REVIEW:
A movie that wants to be a combination of The Winter Solder and the Incredible Hulk 2, you have to give this one credit for trying, It definitely takes big swings. we are given a conspiracy political thriller angle in the first half, and then a monstrous, larger than life villains and creatures situation in the second half. All of this should work. And yet, a whole bunch of it doesn’t. The problem is the movie does too much and moves too quickly. Small moments aren’t given time to play out. Instead they are rushed. Dialogue isn’t given time to play out. Instead actors are speeding through their lines as if they are being timed to get the words out as fast as possible. At one point there actually is real dialogue that is given time and should be hitting with emotion, but instead of letting us listen to it, the movie plays fast moving music in the background the entire time, completely jarring with what the actors are saying. It takes us out of the moment, as if the movie didn’t trust the audience to be invested enough in the conversation. Everything generally feels clunky instead of smooth.
With two villains and a third quasi-villain at the end, to give us the big climactic fight, there’s a whole lot here. But the amount of villains isn’t the problem. There have been plenty of great movies loaded up with villains (including two Batman movies… Batman Begins and The Batman.) The problem is that in every little move, this one takes escalation too far, and wants to do too much at all times. Just take Anthony Mackie’s first action scene as Captain America here. It’s not enough that he has both the Captain America suit and shield, and also wings (keeping something from his Falcon days.) But now he’s got a nano-tech helmet that fades in and out onto of his head and purple vibrating wings made from Wakanda metal that shoot out purple energy waves. And this is representative of the movie, always trying to do too much. There isn’t a single memorable or creative action scene (other than the fight with Red Hulk.) Instead, it’s just rushing from one place to the next.
Now, what does work is the conspiracy thriller angle of the first half. Watching the assassination attempt on the president, and then putting the pieces together like a mystery. Seeing security camera footage of flashing signals on cell phones, lighting up in people’s hands, putting them into a trance, Manchurian candidate-style. All of that is pretty cool. The Isaiah Bradley story, of a man who was imprisoned for thirty years and is now being put back in a box, is great. In fact, I wish they took it a little further. Bradley should have blamed Sam, after he was put back in prison, saying,”my life was fine. I was in a good place. And then you had to insist I come with you to the White House. Why couldn’t you just leave me alone?” But none of that happens.
What does happen is we get tons of Easter eggs to other movies. and that’s always a lot of fun. The way this movie goes back to the Eternals, with Celestial Island, and also brings in the fictional metal Adamantium, (what Wolverine’s claws and the metal in his body is made of,) not to mention all of the many references to Hulk, are all great. There’s mention of the Widow program and the Red Room, (from Black Widow,) and a scene where another former Widow gets a hallway fight action scene (just like Scar Jo’s in Iron Man 2.) There’s also another secret underground bunker with an abandoned lab (just like in Captain America The Winter Soldier.)
This movie has a lot of action. What it doesn’t have is enough character moments. There are two women characters here, one a secret service agent, the other the president personal head of security, and neither one gets enough to do. Neither one gets much story. It would have been cool to learn a little bit more about these characters. Then again, the movies problem is that it already tries to do too much
On a positive not, they finally give us closure on the Tim Blake Nelson character from the Edward Norton Incredible Hulk movie (fourteen years ago, right at the start of the MCU.) The character he’s playing, Samuel Sterns, doesn’t look as cool as he should have, as the Leader.I understand being faithful to the comic with his look, but maybe if he wasn’t green it might have been better, and not quite as ridiculous. Still, it’s great to have him back and to have tons of call backs to that Hulk movie, including talk of the Harlem Hulk vs Abomination fight, and even a quick clip of it. As far as Easter Eggs go, this movie does it right. This one-hundred percent is like The Incredible Hulk 2, and in that regard, it’s kind of neat. As far as being it’s own film, it’s just okay. Certainly not one of the better MCU movies, but far from the worst ones as well.
SPOILER TALK
Here are a few changes I would have made to make slight improvements on this movie. First, with regards to the look of the Leader, I would have had him keep a hood on for most of the movie. Then, only in one moment towards the end, does he take his hood off to reveal the grotesque brain, in a “look what they did to me,” reveal moment.
Secondly, I would have switched the end of movie scene with the post credits scene. The end of movie scene is Liv Tyler showing up to visit her father in The Raft prison. It’s a surprise cameo and a welcome tribute. It should have been the post credits scene. Instead, the post credits scene is just more of the same characters from the movie talking. The Leader talks of how there are other worlds that are coming. That’s it. If you’re going to make the audience wait for a scene at the end, make it something worthwhile. Give them someone or something they haven’t seen yet in the movie. Liv Tyler’s appearance here would have been perfect.
In fact, come to think of it, there’s a lot of talk about the Avengers here, with President Ross bring Sam Wilson to the White House to talk to him about starting the Avengers up again. A cool post credits scene would have been Ross brining in Valentina and Bucky Barnes and talking to them about restarting the Avengers. Since Sam declined the offer, Bucky would be the next option. And this would lead right into the next Marvel movie, coming out in just a few months, The Thunderbolts. That’s the way Marvel used to do post credits scenes, with each one leading to the next movie. That’s back when the post credits scenes used to be great and meaningful.
Finally, the storyline where President Ross locked Samuel Sterns (the Tim Blake Nelson character, the Leader,) up for his involvement in the Harlem Hulk vs Abomination fight, but built him a lab in the underground prison, and then let this guy make pills for the president to take, himself, is a little too ridiculous. You’re telling me the President doesn’t have any doctor he can trust to work on these pills. And instead, he’s gonna go to a guy who he has locked up and is taking the fall for something. And you don’t think that maybe this guy will mess around with the pills he’s making you, to get vengeance for locking him up? I would have found another way for The Leader to get the pills into President Ross’ food or something. Maybe during the assassination attempt in the White House, among all of the confusion and chaos. In fact, maybe that could have been the reason for the assassination attempt… to serve as a distraction so that Sterns could slip the pills into Ross’ drink or something. It’s just one more plot hole in a film that should have been written better.