Friday, April 18, 2014

The Weekly Stuff #83 - Captain America: The Winter Soldier Review & Discussion



It’s time for another episode of The Weekly Stuff Podcast with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman, a weekly audio show that explores the worlds of film, video gaming, and television. Remember to subscribe for free in iTunes by following this link!

As promised, this week’s episode finds Sean and I talking a lot about Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which both of us loved (you can read my written review here). We dive into the story, characters, themes, and action sequences in our typical, in-depth, spoiler-filled fashion, so don’t listen to that segment of the episode until you’ve seen the film.

Before the main topic, though, there’s a good hour of non-Cap content, in which we discuss the firing of Martin O’Donnell, one of our favorite people in the video game industry, from Bungie, as well as some recent PS4 developments and some thoughts on Sony’s planned Sinister Six movie.

Enjoy!





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The Weekly Stuff with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman is a weekly audio podcast, and if you subscribe in iTunes, episodes will be delivered automatically and for free as soon as they are released. If you visit www.jonathanlack.com, we also have streaming and downloadable versions of new and archival episodes for your listening pleasure.

1 comment:

  1. I think I figured out how to do a Sinister Six film.

    So you create something akin to a darkly comedic crime film that’s a mix of elements from In Bruges, Ocean’s Eleven or a Tarantino film.
    We care about them in spite of the bad things they are doing because they are somewhat likeable and have funny but tense team dynamics. We never have the villains trying to do anything too evil so as to lose sympathy; they simply have a personal goal and are willing to hurt anyone that stands in their way.

    Each character fulfils a different archetype and team role to simplify the story. One could be a comic-relief buffoon while another is an anti-hero with principles. They all fit various degrees of evil, some petty criminals while others megalomaniacal super-villains.

    They are all after something that could be tied to a shared origin (Oscorp?) and their plan. Comedy and tension could derive from the team trying to work together but clash in extreme ways due to their differences and just resort to threatening or trying to kill each other (imagine how bad it would be if the avengers were a bunch of criminals instead). They all hate each other and can never agree on anything except for the one thing that keeps them together: Spiderman.

    Spiderman isn’t a character but more a foil that always appears and stops their plans. They become obsessed with stopping him which creates more diverging goals and conflict.
    Spiderman’s wise cracking personality adds to us sympathising with the six because he just seems like an intruding asshole from their perspective. We eventually gain pathos from them feeling defeated by well-known idea that the villains are not ever allowed to beat the hero.

    Instead of Spiderman, the actual villain comes in the form of one of the six. He is possibly the domineering leader of the group who creates the majority of the group’s tension and is the most despicable.
    This causes us to turn our hatred against him (a clear villain who organically comes from the story) rather than Spiderman (which would conflict the audience’s sympathies).
    Eventually the villain wants to do something so heinous and/or against their personal goals that the rest of the team temporarily put aside their differences to kill him (maybe even teaming up with Spiderman if its not too cheesy).

    They then accomplish their own personal goals/arcs but don’t succeed in some evil plan which would again conflict the audience. And maybe they return to their old dynamic in the end, committing crimes and fighting Spiderman (a silly meta accepting of the comic status quo).

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