Captain America: Civil War – reviewed.

I went to see Captain America: Civil War on opening day and, I have to say, it was great! Yet another good outing for Marvel here.

Let's get this out of the way right away: stay until the end -- the very end. There are mid and post-credit scenes.

Also, no spoilers here, so don't worry.

There were only a couple of minor nitpicks, but, outside of that, I’m not complaining.

So I'm not even going to mention those.  They were very minor.

I didn’t really know what to expect --- other than the fact that Cap’ does battle with Iron Man, which the previews indicated.  I’m well aware that there’s a popular graphic novel with the Civil War concept, but, growing up, I never bought that many comic books – not the newer ones anyway.

 I wasn’t familiar with much of the Civil War story arc.

 I did briefly Wikipedia the comic book version of Civil War about a year ago, but I didn’t want to spoil the movie, so I didn’t read too much about it.

I’ve seen all of Marvel’s other movies and kept up-to-date on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. so I was all ready for the next big-screen project in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

The movie started out with a fast pace and while that somewhat slowed down as the movie went on, there were a lot of twists and turns, which helped keep the story exciting.

You didn't need to see the previous Marvel movies in order to enjoy this one, but it definitely helps. It's easy to miss how many little details there are in the movie if you haven't seen Ant-Man, Avengers 2, Captain America 2, Iron Man 3, etc., etc.

Most of the main characters were back for this round. If you’re a fan of the Avengers, then you are probably already well aware that Thor and Hulk sat this one out. I was disappointed in this, but it may have been just as well.

In addition to the returning Captain America, Iron Man, War Machine, Black Widow, Bucky, Hawkeye, Falcon, Scarlet Witch, and Vision, there were a few new additions to this Avengers-packed movie.

You've got Spider-Man (Tom Holland), The Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman) and Ant-Man (Paul Rudd).

 Quite the cast!

That’s not including cameos from Stan Lee (yes, he has another memorable moment!), Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), Crossbones (the dude from the last Captain America movie), and a few others.

Cap’ and Iron Man duke it out, of course – due to differences of opinion on a few things – but there are some actual villains in this movie as well, so you’ve got some various storylines going simultaneously here.

Whose side do each of the heroes choose? That’s just part of the suspense in this movie. There are a couple of very dramatic moments along the way as well.

To contrast the more dramatic moments, there are various moments of comedy. Actually, there are quite a few moments of comedy – more than I expected. If you’re expecting a dark, brooding film, then you’ll be disappointed. Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice was more dark than Civil War – which is kind of ironic considering the titles of the two movies.

The big battle between the Avengers and their superhero pals ends up being serious, but not to start with. It's several minutes of fun and geeking out, seeing the various characters interact with each other.

I mean, who would've ever thought we'd be seeing Spider-Man (after being recruited by Iron Man) doing battle against Falcon and Captain America? Or Scarlet Witch taking down Vision?

Or Ant-Man making a huge presence in the battle? Definitely a geek-out moment!

The battle reminded me of one of the scenes from the old animated X-Men cartoons in the '90s. They always did a great job at mixing seriousness and comedy while focusing on multiple characters doing battle at the same time.

At this point, we're so in the midst of Marvel's phases that almost every Marvel outing is more like an ensemble Avengers movie than a solo film -- not that this is a bad thing.

This was Captain America 3, but, really, it was another chapter in the epic story that Marvel is telling right now. We were introduced to several new characters and those introductions laid the groundwork for future movies.

I'm hoping Marvel has their contracts sorted out because all of these characters have become so entertaining to watch that it'd be hard to imagine the next two Avengers movies without them!



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