The movie is...fine. Just about fine. The general "it's not terrible, at least!" response is true, yes, but only because it plays everything so incredily safe that it couldn't possibly have been terrible. There are no risks taken at all, no attempt to really say anything. Everything is explcitily spelled out for the audience. Exposition is given then sometimes reiterated by other characters just to make completely sure the audience can follow the (not that complex) plot. "Giancarlo Esposito, more like Giancarlo EXPOSITION!" is a hilarious joke I thought of at one point, but I resisted the urge to shout it out in the cinema like I was George Costanza.
What I found most shockingly weak is how they gave Sam's character so little of a character arc: up until the scene with Bucky I was thinking they'd forgotten to give him really any character work at all. Anthony Mackie does fine with what he's given, but how could he do any better when there's nothing for him to sink his teeth into? For all the "WOKE DISASTER!" shit videos from assholes that are no doubt popping up, it's shocking how little his race is even a factor. There's maybe a few lines where if you squint you can kind of see him alluding to being a black Captian America? But Falcon And Winter Solider was actually much braver in that regard and I didn't think that was a very good tv show at all! I'm not saying him being black had to be constantly referenced or anything but they could have at least done something with it and him being a role model for people like him (which is the part that's briefly touched on.) It would have given Mackie somethimng more to play than the weak "I have to be good like Steve!" stuff he ended up with. Harrison Ford does good grumpy and angry acting, I guess, but again he has nothing to play but those two emotions and perfunctory "I miss my daughter" stuff. I did like his Hulking-out acting and the one bit of news footage where he had a moustache. Danny Ramirez is pretty good as the most generic, predictable sidekick character you could imagine. I liked Tim Blake Nelson as Sterns (and his broccoli head) but he's not in the movie enough and again doesn't get anything really meaty. Carl Lumby actually impressed me the most in acting terms.
There's some decent, or at least watchable action bits, and some weak stuff like Ruth's big fight scene. There's stuff that should have been better and made a lot more of an impact: there's a bit where Sam is riding on a missile trying to stop it which struck me as something that should have been a much bigger deal, but it goes by so fast you forget it right away. Red Hulk did look really good though, so I give the VFX artists credit there. The fight he has with Sam is the most fun part of the movie so at least it finishes with a bit more excitement than most of its runtime.
I wonder how much Liv Tyler got paid for six lines of dialogue (half of which she's off-screen.)
Winter Soldier, the movie this is obviously trying most to be like, was a very good comic book movie, still easily in the top five of the MCU for me. But it was also eleven years ago. They should be regularly makig better movies than it by now. There's really no excuse for making something like this which is inferior in pretty much all aspects of production.
