Poll: Captain America: Civil War -- Choose your side!

[PunkRex]

I do think it's a little hypocritical how people call out Iron Man for being kind of far sighted in that he can't see the problems in front of the solution when Cap is always committing the other extreme.

We can't be registering heroes because then my friends will get screwed over!

Errrrrr Cap, as much as I respect your loyalty, they're YOUR friends. Mine was that dude Bucky chucked into a jet engine in the last film.

Can you really blame Bucky for that? He was under the control of a government agency...which is exactly the situation that Cap is trying to prevent for everyone else.

Cap wants power to remain in the hands of individuals, that just won't work. Bucky may have been brainwashed so I suppose he gets a pass but Loki wasn't, neither was Hulk, Magneto, or Deadpool.

Regardless, it's gonna be a interesting movie, and I still love Cap.

 

[mduncan50]

Cap wants power to remain in the hands of individuals, that just won't work. Bucky may have been brainwashed so I suppose he gets a pass but Loki wasn't, neither was Hulk, Magneto, or Deadpool.

Regardless, it's gonna be a interesting movie, and I still love Cap.

Well Magneto and Deadpool aren't part of the MCU, so they don't count yet. And I would imagine that the Winter Soldier is the representation to Cap of the potential result of government control. Loki is a god from another galaxy, so I am doubtful he would give a crap what any government on Earth says he needs to do. As for Hulk, other than when he was being controlled by Scarlet Witch (another superpowered being that was under government control) the only time he was causing major damage is when the military would attack him.

 

[happyninja42]

people with powers so overwhelming they could probably level an entire city in an afternoon, yeah that needs to be registered and controlled.

Same here. Not knowing the level to which the comics or the movie are going to take the registration concept, I can't speak. But if the only thing required was "You will register with the government so we can have a database of known powers, in case something crazy happens", seems reasonable to me. We require people who purchase firearms (in the US anyway), to register them, and we expect them to obey the laws everyone else obeys. Beyond that, there isn't anything they are required to do. But, if we find someone dead by a bullet, and it happens to match the registration of a gun, well now we have a place to start investigating.

Seems the same to me with powered people. "Ok, so we have a crime scene, where someone with ice powers went crazy. How many registered ice users do we have? Ok, lets go talk to them for alibies, and start looking for any unregistered ones." That's hardly slavery, that's just prudent criminal investigation.

"But happyninja42! We don't require people to register themselves in our society!" Right, but we also don't have people who are walking, breathing Weapons of Mass Destruction. But when an actual WMD is involved, amazingly, the world takes serious notice. Because of the scale of damage possible. So yeah, to have a setting where you stuff the destructive powers of global scale weapons into human beings, and then say the governments don't have a right to be concerned about these ambulatory WMD's, is trying to have your cake and eat it too in the comic book world. You don't get to make them a global level threat, and then hide behind "I've got personal rights! You can't do things to me!" Well sorry, but yes, yes we can. We can at the very least know you have these powers, and what they do in case something happens later that points to you. If you obey the rules, and just live your life like normal, fine, go for it. But the second we find a town vaporized in an electrical storm, you better believe we're going to look at the registered lightning powers first. Just like a registered gun. You might not be the culprit, but we certainly need to ask you some questions.

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

Non-superheroes should not be registered as no one should be registered just for existing. Unlike buying a gun it isn't a choice, all they've done is be alive and be born.

Superheroes should be registered regardless of power or lack thereof. If they are taking a legal role they should be expected to have higher standards placed on them.

Anyone who commits a crime with a power should also be registered for obvious reasons

 

[mduncan50]

And we're sitting at 60% Team Cap to 40% Team Iron Man. Tony's definitely leading the Confederate Avengers, but still much closer than I originally thought it would be.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

I'm on whatever side Captain 'murica is not.
Mostly because I can't stand that guy and what he represents.

Bravery, loyalty, self-sacrifice, and protecting as many people as possible? Yeah what a jerk.

OT: Team Cap all the way. I just think Cap is a more interesting character and I prefer his heroism to Tony's snarky drinking habit. Plus, my name is Steve and I'll be making my own Team Steve shirt if someone else doesn't.

 

[Something Amyss]

"But happyninja42! We don't require people to register themselves in our society!" Right, but we also don't have people who are walking, breathing Weapons of Mass Destruction.

I just want to point out that right now, in the US, there is popular support for a dude who wants Muslims to have identification of such.

Honestly, I don't find superhuman registration all that culturally unlikely.

 

[Something Amyss]

Hope they don't mind nuking some more cities to keep trying to defeat them.

Yes, and my original post had been lambasting this and other government body decisions as a bad idea. Even the quote you would have pulled this from was responding to someone rationalising it.

Another excerpt from my original comment:

This does not tell me anyone in the MCU is capable of responsible oversight, so it's hard to call it an argument for accountability. It seems like it's an argument for letting the biggest screwups have the most dangerous toys.

A plan to nuke New York was one case of that.

Speaking of....

If you'd like to change it to government agencies being responsible for lots of things you're welcome to, but that's not what was originally said.

Not what you originally quote mined, at least. I don't know what the deal is here, but given the rest of my message, and the response that was in keeping with the rest of that message, it would seem like this isn't actually my thesis. I'm not particularly sure what cherry picking one line and ignoring anything else I said accomplishes, except to make sure I don't read further replies.

I will not be modifying my statement.

 

[mduncan50]

I just want to point out that right now, in the US, there is popular support for a dude who wants Muslims to have identification of such.

Honestly, I don't find superhuman registration all that culturally unlikely.

But equally as reprehensible.

 

[Something Amyss]

But equally as reprehensible.

Not so much my point, though. Ninja's imaginary opponent said we don't do this sort of thing in the real world.

I kind of imagine we would do exactly this if we had Supermen or Iron Men in the real world.

Well, no, not Iron Men. Tony Stark would be a rugged individualist who was exercising his second amendment freedoms or some such. And he would have moved all his holdings to an island offshore anyway.

 

[PunkRex]

Well Magneto and Deadpool aren't part of the MCU, so they don't count yet. And I would imagine that the Winter Soldier is the representation to Cap of the potential result of government control. Loki is a god from another galaxy, so I am doubtful he would give a crap what any government on Earth says he needs to do. As for Hulk, other than when he was being controlled by Scarlet Witch (another superpowered being that was under government control) the only time he was causing major damage is when the military would attack him.

Well, my point was not that any individual hero would give up their freedom but whether or not they should.

Both sides have their points, I'm super hyped to see what the film says.

 

[Something Amyss]

The thing I take away from Tony Stark is that, yes, he's a fuck up who's constantly making mistakes, but he also realizes he's a fuck up who constantly makes mistakes, and so, when he realizes he fucked up and made a mistake, he finds a way to fix that mistake.

The problem is Tony's like a guy who keeps hitting his wife and then feeling really bad about it afterwards.

I won't be at all surprised to find Mr Accountability breaking the rules within Civil War. He'll say we need to be held accountable and then do something that flies right in the face of that. He practically can't help himself. And then he'll sober up, look at the bruises, and be all "my god, what have I done?" again.

 

[mduncan50]

The thing I take away from Tony Stark is that, yes, he's a fuck up who's constantly making mistakes, but he also realizes he's a fuck up who constantly makes mistakes, and so, when he realizes he fucked up and made a mistake, he finds a way to fix that mistake. Ultimately, he wants a peaceful world with the ability to defend itself from anyone or anything that might threaten that peace, and he sees people who have superpowers as a potential threat, so people need a way to keep track of them and know that they exist and what they're capable of, and they need to be held accountable if they use their powers in a way that causes problems, just like anyone else needs to be held accountable for such actions.

So, this is his solution to that. Is it perfect? No, of course not, nothing humans do ever is, but he's got to try something, and if it goes wrong, if it gets abused for someone's twisted ends, he'd be among the first to stand up and say "no, this is wrong" and try to fix his mistake. And that kind of proactive, long term approach is going to benefit humanity far more than Cap's "let's just brute force our way through whatever comes our way whenever it comes" approach. And the thing is, he's done a lot that worked and worked well, it's just that all we see, all that makes for good storytelling, is his fuck ups.

I don't think anyone doubts that Tony's heart (well, arc reactor) is in the right place, but he has shown a history of stubbornly continuing along a chosen path even after, as Cap says, things start going south. Is it understandable to want to know who is out there and what they can do? Sure. Should the government be able to tell people when and where to use their powers? Hmmm, highly debatable, but I can understand the viewpoint of those who believe so. Should an underwater supermax prison be built to contain anyone that doesn't use their powers as the government tells them? What, no! That's just... Should Iron Man and company engage in super-powered battles, putting the public at risk, in order to bring in those "criminals"? Well now you're just actively causing the situations that you were ostensibly working to prevent.

 

[Elfgore]

I've always been kind of iffy on the matter, mostly because I tend to always bring in my real life ideals. A big ideal is power corrupts for me. So I would not trust people who can level cities in minutes to be roaming around free. If a few lower level heroes have to suffer for it, I don't see why not. So IRL, Iron Man.

But, if we're going by comic book logic and heroes are infallible beings of good. I'd say Cap. Just mostly because he doesn't release bloodthirsty villains to hunt down those opposing him... or release an unstable Thor android.

Movie wise, I don't have the full idea of why. So I'll be withholding judgement for now.

 

[mduncan50]

Just a silly/goofy/cool little thing I found. Apparently if you respond to the tweet shown in the article below, you will receive a short personalized video response from one of the members of that team, welcoming you by name.
http://collider.com/captain-america-civil-war-cast-twitter/

One of these days Marvel will surely do something that isn't the perfect way to promote their movies, but today is not that day!

 

[mduncan50]

See, as far as the MCU goes, I don't see that. Granted, I haven't gotten around to watching Age of Ultron yet, but in Iron Man, I see a sheltered playboy who lived it up off his wealth with no regard for anyone and no concern about what his company actually did with the weapons he designed for it getting a rather rude awakening to the reality of his company and deciding he needed to do something about it, because he couldn't trust his company or the military to make things right. In Iron Man 2, he continues his distrust of the military and tries to keep his inventions to himself, but starts falling into his old irresponsible ways as he's facing his own death by poisoning from the arc reactor keeping him alive. He gets that resolved and gets back on track only to be faced with the realization of the existence of God-like aliens ready and willing to invade earth that humans are totally unprepared to deal with. In Iron Man 3, he's trying to cope with how badly the attack on New York affected him and starts creating all kinds of Iron Man suits to try and occupy himself, and then gets caught up in the Extremis terrorist plot involving the Vice President, leading into Age of Ultron.

And again, I've yet to see Ultron, but I don't see Stark explicitly trusting the government/military by the time Civil War comes around, but he also has reason not to trust people with superpowers to always do the right thing either. At least from the trailers I've seen of Civil War, Captain America seems perfectly willing to go rogue in order to save his friend and fuck anyone who gets in his way. It isn't until Rhodes getting severely injured if not killed in the process of trying to stop him and Bucky that is the last straw that pushed Stark over the edge and fully against Cap. I don't know anything about some underwater supers prison and being forced into allowing the government to use them as unwilling weapons under threat of being sent there (is that how it plays out in the comics?), but that doesn't seem how the movie plays out to me and seems like it would be against Stark's character to go along with such a thing. He spent a couple of his own movies refusing to be the government's weapon, I don't see him supporting others with that kind of destructive capabilities being forced to. But I do see him saying "no, we can't just be given the freedom to run around and do whatever the fuck we want to do when so much gets destroyed and so many people die in the wake of us doing that." And it's hard to disagree that when they step up to end threats, there's a lot of collateral damage that they probably shouldn't be as completely unconcerned about as they usually are, even if far more death and destruction would have been caused if they did nothing. As Cap says at the beginning of one of the trailers, " . . . you try to save as many people as you can. That doesn't mean you save everyone . . ." but who is he to make those decisions on his own authority?

Age of Ultron is actually a pretty big step as to why Stark would choose to hand over autonomy to the government, because it was his own hubris and the lack of anyone able/willing to tell him no that led to the events of that movie, many deaths, and all of humanity being put in jeopardy. I think it was the last straw for him, and while he still wants to help people, he doesn't want to be the one responsible.

The underwater prison is shown rising out of the water in the second trailer, and you see Tony inside of it as it pans across all of the empty cells. In the comics it is a prison in the other dimension from the latest Fantastic Four movie, which Marvel obviously doesn't have rights to, so this is what they've decided to go with.

I don't see the Avengers as having ever been "unconcerned" about collateral damage, and in fact they are often shown trying to save civilians and limit the area of destruction. Instance that immediately pops into mind is the invasion of New York in the first Avengers. We are given both a scene of Cap giving some cops instructions on how best to evacuate and cordon off the area, and we're able to listen in as they enact their plan to keep the invading aliens boxed into a radius of only a couple of blocks to prevent widespread destruction.

And who is Cap to make the decision as you how best to save as many people as possible? He's a man of good heart and conscience. He's not a politician looking for re-election. He's not a General looking for a devastating victory. And he's not a weapon to be aimed at whomever the government is unhappy with that week. Keep in mind, the people you're saying should have oversight over the Avengers are the same ones that continually attack the Hulk in as highly populated areas as possible to maximize collateral damage, and whose response to an alien invasion force that they knew nothing about was to nuke one of the most densely populated cities in the world hoping that that would be able to stop them. (Spoiler: it wouldn't have.)

 

[Something Amyss]

And again, I've yet to see Ultron, but I don't see Stark explicitly trusting the government/military by the time Civil War comes around, but he also has reason not to trust people with superpowers to always do the right thing either.

None of this I actually said. I said that I expected Tony to say we need to be held accountable and then violate that. He doesn't need to trust the government. He just needs to sign up and then play by his own rules. And that's totally within the character of the guy who was demonstrated to hack SHIELD twice in one movie. The guy who had learned his lesson so thoroughly from Iron Man 2 that he called out a terrorist organisation with his personal address, putting those around him at risk, or decided that the answer to one failed mad science experiment was another, more powerful one. The guy who went behind the backs of his own friends to do so.

Stark is still reckless and impulsive in Iron Man 3 and both Avengers movies so far, and it's a good thing that he's written to be always right, because if he accidentally killed a city, he'd probably build a state-killer to make up for it.

As Cap says at the beginning of one of the trailers, "you try to save as many people as you can. That doesn't mean you save everyone..." but who is he to make those decisions on his own authority?

Since you agree Stark doesn't trust the government and seemingly don't even contest the idea that he'll go rogue, who is he to make those decisions with his own authority?

Honestly, I think Avengers Assemble made more sense. The team split on ideological lines, with Cap's team joining SHIELD and Stark's team being the anti-authority team. Of course, being a cartoon, they all learned they were morons and couldn't save the day without each other. But honestly, Stark and accountability go together like peanut butter and cyanide. Even if you like the flavour of peanut butte, it's not a good match.

I think Stark's position is worse, because if history is any indicator, he's going to hold everyone else accountable and go his own way.

Also this:

We are given both a scene of Cap giving some cops instructions on how best to evacuate and cordon off the area, and we're able to listen in as they enact their plan to keep the invading aliens boxed into a radius of only a couple of blocks to prevent widespread destruction.

I trust Cap's motivations more than Stark's. Iron Man's guilty conscience blinds him constantly. Steve's ties to Bucky may have blinded him, but between the two, I will take a mote in Rogers' eye over the beam in Tony's any day of the week. Twice on Sunday.

The writers of the MCU made me like Stark, even sympathise with him. But they did the impossible with Cap and made me trust a Steve[footnote]sorry, old in-joke. Some of my best friends are Steves[/footnote]. They made me believe in one of the most erratically-written characters in a genre of erratically-written characters.