracks. He's like, army. Army regulations say it have to. Has to be a certain distance. This building's in the wrong spot. Yeah, that's him being. He's very smart. He's not, like, he's not a spy, but he's he is very smart. He's able to do like. He catches on very quick. He's a terrible liar, but. But he catches on very quick to things. He sees through the lies pretty well. Like, he is trusting at the start of the movie, but once he's put on the like, don't trust anyone kind of thing, he. He never really, like, falls for anyone after that point. So like Cap is. Is. Is very smart. And he was very smart beforehand.
01:14:06
Case
Like we saw that in the First Avenger when he like, knocked the flagpole down so he was able to grab the flag. Like he's supposed to think outside of the box and be a smart guy. But I. I think the super soldier serum has made him it again. It's like he's 50% better at everything. And it's not necessarily steroids making him better, but it's like. It's like if you were chemically primed to be as wide awake as possible and have the best memory as possible, the best cup of coffee, always in your system kind of situation.
01:14:32
Jmike
So they gave him the limitless pill.
01:14:35
Case
Well, yeah. I mean, yes, like that. That's the thing.
01:14:38
Nicolas
Although I do think there's something that's interesting about Steve's characterization in all of these, which I think is fascinating for as a depiction of a hero in the modern days, especially in the early 2000s, we became very enamored with the sort of Sherlock and these sort of brainiacs who aren't good at other things. Whereas I'd say Tony is a great example of high IQ as far as. And being very a genius in that level. But I think. I don't know what the canon is for the mcu. I think it's at least the Ultimates and the original canon is that he's supposed to have gone to college to study political science and art. That's why in First Avenger, he's really good at drawing the monkey on the unicycle. And so he's an educated guy. He actually has his head screwed on straight.
01:15:26
Nicolas
But those aren't sort of sciencey. Those aren't Peter Parker y awkward things. I think I describe him as a high EQ intelligence kind of person. And I really appreciate that. Being depicted as an innately heroic, humanistic quality.
01:15:44
Case
Yeah. That is a detail that I wished was in this movie. And it's probably the one thing that I think is missing. I don't know where you would put it, but yes, Captain America is an artist is first passion, and that's always been one of his things that he put the pen or he put his paintbrushes aside so he could go off to war is kind of the stories for him in the Marvel comics. In the 70s there was a stretch where he was an artist working for Marvel. Com Comics.
01:16:11
Nicolas
That's wild. I want to read some of those stories because.
01:16:14
Case
Because in Marvel Comics, the world has always been that the. The comics exist in the comic book universe, but they're just based on the real stories. And so he was noted as being the type of artist who would. Who did a great job of like getting the action beats. So. So good. Because he had a secret identity and. And so he was just Steve Rogers comic book artist from. So I wish that we got some of that artistic detail in this movie because that is a nice thing about Steve. But we do get the. Him being emaciated and what is it, 4F unable to participate in war shot there. And we get a later shot of it. And I like that we call back to that special effect that made Chris Evans, who is the sadonist, look like such a runt.
01:16:58
Case
It's a really cool effect that I was just surprised that we get two scenes in this movie. Movie doing it.
01:17:04
Nicolas
They are expensive sequences. And I remember when first Avengers came out, it was in that sort of period where look at this new filmmaking technique we have. That was in the marketing.
01:17:14
Case
Yeah, it was just like the de.
01:17:15
Nicolas
Aging stuff that we've managed to do this. It was like since like Avatar where like the new tech is like the marketing is part of the marketing push. And the skinny Steve was a big. I remember at the time was a big deal. They were pushing it even for like Oscars and academy consideration, things like that. And it's cool to sort of see it come back because it takes a lot of effort to do that. But I think it works perfectly for the storytelling purposes that they do in this film. It doesn't feel gratuitous at all, I don't think.
01:17:45
Case
Yeah, actually it's so not gratuitous. Now that I think about it. It does hit the rule of three because we've got the scene at the Captain America Museum at the Smithsonian at the beginning where we see the. The like how short he was before the super soldier serum. And then like. Like it's like a display where you can see like. Like through a mirror his normal size and then his. His super soldier size. And then we get this shot of him running and then we get the flashback scene with the winter soldier later And I think that works really well in a rule of three because again, getting back to thesis of Captain America, looking for belonging, looking for. For his person to be his. His best friend, to be his brother. In the situation, we are reminded.
01:18:27
Case
Reminded of what Steve used to be three times. And that third time is the most impactful scene because it's him coming home from his mother's funeral and it's him and it's Bucky saying the important line to him, which is I'm with you until the end of the line and establishing like what Bucky meant in. In us being reminded of what Steve used to be and why Bucky meant so much. Like Bucky was his big brother when he. When he was the little guy, when he didn't have anything, when his mom and dad were dead and like, and he struggling to get by and it was, you know, depression era Brooklyn. Bucky was there for him. And so we get. I. This movie is so good. Like, is what I'm getting at. Like, it's so tight. Like the uses of things are so well done.
01:19:12
Case
They. They hit Rules of three really well. You know, again, they build up effectively so that we have the. The stakes of the third act are really magnified. Yeah. Just really good stuff. But yeah, so we get the Highway Fight. And the Highway Fight is awesome. But J. Mike, when I was watching the Highway Fight, I was thinking exact saying, which is like, you always miss with the machine guns.
01:19:33
Jmike
Yeah.
01:19:33
Case
But then again, like in real life, you also kind of always miss with pistols too. Like, it's just that the Black Widow is really good with her pistols, so she's able to hit.
01:19:41
Jmike
Well, there is that. There is that one scene where the patsy guy gets yanked out of the window. It always catches me. Surprise, surprise. I'm like, holy.
01:19:53
Nicolas
That is surprisingly brought violence film. Actually.
01:19:57
Case
Yeah. Sitwell's death there is. Yeah. Yes. They. They. They make Sitwell a traitor, which is wild. Like the. The decisions to make who they made Hydra is wild because that. What was established already in. In Avengers and in Agents of SHIELD and seemed like a good guy and then all of a sudden he's a bad guy. Get, they kidnap him, they get him in a car. We get the Stephen Strange name drop in this movie.
01:20:20
Nicolas
Broke that down. I can't believe I literally didn't notice that until the. This viewing.
01:20:25
Case
Yeah, this was, I mean this was back in the era where like this was still doing like what like the X Men movies did, where it was like let's have as many name drops as we can. Just. Just because the nerds will really appreciate it and we'll figure it out later. I think it makes enough sense in the context of like, oh, well, they are able to figure out that this guy could be potentially dangerous regardless of what way he's potentially dangerous because there's no way to know that he's going to become a magic guy at this point in the timeline. It's. It's fun to like reference him.
01:20:51
Nicolas
I thought it was very cute because they also mentioned future. So it's like, oh, I'm sure it was an Easter egg in that sense. But also that's the second name drop that Dr. Strange has had before. He's actually had an on screen appearance. If you remember, in Spider Man 2 when they're asking when J. J. Jonah Jameson is trying to spitball names for Dr. Oscar.
01:21:09
Jmike
Oh, Dr.
01:21:10
Case
Strange. Now that's taken.
01:21:11
Nicolas
Yeah, no, that's taken. I was like, it's weird that they've. That he's. That Dr. Strange just had like this weird sort of like life before his even existence. Yeah, that really took me by surprise this time.
01:21:25
Case
So funny one, there was a. There was a previous Doc Strange comic book character from the 40s who is very fun. He's very much like Superman but with a super soldier serum. And he's a plainclothes superhero who was a man of science. So he was kind of similar to Doc Savage but with Superman's power set. And so like Doc Strange then fell out of print and then became Doctor Strange. But like that, Doc Strange is not too far off from the kind of identity that we're doing with this movie here with the Superman identity. You know, like, you know, just a sir, I'm giving a guy some extra juice to be a super action man.
01:22:00
Nicolas
There's also, this is a slight digression, but in terms of. It's to do with very nice niche referencing. And this is something that I want to canonize a bit more in popular culture through this medium. So indulge me. It's Captain America, the First Avenger, when they go to the Stark Expo and the first shot is like a big panning over the whole exhibition. And then they pan past. It's a suit that's red and it has a little banner on top of it called the Synthetic Man.
01:22:27
Case
Oh, that.
01:22:28
Nicolas
What is that? And then, but just to clarify to the viewers, the Synthetic man was, I think it was a timely comics invention. But do correct me if I'm wrong. And then once they got bought out by Marvel, it was like. It was the original Human Torch. He became Human Torch later on, but it was the Synthetic man as what was actually one of the first superheroes. And so that's a little reference to him. Yeah.
01:22:50
Case
From the original Marvel Comics. So Marvel Comics was the name of a comic that Timely and then Atlas, because they went through a few different names and then eventually they settled on Marvel as the name. But the original superhero comic they put out was called Marvel Comics and then it was later renamed Marvel Mystery Comics. And their first two superheroes were the Human Torch, who was a robot for some reason, Neymar the Submariner, who we've seen since in Black Panther 2. But. But yeah, so they have that scene in the first Avenger, which is. Yes, I love that. That little like shout out there, because they're never going to do the Android Human Torch in one of these movies.
01:23:25
Nicolas
Like, I, I hope I can prove my nerd credit with that. With that one.
01:23:29
Case
Yeah, no, that's. That's legit. Good Shout out right there. Also a character I love. But yeah, they are doing some really good background details here and just sort of saying, yeah, we'll figure it out later. And that's all fine. So, yeah, Dr. Strange is established. They mentioned Bruce Banner, but of course we know who Bruce Banner is at this point. And they get set well into a car and they're driving on the highway. The Winter Soldier shows up and we have truly a great action set piece where lots of people with guns running around. We get Steve without a shield running away from a dude with him minigun and then him using the shield in a really cool way to deflect bullets from the minigun at people, which is just really cool fight choreography there.
01:24:10
Nicolas
I think it was somewhere interviews they mentioned that especially for that fight, the choreography was heavily inspired by actually the Captain America Super Soldier video game that came out shortly after the first Avengers movie, which had the Arkham Asylum style combat at the time. And so when they did that sort of refracting bullets with the shield thing, that made me really think of a video game sort of mechanic of like. And then you like reflect the blood back into someone else. It's really cool.
01:24:37
Jmike
It's.
01:24:38
Case
It's very cool. I adore most of this fight. I love how Anthony Mackie as Falcon just slowly becomes more of an active participant. Like when he pulls a knife on a dude and just like gets in there in the fight, you're like, oh, that's that's a hardcore move right there. Like that. Like you just knifed a dude and stole his gun and now are shooting guys. Like, I guess you are pretty badass as Falcon. And then we get the reveal of Bucky after a very cool fight sequence between the Winter Soldier and Captain America, which I love because it highlights Steve being slightly stronger, but the robotic arm of the Winter Soldier being even stronger than that.
01:25:17
Case
And so we get some really cool kind of moments of super strength driving a knife through the side of a bus and this really cool grappling that's going on with them. Really effective. I love that. The Winter Soldier just has so many guns on him. He keeps on running out of ammo, dropping a gun, pulling a different gun,.
01:25:34
Nicolas
And just he has a guy in his group who just keeps handing him reloaded guns.
01:25:38
Jmike
Yeah,.
01:25:40
Case
The Suicide Squad, the James Gunn directed Suicide Squad, they have, they've got bloodsport in there played by Idris Elba. So in the movie they make it like a nanotech thing. That is where he gets his guns. But in the comics, his actual deal is that he has many teleporters that just brings guns into his hands whenever he needs it. So his superpower is that he can just have guns in his hands and like that kind of feels what the Winter Soldier is doing here. It's just like infinite guns. Just guns, guns, guns. And then knives and Sebastian Stan was interviewed and discussing training for this movie and he apparently just like played with like the plastic knife all the time to get it down. Because that knife choreography is so good.
01:26:18
Nicolas
The flips and the twirls are incredible. I love how he let the knifes and the twirls. The, the twirls and the flips that he does with the knife are just incredible and very frenetic. And he does thing where he like, he comes down to like plunge down on Steve and then he let. He blocks him and lets go of the knife and catches it with his other hand. I don't know in what way that's better than just lifting your hand up and then going again. But it looks amazing and it's awesome.
01:26:42
Case
Yeah, it's so fast. Like this is an era I forget. The Benio del Toro movie that came out like a couple years before this, that was like a big knife fight movie. Government agents with knife fighting kind of thing. I just remember Ben Del Toro and like a lot of emphasis on the knife fights. I feel like knife fights in general had. Had started to become really big in movies in the 2000s and into the 2000s, because there was sort of a greater appreciation for the guns, for show knives, for pro kind of approach of using a knife in combat. Because, like, guns are. You have a blank, you fire a shot. Like, you can do a lot of cool shots. It's easy to show a gun in a movie. Knife fights require, like, real choreography.
01:27:21
Case
And so, like, I think it's became like a way of, like, showing off your cred for your fight choreography by having, like, a really cool knife fight. And damn, does the Winter Soldier get a really cool night fight here, leading to him ultimately getting yanked, his face masks getting yanked, and him getting tossed over. And we see it's Bucky.
01:27:40
Nicolas
And I want to ask you guys a question. When you saw this, I'm assuming you already knew the backstory. Like, you knew what the. What the. It wasn't a spoiler to you to know that it was back here? I'm assuming.
01:27:50
Case
Yes.
01:27:51
Nicolas
For me, I hadn't read any Captain America comics at that point, and I had only at the time, I think I'd only seen First Avenger, like, in theaters. And then like, once. Once again. And so in my mind, he was. He was gone. He's in the 1940s. And I don't know about all the sort of. All the Marvelly stuff that can bring people back. So for me, it was like a legit, like, jaw dropping reveal. At the time, I just remember being so impressed with, like, how did I. How did I not see that coming? But obviously it is obvious. But I just wonder. I think it does play, personally, especially if you're not. If you're the kind of person who's not fully familiar with, like, you know, comic book tropey stuff.
01:28:26
Nicolas
I think it does actually work as a reveal, and I can attest to that. Obviously, I was 16 and dumb, but it was. It blew my mind at the time.
01:28:34
Case
Yeah. So I knew about the. The reveal. I will say I think it works better in the movies than it did in the comics. In the comics, like, the. The thing is that Bucky was dead for so long, it was like the known thing that Captain America lost his sidekick in World War II. That it frustrated me when they brought him back because it was like, it was a big deal that they were, like, changing the status quo. That, like, his sidekick that's been dead. Like, famously, the first words Captain America said when he came out of the ice was Bucky. No, it was all. It was a big change in the. In the Comics for it. And also Bucky in the comics was supposed to be his teenage sidekick.
01:29:08
Case
It was like Robin to his Batman versus in this he's like the big brother. And then he just becomes smaller because Steve gets bigger. But he's. He's his best friend and like they were like partners. Like he's the sniper when Cap is going on missions in. During World War II. I forget what the term for that is. Like when you have a guy who's out. Out in the field in the sniper who's like watching over. But it's.
01:29:28
Jmike
Yeah.
01:29:28
Case
Something. Yes. Okay. So it works really well that way as their dynamic. And so in this movie I think that makes more sense that like Bucky is set up as being a more. A more effective agent. Like you don't need to retcon that he was actually the wet works guy behind the scenes for Captain America, which is what they did in the comics in this. They just have it off the bat. Like, yeah, he's the sniper, he's the spotter, he's Captain America's lookout. And he's a really effective soldier in his own right that was already experimented on by Zola so that he could be the part of this experiment. And it makes sense that Hydra now being infiltrating, at least America, if not all world governments would have this agent that is just sort of what's. What's the spy term when you're.
01:30:09
Case
When you're marked to look like a different agency. False flagged.
01:30:12
Jmike
Yeah.
01:30:13
Case
Yeah, he's false flagged to look like a KGB operative, but. And he's programmed to speak Russian even though he's actually like working for a Nazi organization that's based out of the U.S.
01:30:23
Nicolas
Do you know what? If I was to bring up. I'm not usually the sort of person to bring up like how I would have done something as the form of critique, because I, I think critique is. Is to try and meet the thing and understand what it's talking about. But I think there was a bit of a missed opportunity to sort of have a bit more intrigue because at least for me, it's not. I think this movie's not really about the twists, but I feel like it's a bit obvious who's a bad guy and who isn't. Obviously, the first time you watch it is a bit more abstract. But the fact. Yeah. The fact that Natasha, like, I feel like it could have been cool to have a bit more play on the whole Soviet spy connection thing.
01:31:02
Nicolas
It feels like that's just A missed opportunity. And to have a bit more of a like boogeyman style thing, like maybe hearing more stories from other people or something like that. Because I feel like it would play more into Nat's character and then suspicion as to who it could be a bit more. But. But yeah, that's not. That's neither. Neither here nor there.
01:31:18
Case
Yeah. I think they held back from that just because the timeline gets so weird with Nat and the KGB stuff like the. In, in the comics where she's allowed to be a bit older and to have like been an actual agent for the kgb. Then it sort of works that he's been this like progressive boogeyman that's like been around like throughout the generations kind of thing. They're. They're doing a lot of shorthand to establish him in this movie. And I, I think it works pretty well. Well, but like I said just in terms of like, I knew it coming in, but I think it was better done in these movies. Even though there is some shorthand in it. Just. Just because I think Sebastian Stan sells the part really well both in the first movie and in this.
01:31:55
Case
But anyway, just moving on through the action beats and then we'll. We'll kind of wrap up our. The other characters and other notes that we're missing because I don't want us to go too long today. It sounds like we could go for hours if we wanted to on this movie because it's a good movie. So we then find out that Fury spoilers we get. We get them prepping for the helicarrier fight. This is really cool. The helicarrier is at like. It's not a big energy beam in the sky, you know, like technically it is because they're like linking up to a satellite and so there is like infrared signals going up in the sky.
01:32:26
Jmike
But.
01:32:27
Case
But it's not a big energy beam in the sky situation. It's three helicarriers that are linked up and will be able to snipe people from all over institute martial law across the world with minimal effort.
01:32:39
Jmike
I mean they kind of make it seem like it's a big like beam from the sky because every time they talk about it, they switch that one satellite scene multiple times.
01:32:50
Nicolas
I think there is a lot of shorthand with the. The sort of staging of this third act. I remember especially when I saw it, I was almost worried to look up reviews because I thought everyone else is going to think this is so goofy. But I love it. It's very video gamey. There's three USB ports that you have to. To that you have to plug into. But it's amazing. It somehow makes for the clarity of the staging, makes it really easy to follow. How far have our characters gotten? Okay, what do we have left to do? They have to get from this one to that one. It makes everything very clear. And all the other characters are also very clearly laid out and what the tasks that they have to accomplish. Nat's been shot, so. Oh, where is she?
01:33:30
Nicolas
And then it's the Mission Impossible things. Boy, the. You know, it's like everyone has like, a real something to do that is also quite characteristic of them. That allows you to. That allows them to bring their characters across through the. Through the choreography. I think it's awesome. And I love this third act, even though it's really goofy.
01:33:46
Case
Like, I agree, it's. I don't even know if I'd say goofy, but it's bombastic. You know, it's gigantic. We have three aircraft carriers that fly, and one, like, crashes into a building like the others crash into the Potomac. You know, we're doing the. This huge stuff. We've got face swapping spy missions going on. We. We've got a.
01:34:10
Jmike
A.
01:34:10
Case
A fight that happens right as the aircraft carrier hits the building, and they have to, like, jump out of the building and land in a helicopter. It's crazy kind of sequences right there. But yeah, it's like, it ultimately comes down so well because again, getting to this whole theme about belonging, it comes down to the. The core fight between Cap and. And. And Bucky. And that fight is so important. Like, we. We also get the tangent fight because we. We get. We get Sam Wilson, we get Falcon, Anthony Mackie fighting Rumlo, which is again, like the. The sort of the guy he thinks is his modern best friend and the guy who actually is his modern best friend fighting each other, which is a good fight right there. And, you know, we get some, like, Hydra conversation, blah, blah. But the.
01:34:53
Case
The core of it comes down to Cap facing off against Bucky. And it's very much. Much like in the original Japanese version of. Of Power Rangers when the Red Ranger and the Green Ranger faced off. And the Red Ranger is like, no, I can't do it because you're my brother. Like, ultimately, like the Winter Soldier. Like, Cap succeeds in getting his mission done, but he's not going to take out the Winter Soldier. Like, he. He gives up and is like, I'm with you to the end of the line. And we get such an impactful, emotional payoff. With that like Bucky, you know, Bucky ends up saving him and we. He snaps out of it enough to. To help him, but he's still like, he's still messed. And so it's. It's this wonderful, like you got through to him, but only for a little bit.
01:35:33
Case
And there's still this like missing person. This like. Like your. Your best friend is. Is still denied you, but now you have a new best friend in. In Sam. And like, I just love the action of it. I. I love that the, like we get cool aerial combat with Sam. We get lots of good, like jumping around, fighting, punching, smacking stuff with shields with. With Cap. Maria Hill does some really like badass moments while she's being like the guy in the chair, like when Gar cards come for her. But it all comes down to that fight between Bucky and Cav. And like again, it's just really good. It's very video game boss setup, like where he's like across the bridge and it's like I gotta face off against you kind of moment there, but really solid. Just. Just an excellent third act.
01:36:15
Nicolas
It really comes together in a way that like, even if I was like seeing pre visualization something, I wouldn't believe that it came together this well. And even just like in the. In themes. It's like as we've had this discussion, like I've had these sort of ideas as to what the movie is really about sloshing around in my head. And it's like when you bring up the whole belonging and things like that. And one of the first notes I made when watching this movie, the most recent time, was that I always like it when. When a title means something a little bit different. Once you've actually got the context of the movie. And it's almost like the Winter Soldier is like the inversion of. It's because the movie is called Captain the Winter Soldier.
01:36:50
Nicolas
And it's almost like those are inversions of each other because Captain America is almost like if we could opposite the Summer Soldier. He's the one who's in the sun. He's the honest. He's doing what things for the greater good, but with honor and transparency. The Winter Soldier is the one who's doing it in the shadows, in the darkness. And the Winter Soldier represents exactly what Steve doesn't want to becoming within this sort of corrupt system. He doesn't want to be a drone. He doesn't want to be a mindless drone just listening to all borders and then forgetting, you know, like The CIA style, sort of the dodgier sides of covert operations. He wanted to stick his hands in the mud so that people could be free. But this isn't free. This is fear.
01:37:37
Nicolas
And it's another way that he feels like he doesn't belong, and that's the fear that he feels. And what's happened to his friend is what he is just such a strong representation of what he doesn't want to happen to him and what he doesn't want to happen to his country and his world and his friends. It's about taking responsibility. And I think that this theme really does get expounded on in civil war in terms of his approach to individual autonomy. And that doesn't mean we give up the right to choose. We won't succeed every time, but we'll do that. We might fail. We'll do that together, too. That's really. It's when I brought. And I would like to bring it back to what I said in the beginning. It's about, like, the sort of contrast between control and freedom.
01:38:18
Nicolas
But in order for something to be meaningful, you can't keep controlling everything in life. You have to let some chips fall where they may, because that's where beauty and things come in. But then that there's a sacrifice of potentially failing, potentially getting hurt, potentially being stood up for a date, potentially being fired from your job. But that's what you need to do in order to actually be yourself. We don't always succeed, but that doesn't mean we give up the right to choose. And we'll do that together, too. And I think that's such a beautiful thing that is so embodied in this character in this sort of trilogy and then in the extension of the franchise itself.
01:38:53
Case
Yeah, yeah. I mean, just to build off what you're saying, like, Cap doesn't win this fight in the end. Like, it is personal. It ultimately ends up being him against the Winter Soldier, one one. But the way he takes down the helicarriers is he appeals to people. Like, he works as a team. He has friends like he has Nat, he has Maria, he has Falcon. But then he makes the message to all the SHIELD People and that, you know, like, enough HYDRA people are corrupted that their helicarriers still get up. But it's not without effort. Like, he is able to appeal to a lot of people and speak to the value of community. But that community isn't through order and imposition. It is through voluntary action.
01:39:33
Case
It is everyone deciding that we are going to work together and we're going to put our faith in some people sometimes like Captain's orders is a thing there where people are listening to Captain Robert Rogers. But, but it doesn't change the fact that they are choosing to work for the greater good as opposed to being ordered to try to make the worst evils go away. That I think is the difference there. And I think that's a really astute point there. The, it's the whole like the good war part of World War II, like where it was like here's the really obvious evils of the world and here's the really obvious good of it.
01:40:06
Case
And I like that summer soldier kind of analogy there where it's very much in the daylight like he was the guy on the serials that they would play to sort of inspire confidence as opposed to being the guy doing all the wet work stuff being the, the Cold War soldier doing the mystery kind of things. I, I really like that analysis there.
01:40:25
Nicolas
Thank you. And, but I couldn't agree more with your whole like Captain Steve appeals to the humanity in the people around him and that's what, that's what ultimately wins the day. And I will. I would like to bring up like two points that could potentially are like potential criticisms of this take philosophically. One sort of thing that gets bandied around about this particular film is the idea that the politics ends up becoming kind of simple. That's not, I'm not saying that as a problem a critique of the movie but just in terms of its feet, the presentation of its themes in that it presents an idea that as long as we get rid of all the bad people in the system then all will be well. Which as we kind of know sometimes it's the system that does need dis. I don't know.
01:41:12
Nicolas
This is getting.
01:41:13
Case
Steve argues that the system has to go down.
01:41:15
Nicolas
Yes, exactly.
01:41:16
Case
I don't. I. Because like I agree with where you're coming from here. Like Steve says like hey we need like this shield needs to come down that the, that the infrastructure that was put in place had way too many people blindly following it looking to minimize bad. So I, I think Steve actually comes. Comes down on the right side of this. I don't know necessarily how much I want to champ like do I want to make this a leftist utopia kind of thing? Because I think that the general ethos of the Marvel U is like center left, a few left leaning kind of things but it's sort of existing in a space where there's A lot of financial interests that keep it from going too far. Like, my whole spiel about how Iron Man's whole clean energy thing disappears after the first Avengers movie.
01:42:01
Case
And, like, God, wouldn't it be cool to be living in worlds with ARC reactors and so forth? Like, they're in an appeal to the status quo that has to exist just by virtue of it being a movie in this larger continuity. Like, we can't see what the world. Yeah, we can't see what the world looks like once America's, like, spy infrastructure disappears completely. But we can see what it looks like once, like, an organization goes away.
01:42:21
Nicolas
Yeah, no, that's true. 100%, I suppose. Just another sort of, like, retort to your. Not a retort, but just an expansion of your take. When you said a voluntary taking up the mantle, so to speak. In what way do you think this film's presentation could be taken Randian? As. As long as there are the powerful people taking responsibility, then we'll be okay.
01:42:47
Case
I don't think it's Randian like, but I do think that it is part of the American conversation to have sort of Randian libertarian kind of elements of it. I think that the art. The. The counterpoint to this, to being, like, too Ayn Randian in the sense of it being like, only. Only like, the great man is sort of leading history through this is that enough people, like, actually volunteer. Like, people, like, put their lives on the line. Like, the one guy is like, no, I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna raise those ships, even though he knows he's just gonna get shot and it's gonna happen anyway. I would argue that this is a scenario where society, like, there is a collectivist kind of approach to things, but it's a.
01:43:24
Jmike
It. The.
01:43:26
Case
But it. It's one where that collectivism is at odds with an authoritarian state. And finding the balance is sort of the difficult point there because, like, if this movie Iron man would totally, like, buck the system and do it by himself. But Cap doesn't do that. Like, Cap. Cap appeals to democracy. He appeals to. To a collective population to do the right thing and is supposed to be the paragon leading them the way in that. And that gets back to the whole Superman thing. Superman's not interesting where he's just doing. Solving problems by himself. Superman is interesting where he's inspiring people to better because of the way he solves those problems. Like, it's. It's only so interesting for Superman to stop a tidal wave, like, taking out of village so many times. Like it. It's Superman.
01:44:09
Case
Doing, doing the right thing in the face of it and inspiring people to do little versions of the right thing is where it gets really interesting. And Captain America is fully doing that in this movie.
01:44:20
Nicolas
I completely agree, actually. And I almost think that there's a sort of intrinsic quality that I think is very appreciated, especially in like a sort of postmodern, 20th, 21st century sort of view of things. Where I should bring it back to. If you guys seen.
01:44:35
Case
Andor I haven't. I know I'm a huge Star wars fan and it's. It is just that the DC or not the dc, the Disney glut of stuff happened right when I had my daughter and it's just very hard for me to keep up.
01:44:50
Nicolas
Oh, okay. I'm very good at explaining something without spoiling it. There's a, there's a sub arc where someone writes a manifesto and he talks about how fascism is fragile and that's why you have to be so strong and stern in keeping it together. Whereas freedom and honor and kindness actually is an innate intrinsic quality to the human spirit. Whereas I think that especially in the 21st century, that's become a bit of an uncool belief. You know, like, especially with post apocalyptic fiction in Western post apocalyptic fiction. This idea that as soon as we Netflix gets shut down, we all just pick up, we all just start murdering and looting. You know, that's just not how history has unfolded. You know, in ancient Sumeria, that was the first civilizations because they had, it was a desert. They.
01:45:39
Nicolas
They had to cooperate and form languages and that's how humans exist. And I find that the idea of it at the end of this film and the whole sort of superhero element, like the Superman ethos that you're talking about in this whole way is the idea that humanity and the inner humanity in all of us is fundamentally good. And it actually takes external circumstances to diminish that. We are, we all first and foremost are good. And there are, but there's plenty of, of evil and maliciousness in the world. But. But that's not how we're. That's not. That's not the innate part of the human spirit.
01:46:20
Case
Yeah, I think the movie supports that because, like, there's the whole argument that Hydra made the world as chaotic and dangerous as it did. Like, there's the implication in this movie that like the Cold War got as bad as it did. The war on Terror occurred. The way it did, all because of Hydra. Now do I love that it creates a big bad that is, you know, behind the scenes making all of humanity's woes necessarily be you know, blamed on someone else? I, I, no, because I, I do also think that we should take our evils and our actions and the systems that are in play that it doesn't necessarily need to be like. I think there's a lot of systems that make people do bad things that aren't necessarily a will at the top of it.
01:47:00
Case
I think it is just the nature of how systems work.
01:47:04
Nicolas
That was a point that I did want to ask because that is a counterpoint to a lot of the thing. It almost comes across as, in some ways as like a juvenile take or like an adolescent take is a better term. An adolescent take on contemporary politics in that. Yeah. This idea that there is one big bad and it's not necessarily the system or it's like it turns out there was this evil thing and it. Yeah, sorry. Yeah. It's a digression.
01:47:33
Case
And I think that the head cannon that makes it work. Okay. Is that while it is creating instability and chaos, that they are not necessarily like that. Hydra isn't. The Taliban is sort of the thing there.
01:47:45
Nicolas
Like these organizations like Hydra is a metaphor for the way that systems become against our interests.
01:47:54
Case
Yeah. To compare it with Batman Begins where they talk about the League of Shadows using economics as a way of attacking a civilization. I think you could see HYDRA as doing a lot of things that are behind the scenes. Creating economic instability, trade wars. Putting things at home are like putting whispers in people's ears where it's like, you have to protect the interests of your nation versus your nation, like those kind of things to create a hostile environment With a light touch. I think a soft touch approach to world manipulation can justify Hydra being a big bad without necessarily absolving humanity of its bad actions.
01:48:29
Nicolas
It also doesn't necessarily preclude that. It's not saying that HYDRA is the only thing making the world back.
01:48:36
Jmike
Right.
01:48:36
Case
Exactly, exactly.
01:48:37
Nicolas
It's not like the One Ring or Sauron or something, right?
01:48:42
Case
Yeah, like. Yes, exactly. Like Sauron is like uniting all of the evil of the world under its like, evil power. In, in this. I'm okay with a scenario where HYDRA is everywhere and is making things worse, but like I said that there's still bad things out there, but it is a challenge. And like it's an MCU movie. Is it necessarily going to have the most nuanced take on it? No, I don't expect it to. I. I expected to ask for it a question and then allow for the audience to sort of, like, come to, like, where they think about it. Because if it was trying to be too prescriptive of, you know, of its stance on politics, then I. Then it comes off as preachy, and it's not the kind of. And it wouldn't reach as many people.
01:49:22
Case
Like, a movie like this, I think, does a good job of asking a lot of questions about politics under the guise of. In the first movie, instead of Nazis, it's the super scientist, like, fringe group of Nazis. And. And in this, it's. It's still that super science fringe group of Nazis, but they're now manipulating systems that are in place and systems that we allowed, you know, that we allowed for this intelligence infrastructure. We allowed for the Patriot Act. If we're talking about US Politics, the world has allowed for a scenario where the US Is able to function as a bully and put, like, bases in nations that we have no business having bases in for. For reasons that, like, only become obvious the second you're like, well, what about the other way around?
01:50:00
Case
Why doesn't, you know, why aren't there French bas like, throughout the United States as just an example of the sort of weird world that we have allowed ourselves to become a part of in the 20th and 21st century in a lot of cases, because of fear. And Hydra becomes the metaphor or metaphorical representation of that fear. So I think that, you know, like I said, the movie comes down to a very personal moment there where it's two soldiers in this. Again, like, I really like the summer soldier, winter soldier metaphor there because that gets down to the personal connection at the very end. Like, two soldiers forced to go different ways. Like, one is the wetworks, one is the. The public facing. I get the medals guy. And we. We see how they. They ultimately come.
01:50:44
Case
Come to blows at the end of this movie. So I think that's a really cool analysis right there. And.
01:50:50
Nicolas
And you know what you say, oh, it's the mcu. It's a big, broad thing. But you know what? In a movie called Captain America 2, it's brought up this kind of conversation between three people. You know, I think that's really the point. It's asking the right questions. And I think it did it incredible, incredibly elegantly. And the movie's 11 years old, but it still feels incredibly current. And, yeah, there's almost nothing I can say to really describe how much I think that this is such A spot on work of literary fiction of the superhero genre.
01:51:24
Case
Yeah. So let's shift because we've talked about the cool, big action scenes, and I wanted to talk about the cool, big action scenes because I love. And it's a great. I, I think that they use action as a really effective way to get story stuff across. They like, we get a lot of Captain America story by way of it. We get the conflict between him and Bucky by way of action. But we have a lot of other cool character bits that I want to talk about, and we've brought up some of them. But I said we wanted to talk about Peggy. We got to talk about Peggy, because if we don't talk about Peggy, we can't talk about Sharon. And Sharon's like, the addition of this movie that completely whiffed Peggy Carter. Goddamn, did they oversell it in the first movie?
01:52:02
Case
Like, the chemistry between Haley Atwell and Chris Evans as a romantic couple is so good. And then this movie, man, it hurts so much that she's old and that she has apparently Alzheimer's or some kind of degenerative mental condition. Nicholas, I don't know about you personally, so the lore of the show is that this started while I was the caretaker for my grandfather, while he was suffering from dementia. And so, like the, like, this was a show I would just edit when, like, while I was like, in his basement with a baby monitor next to me. So, like, I have, like, very firsthand experience, like, with a person who is going through this sort of debilitating mental condition on this one. I don't know if you've dealt with any family members or anything like that where you've seen, like, Alzheimer's or anything.
01:52:45
Nicolas
No, no. Close family members, myself.
01:52:47
Jmike
Okay.
01:52:48
Nicolas
More distant ones.
01:52:49
Case
Yeah, Yeah. I, I, I mean, it's so painful seeing, I mean, age just does it in general. We get the sort of, like, mental component of it where she's lucid and then she's not. And Steve has to go through the experience of her seeing him for the first time again and again. Like it's like a Groundhog Day situation. And, like, that's so painful for him. Like, you see that this isn't the, like, when we get the scene with Peggy where they're talking for a while, we see that he's been, he definitely has been interacting with her for a while because he says knowing that she was part of the founding of SHIELD Is why he's okay. With this. And it's after his mission with S.H.I.E.L.D. So. So he's been doing this in part because she encouraged him.
01:53:28
Case
But that means that she continuously is doing this sort of like, snap to like forgetting the whole thing and. And seeing him again for the first time. And he has to witness it and he has to, you know, he has to, like, calm her down. He says, like, I couldn't miss my best girl. Like, like he has to, like, deal with that sort of emotional element of this character. And that's so painful.
01:53:51
Nicolas
It really is genuinely heartbreaking. And it's also a different kind of strength I think Steve really exhibits in that moment because for one, you know, he will be selfless until the end. That's really his main thing. And he wants, you know, he wants to lighten it. Like, I couldn't, couldn't leave my best girl, you know, standing, especially when she owes me a dance. But every time he sees it must just make his heart drop because this is the woman he loves. You know, it's a very different. It's a very strange kind of situation just to see that happen, I'm sure. I think it's. There's plenty of, like, examples of this sort of thing in media, especially in like, big, larger scale kind of stuff. And it's easy to kind of assume that it. In the framing, that it's like a science fiction, it's a.
01:54:30
Nicolas
It's a fictional thing, but this exact interaction happens every single day. Oh, yeah, it may. It may be dramaticized, and maybe in a sort of sci fi fantasy setting here, but it's such a. It's such a universal part. Element of the human experience that I think this film really humanizes everything about the soul of this movie. I think it's the scene, even though technically the scene doesn't need to be there, but I think it does. This movie would have been completely different if you just cut straight from the previous scene to the next scene. And it almost forms the real heart of the whole thing.
01:55:09
Case
Yeah, it's that compassion that Captain America has for everyone. It establishes that he truly loved Peggy, that it wasn't just. Just like a, you know, a lustful situation. Like he wasn't just into her because she was hot. Like, this is a person he truly loves and wants to. Wants to be there for her, even in her. Her later years. And like, I think that's really good. I think it does a really good job of doing the soldier come home from war situation on a very dramatic Scale, like the outside of time and the war part of it, you know, really magnifies this whole situation that real people deal with when they. When they go off and they come back and make maybe people like life has changed for. For the people that they've left behind in. In very meaningful ways sometimes.
01:55:50
Case
Sometimes they've moved on, sometimes they've. They've had families, sometimes they've gotten sick and had their own issues. And this is happening with Peggy in a really dramatic way. I think it's really good. I think it has a. A parallel structure to what we see with Sam when Cap goes to visit him at the va. I think that we see again, showing that. That Sam, that Falcon is the. Is the true inheritor for the Captain America mantle and for him being his true, like, friend and sidekick.
01:56:20
Case
I think the fact that Sam's response to having been over there and having lost his wingman and having seen, you know, the horrible things about war and coming home and having to sort of feel like the bed doesn't fit him, right, that, you know, that he's sleeping on a pillow, that everything's wrong, is to be empathetic and to. To be a counselor for people. Like he. He reaches out to other veterans and, like, that kind of concern. Like, for one thing, it makes him really good at working with Cap because Cap's also a veteran who's dealing with his own, you know, probably his own degree of ptsd.
01:56:51
Case
Like, it's very weird PTSD because, like, not all soldiers are, you know, injected with a super drug that makes them function better than anyone on the planet, then sent off as a publicity figure and for a period of time before being launched around the world for. For war scenes against Nazi super scientists, where he's being with flamethrowers and laser guns and then being frozen in ice and losing everyone. That's a different kind of PTSD that than everyone else is facing, but it's definitely a form of ptsd. So Sam can relate to Cap in that way, but Sam is also like Cap in that way. Like, is empathetic and wants to be there for people who are hurting in ways that he can. Can respond to them and answer them in really good ways. So I think, Nicholas, you're right.
01:57:34
Case
Like, the Peggy scene is super important to understanding Cap, and it's super important to understanding where, like, what kind of person Cap is. And then that makes it more obvious when we see the people who are. Have similar kind of moments like that. We get Sam having that. That similar moment in the va and honestly, we get Bucky having a similar moment like that when we see him. Like, it's not. It's not quite the same, but. But it's that loving nature. When we see the flashback to. To Cap and his, like, tiny body coming back from the mother. His funeral. Like, we. We get these really emotional moments where we see that the. The heroes really care outside of the context of what can you do for me? And can I. Can I block a bullet for you? They're. They're good for that.
01:58:15
Case
But what they're also good for being there is for being the. The heart and being an ear and being that warm, empathetic person.
01:58:23
Nicolas
I couldn't agree more. That's almost like the. The. The very soul of. Of the superhero. You know, like I said. I said in the beginning, it's. It's. It's not. It's the superhuman element. The super isn't the interesting part, like a cool jumping tall buildings in a single bound, but what we actually really connect with is the human. And that's.
01:58:40
Jmike
That.
01:58:40
Nicolas
That's what's really exemplified here. And I completely agree that it's. It's. It's the appealing to that is that. That really. I guess in this. In thesis of this whole genre, that's really what it's saying is that compassion and these are all just different examples of. Of demonstration of compassion and bravery that isn't purely physical or pragmatic.
01:59:04
Jmike
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't Cap take over the meetings after the snap?
01:59:10
Nicolas
Yes.
01:59:11
Case
Yes, he does.
01:59:12
Jmike
Okay. I was like, oh, man, that movie's a long time ago.
01:59:15
Case
Yeah. Or at least something similar. Like, he's definitely a counselor. And it's really cool that we see that element of Cap because, I mean, it shows that Cap learns from the people he surrounds himself with. He's not just a taker.
01:59:28
Jmike
He.
01:59:28
Case
He gives himself in the same kind of way and carries on the work that he sees as being more important work. Like the VA Stuff is really important.
01:59:38
Nicolas
Yeah, I never made that connection, actually, that. It's like most people look up to Captain America within this world, but Captain America is actually. He's looking up to the memory of his best friend who's. Who's been gone for five years and he's taken over the responsibility in Endgame. That's. I never really realize that.
01:59:53
Case
Yeah, yeah. Like, while there are problems with the later movies that Marcus and McFeely have done, like, I. I really think that the through line of Captain America is really well handled. Between the, for between the three Captain America movies that they wrote and then the Avenger movies. Captain America gets such a great through line and you can see so such a wonderful emotional connection with him. Like again, that we get the. On your left as like such a big payoff line in Endgame. Like, is because we have such a strong relationship here between Cap and Sam. It's established so well. It does such a good job here and we get the relationship with Peggy at the end of Endgame. Like the time traveling stuff. Spoilers for Endgame came out six years ago. But, but you know, he time travels and rewrites history.
02:00:41
Case
Because we definitely see that it's not Steve in the pictures because we see the husband in pictures. Pictures in this movie. So we, we definitely see that it's not Steve. But Peggy hit like was such a hit. Like Haley Atwell's like great just in general as an actress and like is beautiful and stunning and like did such a great job as Peggy and then as Agent Carter in the, in the TV shows. She was really cool and just like a really compelling character. So it's understandable that people would make the assumption that she is the otp, that she's the one true partner for Captain America, when in fact, in the comics the one true partner is Sharon Carter, her niece, who is in this movie.
02:01:20
Case
And I think they do an okay job in this, but by the time we get to Civil War, it's very clear that the chemistry just isn't there in this movie.
02:01:29
Nicolas
I think it works well enough because it's just banter and it's a job for her and there's maybe some energy between the two of them, but it's not in any way reciprocated in any kind of a romantic sense. And then I, I just kind of think that they could have done the same thing. Just don't call her Sharon Carter. I think that's the only change you need to make for this to not be bizarre.
02:01:49
Case
And well, like, I get why they did it because like, when the first one came out, it's like, well, you know, like the real person that he's going to hook up with is her niece, Sharon Carter. That's going to be the important one. And like the idea is that Sharon Carter is like a good, like she's almost as good a spy as Black Widow. Like, she's, you know, she's a good foil for Captain America at like in the Modern day. Like, she's worldly, she's experienced. Like, she knows all the backroom deals and so forth. Like, she knows all the handshakes, whereas Cap is again very like, out front with like, with the medals and I'm the good guy kind of thing. So great pairing.
02:02:25
Case
But the thing is like, the, like, Peggy was introduced more as like a retcon to be like, this is the connection that Cap has to this girl. Sharon Carter has always been his, like, main partner in the comics. It's just like, man, like, Emily Van Camp just doesn't do. Like, they just don't have the same chemistry. Like, she does a good job in this movie and like, I, I, I buy it that she's on their side and like, I, I think she's a good guy. But like, they clearly didn't know what to do with her. They didn't use her for the endgame finale and then they didn't have anything to do with her. And so in the TV show, this is a more recent spoiler. She likes, she goes bad. And it's kind of a bummer. Yeah, she becomes a power burner. Yeah.
02:03:04
Case
And it's kind of a bummer because it was just they introduced this character and didn't have anything to do with her.
02:03:11
Nicolas
It's easy. The biggest misstep of this particular. If you, if you consider Captain America into the Avengers, like this sort of sub, sub franchise, I think her character is easily the biggest misstep in the whole thing. Like, like you say, it's, especially in this movie. It's not, it's not bad. It's just that, like you say, they just don't have it anything to do with her.
02:03:29
Jmike
You know, like, I didn't really feel like they had any chemistry. If anything, like Natasha and Steve had more chemistry than she did with Cap.
02:03:37
Nicolas
Oh, I actually want to talk about Nat. I want to see praise for Nat in this movie. Honestly, I wrote down. It's like you say there's a bit of a sibling sort of energy to it, but like, there's something so unique, genuinely about, about the chemistry between Steve and Nat that it's so fundamentally supportive and they are so fundamentally comfortable with one another that this occasional, like, sexual or flirtatious energy doesn't threaten their friendship and their respect for one another. It's like I would, I call them more than just colleagues, but it's, yeah, it's like it becomes the bond of a sibling. And it's like as I've grown older, you know, only weirdos say that men and women can't be friends. And it's like. It's just so beautiful to see this kind of bounded, platonic, soulmate energy being. Being.
02:04:25
Nicolas
Being described and portrayed in this way. I think they're awesome together. I think they have great chemistry. I think. Well, it's obviously a different kind of thing than Peggy and Steve, but I think that also she represents a great sort of the modern. She's very cold, wary. She's very like. She's also not comfortable in herself and where she is in life and her environment. So they play off each other great in that way. And she also has. I think this is easily the best, personally, the best Black Widow has ever been in any of the movies. I think she's pretty good in. In Endgame too.
02:04:58
Nicolas
But, like, her characterization here really does feel like she's mysterious and regretful and remorseful, but still very dangerous and powerful and compassionate, whereas she becomes a bit more generic superhero like the girl in a lot of them, I think. But this one, I love her. She's maybe my favorite part of this movie. I just wanted to. Wanted to wave the Black Widow flag, really.
02:05:20
Case
Yeah, I mean, she's. I really like her in this. Aside from her hair, I think I don't love her hair in this movie, which is such a patriarchy kind of thing to say anyway. But I'm just. I think that if we're looking for pure aesthetics, I like her hair in Iron Man 2. And if we're looking for functionality in Avengers 1 where it's just like a bob, I think it's a little too long in this movie for how straight it is. It's not quite practical. It's not quite anything. Anyway, that's my hair aside. But I fully agree. I. I love the. The vibe between them. You know, it's kind. It's kind of funny. I imagine, like. I imagine that Nat is poly. Like, she might have, like, a. A specific partner that she is looking. Or she might be looking for like a.
02:06:05
Case
A main partner, but I. I feel like she could exist in a world where she could have, like, casual sex and it wouldn't be a big deal, but. And I feel like she could have casual sex with Steve, but Steve is, like, monogamous to the degree like. Like on a. A Kinsey scale of like 0 to 10 and 0 being the most monogamous, he is somehow like a negative one monogamy wise.
02:06:24
Jmike
Wise.
02:06:24
Case
Like, to the point where it's just like, well, yeah, obviously Peggy. He's going to go back in time for the like the. His one true partner kind of guy. And so that's why. And they're like, just like, they're cool with that where it's just like, yeah, no, like, no, I'm definitely not going to hook up with you because, like, I'm still like, hung up on Peggy Carter. And. And that's the unspoken thing throughout this movie where like, she's trying to get him to date someone. And. And he's like, no, I'm like, he does claim that he's kissed someone else in the time. Which my headcanon is. It's the waitress from the Avengers movie. Forget the actress's name, but she's on critical role.
02:06:57
Nicolas
Ashley Johnson.
02:06:58
Case
Yeah, I. That's my headcanon that he like, hooked up with her because she, like, they were supposed to be setting up the flirtation.
02:07:04
Nicolas
There was a deleted scene. Yeah, the movie where she passes the number.
02:07:08
Case
Yeah, yeah. But that's just like I said, headcanon. It doesn't matter. He. He could have kissed anyone at this point. But I think that he is still hungry. Up on Peggy. If, if it was a different kind of guy, he. I could see him hooking up with. With that and they could just like be work colleagues that happen to like sleep together every now and then and it's fine. But he's a. He's not that kind of guy. He's. He's a very like traditional like 1940s kind of guy. And, and she's cool with that. And thus their relationship is established and it's consenting and it's like exactly what each, each party is comfortable with.
02:07:39
Nicolas
There's also another element that I wanted to. I. It was my last note that I put in all caps, like. Yeah. That you said that you said like he's like a 1940s guy. And the most 1940s thing about this movie, the crazy jackets he wears. And I don't know if you guys noticed, the jacket he wears at the end of this movie is bananas. It's. Notice it's like. It's like an ostrich skin Crocodile Dundee leather jacket with like flared lapels. Go back to look at it. It's. It's. It's a real statement. And I was just like, wait, that's Steve.
02:08:15
Jmike
Yeah.
02:08:16
Nicolas
At the cemetery where he looks at Ezekiel 25:17. Look at the jacket he wears. It's.
02:08:21
Case
Oh my God, that. That's such a Great deal. Like, so I, I, you know what? I, I haven't looked too much at the jackets that he's worn. I've just, like, seen his civilian clothes. That, that's such a great detail because, like, so J. Mike and I are in the D.C. area. So, like, there. So I, there's a lot of stuff in this movie that is. We see every day stuff we see every day or designed to look like stuff we see every day because, like, they shot, I believe in Cleveland for the road scene or like the highway scene. But regardless, they, so they double a lot of stuff. But like, his apartment, they like, clearly are Dupont Circle. And it's like, oh, I drive through that area like, all the time.
02:08:56
Case
Like, I had just been at a bachelor party like, a few weeks earlier when this movie came out that was like, right where he, his, like, apartment is supposed to be. So, like, it was like, very cool that I was like, looking for those things. I wasn't looking at his jackets. And like, it's very fun that you picked up on that detail.
02:09:12
Nicolas
That's, that's a little post credit little game that everyone else can play now that they've gotten to the end of this one. Go back and look at Steve's jackets because they, it's you. There's 80 years of mismatch of fashion sensibility that is just in every single one. Like, he's always wearing slacks and he's always got like a big, boxy jacket. It's like it's sort of contemporary and modern, but he's definitely out of time. And I love all those details. But it's also, it didn't stand out too much because you guys didn't notice.
02:09:40
Case
Yeah, yeah. Because I mean, it looks like he doesn't know how to, like, dress necessarily. Or at least I always assumed that he didn't know how to dress. But like, I love that you're, like, calling it out as, like, these fashion mismatches like that. That's great. I love the awkwardness that Steve has, like, fitting into this world. Like, the list that he keeps is such a great detail of it. But one thing I want to call out is the appearance by dc. What is it? DC Durkins from Dare Comedy. The, The Apple tech guy who shows up. He's a, A TV writer. He was a writer on Community, which is why he knows the Russo brothers. When he shows up, it was like, oh, like it's the guy from all the Derek comedy videos is showing up here.
02:10:17
Case
Steve is so awkward trying to be like, we're going to New Jersey for we're married.
02:10:24
Nicolas
Oh yeah, his delivery of we're married. Yeah, incredible. There's also a couple little things I just wanted like, I feel like comment sections can be very mean and I just want to tell everyone that, yes, we did notice that. That's Anthony Russo playing the doctor.
02:10:42
Case
Yep.
02:10:42
Jmike
Yeah.
02:10:42
Nicolas
Yeah. You don't need to remind us. The ending where Chris Evans is crawling through gantries to try and plug a USB port is very reminiscent of his exact same third act thing in Sunshine. Great film. 10 Out of 10 copie smolders is in it. Yes, we did. Remember, I always found her a bit strange and a bit outside the MCU every single time she comes in. But yeah, she's there.
02:11:07
Case
It's an interesting casting choice because she was so popular for How I met your mother at the time when this came out. And so she's known as like a sitcom actress. And then she's like this badass spy woman in these movies. But she does a good job. I really love the shot where like she sees on the security camera that guys are coming in. She like rolls back, shoots them and then goes back to being like guy in the chair just giving them info about the mission. But, but yes, Maria Hill was as. As evidenced by that. They haven't really done much with her since, like since these movies. Like a character that they put in because they felt they needed to put in.
02:11:40
Case
And I think they cast well and used her effectively, but like only had so much material to use her for.
02:11:46
Nicolas
I also think that just for the plot of this film, like you do need that sort of someone to be there for the action that she does. There has to be someone there for Nick to save him and stuff like that. And also another little note, I did mention it briefly over there. Yes, we do know that Nick Fury's Tombstone quotes Ezekiel 25:17 from Pulp Fiction, right?
02:12:08
Case
Yes.
02:12:08
Nicolas
Don't need to remind us of that either.
02:12:10
Case
Path of the righteous man. Yeah. The only thing I'm surprised that we didn't see anything that said badass on it. Like supposedly his lightsaber.
02:12:20
Nicolas
Oh yeah, he also has a lightsaber. It's mace window. He digs through the ground. Yes, we did notice that one. Although he does have a line at the end of. It's the post credit scene of Infinity War where he's fading out and he goes Mother.
02:12:33
Jmike
Yeah, right.
02:12:34
Nicolas
Yeah, she's out. So that was. That was that part. If he does come back, I don't know. At what point does he become a scroll? I don't know. I don't. I don't pay attention to that part of the MCU or some. Yeah, at what point? Yeah, we're not getting that far in.
02:12:46
Case
The future, but the MCU has spiraled into weird directions. But at the point where Captain the Winter Soldier came out, it was still relatively contained and made sense.
02:12:55
Nicolas
But, yeah, let's hope that if he's in like a Deadpool and Wolverine, then he can finally say the line. They've announced a fourth Deadpool movie and that sets under the way, so maybe Nick Fury can finally say it.
02:13:09
Case
Yeah. We should also call attention to the fact that, yes, Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury is phenomenal casting, considering the fact that they basically said, we're going to use Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury in the Ultimates when they redesigned him from being a white man.
02:13:22
Nicolas
Didn't he inquire because he saw a copy of the comic book and was like, why does he look like me?
02:13:27
Case
Right? He was like, you can use my face as long as I get permission to be him in the movie.
02:13:31
Nicolas
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Lovely time. The Ultimates is actually my sort of in, like, I've read all of Ultimate Spider man all the way through.
02:13:40
Jmike
Oh, wow.
02:13:41
Nicolas
Miles Morales. That's like main in. So that's like the vibe that. And I, I do think that a lot of the sort of 2000s comic book MCU especially did take a lot from. From the ultimate timeline. And I think it's. It's. It's an intelligent modernization. Even though, as you say, Mark Milan is a bit complicated.
02:13:57
Case
But I think, yeah, it's complicated. I think there's a lot of really good things going on there. There's also some, like, there's interesting things going on in that book. Like the first volume of the Ultimates is. Is just ultimate story decompression, no pun intended, where it's like we're going to build up to the Hulk going wild. And like, that's going to be the. The only story point. It takes like four issues for that to happen. So, like, it. It's a comic that really likes just like spending time in on the minutia and gave them the. The space to do some of the, like, the attention to detail that would help set up, like, the mcu. Like, the attention to, like the flight crews needed to like, really like, set up Iron Man's armor and like. Or like the, you know, the.
02:14:36
Case
The funkiness of Captain America coming out of the ice and being. They like, spent a lot of time on that, so fun details there. But it. But certainly it's a written for the trade kind of comic, you know, is. Is all well and good, but. But man, when I was reading it issue to issue and it was constantly delayed, it was a frustrating book to read because nothing would happen, but it was still a really good book. Do we have any other big notes that we want to talk about? Because we talked for over two hours now about. About this movie. And I really love this movie. I've talked a lot about this movie before. I've talked a lot this episode. I'm sorry, Nicholas and J. Mike. I just. I just like gushing about this movie. It's really good.
02:15:16
Nicolas
Me too. I mean, I really do. There's so much about it that I actually, the reason I brought this up when you asked me which. Which film I wanted to discuss is because I genuinely think that for where it is now, I think that this is the most important movie in the MCU because it comes off the back of Phase One. It's very experimental. The Avengers, okay, it just about worked. It came together and then it came off two movies that were very divisive. Iron Man 3 and thought of the Dark World. I remember at the time, were all like, oh, this is so mainstream and lame. They're all just cookie cutter. And then this comes out. And now every other project they seem to announce is, yeah, this is like. This is like the Winter Soldier. This one's more like the Winter Soldier.
02:15:55
Nicolas
It's more like which. Which just means it has a desaturated palette and spies in it. Like, but. But this one, like, it has all the hallmarks of, like, the things that are irritating about the MCU over the years and comic book movies and big blockbusters in general. But this is the one where it worked, and that's why we keep on coming back to it. And it. It has something legitimate to say, which I think is an incredible achievement. And I think, yeah, it does get its flowers, but I think. Think it's. I'd be happy to throw another one on.
02:16:31
Case
Yeah, I. I like, you're totally right. Like, this movie, like, this is the 12 punch of the MCU frankly, saying, like, oh, we can do anything, because the Avengers was like this huge, like, build up that, like, was a remarkable thing that occurred. But then, like you said, we had two movies that were, like, kind of middling, like Iron Man 3. People were like, oh, have we lost the Luster And Thor the Dark World? A lot of people were like, I don't know if. I don't know if these Thor movies are actually, like, all they're cracked up to because the first one didn't have, like, people liked it, but they didn't, like, love it.
02:16:58
Jmike
Love it.
02:16:59
Case
And then this movie came out, and this was weird because it came out in March, I believe, and then April.
02:17:04
Nicolas
April. Was it April 2014?
02:17:06
Case
Yeah, either way. Then we had the. It was March 13th in Los Angeles, in United States, April 4th. So April 4th. So you're right. Then we had Guardians of the Galaxy, which. Which was their big summer blockbuster. And those two movies were the, like, oh, yeah, the MCU is going to. Is going to. Is here to see day. Because we. We nailed it. We did another Captain America movie, which is hard to like from the outset. Saying that we're going to do a Captain America is hard. Captain America, they have failed at doing a lot. Like, if you go back and look at the 1990 movie with J.D. Salinger's son, which is where he learns.
02:17:36
Nicolas
To steal a car.
02:17:37
Case
Which is where he learns to steal a car.
02:17:38
Jmike
Thank you.
02:17:38
Case
I was actually trying to. I was trying to work my way to that. Thank you. Exactly. Where he learns to steal a car. Like, it. It. Like, it's a hard movie. It's a pretty faithful Captain America story, but it's a hard movie to make, like, look really good.
02:17:50
Jmike
They.
02:17:51
Case
They did a really good job of making a Captain America movie that was a period piece. And then they did this one and they combined it with the spy stuff. And, like, that was a really seamless transition fusion of the. These two genres right there that worked really well. And saying, like, oh, we can do superhero movies that are all kinds of things. And then they did Guardians of the Galaxy, which is just like a little bit of superheroes on a space opera kind of movie. And they're like, oh, an MCU movie can be, like, very broad, and we can do all kinds of things, and we can. We can play with genre and in a way that we hadn't really been able to in phase one. And, like, there's an argument that Iron Man 3 is, like a buddy cop movie and that.
02:18:26
Case
That Thor, the Dark World is a fantasy movie. But I think that they're. Because they're less effective. This is the movie that's saying, like, look how. How much we can do in the mcu, like, how Fertile of a playground it is for ideas that we can. We can do stories again. We can have big political conversations in this movie. We can have very personal details about the characters in this movie. And we can make it a real selling thing that. That is full of action and is gripping and appeals to a lot of people, but also makes you think. And I think it does a really good job of being a movie that provokes the kind of discourse that, you know, we can't fucking shut up about. Like, this is a long episode.
02:19:05
Jmike
Ditto.
02:19:06
Nicolas
I. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. This is. I was so excited to come on for this one and I'm really proud that it could be this one. And also Happy Independence Day.
02:19:16
Jmike
Hope.
02:19:17
Nicolas
Hope this serves as like a reminder to believe in ourselves again and what you know.
02:19:25
Case
Well, yeah, Hydra's taken over the real world.
02:19:28
Nicolas
Exactly.
02:19:34
Jmike
There we go.
02:19:35
Nicolas
We were skirting political agnosticism for so long, right?
02:19:42
Case
No, this is a renowned left leaning podcast. But yes. Yeah. In the real world that we're facing, this is saying that one man can stand up to it and do a good job and face off against all that and lead people into a brighter future. So I'm really glad to look back on this movie again. I think it does a really good job of doing a low power Superman story and is really cool and ask the questions that you're would want to ask. Puts the stakes that you would want to put them against. You know, makes the foundation of the story be the moral backbone of the character.
02:20:21
Nicolas
It's impressive and I think that they've really done it. Like what was impressive about the First Avenger when it first came out was that it used all of the sort of the meta idea of the character in its. In the creation of the story. Like that's why he goes on the USO shows and things like that. And I think it does the same for the second one. It's. It's really a. Zack Snyder talks about deconstructionism, but this is. This is really like. This is a deconstruction of the genre itself because the main character is that it's everything to do with that. It's exploration of what that means in a modern world that isn't black and white and simple. And I think the third one also has. It's about when the people you do trust actually do have different opinions.
02:20:59
Nicolas
So they're all examples of different ways in which the story superhero manifests in can in us, not in the real world, but in us in our lives. Like in our world and how we can learn from that and grow and face challenges and realize that life isn't easy, but you never get better at it. It doesn't get harder, you just get better at it. Or it doesn't get easier, you just get better at it. And that's. You know, there's a kid watching these movies for the first time sometime this year. You know, I don't know how old you could be. I don't know. There's an 8 year old who's watching these really old movies now, and they're going to be inspired by this in the same way that were inspired by the classics of our respective days.
02:21:47
Nicolas
And this is one that I know will stand the test of time.
02:21:52
Case
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. J Mike, is there anything that we didn't hit that you wanted to discuss about this movie?
02:22:02
Jmike
This is one of those movies that I had always started but never quite finished. Like, I get halfway and I'm like, oh, I'll come back to it later. Something else I have to do.
02:22:08
Case
Really?
02:22:09
Jmike
Yeah. Our good friend.
02:22:11
Case
You hadn't seen this before?
02:22:12
Jmike
I hadn't seen it all the way through.
02:22:14
Case
Oh, my God.
02:22:15
Jmike
So our good friend Addie, friend of the show, has constantly been on my case because Ovid, from Communities in this movie, the other guy from Derek Comedy, he's like, how do you not finish watching this movie already now? I was like, oh, I mean, I'll get to it eventually. Like, sitting down and watching it, like making myself sit down and watch it all the way through. I was like, this is hell. Yeah, I missed this one.
02:22:38
Nicolas
Wait, so, J Mike, this is fascinating. I'm sorry, we have to take a couple minutes on this. What did you think?
02:22:44
Case
Yeah, like, sorry, we buried the lead here. I just assumed.
02:22:47
Nicolas
Sorry.
02:22:48
Jmike
Yeah, no, it was really good. Like, I was like, I, I, there's. I wasn't surprised by Bucky at all because I, I knew that going in, everyone was like, oh, my God. I was like, spoilers. But, like, it was a lot better than, like, people gave it credit for. Like, I was actually genuinely shocked of, like, some of the stuff they pulled in here. But my favorite thing about it was, like, the trust issue that Cap was, like, trying to, like, find his own people that, like, plays off much later on in the series because, like, you get to the point infinity War where, like, who pops up with him and Wakanda to accept Nat, Bucky, and t', Challa, because those are his people. So he found his own Little family of trust thing going on with. With a falcon too.
02:23:30
Jmike
And so I was like, oh, okay, cool. Like, seeing it's here, you see how it plays out later on. And then how, like, infinity War, it's all right, Infinity War, but Civil War plays out there too. But he's got his people there because those are his people that he trusts. And, like, the circle of trust, it's really big for him. And it's. It's really fun to see. Like, this is where it plays out and goes for it on.
02:23:52
Case
Wow.
02:23:52
Nicolas
So this was almost like a prequel for you.
02:23:55
Jmike
Well, kind of, because, like, I know how it all plays out. Like, yeah, it's just fun seeing things on screen.
02:24:03
Nicolas
I'm so excited that. Wow.
02:24:06
Case
Yeah. Like, I. I am sorry that I. I jumped into this without. Without establishing our. Our respective histories with the franchise, because I. We normally. We normally do talk about that when we talk about movies where, like, what. What is our experience with the franchise before we talk about it? And, like, I just assumed because this movie is such a. A milestone of the MCU and because we've talked about Captain America, the first avenger on the show before, I just sort of assumed.
02:24:31
Jmike
Like, I said I had seen parts of it, but I'd never, like, sat down and like, watched the entire. Made myself watch the entire thing all the way through. So I was like, okay, like, I know how that goes. Like, cool. I've seen this before. I've gotten this point. Okay, now I actually have to pay attention because I have never gotten past this point, which is always, like, after the Z. See, what is his name?
02:24:48
Case
Zola.
02:24:48
Jmike
Zola. The Zola thing. After the explosion at the. At the base. At the military base with Zola, I was like, all right, cool, I'll catch up with this later. Well, I was like, oh, okay.
02:24:56
Case
So you got all the reveals. You just hadn't gotten the.
02:24:59
Jmike
I hadn't gotten, like, the payoff, cuz I had seen, like, the helicarrier thing because everybody see that scene. So I was like, okay, I know this part, but everything in the. The middle right there, I was like,.
02:25:06
Case
Oh, okay, okay.
02:25:08
Jmike
It's cool.
02:25:11
Nicolas
That's.
02:25:12
Jmike
Wow.
02:25:13
Case
Wow.
02:25:13
Nicolas
Wow. Well, yeah, like I said at the beginning, we have three very different perspectives to share here. Yeah, I'm sorry, I wish we had referred to your naivete.
02:25:26
Jmike
I knew how it was all gonna play more often. It was fine. I knew how all this ends.
02:25:31
Case
Actually, motherfucker, I know how you made us not think that because you said, like, this movie Came out while you were in college.
02:25:36
Jmike
Yeah.
02:25:37
Case
And so it made it sound like you'd seen this movie in college.
02:25:40
Jmike
Like I said, like I've seen like certain parts.
02:25:42
Case
It, I was like, okay, you spy, you winter soldier.
02:25:46
Nicolas
You're about to whisper Hail Hydra in someone's ear here.
02:25:49
Jmike
Like, wow, it's so funny. Like, no one else heard him say that because he didn't really whisper at all. He was like, hydra. And I was like, no one else kind of turned around and look at him.
02:25:58
Nicolas
Yeah, that was a weird scene. That's, that's the one scene in this movie where I'm like, I, I, I kind of like. Yeah, like bounces off me, like just this portrayal.
02:26:09
Case
Well, I enjoy that they bring back, what is it? Garry Shandling as the douchebag senator and reveal that he's Hydra. I also, I had a note to talk about this and we haven't mentioned this one, which is that the attention to detail in terms of the Smithsonian thing, having Gary Sinise do the voice for it is really funny because he's a big veteran. I'll documentaries and whatnot. Kind of actor. And so it's just very fitting that we have like a famous actor doing like the Captain America like info dump that we need in this movie. Which by the way, this Smithsonian scene is such a great, like info dump for anyone who missed the first movie. Yeah, like, yes. Also. Also great. This movie has a lot of layers. It's really good. It's really good. J. Mike, would you say it's really good?
02:26:55
Jmike
Yeah, it's really good. Like I really enjoyed it. It's really good. So if you haven't seen this 14 year old movies, which is making my heart hurt saying that out loud.
02:27:05
Case
Well, 12 at the moment. 12 At the moment.
02:27:07
Jmike
12. Yeah. Doesn't make it any better. Keys. I can't believe it's been this long since that movie came out. Oh, my heart.
02:27:17
Nicolas
And you hadn't seen it four years.
02:27:21
Case
It's been so long. Okay, well, cool. Well, glad to know that we finally got you to see this movie, this fantastic movie in the mcu. On that note, Nicholas, thank you for joining us for this episode. It's really great that we got a chance to meet and chat with you and I'm glad we made this work considering that you're in South Africa at the moment, right?
02:27:45
Nicolas
I am, yeah. Across the world.
02:27:48
Case
So wonderful that technology allows us to do this call. Where can people find you?
02:27:52
Jmike
Follow you?
02:27:53
Case
What have you got going on?
02:27:54
Nicolas
Okay.
02:27:54
Jmike
Oh, yeah.
02:27:57
Nicolas
Okay. So, yeah, my name is Nicholas Catalan. You can catch me on Instagram. That's where I'm most often. It's. It's a N I C O L A S dot C A T T E L A N. Ask me a question. Pop me a. Pop me a message. I love chatting. This was one thing when the show came was airing, when Glow Deck was airing, I had loads of people talking about, oh, what's your favorite Star Trek movie? Who's your favorite captain? I love having those conversations. I will happily do that till the cows come home.
02:28:25
Case
Don't. Don't give full answers because we are you super long. But I am curious. Favorite Star Trek and favorite captain.
02:28:31
Nicolas
Favorite movie? It's. It's 0909.
02:28:34
Case
Really? Okay.
02:28:35
Nicolas
Yeah, it's. It's my favorite. My favorite captain is pike from Strange New World.
02:28:41
Case
From Strange New World. Okay, nice.
02:28:42
Nicolas
There you go. Nice.
02:28:44
Jmike
There we go.
02:28:44
Nicolas
Cool. Yeah, catch me there. I'd love to have a chat.
02:28:47
Case
Excellent. Yeah. So again, we connected on Instagram and it was great, great connecting with you. I, I have. It definitely occurred when I had liked too many things like Bravo posts and then all of a sudden every below deck actor or actor star person, I don't know what the right term is, below deck person was being like pitched to me and I was like, Nicholas, that's right. He was a big nerd. I enjoyed him. I'm really glad that you're doing well. People should check out your season of Below Deck Med. It's available on Peacock. Check that out because it was very fun and you had some cute interactions and you didn't get fired for having to drink with the guests.
02:29:27
Nicolas
At the time I thought, what would Jack Sparrow do?
02:29:31
Jmike
Right?
02:29:32
Case
So thank you. Thank you for agreeing to come on the show. This was a blast, man. I really enjoyed having you on here.
02:29:38
Nicolas
Thank you so much. This has been such an honor to come on. You guys are really like, genuinely. This was a. I was scared that it was just going to be like, oh, yeah. So guys, next this scene happens and then did you know that in he says this. And that's a reference to the 1981 issue of. No, this is a real analytical show and I really appreciate your media literacy and how it can actually what it means to us, you know, And I appreciate your take on everything. And thank you. It's the exact kind of vibe I enjoy. And yeah, I can't wait to see more of the show forever. I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Aye aye, captain.
02:30:17
Case
Yeah, well, very much appreciate you being here, J Mike. Where can people find you and follow you? What have you got going on, man?
02:30:25
Jmike
You can mostly find me over the Discord. I'm always lurking and watching and reading things there. And you can also find me on Blue sky, which I'm kind of on. I might take a hiatus for a while, I don't know. But for now I'm over on blue sky at J5. Wait, what is it? J5 BlueSky Social.
02:30:44
Case
Nice. Well, and as J Bike mentioned, the Discord is a great way to get in touch with us. You can find a link to our Discord server in our show notes or at the website certainpov.com where you can come interact with J Mike and me and with all the other hosts of the certain POV shows. It's a great old time. Lots of fun conversations going on about Superman, stuff about ttrpg, stuff about video game stuff. All kinds of great conversations constantly happening there. So it's a great place to check it out if you want to connect with me. And you're not a fan of the whole Discord thing, which you know I get. Cause it's basically slack for fun people, but it's still slack for a of ton type of person.
02:31:21
Case
You can find me on most social media platforms, Aiken, with the exception of Instagram, where I'm holding on for dear life to my AIM screen name from high school, which is Quetzalcoatl5.q u e t Z A L C o a T L5 because I was pretentious in high school. I was also a legion of superheroes. Nerd. That's where the 5 comes from. I wasn't actually required to put a number there because this was that. That long ago. Because I am old as. Also, it was a pretty obscure Aztec deity that I chose for my Instagram handle.
02:31:52
Nicolas
Yeah, the God of the rain, I believe. A giant pterodactyl.
02:31:55
Case
Well, it's a big winged serpent. And then, yeah, there's the Quetzalcoatlus, which is the dinosaur or not dinosaur, the pterosaur named after it, which is the largest thing to ever fly. Looks like a giraffe, but with wings. It's a ridiculously big creature. Although there is a. The hexagopteryx is. Is. Sorry, this is such a tangent, but I just found out about this in the last couple years.
02:32:17
Nicolas
Dinosaur kid here.
02:32:18
Jmike
Yeah, no, I'm very aware.
02:32:20
Case
Hexadotrix is a pterosaur that occupied Europe during the Cretaceous period. That Functioned for the role of the T Rex. Like it had a big, like it was the big predator and it could just fly from island to island and then it would run down its foes, like four legged walk, like run down its foes and just like eat them. Just incredible stuff. Dinosaurs are so cool. I love dinosaurs. I also love mythology. I was pretentious in high school. Again, this is the whole thing. Well, you can find us here. You can find us on the YouTube channel, Certain POV Media. You can support the show if you want. We have a Patreon going for the show. So if you go to patreon.com certainpowmedia you can become one of our backers and those even at the free tier, we really appreciate people coming on.
02:33:02
Case
I write two essays a week, one for a nerdy topic of my choice which have been recently a lot of tech themed ones but like, you know, are just like whatever I feel like writing about and then one essay a week which is about a TTRPG topic. And so I am at the time of us recording this, just finishing up my breakdown of all these subclasses from D&D, 5th Edition, from Xanathar's Guide to Everything and talking about how they would be updated for the 2024 rule set again. Giant Nerd Giant. Massively pretentious. All. All this makes sense. So you can check out our Patreon and it would be really cool. We, we, like I said, even at the free tier we give you essays. At higher tiers we give you sneak peeks and clips of the show.
02:33:41
Case
And at the highest tiers, you get shoutouts at the end of every episode. Such as our example, executive producers Micah McCaw, Carter Hallett, Sean Muir, Lee Greger, Memento Young, Logan Crowley, Joe Masterpiero, Casey and Nancy Aiken, Adam Sampter and Keith Lettanen. These are wonderful people who are supporting us at our highest tier and so they get shout outs at the end of every episode if you want to be like them. That would be really awesome. Literally the week that we're recording this, I just had my second child. So, you know, helping keep the lights on would be appreciated. I, I have to say. But on that note, please tune in next time. Check out all the stuff we've got working on. Check out my other show, another pass. Check out certain pov. It's a great place with lots of great shows.
02:34:22
Case
And then circle back here for our next episode. And until next time, stay Super Man.
02:34:35
Jmike
Man of Steel is a certain POV production. Our hosts are J. Mike Folson and Case Agan. The show is edited by Sophia Ricciardi. Our logo is by Chris Bautista and episode art is by Case Aiken. Our theme is by Jen Moonan.
02:34:55
Case
Do you have a comic book you just can't stop thinking about? One that stuck with you years later on Trade School Guest who posts get the mic to talk about a graphic novel that changed the way they see the world or just made them fall in love with comics all over again. In just five to 15 minutes, you'll hear stories about the stories that real people love the most. Trade School a short form ongoing series about the comic book, trade paperbacks we love and why we love them. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. Certainpov.com.