Amanda Hocking

Amanda's Blog Post

Oh, Captain America

May 15th, 2012 by
This post currently has 23 comments

So yesterday I finally saw The Avengers. I didn’t go see it opening weekend, partially because I want The Dark Knight Rises to win the best opening weekend for any movie since the history of the world, and it would make it slightly harder for it do that if I saw The Avengers.

That’s not to say that I don’t like The Avengers or I don’t want it to do well – because I do. I just like Batman more, and if you didn’t know that, then you must be new here, and I want to extend a warm welcome to you.

Anyway – The Avengers. It was a terrific film, as I’d expected it to be. Joss Whedon always delivers, and I love summer blockbuster with superheros more than I love being alive.

I’d seen all the precursors to The Avengers with the exception of Thor. (I just didn’t get around to seeing it for some reason. I think, in my mind, I kept confusing it with The Immortals and that other movie that looks exactly like the The Immortals but isn’t apparently, and then I would think that I didn’t want to see it.) But I bought Thor on Bluray last week, and I plan on righting the wrong of not-watching it very soon.

On a side note – are either of the previous incarnations of the Hulk (starring Edward Norton and Eric Bana respectively) meant to be related to this series? Or are they only connected in the way that Tim Burton’s Batman is connected to Christopher Nolan’s Batman?

And Spiderman – is he going to be in the future Avengers endeavors? I know the Toby Magquire Spiderman is dead, but will Andrew Garfield end up a part of this franchise?

(Oh! I just remembered. It was Clash of the Titans. I kept thinking that that was part of The Immortals series until Eric set me straight. Thanks, Eric!)

So, yes. I saw  The Avengers. And I liked it. But here’s what I don’t understand – Captain America was my favorite. It doesn’t make any sense.

Tony Stark is sarcastic and cavalier, which is kinda my thing, plus Robert Downey Jr is one of my all time favorite actors (along with Michael Caine, River Phoenix, Sam Rockwell, and Michael Wincott). And Chris Hemsworth – how dreamy is that guy? For real. That long hair throws me off, but those eyes are ridiculous.

And as we’ve already established, Batman is my favorite thing out of anything. Doing a compare and contrast between the Marvel and DC universes, Iron Man would be the Batman to Captain America’s Superman. So using that logic, Iron Man should be my favorite.

(Iron Man’s more of a dark horse, playboy billionaire whose only powers are being super smart and the ability to build/buy fancy gadgets, much like Batman. Captain America and Superman are both all-American, boy-next-door-types that possess super strength, and are more likely to play by the rules than Iron Man or Batman.)

So, Captain America is my favorite, and I don’t know why. Sometimes I think I just like people when they seem really earnest and nice. Captain America was that way.

Oh, and it’s super nuts how the guys look now. Chris Evans and Chris Hemsworth in particular. They actually look like action figures. They’re built like He-Man dolls. The level of their buffness is kinda obscene.

Mark Ruffalo was also in the film. I thought he did a good job. Everyone was talking about how great the Hulk was (note: Everyone is Patton Oswalt one time on Twitter), so I was perhaps a little overly psyched for his performance.

My one issue with the film was Loki. (And to answer the question I’ve gotten a hundred times over the past week or so – Loki in my books was not named after Loki in Thor films. They were however both named after the same Norse god. Most of the characters in the Trylle books have Scandinavian names since it’s based on Scandinavian folklore, so that’s how Loki comes into play).

Loki just didn’t do it for me as some kind of ultimate villain that needed all these super humans to band together, especially since Thor and the Hulk are damn near indestructible. Like if it had been Loki plus Juggernaut plus Red Skull plus Iron Monger uniting together, that would’ve made more sense to me.

I know Loki opens a porthole to space-hell and robotic sandworms come out and chase Chrissy from Growing Pains. So it ends up making sense. And the sequels have to room to grow, because you know there will be sequels, not to mention each individual character has their own series with their own villains.

And I do love when monsters attack New York. I don’t know why. The only thing better is when monsters attack Chicago. I love battles involving skylines.

As an added bonus before The Avengers, I got see The Dark Knight Rises trailer on the big screen. Full disclosure: I teared up. I’m beginning to fear that I’ll probably bawl at the end of the movie, which will embarrass me in front of all the cool midnight show attendees at the IMAX where I will be watching it.

I made a realization, though. I’m very excited about Tom Hardy being TDKR, but I just figured out that I will not be able to see his face or hear or his voice, so it sorta defeats the purpose. Oh well. I’ll know it’s him, and so will he, and that’s what counts, right?

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  • I kept confusing it with The Immortals and that other film that looks faithfully like the The Immortals but isn’t in fact,

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  • Chris says:

    My brother saw The Avengers, but I ended up seeing Prometheus. Anyone else see that? As a big fan of Blade Runner, I was expecting a bit more from Ridley Scott. Instead, all I got was a horror/alien flick with a horrible plot and script. I am NOT looking forward to seeing the new Spider Man; it’s been done before, enough said. We will see how The Dark Knight Rises turns out; my guess is not as good as the others though.

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  • owenbanner says:

    I’ve been a longtime marvel fan, so I was interested to see how the movie would turn out. By and large, when a movie has more than two superheroes or supervillains, it tanks. I was afraid the film would turn out too scattered and we’d only get surface character immersion in between special effects. I have to say that I was impressed by how Whedon handled multiple heroes on the screen at the same time. When the Cap movie came out, I wasn’t too excited about Evans playing him, but I thought he did a great job portraying the guy who is conservative with his values, but reckless when it comes to danger. I’d like Marvel to tackle a more grown-up presentation of their stories the way that Batman has without swinging all the way to Punisher-level gore and violence.

  • Also, neglected to mention that the new color scheme looks great! Well done.

  • Well after all this talk of Avengers, I suppose I’ll just HAVE to go and see it!

  • Lyn Lowe says:

    I’ve never commented on this (or anyone’s!) blog before, but I just had to say something…

    I too love Batman best. My love is so absurdly out of control that some of my friends actually nicknamed me Harley Quinn (which they regret now, because I use it all the time). And, just like you, I see that Iron Man is clearly the Batman of Marvel. Except, just like you again, I loved Captain America best!

    I can’t figure it out either!

  • brandy c says:

    I literally laughed out loud when you mentioned Chrissy from Growing Pains. I said rather loudly during the film to my sisters “HEY! That’s the girl from Growing Pains!!!” and several people shushed me : )
    Captain American and Thor tied for my favorite. I didn’t think I would like this movie, but I did. It was awesome!!

    brandy

  • smober says:

    If you were here, you would see bits of my brain and skull splattered all around right now because the whole comparison between Batman and IronMan just blew my mind. Why didn’t I see this before?? It’s all so obvious now.

    The Dark Knight Rises is going to be AWESOME! I’m planning to go to a midnight with a bunch of friends, so that’ll help boost the opening weekend B.O.

    My sweet heart works for a studio and he and a couple of his coworkers got to see the new The Amazing Spider-Man last week. Mixed reviews- one loved it, one hated it, one felt “eh” about it. All thought Emma Stone is a hottie, so at least they agreed on that.

    By the way, I *finally* bought Switched the other day. It’s next on my reading list, and I can’t wait!

  • Jphoenix says:

    Chris Evans is hot, maybe that’s why captain America is your favorite. He also is such a sweetheart in his movie lol.

  • The first Hulk movie by Ang Lee is not considered in canon with these films, but the second is, hence the cameo by Downey Jr. in the Norton film. They just recast with Ruffalo, which works better in my opinion.

    The other Marvel characters who have appeared in films (Spider-Man, X-Men, Fantastic Four, Ghost Rider, etc) in the last few years have their film rights bought up by other studios, so there won’t be any crossovers in that regard.

    I think having Loki as the villain (with lots of cannon fodder in his alien army) worked, because of the way he interacted with all of the characters. And I loved, loved, absolutely loved the film.

    I’m also looking forward to the final Batman in Nolan’s series.