#mattsmurdick

here’s the thing, i’ve tried to keep my negative feelings about the movie off of here, bc i don’t want to contribute to the negativity too much, but anyone who has me on twitter knows how salty i’ve been about this movie. i did go in there trying to enjoy it but, well. 

i didn’t get all that far...

i 100% advise you do not mention the ‘language’ joke to me. it was overdone, classic whedon characterisation of steve, and an example of whedon ignoring past mcu work. and the fact that, you know, steve has sworn in the mcu. more than most. and was also a soldier. in the second world war. i guarantee you, boy knows how to swear. 

i have to say that steve’s characterisation wasn’t as bad as i thought it would be. it doesn’t make it good, but i was expecting worse. there were heaps of whedon’s classic heavy-handed self-righteousness that the russo brothers attempted to get away from. that’s not to say that it isn’t potentially a character trait of steve’s. i just feel like whedon doesn’t get it. 

i did enjoy large amounts of the party scenes, there were certain lines i was iffy on, especially certain refs to jane and pepper, but generally this was one of the high points for me. 

REALLY loved the twins. still struggled getting past the whitewashing and the neo-nazi thing, but i did think atj and lizzie did well with what they had. and they had more than i maybe expected. i still felt like the script could have done a LOT more with them, 

the death, ofc, was completely pointless. i didn’t get it. we see pietro recover from a lot and also push civilians out of the way for a lot of time on screen. except that one time. bc he had to die. super unnecessary play for feelings that didn’t work past the initial moment bc a few scenes later it was almost like pietro? pietro who? 

wanda. wanda. wanda. wanda. my precious love. my darling. ilysm. one of the small glimmers of light in an otherwise dark landscape for me.

same can be said for maria, helen, and fury. they didn’t do much, but i loved them. 

same yet again for rhodey and sam

likewise, i felt like thor wasn’t badly done at all, and he did get his fair share of screentime, but i felt like he deserved more. what he did was important and it was good to see him striking out on his own for a few scenes, i just didn’t think it was enough. 

see, the problem is that this film was a classic jack of all trades film. it tried to do a lot, and did a fair amount of it okay-ish-ly, but to me it didn’t really succeed in doing any one thing well. it was okay. that’s my verdict on the whole movie tbh. just okay, not bad enough for me to get angry about as a whole piece. but definitely not something i’ll watch again. and i watch almost everything at least 2 or 3 times. 

the cinematography, set dressing, and all the effects and that were good, but i honestly felt that some of them were done for the sake of doing them. one of the things i thought whedon did well in the first avengers was his timings. imo nothing was too protracted. whereas in aou, a lot of things were. too much of ultron monologuing (though it explained things at times, so i get why), but especially too much mindless action. it was simply too much to follow. the hulk vs hulkbuster thing? spectacular visually at times, but honestly what for? it went on far, far too long. other scenes could have done more for other characters in place of it. same as the final battles. towards the end it was just too hard to keep up with who was doing what and why. i was a bit surprised really bc for all my misgivings about this movie, i thought the avengers did the action scenes well, so i was expecting it from aou. some were GREAT, many were just too much. 

and then. then we get to nat. just...just don’t talk to me about nat. because i will cry, i will. it was just. it was too much. i found myself halfway through thinking, what have you done with my child? i’m honestly pretending she wasn’t in it. i would have preferred her to not be in it. it was terrible. she was ooc, the sterilisation bit was sickening, and there was barely a scene she inhabited which was just about her. not about that ridiculous romance plot that literally nobody seemed to enjoy around me. we got that scene with her, clint, and steve which i personally enjoyed. probably because it was her, clint, and steve. but other than that, nat wasn’t in that movie, okay? she wasn’t there. except for the implication at the end that she and steve were in charge.

oh, the other thing i concede i didn’t mind, was her relationship with clint’s family. i’m still gutted (and jesus christ, was the ‘we’re just friends’ angle overplayed or what????) but i did like the way that was written, mainly bc i’ve always found the “nat afraid of children” cliche overdone in fandom, so i’m glad that whedon did that. but honestly that’s literally it with nat. i can’t talk about it i’m still too upset. i was so upset i nearly cried in the cinema. 

also right. that scene in the car. everyone was laughing and murmuring over that scene with her and clint in the car. there was more positive audience response to that one clint/nat scene than any bruce/nat scene. i’m not gonna get into a shipping argument over it (personally, i’d have happily avoided any of this by not doing any nat romance in a movie where there was too much other stuff going on to really handle it well, whoever it was with) but whedon clearly knew their chemistry worked, so i just don’t get why he wasted time on that romance. it was just frustrating and...idk it was off. all that flirting, steve encouraging bruce, then for bruce to do the classic self-loathing thing, only to then try and get nat to run away at the last minute with him???? i’m not enough of a bruce afficionado to know if he was ooc but. it felt up and down idk. 

too much humour. it got overbearing at times and didn’t work with the tone. a couple of steve’s lines were great, tony had some okay ones but idk. 

the fact that clint got lines and a personality means that he, at least, was better than in the first film.