Re: Captain America 2: The Winter Soldier
My initial thought is that Winter Soldier was better than Avengers, and in fact, that Winter Soldier rivals Iron Man and Thor 2 as my favorite Marvel Studios outings. Avengers is probably loved as much for the handful of memorable scenes and lines (and of course, getting to see all those guys together) as anything else. Considering the totality of the film, I don't think it's a masterpiece. It's serviceable, but not totally fulfilling if you can divorce yourself from the geek-gasm of seeing those guys teaming up. I was actually a bit disappointed when I first saw Avengers, though my opinion on it has improved since then.
I just still think Begins and Dark Knight are the artistic high points for movies about comic characters, but also see it as more polarizing for various reasons, which can actually account for them having a higher average rating (metacritic), but fewer raters liking them more than disliking them overall (rottentomatoes). Having said that, I think Cap 2 does a terrific job of bringing that style of Jason Bourne/Three Days of the Condor hybrid-type comic movie to the screen. Just as Thor 2 did a terrific job of bringing a great comic fantasy story to the screen. And of course, Nolan wasn't trying to do either of those things, so in some ways it's hard to directly compare them.
My initial thought is that Winter Soldier was better than Avengers, and in fact, that Winter Soldier rivals Iron Man and Thor 2 as my favorite Marvel Studios outings. Avengers is probably loved as much for the handful of memorable scenes and lines (and of course, getting to see all those guys together) as anything else. Considering the totality of the film, I don't think it's a masterpiece. It's serviceable, but not totally fulfilling if you can divorce yourself from the geek-gasm of seeing those guys teaming up. I was actually a bit disappointed when I first saw Avengers, though my opinion on it has improved since then.
I just still think Begins and Dark Knight are the artistic high points for movies about comic characters, but also see it as more polarizing for various reasons, which can actually account for them having a higher average rating (metacritic), but fewer raters liking them more than disliking them overall (rottentomatoes). Having said that, I think Cap 2 does a terrific job of bringing that style of Jason Bourne/Three Days of the Condor hybrid-type comic movie to the screen. Just as Thor 2 did a terrific job of bringing a great comic fantasy story to the screen. And of course, Nolan wasn't trying to do either of those things, so in some ways it's hard to directly compare them.
