THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM, READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
I think the coolest thing about superheroes is how some of them come off as patriotic way possible. Well in my perspective, there is no superhero that acts such like this one.
PLOT
Captain America: The First Avenger takes place in 1942 and follows the journey of the young Steve Rogers who joins an experiment that makes him the only ‘super solider’. He is personally recruited by Dr. Abraham Erskine because based off of his good heart, he perfectly qualifies. After he goes through the procedure, he gets stronger, faster and immunes his illnesses. However, a Nazi destroys the facility and attempts to steal one of the serums, killing Erskine as he flees. Rogers chases the man down, but he destroys the serum and takes a cyanide capsule to avoid being taken prisoner, saying ‘Hail HYDRA’ as he dies. The term ‘HYDRA’ is the name of a Nazi organization ran by Johann Schmidt, who first tried a prototype of the super soldier serum but suffered from facial deformity. With Erskine dead and his formula lost, Rogers is America’s only super soldier. Rather than getting his chance to fight the war, it is prevented because he is instead hired to promote war bonds while scientists attempt to reverse engineer the formula. He proves his worth when he puts his life on the line to rescue his friend James ‘Bucky’ Barnes (Sebastian Stan) and hundreds of American soldiers from a HYDRA Base. During the rescue mission, he encounters Schmidt who reveals his deformed face that inspires his nickname ‘Red Skull’. After this, he would assemble the Howling Commandos, under orders of the SSR (Strategic Scientific Reserve), and infiltrate more bases. He would also be equipped with a circular shied made up of a rare metal known as ‘Vibranium’. Sadly, Bucky would apparently die when capturing Schmidt’s accomplice Arnim Zola from a train. Zola would share the last stronghold of HYDRA, but also shares that Schmidt will use a magical cube known as the ‘Tesseract’ to make advanced weaponry for his army and begin an act of complete world domination. When Rogers leads a final charge to the stronghold, he is able to track Schmidt down and board his aircraft he fled on. When the two fight each other, the cube is activated and when the Red Skull touches it, he gets sucked into a wormhole. Knowing that the ship carries nuclear weapons made from the cube, Captain America chooses to crash into the Arctic to avoid detonation. When unable to find him, SSR agent Howard Stark is able to find the cube. Rogers would never be found until decades later, frozen in ice. When he wakes up, he appears to be in a 40s style hospital room. He chooses to escape when hearing the radio broadcast of a baseball game he attended in 1941. He meets SHIELD director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), who explains it’s almost 70 years since he crashed, implying that he likely survived through suspended animation. But the film ends with the super soldier barely remembering that he planned a date with Agent Margaret ‘Peggy’ Carter before he crashed.
THOUGHTS
Like Thor, I really enjoyed seeing this film back in 2011 because as a fan, I felt that this origin story was done right. Before I go any further with the praise, there were some things that still bother me when re watching it. Not only was it a massive coincidence that there was only one yellow taxi cab when the HYDRA agent escapes, but it was dumb of him to blow up the observation room before taking the vial. If he didn’t want to be caught, he should’ve taken the vial first then set off the explosive. Also since this is MCU canon, I am confused how no one from Asgard was aware of the Tesseract’s presence on Earth. If this artifact is important to Asgard, someone should’ve found it before Schmidt would. My last gripe is in the ending. SHIELD messes up big time with keeping the illusion that Steve is in the ‘40s. There mistake is that they play a baseball game he went to before the serum. Sure they wouldn’t have known that but if they wanted to break it slowly like Fury planned, they should’ve played a game that happened after his crash. If you ignore all of that, I’m positive that you’ll still enjoy this film as much as I did. It is a clever approach for a superhero film to take place in the military perspective. Joe Johnston succeeds in displaying both of those genres at once. Looking back, the visuals are fairly dated as they aren’t perfect but far from terrible; and each action sequence holds up as well. And on top of that, he creates a great ensemble of characters we get to enjoy. Like the Human Torch from Fantastic Four, Chris Evans is able to create the embodiment of Captain America, and every scene he’s in, you’ll always be rooting for him. What we like about him is how not matter how much he goes through, he refuses to be broken. The biggest difference between him and his fellow Avengers he would align with once he wakes up, is that he is naturally good and didn’t need to change to be so. I like the change of how he and Bucky knew each other before joining the war, rather than out of luck because it makes their friendship stronger. Seeing him wake up and meet Fury was a shocking moment, due to being a spot on moment from The Ultimates, but also because you feel bad for how he missed out on his whole life and only remembered his date with the only woman he loved. Every time I think about that scene, it becomes more heartbreaking than I would originally remember. Thankfully, that second chance comes around by Endgame. I also liked Hayley Atwell as Agent Carter because she’s a woman not afraid of being in a man’s world. She’s also like Erskine because she sees potential of someone within. The romance between her and Steve is earned because you can tell that she has her interest in him before he took the serum; which makes it possible that she’d likely give him a chance if he never took it. The addition of Howard Stark was a surprise mainly due to the addition of Dominic Cooper playing the younger version of the character.In his given screen time, you definitely see where Tony gets his charm and intelligence from. Since he failed to make flying cars a success, the lesson we learn from that is that we have to be willing to fail to see success. That mentality worked in his favor since Stark Industries stuck around long after the war ended. I honestly enjoyed Stanley Tucci a lot as Abraham Erskine. He may have not been there as much, but he is more important than one would think because he gave Steve the chance to be a soldier because he only saw all the good in him, unlike other soldiers he knew. Hugo Weaving is perfectly intimidating as The Red Skull as his obsession made him stronger but it led to his downfall. Many were not sure of the character’s fate when he touched the Tesseract and disappeared, but thankfully Infinity War answered the question. Toby Jones may present Arnim Zola as someone who joined out of fear, but for some reason you can sense his loyalty. Overall, Johnston succeeds in making a standard superhero movie that is good on its own, if you don’t plan to watch the other MCU movies. If you like military movies but don’t want to watch the other MCU movies, check this one out.
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