In a summer filled with comic book adaptations that I truly enjoyed, “Captain America” rises to the top, with “X-Men: First Class” and “Green Lantern” following (in that order) and “Thor” being a little further down, but still an enjoyable movie in its own right. I worry a bit about the box office draws of these movies. While the Captain still has an outside shot of hitting 200M, “Thor” is the only other comic book movie that came moderately close to reaching that milestone. I also wonder how well a movie called “Captain America” will do overseas. I just do not want this beautiful age of multiple comic book movies every year to ever end. Though, with a Spider-man, Batman, Avengers, and Superman movie slated for the next couple years, I guess I should reserve any internal panics I might be having. If one or two of those movies fail…I will start to panic.
So, why does “Captain America” succeed? Because we want him to succeed. He is an underdog with honor, respect, courage, and a heart of gold. Before Rogers even becomes Captain America, his moral code and non-physical attributes are things we can and should all aspire to achieve. Simply put, he is a likable person. After he becomes Captain America, he maintains his impressive persona, and while he now has improved physical attributes, he is not invulnerable and still finds himself in underdog roles, which means he still finds us rooting for him.
The story itself has all the key elements for an exciting, fun, action-packed, interesting and entertaining journey. It has an origin story, an arch-nemesis, a love interest, a dab of comedy, and lots and lots of fighting and explosions, all the while, setting up the last biggest piece to “The Avengers” origin tale. It is entertaining as a standalone movie and nerdgoobilish when considered as part of something even bigger to come.
Being set in the World War II era also allows for a new, fresh setting for a superhero to be thrown into. A superhero in a war. What fun! I mean…war certainly isn’t fun. But…a superhero in a war? Fun!
Finally, I had severe reservations about the actor playing “Captain America”. I had nothing against him, other than he was already part of the “Fantastic Four”, another Marvel movie. Thankfully, even when not in costume, he looks and acts so much different than his other character that I did not even notice while watching this movie.
You should see this movie…for America. You do like America…don’t you????
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