Now that AoS S3 is over, AC has been cancelled, and ‘Most
Wanted’ has been cancelled pre-production once
more, Marvel must have been bored, or something, since it came up with the
idea of Captain America/Steve Rogers being an agent of Hydra all along. To paraquote
the Old Testament book of Leviticus, the Hell?
Let us start again. In ‘Civil War’ the movie, captain
America came off the screen as a right arsehole at times, especially when it
came to Tony and his family. Tony himself can be a big-mouthed jackass from
time to time, but he tries, he really tries, and the entire ‘Civil War’ movie
is actually based on this. Steve has ideas of what a heroic life should be
life, and so does Tony, and neither of them like each other’s idea, and then
along comes colonel Zemo with his own grievances against the Avengers, and it
all goes to Hell, and Stark and Rogers aren’t talking to each other anymore,
and the Avengers are outlawed, and -
Okay, ‘Civil War’ was a very impressive piece of mass media,
let us be honest here. The characters were well rounded and real people, the
background and its details was awesome too, and Black Panther and Spider-Man
were introduced (and will be getting their own movies in the future), and the
Ant-Man kicked ass too.
Of course, this being the MCU, there was at least one sticky
point – Ant-Man the movie. In the credits scene, the audience saw Cap and
Falcon actually capture Bucky and working on de-brainwashing him; the Accords
are mentioned too. Then comes ‘Civil War’, which seems to be ignoring this
scene, as Barnes is out at large once more, and not really de-brainwashed too.
Tough break, Ant-Man the movie.
Otherwise, however, ‘Civil War’ fits well enough with the
rest of the MCU continuity; in many ways, it seems to be a direct continuation
of the previous Captain film, ‘The Winter Soldier’. Now what?
Let us start with an important point – Hydra is gone in MCU.
The Avengers, the agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., had finished it off between the ‘Age
of Ultron’ film and now. Crossbones/Brock Rumlow, who is an important
Hydra-related villain in the comics, (and ‘Winter Soldier’ movie) is killed in
the first half-hour of the film and is forgotten almost immediately in all the
fallout that follows. Hydra as such is gone in MCU, general Talbot in AoS has
destroyed it with S.H.I.E.L.D.’s help, so that’s it, the odds of Hydra
returning to MCU is possible, but until the next MCU movie or series features
it coming back, (and Werner von Strucker, for example, is still alive in AoS)
it is gone. Case in point – Helmut Zemo. In the comics, he is an important
figure in Hydra hierarchy; in MCU, he was a native of Sokovia, a colonel of
its’ secret service, who had an axe to grind with the Avengers because of the
‘Age of Ultron’ events: his family got killed. He was not Hydra, he helped the Avengers to fall apart all the same –
so it is quite likely that any villains that the Avengers, (or the agents of
S.H.I.E.L.D.) will face in the future, will not be Hydra. Fair enough. So-
So now, Marvel comics release a new Steve Rogers series,
where Captain America is an agent of
Hydra. The Hell?
Yes, Marvel comics and MCU tend to be treated as separate
entities, but they (especially the comics) seem to be blurring the lines,
especially with the comics’ AoS story
lines. S.H.I.E.L.D., by now, has become established in comics, and it seems to
be reflecting the MCU, as Avengers and agents (and an occasional X-Man or so)
interacting openly with each other in the universe. Now what?
Into the mix comes Grant Ward, who, in the MCU, was a Hydra
agent, who eventually became a host for Hive, an InHuman villain in the last
part of AoS S3, who almost turned a large part of the world’s human population
into InHumans or Primitives – take your pick. Grant was a controversial
character – odds are, that at first the writers planned to redeem him…and then
changed their mind; but frankly, AoS the TV series constantly suffered from
continuity gaps, canon controversies, some nasty characters who were supposed
to be ‘White Hats’, and etc.; the point is that some people hate him, a lot,
and others are solidly behind him, precisely because of this controversy, which
is why, one suspects, the show had him finally killed in mid-S3 finale, and
Hive became an independent character instead.
And also? AoS S3 finale was reminiscent of the first captain
America film finale, where Steve and Peggy say good-bye and Steve vanishes,
until Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. discover him in the Arctic. That is fine, except
that here it was director Coulson, rather than Lincoln Campbell, who was
supposed to perish alongside Hive.
To elaborate: ever since the mid-season S3 finale Coulson
was growing increasingly haunted by him killing Ward on Maveth and needed
repentance/closure/whatever for his actions. On the other hand, the first episode
of S3 showed Daisy and Lincoln working their powers in perfect tandem to defeat
Andrew/Lash; it was one of the worst episodes of the entire series, but still
it was canon.
Again, it could have been a very dramatic finale – Coulson
sacrificing himself to stop Hive, to fix his mistakes and shortcomings, and to
give his adopted daughter, Daisy, and her new boyfriend, Lincoln, a fresh
chance to be themselves, their own people, free from the past influences of
Hive and Grant Ward. If, six months later, Daisy and Lincoln were on the outs,
it would still work and create a further dramatic conflict between the team
members, not unlike to how it went on ‘Civil War’ between the various
Avengers…but it did not happen. Instead, Lincoln is dead, Daisy is swinging in
the wind, and Coulson was demoted from his directorial office in S.H.I.E.L.D.
This, too, can work – after all, after the Avengers’ Civil War, we had an ‘age
of Darkness’ – we had Stark as a director of S.H.I.E.L.D., we had Osborn (and
hey, he is Spidey’s archnemesis, so maybe he will appear in MCU in time?), and
we had all sort of nastiness afterwards. Maybe Coulson’s demotion will make
sense in S4 when it comes to screen…but mostly, this is just another AoS
clusterfuck. Ian Quinn is gone, the Koenigs are gone, Hunter & Morse are
gone, Deathlok, Joey – they all just left the show without a reasonable
explanation. At least Mitchell, who played Lincoln, had closure for his
character, cough.
Back to the comics – now, the comic version of S.H.I.E.L.D, has Grant Ward in it – as S.H.I.E.L.D.
spy in Hydra, at least for now, (building an army of Iron Man rip-offs, in a
plot similar to Iron Man 3 movie), and Captain is Hydra. Already there are
theories that the Red Skull has used a cosmic cube to accomplish this, but it does
not matter. People are upset. People are pissed. Moreover, people are claiming
that the writers for ‘Steve Rogers the Hydra agent’ have ripped-off this idea
out of AoS S1 (Grant Ward). Now what?
Well, it is ‘just’
a comic – people will get over it…eventually, because it is captain America, so odds are that this idea will go down like a
lead balloon especially at first (and later on too, if this trend picks up
momentum). Comics themselves are a confusing medium of mass media, especially
Marvel with their interactive and intertwining plotlines, so odds are that the
shock of cap being Hydra will be buried, eventually.
However, an aftermath, an aftertaste will remain. People
will not forget how their beloved
character was turned into a ‘Nazi’ (something that MCU tried to distance itself
from, especially on AoS, again), and since the Internet is a ‘global village’
of sorts, this controversy will cause problems, especially among Marvel fans,
for a time at least.
However, wait! Cap’s predicament is supposed to reflect on
real world’s issues! Donald Trump and the right wing! No, just no. Trump is a
most unpleasant man, but he, currently, is executing one of the basic features
of the American society: equal opportunity for everyone. He saw, for himself, a
chance to become the president of the U.S., and he took it. On the other hand,
an American citizen named Krystal Lake, (works in Home Depot), used the same
opportunity not to enter politics, but to order a custom cap, with a pithy
slogan: ‘America was never great’ or something along those lines. As a result,
Trump may become president of the U.S., while Lake has a cap with a pithy
slogan, the end. The moral?
Yes, Americans are a people with a freedom of speech and
they use it, and they will keep it, and yes, the American president is elected
by the people (and for the people…maybe). Guess what, there are plenty of
people behind Trump, and no pithy message will be able to change this, not
alone.
Do you know what happened in Russia, after their WWI
misadventure? The Royal family was deposed, but not by the Communists, no. By
the aristocracy and intelligentsia, by the people who would be later depicted,
(sometimes), as monarchists. They were not, not really – they honestly intended
to depose the monarch and create something between a democratic republic (the
U.S.) and a constitutional monarchy (the U.K.), not the USSR. Only, while they discussed, debated and talked,
Vladimir Lenin (look him up on the Wikipedia, if you don’t know him) and his
communistic comrades got together, produced several simple and
straight-to-the-point slogans, and won the hearts of the masses – workers and
peasants, primarily, but the rest of the social strata of Russia of that time
was present too. The result? The USSR. Was it built to last? Gorbachev broke it
from the inside, and ta-dah, we have Perestroika, and then, 25 years later, the
U.S. finally realized that one more victory like this one, and they will be
undone, so they…got involved in Middle East, and northern Africa, and now they
are much more undone than before, for Obama the democrat just continued what
George Bush II the republican has started, and- Enter the Trump.
Trump is not a very good person. He already backed out of a
debate with Sanders, for example. However, he is a man with concrete, specific
ideas, and people appreciate it. The international democracy, the global
village that the U.S. has been practicing since the Cold War and beyond isn’t
for everyone – hence the rise of new right-wing practice, hence the growing
insistence that the Middle Eastern refuges go home or wherever/whatever, just –
out of Europe. If Trump wins the election, he might be the American version of Gorbachev
– but pithy slogans on custom-ordered headwear will not prevent this – and neither
will comics. How does Captain America, as well as the rest of Marvel relate to
the ‘Trump situation’ directly? They do not. As a result, Marvel is stuck with
Cap being Hydra, and – nothing more, at least for now. Maybe Tony is a member
of the communistic Leviathan or something like that, who knows? It is not the
point.
The point is that Marvel has overshot its’ mark completely.
If Captain America being Hydra is some sort of a pithy statement, that is.
Otherwise? It is just another plot twist to boost up the sales, in the worst
traditions of AoS the TV series, and it will reverberate/backfire on the Marvel
comic series as such as well.
End
