With its superb fight scenes and stand out performances by a
talented cast, this movie is a fan favourite and cornerstone of the Marvel
Cinematic Universe.
I don’t think you’re going to like what I have to say about
it.
So I’m going to start with the little disclaimer I have for
this series as a quick reminder.
Once again I’m rating
the depiction and use of torture, not the movie itself. I’m trying to
take into account realism (regardless of fantasy or sci fi elements), presence
of any apologist arguments, stereotypes and the narrative treatment of victims
and torturers.
The relevant plot details are, well, most of the film. I’ll
try to be as brief as I can.
Steve Roger’s (aka Captain America) boss at SHIELD (Nick
Fury) is assassinated by a mysterious man known as ‘The Winter Soldier’. Before
dying Nick tells Steve that SHIELD itself has been compromised and gives him a
usb.
On refusing to hand over the usb Steve is attacked by a
large group of his former colleges in a lift.
He escapes and teams up with Natasha Romanov aka the Black
Widow. Together they discover that SHIELD has been infiltrated by Hydra, a Nazi
organisation who are particularly interested in SHIELD’s latest weapons project
which they could use to kill millions.
The Winter Soldier, a character who is heavily coded as
mentally ill, is ordered to assassinate them by Hydra.
Steve and Natasha track down a SHIELD/Hydra agent and
threaten him with death or grievous bodily harm unless he gives them
information. They get the information they want.
They clash with the Winter Soldier and during the scuffle he
is unmasked and revealed as Steve’s long lost wartime friend Bucky Barnes.
Steve, Natasha and their friend Sam are all captured by Hydra.
The audience is told that Bucky, apparently now a super-soldier,
was captured by Hydra, tortured and brainwashed. He has been their best
assassin for decades. A scene of his memory being ‘wiped’ follows with props
that are heavily reminiscent of ECT machines.
Steve, Natasha and Sam stage an assault on SHIELD HQ in an
effort to stop the launch of the new weapons. In the process Steve takes over
the comm system and announces Hydra’s plan to the entire base.
Two sympathetic characters are shown resisting Hydra demands
when threatened with death. One of them dies for his trouble.
Steve and Bucky fight until the last weapon is disarmed.
With the threat of civilian casualties gone Steve refuses to fight Bucky and
tries instead to appeal to his humanity, asking him to remember their
friendship. Bucky beats him unconscious but stops short of killing him.
I’m giving it 0/10
The Good
And well that really is the problem: with regards to torture
I cannot think of more than one good thing about this film. Usually I’d throw
the movie at least one point for a single good scene, but in this case I think
the scene is part of a larger entirely negative trend in the narrative.
1)
The scene I’m thinking of is the attack on Steve in the
lift. About eight or nine people, all armed in various ways, attack Steve at
once. His arms are pinned by several people each while he’s repeatedly shocked
with a device a bit like a cattle prod. This basic set up is extremely true to
life for many cases of police brutality, although a Taser would have been a
more likely weapon.
The Bad
Where to begin?
1) Every major
‘good’ character in this movie engages in torture.
Our heroes Steve, Sam and Natasha
torture a Hydra agent for information by threatening to kill him, then throwing
him off a building (Sam catches him before he falls to his death).
This is not just portrayed as good and reasonable but it is played
for laughs. The scene is used to extend a joke about Steve’s dating life.
3)
The ‘bad guy’ they torture does not resist once they
have tortured him. This is extremely unlikely. The data we have at the moment
suggests that torture makes people far
more likely to resist.
4)
This stands in contrast to the way ‘good’ characters act when threatened
with death or torture. The film consistently shows ‘good’ people resisting torture and ‘bad’ (or in
Bucky’s case mentally ill) people complying
under torture. This is not only wrong; it’s frankly sickening and perpetuates
extremely harmful stereotypes about victims and torture.
5)
Brainwashing does not work and is a central, important
plot device in the film. The story simply does not work unless violence,
torture and pain can ‘force’ a victim to change sides.
6)
Torture cannot change hearts and minds. It cannot force
someone to support or work for a cause they are strongly against.
7)
Memory really
does not work in the way the film suggests. Anything that could remove old,
strongly held memories, such as those of childhood or the victim’s name, would also have removed their memory of how to
drive a car, fight hand to hand, use a gun or virtually anything else Bucky
does in the film.
8)
Even accounting for the sci-fi idea of removing specific memories, torture and pain
would not force a victim to comply with their captors. In fact it makes
resistance more likely. A Bucky Barnes
without the memory of his friends or the war would still almost certainly
resist Hydra simply because they caused him pain.
9)
There has never been a recorded case of ECT machines
being used to torture. They have been
used as a form of abuse in some hospitals but they have never been used by
military or terrorist organisations such as Hydra. This is another inaccurate
stereotype: the idea that torture is ‘scientific’ or ‘high-tech’.
10) The
film assumes that a victim of systematic abuse over decades would be physically and mentally capable of complex
assassinations. Instead the sort of damage to both physical and mental health
this would inflict means that Bucky and Natasha should both be noticeably less capable than
their colleagues. Instead they are more capable than their colleagues,
implying that abuse made them ‘better’ at committing wanton acts of violence.
11) Both
this film and other Marvel films state that Natasha has both suffered and
committed abuse, yet she shows no severe symptoms. This seems to be narratively
linked to the idea that she is ‘strong’. And I detest the notion that a basic,
bodily reaction to trauma makes victims weak.
Overview
I think the word for this movie’s use of torture is ‘dire’.
It’s not just consistently wrong.
It’s not just based around an impossible, trope laden
premise.
It’s not just running through a check list of every harmful
stereotype that regularly turns up in fiction.
The movie supports the notion that the torture of ‘bad
people’ does not ‘count’.
It shows ‘heroes’, particularly individuals that the
audience is supposed to think are morally above reproach, engaging in torture
and the plot supports and justifies
their doing so. It tells us that really ‘good’, ‘pure’ characters, such as the
titular hero, threaten ‘bad guys’ with torture and then stand back to watch
their friends do the torturing.
It shows victims (ie Bucky) as dangerous and violent and without other symptoms. It shows
torturers like Natasha as without
symptoms. It shows torture as a successful interrogation tactic and shows
torture fundamentally changing hearts and
minds.
Even accounting for sci-fi elements, the movie’s attitude to
and treatment of torture is consistently false, dangerous and fundamentally against the basic principles of human
rights.
Human rights are not for ‘good people’. They are for everyone.
Whatever their race, gender, creed, politics, or crime. Torture is never justified.
And for that reason this movie’s treatment of torture is
quite possibly the worst I’ve ever seen. It is a shining example of how much
torture apologia pervades popular culture.
Question re: Bucky (setting the “that’s not how memory works” aside) – I think the central premise was less that he was tortured into complying and switching sides, and more that there was some complex psychological mechanism that included him no longer being able to tell sides apart (possibly as a result of memory loss), some extreme form of Stockholm syndrome, PTSD and anything that is leftover from the army.
This is a harsh thing to read when I still want to pretend CAWS is the only MCU movie I enjoy without reservations… (ʘᗩʘ)
i don’t hold catws quite in the same regard so this was an interesting read.
“There’s a great scene in The Winter Soldier where Captain America knows he’s about to be attacked by 20 men in a moving elevator, and says, “Before we get started, does anyone want to get out?” Evans performs it convincingly with equal amounts of mild boyish glee, amused lightness, matter-of-fact resignation, chutzpah, and confident menace. It’s a wonderful moment, in no small part because you realize just how much fun it’s become to watch Chris Evans excel at playing (and growing with) this character. It’s one of many moments in a Marvel movie that makes you realize there really was greatness in Chris Evans.”
I think it’s a possibility. smarter, more observant people than me have worked out meta on this. A few weeks ago I saw a post about Bucky’s bruising/bleeding after Steve rescues him in ca:tfa
and how it compares to Winter Soldier in the chair:
It’s certainly a compelling argument. Whether or not they tested a rudimentary version of mind wiping technology on him, there’s a lot to be said for the way Bucky dresses before and after his capture. There’s a deliberateness to everything he wears, both from the directors/costumer designers in the movie to Bucky himself, because his clothing certainly does tell a story. There’s been fantastic meta on Bucky’s clothing, too. Let’s take a look at the Bucky we first meet:
what a dapper motherfucker. So pristine, and (mostly) to regulation with his tie and collar just so, with just a little bit of charm and personality shining through with the jaunty angle of his hat. This is why most people agree that Bucky Barnes cares about his appearance, that he cares about it so much that he used his hat to set himself apart.
The next time we see him before he’s captured is the deleted scene where he’s wearing his helmet. Again, it’s at an angle, but whereas the hat choice is deliberate, I would argue the helmet was donned rapidly. The fact that it isn’t buckled bothered me (like he was being cavalier with his safety/had to look good in the middle of a war zone) until I saw American Sniper, where there was a very similar moment where the sniper finished sniping and then moved to put his helmet on, very quickly with the emphasis on getting it on rather than fitting it properly, and I went ‘ooooh, that could explain it’. Bucky might need to get it on and off quickly so it isn’t obstructing his shooting. I’m sure there’s also a possibility both are for movie purposes too, blocking and face shots etc.
This is the last time we see something on his head until he’s in the mask as the Winter Soldier.
Let’s take a moment to compare Bucky before he’s shipped off, to Bucky post-capture.
First of all, no hat. Second, compare this to Bucky done up in full uniform from the first scenes. We’ve all read the fantastic meta that talks about his mental state in this scene, and I agree with that. This is a Bucky who can’t bring himself to wear his full regulation uniform.
But take a look.
what
other
similarity there is
Bucky no longer wears anything tight around his neck.
Bucky no longer wears anything tight around his neck.
And suddenly, his outfit in the bar scene becomes more of a focused, deliberate lack of regulation uniform. He literally cannot bring himself to do up his collar or tie, and it doesn’t get better.
His jacket is never done up fully, just tucked in. It LOOKS dapper as fuck, and I’m sure he’s aware he looks good in it, but if he picked it out himself as we enjoy speculating, he also picked something he’d be warm in but could also get it away from his neck with a quick tug. Is this so he can breathe easier? Is it because he actually had something around his head and neck while tortured? We could get into the possibilities indefinitely.
brb crying over Bucky again
I just want to add that every scene we see him in after the rescue, he’s holding something he can use as a weapon. On the battlefield, it’s the guns. Specifically the big one he has taken to carrying like a baby, which I have no doubt he intends to use on Zola next time he sees him (he seems the poetic type to kill Zola with a gun taken from the place that tried to destroy him). In the bar, it’s the glass, which he only lets go of when Steve is present. He doesn’t want to ever be in a situation where he is bound down and shackled like an animal again, so he takes pains to make it as difficult as possible for anyone to get to him that way again.
Ye gods, this is perfect. And he’s so low-key about it that even though we see Steve carefully taking in the state of Bucky’s dapper uniform in the alley (“You get your orders?”), he spends very little time checking Bucky over once they’re away from the factory. Even in the bar scene, if I remember right, Bucky looks at Steve WAY more than Steve looks at Bucky. Steve doesn’t feel the need to examine Bucky closely—he’s always busy with something else—even as Bucky keeps his laser-focus on Steve.
Bucky slipped the extent of his trauma right past his best friend. Steve doesn’t seem to have any idea how fragile Bucky is, even though Bucky’s practically hanging a neon sign on it with these wardrobe changes.
Thank the Russo brothers for a) shooting outside in a real setting with practical effects not CGI, for going with a shaky cam that actually added to the sense of immediacy and wasn’t annoying as fuck.
Let me tell u what makes this scene so great. It’s the fact that Steve has a match, an equal. He mows down the goons on the Lemurian Star, escapes SHIELD HQ by fighting 15 people in closed quaters, jumps off a buliding and blows up a plane, then within hours he meets up with Natasha and survives a missle strike. He has no match, no equal in this world. That’s what happens when Batroc challenges him – this scene shows us that men think they can go toe to toe with Steve but they simply can’t.
And then this scene is a rare beast. It’s an action scene that is actually a character building scene. We saw the WS blow up Fury’s car and shoot him, but that could have been any common soldier. Sam could have deployed the mine. Natasha could have taken the shot a Fury. None of them could survive in no holding back fight with Steve.
Within seconds, Bucky has Steve off of him (usually if Steve is close enough to hit you, it’s game over for you), then disarms him and uses his weapon against him. Bucky dictates the speed and the path of the fight, and while Steve tries to attack, most of the time he is dodging. This tells us the audience, several things: a. Steve is in actual danger, b. Steve, judging by his face, is scared (remember what beatings he has taken up unitl now) and therefore c. for the first time in 3 movies, Steven Grant Rogers, Captain America, is not safe. The stakes are real. You are feeling the adrenaline Steve is feeling, even if you are not sure why. That’s what makes this scene a masterpiece.
Bucky apprehended and imprisoned in container D23 in CA: Civil War
Someone’s tags inspired this: #he’s so used to this #waiting #god
So I have to bet that they dug up how to build the holding cube from the Hydra infodump, right? Or do we think this was just sitting around in a warehouse somewhere because in CA:TWS they certainly had the stuff ready that they put Cap into that you know was built for the Winter Soldier. He doesn’t even really try to break out until he gets hit with the words. You know he broke out before or tried to and it’s been engineered to suit him perfectly.
No, the plot to get the Winter Soldier back (and probably back under mind control of some sort) came the minute Ross and people like him took a breath after the fall of SHIELD.
And Bucky knew it. He’s the most cynical optimist we’ve seen in the MCU. I bet he and Bruce Banner would have a lot to talk about (re: the Hulk containment chamber on the Heliicarrier).
Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Maria Hill, Pepper Potts, Original Female Character Additional Tags: everyone wants to hire Maria Hill, Maria Hill’s terrible horrible no good very bad weeks, Maria Hill has no time for your bullshit, Pepper Potts has no time for your bullshit, Pepper Potts and her team of badass ladies, ladies in the Tower, hypercompetent women Series: Part 1 of Settle in and find your home Summary:
“No offense meant, but I’m not up for games, Pepper – what do you want?”
Pepper startles Maria by being just as blunt – not that Pepper plays around much, but she’s usually one for observing basic social niceties and putting the kind of lead-up to a conversation that means you more or less know where things are going. Apparently not right now. She just takes her cue from Maria instead.
“I want you to sign this,” she says, as Eva takes a folder out of her bag and leans over to place the SI-stationery file she takes out of that in front of Maria on the table, “I want you to take the job I’m offering you, and I want you to sort out the absolute fucking rats’-nest of a mess in the security and personnel end of my company. I want to make goddamn sure that nobody ever manages to do what they did on Insight Day again.”
Fic recommendation time again. You don’t need to have read the rest of the series or the connected works for this one (tho it’s a great gateway). Takes place right after Captain America: Winter Soldier and assumes that the characters are actually competent or hyper-competent people. Wonderful Maria Hill voice.
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