Well, that's the key point out of the way. The third Captain America film takes it's central plot cue from the Civil War comic storyline, but that's pretty much it as apart from the idea that governments would call for superhero oversight it plays out very differently from the source comics.
This is a good thing. The story presented here is for the large part much more sensible, it does however falter as the core argument effectively takes a back seat fairly quickly and the ongoing conflict between the heroes depends upon Cap'n being a bull headed jerk who is unwilling to trust most of his team mates and see no irony in distrusting other's judgement whilst being convinced that he is literally always right about every decision.
The idea of the requirement supervision is introduced with a sequence discussing the impact of events in the last few Marvel films, much in the same way BvS looks to address the destruction in Man Of Steel, it's a smart move that helps to bring a bit of realism into the MCU. Combined with this a world weary Tony Stark is approached by a grieving mother who lost her son in the events of Age Of Ultron.
So Tony believes the introduction of oversight by the UN is the right thing. As someone points out The Avengers are essentially a PMC operating with unimaginable power across borders with out answering to or consulting with anyone. It's hard point to disagree with.
Anyway Rogers dislikes the idea and give a vague reasoning of feeling that governments have 'agendas', it's a weak point of the film that he never really manages to explain what troubles him or why he believes his judgement is infallible. Instead the conflict is driven by his pursuit and defence of a reappeared Winter Solider. He even concedes that his former friend has indeed killed a lot of innocent people.
So that's Tony and Rogers, everyone else basically just sides with one of them with a quick line or two of dialogue. Basically a setup that had the chance to provide a lot of real character drama is not really treated that way, which is a missed opportunity. Although the plot does hold a couple of nice twists as the Avengers are indeed being manipulated for what I thought was a fascinating reason.
There are lot of positives in the film elsewhere. The action sequences are lively and creative, showing the playfulness and imagination that was so badly lacking from DC's recent big hitter.
All the various heroes have very much their own distinct style, none more so than the newly introduced Black Panther, which help make the central stand off sequence at the airport a great sequence. It's a pacy with a well judged tone that includes humour and acknowledgement that these are friends having a fight in amongst the brawling.
The the two stand outs in the sequence are surprisingly Paul Rudd's Ant-Man, a brilliant mix of star-struck and goofily effective. And the other standout is Tom Holland's Spiderman. Possibly the best screen incarnation to date of the character. Unfortunately the two only really feature in this one stretch.
Strangely to me the film felt much more like an Iron Man film the third Captain America entry because I found Tony's position much more sympathetic (and the two characters have roughly equal screen time) and he actually seems to have the greater emotional journey especially when tragedy strikes his friend Rhodey. In fact Tony even comes over to Roger's side towards the end only for a reveal to again see Rogers be, well a jerk, rather than trying to diffuse a situation.
In general it's not as strong as Winter Soldier was as a film but it's still a solid entertaining couple of hours that just lacks that edge of drama it feels like it could of had. It'll be interesting to see where the storyline goes especially since in the end Rogers comes away as both a criminal and with no real sense of justification for his actions.
Still, better than BvS. But I am wondering if X-Men:Apocalypse might be this blockbuster season's superhero winner.
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