![]() ![]() Falcon even battles a resurgent Georges Batroc (Georges St Pierre), a close-combat Euro-villain last seen troubling Steve Rogers on the Lemurian Star at the beginning of The Winter Soldier. The opening action salvo matches anything we have seen the MCU deliver on the big screen and intentionally mirrors one of two MCU films TFATWS is taking the biggest cue from – the geopolitical machinations of Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Civil War. TFATWS looks, certainly from the way ‘New World Order’ takes time to establish where Sam & Bucky ‘the Winter Soldier’ Barnes (Sebastian Stan) stand post- Endgame, to be a six-hour movie in all but name. WandaVision broke through and captured audiences at the start of 2020 starved both of Marvel content and storytelling built on mystery and theory, but it remains an unorthodox beginning for Marvel’s ambitious plan to use Disney+ as a means of transforming the MCU into a multi-platform operation. He’s had a substantial suit upgrade, perhaps to distinguish him from the Avengers he was long in the shadow of, but the team structure around him no longer exists in the same way.Īt the same time, the title leans toward the wider aspects of TFATWS’ place in the MCU landscape. government, dropped into the Tunisian skies by the Air Force to fight a terrorist organisation as we see in the opening action sequence (which reminded me of the jet vs alien ship canyon shootout in Independence Day at points), but he appears to be a lone entity these days. Wilson, as the Falcon, is now operating as an agent for the U.S. ![]() The post- Endgame ‘New World Order’ within the MCU has yet to be fully constructed but it appears to be a world without a concrete, established superhero structure of protection with Tony Stark & Natasha Romanoff dead, Captain America gone (and as we see in the eulogy Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) gives here, assumed dead), and the rest of the Avengers having moved on in different ways. TFATWS looks set to combine both of these aspects into what Malcolm Spellman’s series will explore-not just loss but legacy. Far From Home played it a touch for comedy and skipped over the psychological consequences and WandaVision played with it as background, using it as a framing device through Monica Rambeau to explore less the personal costs for those ‘blipped’ (and those who stayed behind) but what it turned government entities and nation states into. Far From Home and WandaVision both explored the consequences of ‘The Blip’, aka the moment Thanos the Mad Titan wiped out half the universe with the Infinity Gauntlet only for them to reappear five years later, in different ways. Yet in some sense, TFATWS also serves as part of the epilogue to Endgame, certainly in this premiere. The first episode of what stands to be a limited series is called ‘New World Order’. Neither of those stand as clear candidates for a semi-relaunch whereas TFATWS clearly has aspirations in this regard. It could be argued that Black Widow was designed for this role but given it appears the Scarlett Johansson-picture is set largely before the events of Avengers: Endgame and serves more as a swan song, that is open to debate similarly Spider-Man: Far From Home, which tailed Endgame in the summer of 2019, a film serving more as an epilogue to the third phase. If we look at Phase Four in the context of a ‘Season 2’, then TFATWS makes far more sense as a season premiere than WandaVision, an offbeat slice of mystery box experimentation, ever did. WandaVision, originally due in December, turned out not just to be the first new Marvel Cinematic Universe property to appear on the incumbent streaming service but the launch, unexpectedly, of ‘Phase Four’ in the long-running Marvel saga, or as I extemporise on in my book, those first three Phases should perhaps be considered ‘Season 1’ of the cinematic TV series that is the MCU. TFATWS, as I’ll shorten the title for expediency, was forced to shut down production before a long-planned August 2020 release date, theoretically in the wake of Black Widow’s cinematic arrival in May 2020. Thanks to Covid-19, like with much else in the world of culture and entertainment, plans changed. ![]() Later this year, Marvel debut their animated series What If…? which explores alternate universe takes on classic Marvel universe stories, but one unlikely to appear is this: what if The Falcon and the Winter Soldier had been the first Disney+ MCU series released? ![]()
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