Review: Captain America 2 - The Winter Soldier

Seeing as he gets a name check in the title, you'd expect the Winter Soldier to have a bigger part in the second Captain America film - but in fact he ends someone playing second fiddle to the main villain and looks like he's spent too long listening to 30 Seconds To Mars and My Chemical Romance to be any real threat.

That's not the only problem with this sequel either, with the biggest problem facing this this film (and the Marvel Universe as a whole) is that since Agent Coulson's reappearance in Agents of Shield, it's tough to believe for a second that anyone is in any real danger at any point in the plot. That said the Marvel films have their formula down to a tee, with impressive action sequences interspersed with snappy one-liners to lighten the mood, meaning the Captain America 2 is always entertaining, but future films need to up their game to hit the heights of previous successes.

Review: Captain America - The First Avenger

The final offering in Marvel's Avengers origin stories, Captain America offers two hours of fun, but ultimately forgettable action - yet deserves credit for how it manages to avoid becoming the nationalistic nightmare that Matt Stone and Trey Parker so successfully lampooned in Team America: World Police.

Chris Evans is excellent in the lead role, his softly spoken portrayal of Steve Rodgers standing out against the usual OTT performances you've come to expect from Marvels' Superhero films. Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter is the stand out amongst the supporting cast, but one of Captain America's main problems is that there's too many of them - The Cap's crew coming and going in the blink of an eye being the case in point for too many cast members spoiling the broth.

Captain America also falls short of hitting the heights of the Superhero genre by just kind of petering out towards an end thanks to the lack of a big action sequence or the feeling that he's ever really in any real danger at some point resulting in a leaving the cinema in a bit on anticlimax.

*speaking of which don't bother staying after the credits this time - I'm pretty sure the original post credit sequence was moved to the end of the film and you just get a rubbish Avengers trailer this time.