These are productions that should spur conversation and inspire viewers to look at the authoritative figures in society a little differently. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, meanwhile, teased a very dark turn for new Captain America John Walker ( Wyatt Russell) right down to a post-credits scene that showed him making a ramshackle red-white-and-blue shield in a shed like he was a domestic terrorist. At least The Winter Soldier had the guts to end its story with S.H.I.E.L.D. Worst of all, these shows feel like they’re actively chickening out on going all the way with the political subtext of their stories. Why would someone spend time on the glacial pacing of Secret Invasion when they could just watch The Americans? Meanwhile, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Secret Invasion are both arriving in a streaming television landscape with minimal expansive spectacle and with tons of competition from other actually-substantive political thriller TV shows. However, that was less of a problem since it could provide blockbuster movie-level thrills to compensate for the lack of sociopolitical depth. Captain America: The Winter Soldier didn’t have a lot to say about the presence of rampant surveillance. Most damningly of all, the lack of concrete political commentary in both of these programs feels totally extraneous in the modern streaming landscape. Generic and poorly-editing fight scenes are the name of the game within The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, which only further diluted any potential entertainment in this show. Thanks to the shows being limited-run TV shows that have to put most of their money towards the salaries of famous actors, these programs also don’t have the cash to pull off the kind of tactile and compelling action sequences that were so engaging in The Winter Soldier. Similarly, Secret Invasion has come under fire for being incredibly tedious and slow-moving. By contrast, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was padded out to meet six hours of “content” which resulted in a series that had no sense of forward momentum. The Winter Soldier was always on the move, informed by a sense of paranoia over Steve Rogers being unable to trust anyone. This is a problem for many reasons, but it’s especially rough because the pacing of traditional Marvel Studios TV shows is anemic to the propulsive suspense of a darker thriller. The big screen has become the home for much more elaborate cosmic and fantastical adventures, while more grounded Marvel Cinematic Universe fare has found a home on Disney+. Chiefly, this was a six-episode miniseries, the only domain at the time that Marvel Studios had opted to mimic the aesthetic of that 2014 superhero film. In hindsight, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was a harbinger of how Marvel Studios would be struggling to recapture the creative alchemy of The Winter Soldier. Rather than building on what worked in this 2014 film, productions like Secret Invasionhave merely expanded on its shortcomings. Unfortunately, subsequent Marvel Studios productions following in the footsteps of this particular project have felt as derivative and hollow as The Winter Soldier felt fresh and bold. This lent some urgency and purpose to its grounded aesthetic. Rather than mimicking what worked in earlier Marvel movies, The Winter Soldier had a creative inclination to deliver something truly new compared to what people had previously expected from the big-screen version of Captain America. For another, going this route with the second Captain America movie ensured that The Winter Soldier could offer something new compared to the glitzy retro vibes of Captain America: The First Avenger. The camerawork was more intimate and the fight choreography was significantly more reliant on believable physicality than prior Marvel Studios projects. For one thing, it leaned into the fact that its story was supposed to involve flesh-and-blood people by delivering a barrage of more tactile and bone-crunching action sequences. Still, Captain America: The Winter Soldier did a lot of things right in opting for a more grounded approach at least inspired by (if not directly imitating) vintage political thrillers.
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