Re: What Did You Watch? 2025-02-08 (Saturday)

On Feb 9, 2025 at 10:26:35 AM PST, "Arthur Lipscomb"
<arthur@alum.calberkeley.org> wrote:

Captain America: Civil War (4K disc) 2016 movie set in the MCU.  After a
mission goes bad Thaddeus Ross shows up with a proposal to reign in the
Avengers. The last time we saw Ross we was a general, now he's the U.S.
Secretary of State.  At this rate, maybe one day he'll even be
President. Anyway, after the ultimatum is delivered one group of
Avengers lead by Iron Man decide to sign on to the new restraints while
another group lead by Captain America decide to go their own way.

I re-watched this recently, too, and I have to say, the scene where Ross sits
them all down and lectures them always angers me, particularly when he focuses
on what happened in New York, implying that the Avengers are responsible for
all the damage and (presumed) deaths that occurred.

Excuse me? How is *any* of that damage the fault of the Avengers? If they
hadn't been there, the city literally would have been completely destroyed by
the Chitauri (as well as the rest of the earth, eventually) and when Cap
weakly tries to make that important point, Hurt responds with "But at what
cost?"

Cap should have responded, "Excuse me, motherfucker? I know you didn't just
say that. Wasn't it you assholes in the government that launched a fucking
*nuke* at Manhattan in response to the invasion? The only reason New York is
still standing at all and isn't a radioactive slag heap is that we took the
time-- in the middle of a pitched battle-- to *also* stop you assholes from
killing millions of innocent people. Now you want us to let the same people
who wanted to nuke New York to start calling the shots with us, too? GTFO."

That whole scene just pisses me off, both for Ross's hypocritical arrogance
and for the way the team just sat there and took it rather than pointing out
the gaping holes in his bullshit.

As for the Accords, I want to know what justifies requiring Romanov and Barton
to register with the government. At least in these movies, they're not
enhanced, either biologically or technologically. They're just people. One is
good with a bow/arrow, the other exceptionally skilled in hand-to-hand combat.
If that's the criteria in these "Sokovia Accords", then everyone who qualifies
as Marksman on the pistol range or achieves a black belt in martial arts would
have to register and be monitored and controlled by the United Nations.

Seems like there'd be just a few constitutional issues involved there,  at
least for the Americans who met the standards of the Accords.

And since, per AGENTS OF SHIELD, the Accords weren't limited to just the
Avengers but rather any "enhanced person", why was someone like the Son of
Coul, who was technologically enhanced with that nifty bionic hand that could
do all sorts of tricks, not required to register, but Tony Stark was? And how
much tech assistance triggers the reporting requirement? After all, a gun is
tech, so does merely carrying a gun require registration? If not, then where's
the line between a holstered gun and an Iron Man suit that imposes a
submission-to-the-United Nations requirement on a person?

And what qualifies as "enhanced"? Would someone with those kangaroo-like leg
prosthetics be considered "enhanced"? I mean, they *can* run and jump faster
and longer than people with normal human legs, after all. And then there's
Thor, who isn't enhanced at all. He's just not human. He's normal for his
species.

Those "accords" presented so many legal and due process challenges, which
both the show and the movies gloss over (for good reason--- most people don't
care about that stuff), but which the law geek in me would love for them to
have addressed.