This is the second movie this year to pit popular superheroes against each other, and boy is this better than the first (Batman v Superman).  I had become sorta ambivalent towards the Marvel superhero movies recently as Disney has been churning them out year after year since Robert Downey Jr kicked everything off in 2008’s Ironman.  They’ve all been entertaining and worth seeing on a hot summer day, but the type of movies that immediately evaporate from your brain the second you see daylight (except for maybe Guardians of the Galaxy which was off kilter enough to stick out).

Civil War is still a popcorn movie in the vein of the other Marvel films, but it hits each part of the Marvel equation so well (action sequences, star power, and humor) that it gravitates to a level above the rest.  Yeah sure, Downey, Evans, Renner, and Johansson do their standard shtick, but Paul Rudd’s Ant-Man, a high school-age Spiderman, and most notably Black Panther bring their own welcome elements to the party.  Coming into the year, I thought Marvel was stale enough to allow WB’s newer Batman/Superman franchise to reinvigorate the game a la the Golden State Warriors, but after each of their respective 2016 installments I don’t foresee a changing of the guard.  Already looking forward to 2019’s Captain America: Biceps.  TIER 1 – RATED GREG