I don't really want to engage with all this, but just to say regarding Fury: rewatch the Iron Man credits scene. He's fairly cheery. This feeds into that well.
People change over their lives. If Fury were exactly the same in 1995 as 2018 it would be unrealistic and indicate a fairly boring one-note character. No, Fury has 23 years of development there. Showing what he was like before allows us to see his growth and change, and opens up Samuel L. Jackson to playing the otherwise somewhat same-y role in a completely new and interesting way that teaches us a lot about who Fury was to inform who he is now.
It's like when people realise their grandparents had excitement just like them in their younger days. Someone being bitter and jaded in later life does not mean they were always that way - in fact, it usually means the opposite.
