Falcon and Winter Soldier S1, Ep. 2: Cheap knock-off, or the real deal?

The Falcon And The Winter Soldier (Disney Plus) - Episode 2: Star-Spangled Man

Episode 2 of Falcon and Winter Soldier was a pretty stuffed episode with a scattered focus on continuing its racially charged undertones *through two different scenes with mixed results), getting the chemistry between Sam and Bucky to spark once again, and bringing back a major character from an MCU movie.

The opening scene trolls the audience into thinking John Walker, the new Captain America, is prepping for something truly important, but really he's making a return to his alma mater for a media spectacle and a national interview. I initially felt like he was acting like a school mascot coming out to kickstart a pep rally at halftime.

The school setting is the perfect environment to sell us on the "new" Captain America; it's not about who's under the uniform, but rather, the uniform itself, what wearing it represents, and the people who blindly follow that allegiance. He's the new five-star recruit who is signing a letter of intent to play with America, and the media tries to convince America (and the show's audience, for that matter) to give him the same allegiance we gave Steve Rogers. Yeah, when this new guy brings back an entire platoon of men from captivity, maybe then we can get on board. His canned responses during the interview merely prove how much of a farce all of it was.

This new Captain America seems like a good guy on the surface. How could a guy who has earned three medals of honor not be? But while giving that transparent interview at midfield, he talks about how he isn't Tony Stark or Bruce Banner because he doesn't have fancy gadgets or super strength. Uh, hello?! The guy John should be saying he isn't is Steve Rogers. But later he claims he isn't trying to replace Steve; he's just trying to be the best Captain America he can be. After he opens his big mouth later on, though, it's clear Walker is merely a yes-man lackey for the government, quite unlike the real Captain America.

Being the real Captain America also requires having a good sidekick. Lamar Hoskins, also known as Blackstar, appears to be that guy. The duo that he and John form is such a poor ripoff of what Steve and Sam had, which mostly is the point, but again, with only six episodes to tell this whole story, we don't really have time to truly develop animosity towards them. Instead, we're just supposed to figure out we don't like them because they're arrogant and overconfident. It's a bit clunky and predictable, but I guess it still works.

While Steve Rogers and Sam form the great OG duo, Falcon and Soldier may be the funniest pair in the entire MCU. Falcon isn't afraid to make fun of the literal gears churching in his brain or how ancient he is. Bucky's sarcasm and intimidating staring skills are formidable. We finally get to see these guys loosened up a bit as they exchange plenty of funny quips throughout the episode (The conversation they have about "The Big 3" was hilarious).

The duo even needed a therapy session during which they gaze into each other's eyes before getting to the heart of certain, real issues. Bucky thinks that Steve misplaced his trust in Sam, which may mean that Steve also misjudged him. Sam thinks that Bucky and Steve need to let him make his own decisions instead of guilting him into "taking up the mantle." The amount they're playing into the "emerging from Steve's shadow" angle is already getting old, and it feels a little contrived (though not nearly as much as Spider-Man needing to become the next Tony Stark). I suppose they need to condense that story quite a bit for a simple six-episode story arc, but it doesn't seem right considering the ramifications the end result will have on the MCU going forward, no matter which of the two winds up "taking the shield" (or maybe neither of them does).

Sam and Bucky also are at the heart of the two impactful scenes with strong social messaging. The first scene was executed poorly. Bucky introduces Sam to Isaiah (a black man), who apparently was once a super soldier who knew Bucky years ago (and even kicked his butt once, apparently). To explain his absence for all these decades - and let's be real, the way Marvel is justifying why we've never heard of this character until now - Isaiah explains to them he was wrongfully imprisoned for years. I'm not trying to trivialize the message. Yes, men get wrongfully imprisoned all the time, and yes, a disproportionate amount of them probably are black. But come on, don't just materialize a character out of thin air solely as a mechanic to make that point. The hurt and outrage the audience is getting coerced into feeling is so hollow and unearned; it is such a ham-fisted storyline that treads on marginalizing the impact of the story in Captain America: Civil War.

The other impactful scene was executed beautifully and organically, and didn't overplay it to the point of compromising its message. Sam and Bucky leave Isaiah's house in a puff and take a stroll down the street. That's when a cop car pulls up. The cops instinctively consider Sam an agitator, even though they have no reason whatsoever to think something is afoot, but the cops also don't move on Bucky at all. Pretty realistic depiction of the sad state of racism in our country. What I really appreciated was Sam's ability to stay relatively calm in the situation. Look, a lot of controversy centers around policemen and how they handle their authority. Sometimes they abuse it and other times they handle things the right way (anger directed at the cops themselves probably should be re-aimed to incite reform at a higher level instead, but that's a different discussion). Regardless of how Sam may feel about cops, he doesn't let his emotions get the better of him, and that pays off in the scene. Perhaps to diffuse the situation, the writers come up with a moment of comic relief when the cops turn to arrest Bucky for violating his mandated court order to attend his therapy session.

While the good guys are escorted to the police station, the bad guys are at work. We are reminded of a government agency dedicated to re-integrating blipped people back into society (hopefully their health insurance is retroactive). But the Flag Smashers don't want the people who were in charge before the blip to rise again, so they're trying to lead a resistance. Karli, who seems high up in the Flag Smashers organization, is played by the same actress who was Enfys Nest, the leader, coincidentally, of the Resistance group in Solo: A Star Wars Story (hey now, I didn't even force that reference this time). Casting her makes sense because she's basically playing the same character. Karli is a legendary Freedom Fighter who's earned a Robin Hood nickname among the Flag Smashers community. She leads her group in a small operation involving the smuggling of goods.

That's when things kick into high gear with the biggest action scene of the episode. Sam and Bucky track down these thugs and try to apprehend them, but the Flag Smashers fight back, all while riding down the highway on top of two semi-trucks. The Flag Smashers prove to have super strength, too, further supporting the notion that plenty of other super soldiers we don't know about are out there. I guess we need some reason to have villains on the same level as our protagonists, huh?

The discovery of more super soldiers leads Sam and Bucky to the conclusion that one person might have some answers: Zemo is back! As we learn in the final shot of the episode, he's been hanging out in prison this whole time. Many "hardcore" fans pushed back against Zemo when he debuted in Captain America: Civil War, but I think he's a great "bad guy." His approach is different than just the typical beat-em-up bad guy; he has more finesse, more plotting, and smarter thought processes that proved to work the first time around. Hopefully Zemo is used in Falcon and Winter Soldier; I'm going to be pissed if we just get one scene with Bucky and Sam questioning him for a few minutes in next week's episode, only to never seeing Zemo again. I doubt they would do Zemo dirty like that, though!

Notes:

-"A Sorcerer is a wizard without a hat" is one of the greatest quotes of all-time.

-It's crazy to think that The Hobbit came out in 1937!

-There was a great throwaway racism joke: this kid calls Sam the "Black Falcon" because he's black, so Sam wonders if he should call him "black kid." Good commentary on the fact that we all need to stop labeling people by their race, as if it's a detrimental qualifier or an asterisk or something.