What If...?: What If... the Red Guardian Stopped the Winter Soldier?
December 24, 2024 2:15 PM - Season 3, Episode 3 - Subscribe
In Soviet Union, road trips you!
Like the last episode, this is one that has a relatively simple premise--Alexei Shostakov, the Red Guardian, intervenes in the Winter Soldier's assassination of the Starks--that has some pretty major implications for MCU continuity going forward. Mostly, it's an excuse to have Shostakov, who's a pretty fun-loving guy for someone who also spouts Russian propaganda like no one since Chekov in Star Trek, teamed up with the dour, all-business-and-that-business-is-killin' Barnes.
But hey, it's kinda fun. It's not really clear what connection Dreykov (the creator of the Black Widow program) and Hydra have, and I kept expecting the surprisingly capable sheriff's deputy or park ranger or whatever America Ferrara's character was supposed to be to reveal herself as another Black Widow, but eh, whatever. Also, the revelation of "The Rook" was both a surprise and made perfect sense.
Like the last episode, this is one that has a relatively simple premise--Alexei Shostakov, the Red Guardian, intervenes in the Winter Soldier's assassination of the Starks--that has some pretty major implications for MCU continuity going forward. Mostly, it's an excuse to have Shostakov, who's a pretty fun-loving guy for someone who also spouts Russian propaganda like no one since Chekov in Star Trek, teamed up with the dour, all-business-and-that-business-is-killin' Barnes.
But hey, it's kinda fun. It's not really clear what connection Dreykov (the creator of the Black Widow program) and Hydra have, and I kept expecting the surprisingly capable sheriff's deputy or park ranger or whatever America Ferrara's character was supposed to be to reveal herself as another Black Widow, but eh, whatever. Also, the revelation of "The Rook" was both a surprise and made perfect sense.
This show is confounding to me, I both love it and hate it. I love that the writers get to cross-pollinate ideas from the movies that normally stay silo’ed—like last episode’s “what if Agatha Harkness discovered the plot of the Eternals,” or this episode’s “Of course the Red Room would be crossing paths with Hydra.” And I love that it’s an opportunity to spend more time with characters who will never get movies or series of their own, like Kingo and Giant-Man.
BUT I also don’t love how the heartfelt, character-driven stories are weighed down by characters acting extremely goofy. The tone is very inconsistent, like the zombies episode where the demise of the human race kept getting interrupted by unfunny joke-shaped comments from Ant-Man’s severed head. Though this episode leaned more into the mismatched buddy comedy style, so I didn’t mind it here. (But why do the characters keeping doing that awful Dreamworks half-smile!)
And I don’t love how the animation is impressive enough to go fully Uncanny Valley, like the dance battle from Agatha’s episode. That whole dance sequence was both amazing and unpleasantly robotic. (Though again, the animation is impressive—Agatha as Cosmic Queen was breathtaking.)
Also the dialogue is often terrible, and things often blatantly don’t make sense (like Banner’s Mighty Avengers Protocol Voltroning a bunch of mechs he had nothing to do with building).
So I watch this show because I can’t not watch it, but at the same time it embarrasses me some.
That said, I enjoyed this episode! And the last. The one before was just “let’s meld kaiju and mecha into the MCU” in no way that makes sense
posted by ejs at 7:11 PM on December 24 [4 favorites]
BUT I also don’t love how the heartfelt, character-driven stories are weighed down by characters acting extremely goofy. The tone is very inconsistent, like the zombies episode where the demise of the human race kept getting interrupted by unfunny joke-shaped comments from Ant-Man’s severed head. Though this episode leaned more into the mismatched buddy comedy style, so I didn’t mind it here. (But why do the characters keeping doing that awful Dreamworks half-smile!)
And I don’t love how the animation is impressive enough to go fully Uncanny Valley, like the dance battle from Agatha’s episode. That whole dance sequence was both amazing and unpleasantly robotic. (Though again, the animation is impressive—Agatha as Cosmic Queen was breathtaking.)
Also the dialogue is often terrible, and things often blatantly don’t make sense (like Banner’s Mighty Avengers Protocol Voltroning a bunch of mechs he had nothing to do with building).
So I watch this show because I can’t not watch it, but at the same time it embarrasses me some.
That said, I enjoyed this episode! And the last. The one before was just “let’s meld kaiju and mecha into the MCU” in no way that makes sense
posted by ejs at 7:11 PM on December 24 [4 favorites]
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posted by SPrintF at 4:30 PM on December 24 [1 favorite]