Captain America: The Winter Soldier Reviews (SPOILERS)

[Elheru Aran]

Watched it this weekend with the wife. Surprisingly, for someone whom comic-book stories typically leave cold, she enjoyed it well enough. She also enjoyed First Avenger though, so I think it's a bit more how the movies are handling Cap's story than anything else-- she's a sucker for sentimental stuff.

My biggest gripe with the film was that it just didn't really bring home how big of a deal Bucky was to Cap. This ties into the first movie which also had a similar problem. About all you (or I, rather) got from it was that Bucky was Cap's friend, he dies in the war, are we supposed to be sad about that because sad shit happens in the wars... then Winter Soldier, and he turns out to be Bucky. That's... nice?

This may just be a me thing, though. If they had spent more time establishing and strengthening the Bucky-Steve relationship in the first movie and then brushed up on it a little more forcefully in the second, that particular plot point would have worked better for me. The rest of the film was fun, although in retrospect the whole HYDRA thing was a little cheesy. Redford was superb, I will say that. I was half expecting him to turn out to be the Skull, but I'm glad they didn't go that direction. Would've been too cliche. Cap grabbing his old uniform from the Smithsonian was pretty awesome, too.

Overall out of 5 I would give it a 4.5. It was easily on a par with the first movie, IMO, something that they didn't quite pull off with Iron Man 2.

[Imperial Overlord]

I think this is just a "you" thing. In First Avenger they show how close Steve and Bucky are. Bucky sticking up for Steve when Steve gets into a fight, double dating, talking, and being the motivation for big rescue which is the first time Steve goes into battle. Winter Soldier shows Steve thinking about Bucky at the exhibit, the flashback involving his parents funeral, little details like Bucky knowing where Steve hides his spare key and so forth. Add that to the fact that Steve's lost everything and everyone from his past and suddenly finding out that his closest friend might be alive. They set it up pretty damn well.