Falcon And The Winter Soldier “One World One People” Review
Falcon And The Winter Soldier “One World One People” is the sixth and final episode of Falcon and The Winter Soldier Season 1. I had my reservations about this episode going into it. Especially after the mess that was episode 5. Unfortunately, the show wasn’t able to pick itself up off the ground. It was a perfectly fine episode. But that’s all. Fine.
The Hostage Situation
We’re back with the Flag Smashers and their takeover of the GRC. Sam is dealing with them head on in his new Captain America suit. He, rightfully, makes the call not to evacuate because it’s clearly a ply. But he’s ignored and people are evacuated anyway. Only to be placed in vans with bombs attached to their rear doors. Meanwhile, my favourite personality vacuum, Karli is encouraging the Flag Smashers to take more and more drastic action. Even though it’s clear they don’t agree with her anymore. Sam defeats the French guy who was after him (can’t remember why and really don’t care at this point.) And flies off to save some hostages that have taken off in a helicopter. Using Redwing to locate if anyone on board has flight training, he crates a situation for her to grab the controls whilst he takes out the Flag Smasher that’s currently piloting it.
On the ground Bucky is dealing with a whole bunch of Flag Smashers. Karli tells them to set light to one of the hostage vans as he’ll have no choice but to back off and save them. He does and tears the door open with his metal arm. Meanwhile, Walker shows up, but he’s kinda good now. He’s obviously out for Karli and that’s understandable. He fights a bunch of Flag Smashers but as he has an opening to take Karli down he notices one of the hostage vans hanging off the edge of a broken road and about to fall. Bucky is preoccupied so he can’t save them and neither can Sam. So he does the heroic thing and saves the citizens instead of enacting his revenge.
A New World
Karli and some others escape underground where they’re met with Sharon Carter. Who reveals she’s the Power Broker. Batroc threatens to expose her but she shoots him. Hearing the fire, Sam chases it to see Karli holding a gun to an injured Carter on the ground. He tries to reason with her but before anything can be done. Sharon shoots Karli and he dies in his arms.
The ending of the episode is a scene in which Sam pleads with the GRC to do something about how they’re handling the situation. He reasons with them that they understand how hard it is to help displaced people and to imagine how those displaced people feel knowing their plight is being ignored. They accept and they move to make more amends to how they help the citizens of the new world.
After a brief bit of family time with Bucky joining in the family cookout. Sam goes to see Isaiah Bradley, who’s softened a little but is still hateful towards the government for what they did to him (as he should be.) Telling him to clean up. Sam takes Isaiah to the Captain America exhibit from episode one, now with a new feature. A statue of Bradley and a plaque commemorating everything he did for his country and who he is.
Walker becomes a new super soldier working for the government codenamed US Agent. And in a mid credits sequence we see Carter get her full pardon from the US court. As she’s walking out of the building she calls one of her contacts and tells them to be ready as they’ll soon have access to all of USA’s secrets.
Review
So after all that, what did I think? It was fine. I guess. If the plot outline seemed disjointed and a bit of a mess that’s because it was. The whole thing came together but it all happened so randomly you didn’t really know where to look. Add that to the fact that the episode stopped the pacing to a grinding halt for a few seconds to make some shoehorned-in political point and the whole thing became a mess. The only time the pacing was streamlined and seemed to know where it was going was after during Sam’s speech. During and after that was fine but that’s probably because all it had to do was tie up loose ends.
The episode had two stand out moments for me. Sam’s speech and Isaiah seeing his statue in the museum. The rest was all kinda just… there. It existed and it happened but it felt again like it was all just being dragged out for the few moments we got of genuinely good writing.
I’m not annoyed. I went in with low expectations but even I was disappointed. A bad end to a show that started so well. Just like WandaVision. I really hope Disney don’t make too much of a habit of doing this…
