Captain America: The First Avenger
by Cheeto
Posted on 30 January 2022
Rating -
Captain America: The First Avenger is a 2011 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character Captain America. Produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Paramount Pictures, it is the fifth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). The film was directed by Joe Johnston, written by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, and stars Chris Evans as Steve Rogers / Captain America alongside Tommy Lee Jones, Hugo Weaving, Hayley Atwell, Sebastian Stan, Dominic Cooper, Neal McDonough, Derek Luke, and Stanley Tucci. During World War II, Steve Rogers, a frail man, is transformed into the super-soldier Captain America and must stop the Red Skull (Weaving) from using the Tesseract as an energy source for world domination.
First off, this film is impossible to be bad in my eyes, I love both superhero and war movies, and that’s what Captain America: The First Avenger is. Yeah, most of the MCU movies showcase some kind of war, this film actually showcases a real war that took place; WWII. I understand that this is slighlty biased due to the war setting bumping this movie up a half-star or so, but I’m only trying to tell the truth.
Once again, Marvel hit the nail on the head with the casting of our main character, Chris Evans was almost born to play the role of Steve Rodgers. Standing at 6’1, and covered in muscle, I don’t think anyone else could’ve played the role. I also think that Chris Evans plays the role of Steve Rodgers perfectly.
Speaking of Steve Rogers, how he is written in this film; it’s brilliant. I love how through the first half of the film, he is this skinny, brittle man, but that doesn’t stop him from having the biggest will. He wants to fight for his country, even with all of the barriers in his way. I also love how, when he is turned into Captain America, he still has the heart and will of when he wasn’t the super soldier. Of course at this point, he does have a little swagger about him. I can’t not mention the iconic scene in which we see Steve injected with the super-serum and transfromed into Cap. As the machine door opens, we are greeted with a beast of a man, the perfect introduction to Captain America.
I love the actual suit of Captain America. As a character that has been around for decades, his suit has gone through many different looks. Some of course, outdated. This suit is perfect for the modern time, while also looking like it came out of WWII. It’s exactly how you’d expect Captain America to look in the real world. I also like how it looks with his helmet and his jacket.
I think Hayley Atwell, Sebastian Stan and Tommy Lee Jones all put in great performances in supporting roles. Especially Hayley Atwell, who perfectly plays Peggy Carter. It was so successful in fact; that she got her own TV show.
I like how they explain how Steve was frozen in ice, it isn’t far fetched at all, and it makes a lot of sense. Also it moves into The Avengers very Smoothly.
Just a last quick one, I also like how Steve goes from being a laughable propaganda tool, to fighting in the actual war itself. This just makes for; not just a great, but an intersting story arc. It also helps us come accustomed to our main protagonist.
Now unfortunately, that’s just about where the positives end for this film. First off, I don’t like the main antagonist of this film; Red Skull. It’s surprising because I actually think that Marvel got the casting of him spot on with Hugo Weaving. Everyone knows how great of an actor he is, but unfortunately, he couldn’t even stop the character from being one of the most forgettable antagonists in the whole franchise.
In my opinion, Red Skull was poorly written, and his scenes are some of the hardest to get through. They try and do this small reveal scene, but it isn’t that much of a surprise anyway. This due to the fact that it was pretty obvious from the start, and the fact that he wasn’t that interesting of a character to start off with anyway.
I think that the second half of the movie slightly tieters off, and it easily isn’t as good as the first half. Pair this with an okayish ending, and this movie really is a movie of two halves. I also think, to a certain extent, that it’s rushed. Maybe this is because they were more focused on The Avengers, I don’t know.
Overall, I really do enjoy this film. Yeah there’s some things that bring it down, but overall, I’d recommend it to anyone looking to get into the MCU. I can also let it off due to the fact that Marvel was still trying figure out how to bring it’s properties to the big screen. Watch this one guys.
Leave a Reply