The Falcon & Winter Soldier

[Dragonus45]

Maybe, maybe not, but "bottom half of the MCU" is objectively false.

True, very bottom of the better half might be more accurate.

[Starbuck_II]

Except he killed a guy who didn't kill his friend. And, again, repeatedly claimed he was totally justified. So why, now that the person who WAS responsible is dead is he suddenly A-OK?
It doesn't fit.

Dude was a terrorist that was involved in deaths of multiple people.
Sure, she pulled the trigger multiple times of those deaths, but he was complicit.

So, Walker was justified.

[Psyren]

Dude was a terrorist that was involved in deaths of multiple people.
Sure, she pulled the trigger multiple times of those deaths, but he was complicit.

So, Walker was justified.

Due process, what's that? Captain America is above such petty concerns.

[Ramza00]

What? His first scene is him agonising over having to live upto being cap. The two people who know him best are making jokes about he's going to throw up he's so nervous. Then he saves Sam and Bucky from being murdered and they tell him that he's basically scum for doing his job. They then let a person who has just burned a building full of people to death have a nice chat directly leading to the death of his partner. He then tries to give the family some closure before trying to do what he promised.

If Sam and Bucky had just helped him the entire series could have been wrapped up by episode three but nope they are happy to let people die to prove a point. If you think Walker is evil Sam and Bucky are far more in the wrong in this series but again you seem to want to paint him in the worst possible light because we've been conditioned to have Protagonist centred morality.

What was his internal motivations and animating energy?

Not what external events happened, what drove Walker, what “animates him” the ghost in his flesh biological machine?

I can provide two different people the same stimuli, and how they respond to it emotionally can be different.

[Ravens_cry]

Dude was a terrorist that was involved in deaths of multiple people.
Sure, she pulled the trigger multiple times of those deaths, but he was complicit.

So, Walker was justified.

Murdering a cowering man, his hands raised in surrender, calling out for mercy.
A terrorist, yes. But still a human being.

[Clertar]

For years now there has been this received view of the MCU fims as having a "villain problem", with their big-third-act-fight villains. This is sometimes phrased more specifically as an overuse of the trope of an antagonist with the same powers as the hero (as in Iron Man, Black Panther, Ant-Man).* Even villains more nuanced as characters on the script page, like Killmonger, are seen as part of this problem.

And yet, things like The Falcon and the Winter Soldier show why studios go with the classic villain model that a part of the fan base has been decrying. When the antagonist is not presented in the classic maniqueist pattern, as we see with the gallery of antagonists in this series, a part of the audience feel uncomfortable and are pushed to still needing to classify those characters as being either good or evil, when a significant part of the effort was precisely to avoid this good/evil antagonist setup. Luckily it seems that this is a minority view and there won't be a big enough backlash for the MCU to course-correct once again back to maniqueist antagonists.



As for Walker, I'm really not familiar with the comics character of US Agent. Any chances that they might turn him into a "Captain Punisher" type of character?



*For some reason this is almost never brought up with DCEU movies (Wonder Woman, Shazam, Man of Steel).

[Kareeah_Indaga]

*For some reason this is almost never brought up with DCEU movies (Wonder Woman, Shazam, Man of Steel).

I’ve only seen Shazam once, but IIRC his antagonist’s primary gimmick was summoning the Seven Deadly Sins not flight/lightning/everything else that was in the Shazam package. Wonder Woman may have fought another god-like entity at the end but most of the movie was spent opposing an evil general who got super strength from drugs and an evil scientist who made said drugs plus some very nasty poisons. Can’t speak to Man of Steel as I haven’t seen it, but judging by the other two, people don’t complain about them having that particular villain problem because they don’t have it.

[Kyberwulf]

Eh, I understand why he would kill the guy. Sure it wasn't right. But it was understandable. As for him being "insane"? I think thats a way for people to try paint him in a particular light. Enraged, sure I will give you that. Considering what happen and who the guy was, I wouldn't lose sleep over it. Besides, you make it seem like he was laughing maniacally while he did it. He wasn't you can see he was ashamed of what he did, he wasn't proud of it.

[Spacewolf]

Due process, what's that? Captain America is above such petty concerns.

I mean the reason Captain America went rogue was because he didn't like the idea of being accountable to anyone. Turns out being an extrajudicial murder hobo is basically Caps MO in the MCU.

Obviously Cap is a paragon a virtue which is the only reason why he can say that but Tony was right to say that the arrogance to say your superpowered world wide police murder squad doesn't need some sort of oversight or accountability is staggering.

[hungrycrow]

I don't think it makes him insane, but it's worth pointing out Walker also tried to murder Sam, for much less justifiable reasons.

[Cikomyr2]

I don't think it makes him insane, but it's worth pointing out Walker also tried to murder Sam, for much less justifiable reasons.

Yes. That's very true too. Walker did not fought Sam and Bucky with the intent to just beat them off. He tried to kill them, and could have succeeded while they only wanted the shield back and clearly stated their intent.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Clertar
For years now there has been this received view of the MCU fims as having a "villain problem", with their big-third-act-fight villains. This is sometimes phrased more specifically as an overuse of the trope of an antagonist with the same powers as the hero (as in Iron Man, Black Panther, Ant-Man).*

I don’t know what you mean about a “received view,” but I’ve had this frustration for years, starting with the Hulk fighting Abomination (or whatever it was) created with the same process but more evil, and continuing with Captain America fighting Red Skull, created with the same process but more evil, and so on.

I don’t think I’ve seen it mentioned before, but it annoys me—for the repetition, the laziness, the sheer tropeyness of it. This is one of many reasons I enjoyed Homecoming so much, because they gave us an appropriately challenging villain who is nothing like Peter Parker. And better yet, they were able to hit the story note about a hero’s greater inner strength without contriving to give him a villainous duplicate to face off against.

More recent movies—Dr. Strange, Captain Marvel, Ragnarok—have managed to avoid this issue, and hopefully we won’t see as much of it hereafter. But it was pretty glaring in many of the earlier MCU entries.

[Kyberwulf]

See, in a world were you need justification for someone to be a human and worth something, you would expect someone to be in perfect control of there emotions at all times. I don't think it's justified that he tried killing to keep the shield, but it is understandable. His best friend was just killed, emotions were high, and lets face it. Falcon and the Winter Soldiers weren't exactly b holes to him.. they were one step up to that. If it was anyone he actually valued and respected, and who treated him with respect at SOME point in knowing him. I bet they could have talked him down. They didn't come to reason with him. They came for one reason, to TAKE the shield. They didn't care about him at all.

For all the talk of these guys being good, if they just tried to get along with the guy. It could have been better.

Also, I don't think Steve is the paragon of virtue that you say he is. If he would have killed Winter Solder or did anything to neutralize him as a threat, instead of selfishly trying to "Save" him. How much violence could have been avoid. How many deaths? How many normal citizens and government agents wouldn't have went to the hospital for various injuries.

[Rater202]

I mean the reason Captain America went rogue was because he didn't like the idea of being accountable to anyone. Turns out being an extrajudicial murder hobo is basically Caps MO in the MCU.

Okay, but this is gonna be really difficult to explain without getting to rules forbidden territory, but what we know about the Accords suggests that it's less "I don't want to be held accountable" and more "Tony, did you read this thing? We would basically not be able to do anything that the Avengers are supposed to do because some very not nice people would be able to forbid us from doing anything inconvenient for them."

I can't explain more than that though without breaking forum rules so please take my word on that.

The conflict of the movie is that General "thinks pissing off the hulk is a genius strategy that will lead to capturing The Hulk" ross manipulated Tony's feelings of guilt so that Tony would think that becoming a near literal slave to nominally the Un but most likely just Ross in practice was the only way to take responsibility for his screw-ups, and later in the movie, it's established that Tony didn't even read the Accords as he's surprised by how little freedom he has.

Captain Amerca: Civil War is better than the comics Civil War, but looking at objective facts Cap is still objectively correct and Tony is still the bad guy.

@Kyberwolf.

That's not virtue, that's ruthless pragmatism.

The Winter Soldier was brainwashed. A prisoner in his own body, helpless to control his own actions.

Even before that was the case this was true, but in this very series it was established that in the MCU Buck was fully conscious and remembered everything but was helpless to do anything but kill and follow orders.

As he was not in control of his own actions but was instead being literally mind-controlled, Buck is innocent of all of the crimes he committed as the Soldier. Instead, the people responsible for those crimes are the people who brainwashed him and were giving him orders.

Therefore, killing the Winter Soldier is murder, just the same as if you shot a hostage to save another hostage.

There's nothing at all selfish about not wanting to murder an innocent for the sole reason it's more convenient than trying to save them. The fact that Buck is Steve's friend is immaterial.

You can say in hindsight that it wasn't worth it... But how many people is Bucky going to save now that he's free of the brainwashing?

[Psyren]

Yes. That's very true too. Walker did not fought Sam and Bucky with the intent to just beat them off. He tried to kill them, and could have succeeded while they only wanted the shield back and clearly stated their intent.

It's almost like he has a pathological need to be seen as Captain America or something...

I mean the reason Captain America went rogue was because he didn't like the idea of being accountable to anyone. Turns out being an extrajudicial murder hobo is basically Caps MO in the MCU.

Obviously Cap is a paragon a virtue which is the only reason why he can say that but Tony was right to say that the arrogance to say your superpowered world wide police murder squad doesn't need some sort of oversight or accountability is staggering.

I take it you see no difference at all between a surrendering Flagsmasher and Hydra agents trying to kill Steve then?

Also what Rater said re: the Accords.

[Spacewolf]

Okay, but this is gonna be really difficult to explain without getting to rules forbidden territory, but what we know about the Accords suggests that it's less "I don't want to be held accountable" and more "Tony, did you read this thing? We would basically not be able to do anything that the Avengers are supposed to do because some very not nice people would be able to forbid us from doing anything inconvenient for them."

I can't explain more than that though without breaking forum rules so please take my word on that.

The conflict of the movie is that General "thinks pissing off the hulk is a genius strategy that will lead to capturing The Hulk" ross manipulated Tony's feelings of guilt so that Tony would think that becoming a near literal slave to nominally the Un but most likely just Ross in practice was the only way to take responsibility for his screw-ups, and later in the movie, it's established that Tony didn't even read the Accords as he's surprised by how little freedom he has.

Captain Amerca: Civil War is better than the comics Civil War, but looking at objective facts Cap is still objectively correct and Tony is still the bad guy.
?

So it's better that a bunch of people can literally decide to kill anyone, anywhere without trial? Seems like that might be pretty questionable.

Except Ross isn't a part of the UN he's the US sec of state, he might have influence at the UN but he can't order death squads around. The terms under the accords are the Avengers can't operate in a country unless given a directive by the government of that country or by a UN subcommittee so a country can still ask them to come in and they are perfectly within their rights to do so. There's not even anything in the shown parts of the accords that says they can't refuse a mission.

You'll have to point out the bit where it's indicated Tony hadn't read the accords as I just had a quick scan through the film and couldn't see the bit where he is surprised.

The only reason Caps I want to be able to kill anyone I want any time I want without consequence stance has a leg to stand on is because it's cap saying it.

I take it you see no difference at all between a surrendering Flagsmasher and Hydra agents trying to kill Steve then?

Also what Rater said re: the Accords.

See the bit where I said the only reason Cap gets away with it is because he's supposed to be a paragon kind of implies I see a difference. My point was that Cap has very rarely followed due process and infact takes offence when people try to apply it to him because he knows best.

[Kyberwulf]

Oh, I am sorry. Him being brainwashed will nullifiy all the people he killed and and make all the people he help put into power just be brought to justice once he is free. Yeah. All's well's, that end's well.

This is the same someone being drugged and let loose. Instead of Steve Rogers going, Hey we should use all our power to stop manical murderer from getting in the car and driving wreckless down the road. Going, hey lets just talk to him and see if he will stop. I mean it isn't his fault. If this was ANYONE else then Bucky, Steve Rogers would have put that shield into that guys face pretty hard. Stopped him dead. The fact is, he SELFISHLY didn't do that because it was his friend. Again, I think its understandable. NOT right, not justifiable, but understandable.

I mean in winter soldier, count the ways that would have been made better if he had just used all his force to stop him, even if that meant killing him.

[Rater202]

So it's better that a bunch of people can literally decide to kill anyone, anywhere without trial? Seems like that might be pretty questionable.

Except Ross isn't a part of the UN he's the US sec of state, he might have influence at the UN but he can't order death squads around. The terms under the accords are the Avengers can't operate in a country unless given a directive by the government of that country or by a UN subcommittee so a country can still ask them to come in and they are perfectly within their rights to do so. There's not even anything in the shown parts of the accords that says they can't refuse a mission.

You'll have to point out the bit where it's indicated Tony hadn't read the accords as I just had a quick scan through the film and couldn't see the bit where he is surprised.

The only reason Caps I want to be able to kill anyone I want any time I want without consequence stance has a leg to stand on is because it's cap saying it.

Okay, try this on for size.

Let's say for the sake of argument that Doctor Doom, a monomaniacal fascist dictator with access to advanced technology and powerful sorcery who dreams of world conquest and forcing everyone to worship him as the ultimate genius, if not literally treating him as a god, exists somewhere in the MCU.

Would you want to live in a world where The Avengers need Doctor Doom's permission to go stop Doctor Doom's evil plans?

[Psyren]

See the bit where I said the only reason Cap gets away with it is because he's supposed to be a paragon kind of implies I see a difference. My point was that Cap has very rarely followed due process and infact takes offence when people try to apply it to him because he knows best.

No, you clearly don't see the difference.
He "got away with it" because he was killing literal genocidal monsters. You do know who Hydra are, right?

[Spacewolf]

Okay, try this on for size.

Let's say for the sake of argument that Doctor Doom, a monomaniacal fascist dictator with access to advanced technology and powerful sorcery who dreams of world conquest and forcing everyone to worship him as the ultimate genius, if not literally treating him as a god, exists somewhere in the MCU.

Would you want to live in a world where The Avengers need Doctor Doom's permission to go stop Doctor Doom's evil plans?

That's where the Subcommittee comes in, suspect they might have something against a world conquest wizard. Again the other option is an American organisation can go to any country and kill anyone they want then face no repercussions for it.

No, you clearly don't see the difference.
He "got away with it" because he was killing literal genocidal monsters. You do know who Hydra are, right?

Funny don't remember using the words he got away with it literally anywhere.

[Jan Mattys]

Okay, try this on for size.

Let's say for the sake of argument that Doctor Doom, a monomaniacal fascist dictator with access to advanced technology and powerful sorcery who dreams of world conquest and forcing everyone to worship him as the ultimate genius, if not literally treating him as a god, exists somewhere in the MCU.

Would you want to live in a world where The Avengers need Doctor Doom's permission to go stop Doctor Doom's evil plans?

My guess is that the Un Council would vote on that and that Doom wouldn't have veto powers. So if the UN decide that Latveria has a "Open Gate to Hell protected by murderbots" problem (just an example), then they would greenlight the deployement of the Avengers on Latveria after voting about it.

It doesn't sound unreasonable to me. And again, the system has its problems no matter the way you look at it. Just like "letting goverments decide" can go downhill fast if Dr. Doom is a legitimate ruler of a country, the same goes for any free-to-act Avenger who isn't a paragon of Virtue and can't hold the Hammer of Thor as a proof.

ps: now that I think about it, having a literal artifact able to judge without fail the moral standards of people is probably the greatest reason why you can't really compare the MCU with our world ^^
pps: just out of curiosity (and ignorance): has there ever been an instance in Marvel's history where anyone managed to fool the Hammer of Thor? I don't mean "create a duplicate and fool the people by lifting the duplicate", I mean "being evil or malicious and still be able to lift it due to shenanigans".

[ecarden]

now that I think about it, having a literal artifact able to judge without fail the moral standards of people is probably the greatest reason why you can't really compare the MCU with our world ^^
pps: just out of curiosity (and ignorance): has there ever been an instance in Marvel's history where anyone managed to fool the Hammer of Thor? I don't mean "create a duplicate and fool the people by lifting the duplicate", I mean "being evil or malicious and still be able to lift it due to shenanigans".

Hela did in Ragnarok, I believe, right before she smashed it.

More generally, I think Ragnarok actually undercuts quite a bit of the mythos of Mjolnir's judgment as it was Odin who cast the spell limiting its usage (as far as I can tell) to those judged worthy and the story of the Thor movies is Odin's journey from merciless imperialist to incompetent screwup...

So, why do we care how the artifact judges people? It appears to be based on Odin's standards and those are the furthest thing in the world from unimpeachable.


As for the Civil War debate up above, I'm going to leave the substance of that in the real world alone, because it's likely to get this thread locked. I will say that narratively there's quite a bit of deck-stacking with 'you can arrest people and jail them indefinitely without trial' which is totally unnecessary to the plot. I could see some sort of 'trial in absentia' thing for folks who can mind control or kill a room full of people.

[Rater202]

That's where the Subcommittee comes in, suspect they might have something against a world conquest wizard. Again the other option is an American organisation can go to any country and kill anyone they want then face no repercussions for it.

Except that by the time the Un subcommittee has met and voted on it Doctor Doom has already taken over half of Europe simply because it takes time to get people together to vote on something.

Assuming that nobody on the subcommittee comes from a country that votes against letting the Avengers do anything for fear that it come back to bite them later.

It isn't about "an amerian Organization being allowe to kill anyone they want," the Avengers aren't a band of killers. It's about a group of people who were assembled to deal with worldwide threats being allowed to do what they need to do when they need to do it.

[Kareeah_Indaga]

You'll have to point out the bit where it's indicated Tony hadn't read the accords as I just had a quick scan through the film and couldn't see the bit where he is surprised.

I’m going to take a stab at a guess and say that was the part where Tony is talking to the Anti-Reg prisoners in the Raft and is legitimately surprised they were taken to the Raft. I want to say the bit with Hawkeye. Rater, correct me if I’m wrong.

Except that by the time the Un subcommittee has met and voted on it Doctor Doom has already taken over half of Europe simply because it takes time to get people together to vote on something.

Second this. Wasn’t the whole bit with Thanos in Infinity War a grand total of two days? No way would the UN be meeting and voting on sending anyone anywhere before Thanos got what he wanted.

[Spacewolf]

Except that by the time the Un subcommittee has met and voted on it Doctor Doom has already taken over half of Europe simply because it takes time to get people together to vote on something.

Assuming that nobody on the subcommittee comes from a country that votes against letting the Avengers do anything for fear that it come back to bite them later.

It isn't about "an amerian Organization being allowe to kill anyone they want," the Avengers aren't a band of killers. It's about a group of people who were assembled to deal with worldwide threats being allowed to do what they need to do when they need to do it.

Sometimes that's an issue yea. Although it's been shown several times in the MCU that politics can move quite fast when it needs to. Usually UN votes are to a majority so alot of people would have to want a Dr Doom overlord.

They are literally a band of killers that's what they do we just know they usually kill the right people but shockingly I don't think letting people kill whoever they want with no supervision is the answer. Especially when it takes them multiple years to even look back on the devastation they've caused and go hmm maybe we could do better. Then there's always the question of when do they go kill Doom? Usually he's pretty popular within his own country so do they go in and kill a popular dictator as he starts to build up his forces and start a civil war? Is the point when he starts building up his forces on the border of another country? What if he has nuclear weapons do the avengers still risk going in? Should that all be decided by a group of about 5 unelected unaccountable people?

Second this. Wasn’t the whole bit with Thanos in Infinity War a grand total of two days? No way would the UN be meeting and voting on sending anyone anywhere before Thanos got what he wanted.

Then they could quite easily have a standing order in the Accords- the following countries allow the avengers to operate unless otherwise said. Not to mention the whole point of Infinity war is that it wasn't the Earth being attacked it was the avengers themselves so the accords wouldn't have affected that particular incident.

I just don't see how allowing people who have no accountability kill anyone they want for whatever reason they want and the response being well we're the Avengers if you have issues feel free to get lost. Even suggesting they could have done better is met with a resounding eh.

[Cikomyr2]

We are just re-arguing the same morality argument as the closed Civil War thread old. I don't think any argument presented about the Sokovia accords here haven't already been debates then.

Let's drop that one guys.

[Psyren]

Funny don't remember using the words he got away with it literally anywhere.

I said the only reason Cap gets away with it

I'm speechless yet again

ps: now that I think about it, having a literal artifact able to judge without fail the moral standards of people is probably the greatest reason why you can't really compare the MCU with our world ^^
pps: just out of curiosity (and ignorance): has there ever been an instance in Marvel's history where anyone managed to fool the Hammer of Thor? I don't mean "create a duplicate and fool the people by lifting the duplicate", I mean "being evil or malicious and still be able to lift it due to shenanigans".

Given we know the reverse is true (be unable to lift it, but still be capable of saving the world multiple times - i.e. Tony) I'm not sure what value that litmus really has at the end of the day.

Then they could quite easily have a standing order in the Accords- the following countries allow the avengers to operate unless otherwise said.

Not only do the Accords not have such a clause, they pretty much never will, since the Avengers could interpret that in all kinds of ways to act when SHIELD, SWORD, Ross, Hawyard, their shadowy handlers etc don't want them to. And that is their chief flaw that Steve foresaw.

Even if we set aside the logistical issues of quickly convening a vote during a crisis somehow, any number of influential bad guys (and I count Ross among them) could easily get that vote forestalled or corrupted. Or the vote will go through and give the Avengers {specific directive} then they enter the field and realize they need to do {something else} instead, resulting in them getting yelled at.

No, the Accords serve one purpose and one purpose only - so that {UN Representative} can haul the heroes in and yell at them about being loose cannons who don't play by the rules, without being associated with any one country. It will pretty much never be used to make the heroes lives easier than they would be without it.

[Ramza00]

Eh, I understand why he would kill the guy. Sure it wasn't right. But it was understandable. As for him being "insane"? I think thats a way for people to try paint him in a particular light. Enraged, sure I will give you that. Considering what happen and who the guy was, I wouldn't lose sleep over it. Besides, you make it seem like he was laughing maniacally while he did it. He wasn't you can see he was ashamed of what he did, he wasn't proud of it.

Sigh you do not get the horror of what Walker did. He is scary precisely because he didn't manically laugh. He is scary precisely because he will not lose sleep over it. He hurts people and he feels justified in it for he has his reasons and thus he is prioritizing his emotions and feels over the fact you can't resurrect the dead.

No military commander would want Walker on a Special Ops union / Seal Team 6 / Marians etc if he did not have superpowers. If there were 100 Super-Soldiers you would never use John Walker.

-----

And this is not counting people who have different responses with the Police for things they can't control, how the Cops treat some people differently. Whether it is due to race, gender, and so on. Some people are given far more benefits of the doubt and others are inherrently suspicious in this injust world.

[Ramza00]

Just a reminder you can't make in fiction that is ongoing a perfect national or international structure and keep the tension flowing. You have to have humans be screwups, or moles in the story, and so on. For example in Avengers 2 in the first act they had the team attack a Hydra base. Did Sokovia have to allow this if we rearrange the movies order and the Accords happened first? As writers then they outside the text have to make a choice. What would happen now in this situation. Would the Avengers tell Sokovia and Sokovia keeps this information secret? Would they allow or not allow the attack on the Hydra base? Would Hydra be forewarned by a mole, computer virus, etc that they are being attacked and the base is empty, etc?

All those are narrative choices but to make the movie interesting you have to have tension, you have to have a story where things do not go according to plan. You can't construct a perfect justice computer, you can not create a Dostoevsky's "The Crystal Palace" for there is no tension then. You have to make choices to make an interesting story and the story must have tension to trigger emotions in the reader.

In sum this article by Emily VanDerWeiff

Lead: _{WandaVision’s disappointing finale and} the problem with demanding “justice” in fiction
Sublead: We don’t want justice in a story. We want the authors to know what justice might look like.

https://www.vox.com/culture/22325656...nt-story-karma

Movie Stories can not legitimate systems, but they can shine light on legitimacy but also other things such as dystopia. Stories can create vibes, but people must choose to accept those vibes or not. Do they consent to the vibes the choices made even if they do not assent to every detail of the choice?

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Not to mention the whole point of Infinity war is that it wasn't the Earth being attacked it was the avengers themselves so the accords wouldn't have affected that particular incident.

No, Thanos wasn’t after the Avengers, he was after the Infinity Stones. The Mind Stone just happened to be embedded in the Vision’s head. And it’s iffy if Dr. Strange counts as an Avenger since we don’t see anyone track him down to sign the Accords.