Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

In 2008, Iron Man was a surprise hit, and a post-credits scene kicked off a campaign that led to several Marvel flicks which built up to 2012's The Avengers. One of those movies was 2011's Captain America: The First Avenger, which introduced us to the Captain America character and gave us a bit of foundation for the Avengers movie the following year. The first Cap movie was a blast, an action-packed movie with a hint of World War II nostalgia. But with Cap's backstory revealed, the sequel decided to go in a totally different direction, retaining the action, but replacing the nostalgia with some modern day drama we can all relate to.

The plot is reminiscent of a Tom Clancy book or movie, with lots of political drama, although it keeps the politics to a minimum for dumb-dumbs like me who don't follow politics and wouldn't understand more advanced political vocabulary. They also throw in lots of action, humor and everything else we've come to expect from Marvel movies. There are lots of twists and turns in the plot, and I won't spoil them because they really do make the movie.

While I very much enjoyed the movie, I did have one slight problem with it. Rather than feeling like a true sequel to The First Avenger, The Winter Soldier feels more like a sequel to The Avengers, or "Avengers 1.5" in comic lingo. While both Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World both focused exclusively on the titular characters, The Winter Soldier focuses on the rest of the Avengers (Cap, Black Widow and Nick Fury) who won't be in their own movies. Outside of some brief moments at the beginning of the movie (we see Cap has a list of music, movies and food he needs to catch up on from when he was frozen, and we see Cap visit a Captain America exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum), the story is all about the team as opposed to the individual. Even the relationship between Cap and the Winter Soldier is only briefly touched on, taking a back seat to the main plot involving S.H.I.E.L.D. although they have Sebastian Stan (the Winter Soldier) signed on for multiple Marvel flicks as opposed to Chris Evans who I believe is only signed on for three more, and the post credits scene hints that we will be seeing more of the Winter Soldier in the future.

One other thing I really enjoyed about the movie were the little details and cameos. There is a point about midway through the movie where a S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent namedrops some really important people from the Marvel Universe, and it makes me think that we'll be getting movies with these guys in the not-so-distant future. We have an An- Man movie coming out next year, and Cap 3 announced for 2016, but the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been mapped out to 2028! There's a lot of time to make these movies.

Overall, The Winter Soldier ranks in the top tier of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies released so far. I would rank it below Avengers, but equal to the first Iron Man and Cap movies. I want to see more Captain America, and with only Guardians of the Galaxy to tide us over, it will be a long wait for Age of Ultron next summer!