Captain America

[ivyfic]

Just watched Captain America, finally! So before I read all the reaction posts I tagged...

First let me say that I'm not really a fan of WWII films (Indiana Jones excepted), particularly the way Americans mythologize it, and this film? Holy cow. They actually had people unironically riding A-bomb equivalents a la Dr. Strangelove. You know, there was a force in WWII with a super secret science division devising a way to wipe cities off the map from a distance. Us. And we actually did it. So. I think this movie encapsulates what Europeans think is wrong about how Americans view the war.

That being said, I liked it. I was not enthralled by it, and, for all its flaws, I think I had more fun at Thor, but I liked it.

- Brilliant move making Captain America a piece of propaganda. Cause, you know, he is. That was some meta shit going on right there.

- Who was the dude with the bowler hat and the Victorian beard? I'm assuming he's a character in his own right, cause otherwise that was really odd.

- For all the Howard Stark call out was fun, I had some problems with it. Basically they were making him Tony Stark but not. A) You do not get a man like Tony Stark from a man exactly like Tony Stark. Someone that rebellious comes from someone hella strict. B) I have a problem liking Howard Stark because he is going to be responsible for building the global arms dealing empire that Tony feels so guilty about. And you can push blame onto Obadiah Stane, but the more you make Stane culpable, the more ineffective you make Howard. I'm sure someone with comic book knowledge will tell me how this is exactly how Howard is in the comics, but to me, it seemed like they were trying to treat Howard and Tony like the same character, and without getting the intervening period where we see how Howard got to where Tony ended up, it felt cheap to me.

- Chew that scenery, Hugo Weaving!

My final thought: The last five minutes of that movie were the first five minutes of the movie I'd rather have seen. And I don't mean the Easter egg/trailer. I know Cap's coming back in Avengers, but that won't be his story, and I freaking love lost in time stories and want the whole movie to be about that. (I'm anticipating that the Avengers will be a sprawling mess, because it is practically impossible to tell a good story with that many main characters. I give you Spider-Man 3.) (By the way, do you ever wonder about the options contracts they must have with all their stars, to build up a movie universe like this? Starting with Iron Man in 2008!) So if anyone has lost in time fic to recommend, gimme.

Also, saw the trailer for the new Spider-Man and um... Really? He has the Cullet! It's Twilight-Spider-Man.

Comments

[derryderrydown.livejournal.com]

The dude with the bowler hat is Dum Dum Dugan. In comics, he's Nick Fury's right-hand man. (In comics, Nick Fury was one of the Howling Commandoes. I'm not entirely sure how he and Dugan are middle-aged seventy years later but I have no doubt it was 'explained' at some point.)

The options thing is one of the reasons Chris Evans was wary about signing on for Captain America. I think it's for three Cap movies and three Avengers movies.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Wow! They're really covering their bases! Six movies? Is the Marvel movie canon going to get as complex as comics canon? Cause I don't think I could handle that.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Evans' reasoning for not taking the role at first, and his concerns about it, was one of the only Hollywood-type-complains-about-his-awesome-paying-job excuses I've ever felt sympathy for. He literally is signing away a decade of his life to not one but two franchises of potentially disastrous quality. That's a lot to ask.

I'm so happy someone else recognized Dum Dum Dugan. Needs must read more about him, I'm only tangentially aware of his story.

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

I still think that they should have bought the rights to Wolverine back and made a Wolverine/Cap/Howling Commandos movie set in WW2.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

We have rights issues to thank for neither Magneto nor Wolverine making it into this movie. For once, I'm not sorry about this whole Marvel versus other studios with its properties nonsense. It would have been an entirely different and probably less good film.

[airspaniel.livejournal.com]

They wanted to have young Erik Lehnsherr in CA, but couldn't get the rights to X-Men back, not even in a limited capacity. I can't even imagine the legal clusterfuck Marvel's movie division must be. Avengers is the movie we never thought we would see.

No, actually, Justice League is the movie we never thought we'd see, but since we'll never frigging see it, Avengers will have to do. I still need to see Captain America. I like Chris Evans well enough, and it seems like fairly mindless fun.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

The WB is still in denial about Green Lantern. THey have made more noise about a Justice League movie and are currently (last I heard) considering getting it off the ground before introducing other JL members in their own movies. This is a patently stupid decision, but nothing will come of it before we see both how Christopher Nolan ends his Batman movies and how badly Zach Snyder can fuck up Supes. If those two movies fail on top of the Green Lantern debacle, maybe they'll reconsider. They're already reconsidering sequels to GL with Ryan Reynolds, so here's hoping they do the right thing, bring a John Stewart GL to the screen and make a Wonder Woman movie and then think about doing the Justice League.

Jesus. I cannot believe that, with two of the most famous characters in the entire comics pantheon, Warner Brothers can't make a go of a Justice League movie. But at this point, they absolutely cannot. We'll have to content ourselves with the frequently awesome DCAU.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I think this movie encapsulates what Europeans think is wrong about how Americans view the war.

Yes and no. It's interesting because this film walked a veeeeery tight line between knowing acknowledgment of the kind of things going on in war that aren't readily addressed in our modern romanticism of that time period (I couldn't think of another war movie that made a serious plot point of the whole "Buy War Bonds!" and associated propaganda in recent times aside from Flags of Our Fathers) and a knowing wink towards that self-same nostalgia. You have the perfect hero, fighting the perfect war, against the perfect villain (perfect, in the Red Skull's case, meaning unrelentingly evil, never-think-twice-about-killing-this-guy villainy). That's a sop to our assmuption that WWII was the last "good" war. At the same time, the hero is a jumped up actor who may be doing good himself but who does infinitely more good by inflating (over-inflating?) the self-esteem of his countrymen in order to get them to give more and work harder for the war effort. The fact that that go-get-'em patriotism is shot full of ugly stares when it's confronted with the true patriotism of soldiers who will have to die for their country in that one scene is another bit of willingness to address that rift between the pastiche and the reality.

I, too, enjoyed the meta shit, especially the Captain being a comic book hero based on a real guy in the movie based on that same comic book. That was some layers of meta right there, especially as they managed to work in both the real-world iconography of that first Captain America comic with the movie's version of Steve Rogers punching out Hitler. That was impressive.

I know Cap's coming back in Avengers, but that won't be his story, and I freaking love lost in time stories and want the whole movie to be about that.

The way First Class ended, it rushed things so that some true pathos between Charles Xavier and Magneto was skipped in such a way as the momentum there can never be retrieved. I felt like Captain America did the same, though not to the same degree, by giving so little of the Cap's impression of life in the 21st century. There's so much melancholy in the ending and it's so abrupt and The Avengers is coming before a sequel, so a lot of the momentum will likewise be lost in trying to explore Steve Rogers in the future. I mean, how can we mourn with him for the world and time and people he lost if the next we see he's kicking ass with Iron Man?

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I have no idea how they're going to establish the relationship between Cap, Iron Man, and Thor properly over the course of a single movie. They're Marvel's own version of the DC Trinity, and the Avengers just never worked as a story concept without acknowledging their relationship somehow.

Side thought: I just realized that, given Superman and Batman's deeper relationship in the DC Trinity, and Cap and Iron Man's in Marvel, that makes Thor Wonder Woman. :P

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I just realized that, given Superman and Batman's deeper relationship in the DC Trinity, and Cap and Iron Man's in Marvel, that makes Thor Wonder Woman.

He does have a very impressive rack.

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

'Tis true.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Yes, and I really liked that bit about the war bonds. Probably my favorite part of the movie (aside from the last five minutes). I think I just can't get over the blatant, jaw-dropping denial this movie is in about the Manhattan project. Because, as I said, we were the ones with a secret science project developing weapons capable of unprecedented destruction, and we used them. I mean, they had a whole thing that looked so much like the end of Dr. Strangelove, I just couldn't believe that we've come to a point where imagery like that can be used without apparent thought on the creators parts that it might look like the A-bomb. And there's the whole, Americans as heroes of the war (when we decided to show up) thing. I mean, there was passing mention that we weren't the only people in the war...but barely dealt with.

I've just been learning about the Russian front in WWII, so I don't think I'm in the mood for light action-adventure in that setting. The movie kind of makes it look like America's hands are clean in that war... Having a Japanese-American soldier from Fresno just reminded me of the whole internment camps thing, and with him just being there with no exploration of it made it feel like it was a denial of our anti-Japanese racism at the time. And there's the whole Captain America as Aryan uber-mensch, but that's totally fine when the master race is American thing and I just. Yeah. Not inclined to cut it a whole lot of slack.

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

I would have liked it if they threw in bits from some of Brubaker's later work where Cap talked about fighting with the French Resistance and how impressed and kind of intimidated he had been by them.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

What, the polyglot, multicultural Howling Commandos team didn't cover the "other people are in this war, too" enough for you? :)

I think you are looking, specifically as regards Steve Rogers: uber mensch, for the darker stuff and this movie didn't serve it up. That's acceptable as this is a fantasy. It poked a little fun at our fantasies, too, but it wasn't the movie on which to engage issues of American racism, etc. I don't think it's wrong to want those things, just that you're looking in the wrong place.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

As someone who has never read the comics, those were random and unexplained people. They had no names and had one line each, if that. There presence served to tacitly erase American racism by presenting a Japanese and black American as part of the same unit when our units were actually segregated.

I think, basically, I have a problem with Captain America in total, as a premise, and I'm just not going to like any story that comes out of him in WWII. The whole set up is problematic to me, and even though they did a good job of mentioning the propoganda and issue and poking fun in passing at the idea of Americans as saviors, that is ultimately undermined by him actually being the uber mensch and the savior of Europe.

Sorry, just not going to be in the Cap bandwagon.

Random drive-by comment...

[ealgylden.livejournal.com]

For all the Howard Stark call out was fun, I had some problems with it. Basically they were making him Tony Stark but not. A) You do not get a man like Tony Stark from a man exactly like Tony Stark. Someone that rebellious comes from someone hella strict. B) I have a problem liking Howard Stark because he is going to be responsible for building the global arms dealing empire that Tony feels so guilty about. And you can push blame onto Obadiah Stane, but the more you make Stane culpable, the more ineffective you make Howard. I'm sure someone with comic book knowledge will tell me how this is exactly how Howard is in the comics, but to me, it seemed like they were trying to treat Howard and Tony like the same character, and without getting the intervening period where we see how Howard got to where Tony ended up, it felt cheap to me.

It's not. Not at all. Howard was an inventor, and apparently a brilliant one (though not Tony-brilliant), but he's much more of a businessman. If Tony could get away with running his entire business empire from his labs and could run board meetings with schematics and soldering iron in hand, he'd be thrilled. But Howard actually loved the ruthless masters-of-the-universe corporate gig. He and Stane and comics!Justin Hammer (who was not much like the movie version, starting with the fact that his design was based on Peter Cushing- Grand Moff Tarkin Cushing, not the sweet RL guy) were all real hard-charging, hard-drinking (at least in Howard's case), utterly-obliterate-the-competition types. Tony's a good businessman, but he's not icy and cut-throat like his dad's generation. Howard probably never lost a day's sleep over his arms dealing, unlike his son. He was never wrong, after all.

Cold is a good word for him in general, actually. He sent Tony off to boarding school very young, and less because he thought it would be stimulating for a young supergenius than to get him out from under foot. He withheld affection and praise lest it make Tony "weak." He thought Tony was reckless, aimless and wasteful of his gifts, and didn't hesitate to tell him. Which wasn't entirely untrue, but considering Tony was just 21 when Howard and Maria died, was also a bit of a cruel and premature condemnation. Was he physically abusive? Doubtful, though I won't swear no writer ever has implied such a thing (the comic has been around a while). But he was cold, cruel, withholding, and emotionally abusive. Flirty, fun Dominic Cooper!Howard is not someone Tony would have known, and not a Howard I recognize. Comics!Howard was the kind of guy Tony could (apparently) run into in Mephisto's Hell (in the IM: Legacy of Doom miniseries) and think it pretty plausible. I can't imagine what trigger is supposed to turn this guy into that guy.

Soooo, one very long comment later... I agree! It was cheap, inaccurate characterization, and throws the two main Howard connections we've seen (with Tony and Obadiah) into warped disarray. They made sense with the first half of John Slattery's appearance in IM2, when he charmed the camera while drinking and pawning wee!Tony off on Maria, and have been sliding out of true ever since.

Re: Random drive-by comment...

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

See, that's what I would expect Tony's father to be. I read a lot of business history, and history in general, and over and over you see that the hard-nosed empire builders, the brilliant, cold, calculating ones who have the political acumen to build power and hold onto it, they are shit fathers. Because they dominate everyone in their sphere, including their son; they don't want to share power with anyone for fear of being overthrown, including their son and successor. That's the father I'd expect Tony to have--he's the cliche of the heir with the dominating father. Access to unlimited wealth plus the urge to rebel (because he can't be the man his father was), that's Tony.

It's like the TV show Kings. You need a father like that to get a Tony. Not someone like Tony. Which doesn't mean he can't be charming--someone who can hold power like that often is--but it just seems like they wanted a Tony in the 1940s and that really didn't work for me.