REVIEW: “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”

This weekend “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” came out and is already crushing in the box office. I’m sure that has nothing to do with all the beautiful people in the movie, but it’s also because the latest Marvel installment has a killer story with an awesome villian.

“Winter Soldier” finds Steve Rodgers dealing with the problems of a new century, new technology, and 70-plus years worth of culture. Cap and Black Widow are doing missions for S.H.I.E.L.D. and are beginning to question all the secrets Director Fury has been keeping from him. After a shootout in downtown D.C. Nick Fury finds his way to Rodgers apartment to give him a USB drive full of secrets and tell him that S.H.I.E.L.D. is compromised. Soon after Fury is shot, Rodgers has his first encounter with the Winter Soldier. Fury soon dies at the hospital, supposedly. Senator Alexander Pierce invites Rodgers into his office to find out why Fury was killed, and when he fails to divulge that information Pierce sics the entire force of S.H.I.E.L.D. on bringing Rodgers in.

Cap and Black Widow go on the lam to try and find what Fury was so worried about, and the reason someone wanted him dead. They discover that Hydra didn’t die with Red Skull. While Cap was buried in Ice, Hydra operatives had been infiltrating government agencies and guiding the culture into chaos. Turns our Fury isn’t dead and he gives them one last mission to stop Hydra from murdering anyone who might pose a threat to their plan for world chaos.

In the midst of all this action comes the Winter Soldier, who turns out to be Cap’s long lost presumed dead friend, Bucky Barnes. In one of the saddest storylines we find that when Bucky was captured in 1943 he was experimented on by Hydra, and that allowed him to survive the fall to his death. Since then they have been using him to promote their agenda by taking out politicians for 50 years. When Bucky starts to remember Steve and who he was they brainwash him again into being a mindless drone whose mission is to destroy Captain America.

In a intense battle aboard a S.H.I.E.L.D aircraft carrier Cap spurs Bucky’s memory and in the end we see Bucky visiting the Captain America exhibit at the Smithsonian and seeing a tribute to his fallen friend, Bucky Barnes. In the wake of S.H.I.E.L.D’s destruction we see agents moving to the CIA and Stark Industries. I’m sure we’ll be dealing with that fallout on Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.EL.D. and the upcoming movies.

Tell us your favorite part of Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Tweet us @litdarling