Best Marvel Movie/Series (TieBreaker)

The Avengers

I think Civil War is the better film. I still think Avengers was a great movie,but Civil War is smarter and love the fact Spider-Man is in it. It makes me annoyed though when people say they didn't like it because it was nothing like the comic. It was never going to be.

Civil War does a great job weaving so many characters into a cohesive storyline, and it certainly has a more emotionally affective third act.  But I thought it took too many shortcuts to get there.  Zemo's plan being dependent on Tony finding out about the mask at the right time, Ant-Man and Spider-Man having no logical reason or motivation to take part in the airport fight, literally nobody taking 5 minutes to understand where the other side is coming from, etc. 

I love both flicks, and frankly, Cap's outfit alone makes The Avengers seem dated already-- but the deciding factor for me was the pure joy of The Avengers.  Civil War is a downer in too many ways.  Watching two heroes fight each other nearly to the death when a conversation could have resolved everything leaves you feeling disappointed in both of them.  The action in Civil War gives it an edge over anything we see in the Avengers; yet (at least for me) when the credits roll, I feel like I could go back and watch Avengers again immediately while Civil War makes me want to talk to the characters through the screen like when the defense on my favorite team gives up an easy score. 

In the end, there is no wrong answer here.  Both films are awesome in their own way and the positives far outweigh the negatives.      

Loved what they did with Black Panther in CW.  30 seconds of screen time and you understand T'Challa and his father, their relationship and their world view.  Masterful stuff.  Less impressive was Ant-Man's inclusion.  His entire motivation in his own flick was to be a better father; yet he immediately signs up for a job that will likely land him in prison for breaking international law.  He didn't even know these people.  Meanwhile Tony signs the accords because he feels guilty about collateral damage-- so he recruits a high school student  for a potential standoff with super powered terrorists.

The Zemo thing wasn't that big of a deal because you could argue he would've waited for Tony to come eventually, it wouldn't have taken long regardless.  But it was convenient that he and Cap showed up at the same time.

Cap & Tony's perspectives were totally clear.  They just didn't listen to each other.  Given the events of TWS, Caps point of view regarding government oversight was totally understandable.  But he had to know the world was never going to accept global vigilantism.  Black Widow had the most sensible perspective on the situation, and if not for the sake of the plot, he would've listened to her.  Nobody bothered to point out that the alien invasion or any of the examples Sec. Ross brought up would've been exponentially worse if the Avengers had not intervened.  Nobody pointed out to Tony that the Ultron fiasco was his fault, not the Avengers. 

For that matter, the airport battle itself was filled with reckless behavior.  Scarlet Witch is throwing cars at people!  Cap drops a jet bridge onto Spidey's head without any reason to suspect he could carry the weight.  I'm trying to imagine what would've happened to Falcon if Vision's laser had hit him instead of War Machine.  It was an awesome action set piece.  Awesome.  But you take a step back and you have to ask yourself why they're being rougher with each other than they are with the villains they fight.  Individually any of these things can be excused and forgotten as part of a larger action sequence.  But when they continue to prove that the heroes in this flick simply aren't thinking most of the time, it's a problem. 

I love both flicks.  I saw Avengers in theaters four times and CW three, I don't need to be convinced they were both great.  But something about the internal logic of CW is always going to seem off to me.                    

My vote goes to Avengers because it's not just my favorite movie out of the MCU, it's one of my favorite comic book movies, period.

I agree with a lot of what the poster above me has already said regarding the pure joy of the movie, specifically the moment we saw the team come together on the big screen for the first time. I must have had the biggest, silliest smile on my face for pretty much the entire movie. Nothing beats that for me. As a child it never even occurred to me to dream that I'd be able to see my favorite comic book characters come to life like this. What a thrill The Avengers was and what an exciting ride the MCU has given and continues to give us.

I personally didn't feel Civil War flowed as well as Avengers. The movie felt rushed as if part of the story got cut or glossed over so that they could get everybody on the screen together and give the audience a big fight. I get that that's the nature of things when adapting something from one medium to another but I really felt like I was seeing an incredibly abbreviated version of something that should have been bigger and deeper than what we got (and no, I never read Civil War so I'm not comparing it to the comic book).

Avengers flowed more smoothly and naturally imo. Maybe it's because it had five other movies leading to its release so a lot of the story had already been built up through these previous movies and it didn't feel like a lot of things were missing. Maybe it was the first team-up movie of its kind so I'm just biased. Maybe it all just comes down to personal preference and what works for me doesn't work for someone else. Either way, I think both movies are good. I just prefer Avengers and tend to rewatch it more often.