Can’t we all get along? Superheroes fighting each other appears to be the theme of 2016. Does Marvel’s Civil War fare better than Warners’ Dawn of Justice?
Over the last four years the world has discovered its debt to the collective hero force known as The Avengers – but there’s been a terrible price to pay. A look back at their victories shows the damage that’s been done to innocent lives in the process. Washington. New York. Sokovia. Metropolis.
Tony Stark is approached by a woman who lost her son when the Avengers ‘dropped a city’ on him and who mourns him as a needless innocent casualty. At the same time General Ross (William Hurt) is helping spearhead an initiative to be referred to as the ‘Sokovia Accords’ which would seek to make sure the Avengers only act when sanctioned and are held to a standard that would punish any violations. Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jnr.) sees it as a less-than-ideal but necessary move. Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) is less convinced – he believes in collective responsibility but notes that signing up to such an agreement puts their ability to act at the whim of other agendas. he’s never been one to stand by and do nothing and need to seek permission to help.
The Accords go-ahead but the signing is attacked by The Winter Soldier, also killing the king of Wakanda. Is Cap’s childhood friend Bucky (Sebastian Stan) really responsible – has Hydra brainwashing once again reactivated another agenda? Warned to step-down, Captain America ignores those orders for the sake of his oldest friendship and finds himself on a collision course with some of his current team-mates. As the team deal with modern-day fault-lines, they find their fates and actions tied to the memories of legendary figures from the past, those involved in the earliest days of SHIELD…
While Zack Snyder’s Batman Vs Superman paid lip-service to consequence, batting its eyelids in the direction of audience and then muttering ‘Can we PLEASE get back to the wholesale destruction and self-pity now?‘, Civil War does a thoroughly better job of balancing personal conflict, morality and unapologetic action… and having the characters have fundamental reasons and motivations for their action and clashes of outlook. While Bruce Wayne and Kal-El gazed at their navels, the actions of Tony Stark and Steve Rogers are each weighed more diligently. The strength of the Civil War concept is that neither side has the complete higher ground and everyone’s motivations are fairly examined. Tony is not wrong that the Avengers need accountability and that people are rightly scared that these human/weapon hybrids and their actions could (and have) lead to acts of hubris and disaster. Equally, Steve was brought up fighting against draconian laws and despots and sees all too easily how ‘permission’ to use powers and only for certain validated causes leads to an abuse of individual rights.
That’s not to say Civil War has perfect momentum – for a story that examines both points-of-view, it doesn’t deliver the traditional three-act structure or expected neat ending of an action-outing where might makes right – it takes quite a while to finally assure audiences that the Marvel Universe just got a lot more fractured and isn’t going to get a magical reset solution in its final moments. A good fifteen minutes could probably have been snipped to make it a leaner, meaner fighting machine to make its point.
Though both sides’ hard-hitters mainly appear to get away with superficial cuts and bruises with deeper damage to relationships, there are named casualties here… the Marvel universe losing some very familiar players that we’ve come to know – their demise gives a genuine sense of time-passing on a generational scale.
For all the special-effects on show – and there are plenty – the Russo Brothers have wisely stuck to the idea that audiences are getting a little blase about CGI destruction – both ethically and just through repetition. The very fact that the story deals with issues of wholesale, widescale collateral damage allows them to keep many of the action sequences grounded with a hand-to-hand combat motif that sees our heroes-turned-enemies get up close and personal. Kudos to the stunt-people and the often seamless editing that makes them work. That being said, the best achievement and key moment of VFX is not in the midst of battle but a virtual reality de-aged Stark/Downey where we see his last conversation with his late parents. It’s pretty much flawless in execution showing just what can be acheived nowadays when required. But, Spidey’s ‘You know that shield defies the laws of physics, right?‘ is a knowing wink to the audience that there’s still a fun suspension of disbelief to be enjoyed. (The ‘old’ movie referenced being The Empire Strikes Back… yeah, I’m officially ancient as Stark feels…)
And yes, Spider-man. Marvel‘s deal with SONY allows the webslinger to join the heroes’ line-up and he’s fully embraced. This is the youngest Spider-man we’ve seen on screen and Tom Holland gives us a somewhat naive, gleeful young hero making his first steps into the wider world. The scenes between him, Stark and Aunt May (Marisa Tomei also being the youngest Aunt May we’ve seen) are fun as well as good marketing for SONY‘s solo venture next year. The slight case of her-worship for Captain America, whom he’s forced to fight, also plays well – with a nice pay-off in a after-credits scene.
Not perfect then – a story that either needs a little streamlining or a mini-series to accommodate everything, but still more than keeping the flag flying for the Marvel Universe, gives us plenty of fun to balance the ‘message’ and utterly trounces the dark and dour Dawn of Justice, if only that I was made to give a damn about everyone here and absolutely no-one in the DC outing.
9/10
