In essence, the six episodes served as a protracted origin story, selecting up the place “Avengers: Endgame” left off. Yet Steve Rogers’ parting want that his good friend Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) take up his iconic defend — a want shared by Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), a.ok.a. the Winter Soldier — neglected the many years of battle that, in several methods, these characters missed after World War II.
Sam’s path to overcoming that reluctance — and accepting his transformation from the Falcon into Captain America — evoked darkish chapters in US historical past, together with the authorities experimenting on African-American males.
“They will never let a Black man be Captain America,” Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly), the surviving sufferer of that injustice, informed Sam in an earlier episode, which made the latter’s look in the revised uniform — courtesy of the Wakandans — and listening to him utter the phrases “I’m Captain America” a very stirring second. As his speech about the want to assist refugees and dispense with labels made clear, few display screen superheroes have felt extra grounded.
The previous couple of episodes had been so wildly entertaining, although, that the remainder of the finale did not fairly measure up, wrestling with too many aspect plots, together with the destiny of John Walker (Wyatt Russell) after his ill-advised stint as Captain America, and his seduction by the mysterious Val (Julia Louis-Dreyfus). Throw in the revelations about Sharon Carter (Emily VanCamp), and for as soon as Marvel’s well-known teases for future initiatives felt somewhat extra conspicuously like free ends, begging for a second season.
The present additionally discovered time to let Bucky come to grips together with his grim historical past as a ruthless killing machine, however finally its best asset stemmed from what Marvel recognized in Mackie and Stan’s display screen time collectively in “Captain America: Civil War” — the breezy chemistry between them, and how these characters transfer on with out the man who united them.
“WandaVision” and now “Falcon and the Winter Soldier” took full benefit of the inventive latitude that streaming gives, with the freedom to commit six hours to a narrative and permit such relationships to breathe in a means that motion pictures cannot.
In earlier episodes, although, “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” often soared. Measured in opposition to these highs, the finale did not fairly stick the touchdown.
