"I can do this all day."
#05 Captain America:
the First Avengers
Retrospective
10 Year Anniversary & Infinity War Countdown
! O U T A L R E A D Y !
[July 22th 2011, PG-13, 2hr 4min, Drctr: Joe Johnston, Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi, War]
"I don't like bullies. I don't care where they're from."World War 2 has always been such a popular topic for Hollywood to cover ever since it has become accepted to be adapted and although the frequency has been steadily going down as of late, the years of constant 'adaptations' has saturated the subgenre to the nth degree but we never had a superhero twist to it, which is where this film came in. Starting with people unearthing something mysterious under the ice in the modern times, it smartly followed by the Nazi counterpart of SHIELD, HYDRA led by Johan Schmidt unearthing a piece of technology from safekeeping, something out of the myth just like Thor and Odin. The introduction of Steve Rodgers couldn't have been better with him desperate to serve the country in the war but does not have the physical prowess to backup his limitless spirit. Speaking of which, I can't believe how well the face-swapping technology holds up even until today, with Christ Evans' being put upon a smaller, skinnier actor for the whole of first act, giving us a tease of how far the technology would go (have you seen how good Thanos looks?!). His all-American and do-gooder attitude is being shown at the forefront to his benefits as all his actions are the essence of Captain America, showing us he is the best candidate to be injected with the Super Soldier Serum. The Tesseract has been used as a supernatural unlimited source of power and even though its real purpose isn't known yet, its side effects have been taking its toll on the Red Skull for the worse compounding the effect of the unfinished serum he forcefully took. Hugo Weaving is delectably sinister and crazy as his descent to madness worsens while Stanley Tucci and Toby Jones are solid as the supporting doctors on both sides. The highlight have to be Hayley Atwell though as the confident and excellent SHIELD Agent Peggy Carter, giving Chris Evans a run for his money as his (almost) equal in her part. Him putting on the spandex to sell the American bonds is a clever commentary on how war was dealt with during the times with their own propaganda, complete with song and dance that he begrudgingly accepts and finally excels in with his stoic charisma. Finally stepping into the war zone as he was designed to to save his old friend Bucky Barnes, it is the hectic war sequences being injected with supernatural technology that really excel in using the premise and giving it a fresh twist, complete with a jailbreak and in contrast break in. As the titular Captain capably leading his Howling Commandos effectively against the HYDRA's many heads, it steadily crescendoed into a showdown between two opposing ideals on the same superhuman coin and his decision to sacrifice himself for the good of the mankind hits me every time. He's going to miss that dance though, as the romance between Steve and Peggy really is the one true relationship that I can see genuine chemistry, respect and understanding between them under such dire circumstances. The comradery between Rogers and Barnes is also being built up effectively as that loss really hit the latter hard, which would be confounded later in the Winter Soldier. This concept was executed perfectly as best as they could have done at the time and set up the Avengers with a fully defined leader in Captain America.
"Is this a test?"
"Hail HYDRA!"
"But a weak man knows the value of strength, and also compassion."
P.S. I love how the universe is being built up well with SHIELD and HYDRA being the two opposing forces that lived on in Agents of SHIELD and Agent Carter!
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