Speaker 1: On the Bechdelcast, the questions asked if movies have women
Speaker 1: and them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands,
Speaker 1: or do they have individualism? It's the patriarchy, Ephyn best
Speaker 1: start changing it with the Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 2: Hey, Caitlin, yes, Jamie, do you want to go to
Speaker 2: a dance?
Speaker 3: Yes? I do. I've never danced with a woman before,
Speaker 3: though I don't know how to do it.
Speaker 2: Maybe because you're Chris Evans head on Jeremy Strong's body.
Speaker 2: That's kind of my things difficult. Did you see that
Speaker 2: Jeremy Strong was almost the body double no for yes, yes,
Speaker 2: for short King Steve Rogers. They almost composited Chris Evans
Speaker 2: first of all, very large seven foot tall man head
Speaker 2: onto Jeremy Strong's live body, and that would have been historic.
Speaker 3: Is Jeremy Strong small? He is?
Speaker 2: He's Jeremy small, I think, and by small, I mean
Speaker 2: I think five to seven. Because I did. I went
Speaker 2: so deep on the body double here because it looked
Speaker 2: so like the most too. There's I mean, the most
Speaker 2: twenty eleven thing about this to me, because the military
Speaker 2: industrial complex is timeless.
Speaker 3: Oh, of course, the.
Speaker 2: Most twenty eleven thing to me is a lot of
Speaker 2: the graphics, and specifically Steve Rogers one point. Oh, I
Speaker 2: could not. I could not. Every time you see him
Speaker 2: from a new angle, you're like, who is this?
Speaker 3: It's really bizarre to look at Yeah.
Speaker 2: It cracked me up. Let's see how tall Jeremy Strong
Speaker 2: is and then add one inch because I think that
Speaker 2: that's usually how that works with celebrity heights. Sure, sure,
Speaker 2: he's five to ten, so let's say five eight five Okay, right,
Speaker 2: so yeah, and then and then Chris Evans is I
Speaker 2: don't even god knows four hundred feet tall. No, he's
Speaker 2: six feet Oh you're telling me, Chris Evans that I
Speaker 2: don't understand. I know that the body double they went
Speaker 2: with not immediately like talk about men's bodies for like
Speaker 2: twenty minutes. We're objectifying men. I think it's we're objectifying men.
Speaker 2: And I'm not short shaming anyone. If you're a long
Speaker 2: time listener of the show, I love a short king.
Speaker 2: But the composite looks so bizarre.
Speaker 3: No, it's the effects that's the problem.
Speaker 2: It's it's Benjamin Button gone worse. It's so weird. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but yes, his actual shout out to his uh to
Speaker 2: not Jeremy Strong who was the body double who is
Speaker 2: five to seven, and Chris Evans Giant Head.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the body double was Leander Deeny.
Speaker 2: Yeah, who plays a bartender in one of the scenes,
Speaker 2: which I have a fact I tried to get excited about,
Speaker 2: but unfortunately everything about this movie is so boring. Welcome
Speaker 2: to the Bechtel Cast. My name's Jamie Loftus.
Speaker 3: My name is Caitlin Drante. This is our podcast where
Speaker 3: we examine movies through an intersectional feminist lens, using the
Speaker 3: Bechdel test simply as a jumping off point. Yes, I
Speaker 3: feel like, look, if you don't know what that is,
Speaker 3: listen to another episode, look it up. Oh, there's just
Speaker 3: so much to get into today coming in to.
Speaker 2: Sorry, and also, I mean, let's just get it away,
Speaker 2: get it done. At the top, this movie doesn't pass
Speaker 2: the Bechdel test, so it's not even really that's not
Speaker 2: really what our show is about. And if you came
Speaker 2: here to find that out, guess what grow up. To
Speaker 2: no one's surprise, it does not pass the Bechdel test,
Speaker 2: and I think kind of bears through that spirit throughout
Speaker 2: the film. But we are talking about Captain America. The
Speaker 2: first Avenger twenty eleven. The reason we're talking about that
Speaker 2: quick plug is because we polled our Patreon aka Matreon
Speaker 2: audience because around this time of year, although we are
Speaker 2: not Fourth of July heads ourselves, for maybe obvious reasons, Helena,
Speaker 2: we tend to cover a piece of either satire on
Speaker 2: America or American propaganda. So we put up a list
Speaker 2: of options for our matrons. I was really hoping that
Speaker 2: Doctor Strangelove would pull through, but unfortunately, and Shadow to
Speaker 2: our matrons, thank you so much. Five dollars a month
Speaker 2: gives you access to two new episodes a month with
Speaker 2: just Caitlin and me, and a back catalog of over
Speaker 2: two hundred episodes. Wow. And the amazing thing about our
Speaker 2: matrons and I totally understand, is that they will often
Speaker 2: vote for a movie they know we will hate and
Speaker 2: have a lot to say about, which I suspect is
Speaker 2: why we are today talking about Captain America the first Avenger.
Speaker 3: Because I mean, this poll was chaos, second chaos, It
Speaker 3: was chaos. We put up five movies, but originally we
Speaker 3: were going to do an American tale, but neither of
Speaker 3: us could get through it, so we were like, never mind,
Speaker 3: pass maybe another time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we just did Land Before Time, and we're just like,
Speaker 2: I think we've hit our Don Blue quota.
Speaker 3: For the year. Yeah, see you next year, Don exactly.
Speaker 3: So among the five movies that we posted were Captain America,
Speaker 3: which obviously won the poll, which is why we're doing
Speaker 3: it today. But then there was also Team America World Police,
Speaker 3: and that was strange we were rooting for and that
Speaker 3: I was rooting for Doctor Strangelove. I would have also
Speaker 3: been very happy doing Doctor Strangelove. All three of these
Speaker 3: movies came within a few votes of each other. It
Speaker 3: was the closest race for first place on the Matreon
Speaker 3: I think I've ever seen.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna call it for next year.
Speaker 2: We're well, I mean even we could do it on
Speaker 2: the Matreon if we wanted, We could just do those
Speaker 2: two next year. True, but I do think unfortunately, while
Speaker 2: it's the movie I was least excited about, it is. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think the reasons that I'm not excited about it
Speaker 2: are also what make it interesting for discussion. True, because
Speaker 2: this is fairly early in the what would become a
Speaker 2: very painful for many decade of Marvel release after Marvel
Speaker 2: release that has only in the last I think like
Speaker 2: three years, stopped paying dividends for the Disney Corporation. So
Speaker 2: before we get into this, I mean, we're gonna be
Speaker 2: talking a lot about American propaganda and American symbols. Yeah,
Speaker 2: which is something that because it's also Hot Dog season,
Speaker 2: has been heavily on my mind recently because I keep
Speaker 2: getting emails about it. But the thing I just wanted
Speaker 2: to make note of before we start, because we talk
Speaker 2: about the show on the show often, you know that
Speaker 2: things that I'm assuming most of our listeners kind of
Speaker 2: share our views on, which is that America is a failed,
Speaker 2: violent colonial experiment that gets kind of worse by the day,
Speaker 2: and we talk about myriad reasons as to why that is.
Speaker 2: But a story that has been on my mind a
Speaker 2: lot this last week and is one that if you're
Speaker 2: not familiar with it or you haven't seen it coming
Speaker 2: up in your feed, I would highly encourage you to
Speaker 2: get to know more about is the Prairie Land Defendants.
Speaker 2: I think it is like a story that is starting
Speaker 2: to be discussed more, but is you know, very indicative
Speaker 2: of where we're at right now. So when we're talking
Speaker 2: about captain America. We're talking about what does America mean
Speaker 2: right now? It means this, which is protesters anti ice
Speaker 2: protesters specifically who were protesting last fourth of July. A
Speaker 2: handful of them have been given essentially anywhere ranging from
Speaker 2: thirty years to life one hundred years in prison for
Speaker 2: anything ranging from protesting and resisting police violence to literally
Speaker 2: just making a leftist zine. That is so chilling to me.
Speaker 2: There is a defendant, Elizabeth Sodo, who was sentenced to
Speaker 2: thirty years in prison for a protest she didn't even attend,
Speaker 2: for making an anarchist zine. The FBI rated her and
Speaker 2: her husband's home finding finding as you can imagine, literally nothing,
Speaker 2: including a zine that was like an ari Aster fan
Speaker 2: zine and poetry, you know, just things that you know,
Speaker 2: someone who has this literature or you do. It is
Speaker 2: you know, been explicitly said in their sentencing that this
Speaker 2: is being done to make an example of protesters. It
Speaker 2: is an attempt to reclassify any level of resistance. I'm
Speaker 2: not even talking about particularly radical resistance, any level of
Speaker 2: resistance as an act of terrorism, and of course you know,
Speaker 2: classifying Antifa as terrorists. Bear that out if you are
Speaker 2: sentencing anti fascists to life in prison. What does that
Speaker 2: make you? All things that I know most of our
Speaker 2: listeners are are well aware of and fairly engaged with.
Speaker 2: But yes, because we're talking American propaganda today, you know,
Speaker 2: is this the direct result of Captain America. No, but
Speaker 2: it's asking the question what ideals is Captain America holding up?
Speaker 2: And that changes with time, but I don't think it
Speaker 2: necessarily gets better. So that's my little soap box for
Speaker 2: this week. We'll leave a link to more information. There's
Speaker 2: some great reporting from Lex mcmahnimon in The Guardian about
Speaker 2: this big fan of their work, highly recommend you check
Speaker 2: their work out. And yes, there's so much more I
Speaker 2: could say, but I will just leave it at that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and well that's Captain America.
Speaker 3: Let's do it. Thank you for sharing all of that. Jamie.
Speaker 3: It's real bleak out there and the irony that like
Speaker 3: this movie is all about. Well, we have to fight
Speaker 3: the Nazis, we have to fight fascism. Forgetting that the
Speaker 3: US has always been a fascist country.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean I don't think it's forgetting, omitting.
Speaker 3: Omitting, refusing to acknowledge.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean that's It's so tricky because it's like, yeah, hard,
Speaker 2: hard to argue with a character who is you know,
Speaker 2: whose original idea was what if Hitler got punched in
Speaker 2: the face And you're like, Okay, I'm listening, Okay, I'm listening. Great,
Speaker 2: great idea, but there's a lot going on.
Speaker 3: We'll get into it, Yes, we'll get into it. But Jamie,
Speaker 3: what is your relationship with Captain America? The first Avenger
Speaker 3: slash boy Captain America? In general?
Speaker 2: I think I saw this in theaters. I honestly am
Speaker 2: not sure. I was trying to go through this with
Speaker 2: Grant last night. Like my Marvel history is so all
Speaker 2: over the place. Most of the movies I have seen
Speaker 2: in the Marvel universe were watching them for the Bechdel cast.
Speaker 2: But I do think this was early enough in the
Speaker 2: Marvel run that this felt like intriguing enough to give
Speaker 2: a shot, or like maybe I was just bored because
Speaker 2: it came out in this summer. I vaguely remember this
Speaker 2: coming out. I think I saw it, I did not
Speaker 2: really retain any of it, and I certainly did not
Speaker 2: return for any of the sequels. So yeah, I mean
Speaker 2: this truly, like outside of even if we're like stepping
Speaker 2: back from the like propaganda element of it because you know,
Speaker 2: I saw Superman last year. I yeah, I will, you know,
Speaker 2: if it seems interesting, I will check it out.
Speaker 3: And I think that movie had some interesting things to say.
Speaker 2: I think that that movie was saying something. You know,
Speaker 2: it's like it in a blockbuster. It's only ever gonna
Speaker 2: say so much. But I'm like, I'm willing to take
Speaker 2: the journey. But even outside of that, I just like,
Speaker 2: this is the exact kind of movie that is just
Speaker 2: like for me, my eyes are just gonna absolutely glaze.
Speaker 2: So I apologize if there's plot point in this movie
Speaker 2: that I'm like, uh what, because I just found it
Speaker 2: so hard to pay attention to. It's like, yeah, just
Speaker 2: not for me. With all due respect, I know that
Speaker 2: a lot of people have like nostalgia for this movie.
Speaker 2: It seems like one of the I mean, it's definitely
Speaker 2: less boring than the Marvel movies that were coming out
Speaker 2: ten years after this, But that is like a very
Speaker 2: low bar to clear. Sure, yeah I didn't Yeah, I
Speaker 2: didn't like it, but but now I've seen it at
Speaker 2: least once, but maybe maybe also maybe more, I will say,
Speaker 2: you know what, Hugo Weaving ripping his face off. Oh
Speaker 2: my gosh, that woke me back up. I kept, I kept,
Speaker 2: I tried to. I truly, I've I've watched this movie
Speaker 2: at night. I watched it in the morning. I tried
Speaker 2: it in the afternoon. Nothing could keep me awake. But
Speaker 2: Hugo Weaving taking his face off.
Speaker 3: That got me.
Speaker 2: That got my ass.
Speaker 3: Hugo Weaving ripping his face off and turning into Hugo
Speaker 3: Weaving with red skull makeup on was really shocking. I
Speaker 3: didn't remember that happening. I had seen this movie before,
Speaker 3: but I similarly kind of didn't remember anything about it.
Speaker 2: It's also like, even if you liked this movie when
Speaker 2: it came out, there were just so many movies that
Speaker 2: at some point they have to start blurring. I forgot
Speaker 2: vegas of Aastian stan.
Speaker 3: Is in this Yeah, yeah, he's he's a guy. He's
Speaker 3: becomes a pretty big part of the MCU.
Speaker 2: Yes, I knew that. I just didn't know he went
Speaker 2: back to like the beginning. Yeah, I did not know
Speaker 2: that Stanley Tucci was a part of the MCU for
Speaker 2: fifteen minutes. That was news to me. I also this era,
Speaker 2: I'm very glad Stanley Tucci moved on from this era
Speaker 2: of like I feel like in the like late twenty
Speaker 2: early twenty tens, he's like, what if I looked a
Speaker 2: little scruffy, And I'm like, that's not that's not where
Speaker 2: he succeeds. I feel like this aesthetic for him, the
Speaker 2: lovely Bones character, don't even get me started. I'm like,
Speaker 2: Stanley Tucci, I need you to play a lovely man.
Speaker 2: I need you to give me Julie and Julia Devilwar's prana.
Speaker 2: That's where you live for me.
Speaker 3: I agree, Yeah, yeah, I did not remember his presence
Speaker 3: in this movie, so I guess. Yeah. My history with
Speaker 3: it is I didn't see it in theaters. I would
Speaker 3: go on to see most MCU movies in theaters, but
Speaker 3: because this was one of the earlier ones, and it
Speaker 3: was before I even realized that they were building out
Speaker 3: a cinematic universe. Sure, I had no interest in Captain
Speaker 3: America as a character as a superhero. I was like,
Speaker 3: what the fuck is this? I don't care. I think
Speaker 3: conceptually Captain America is the worst, most boring Marvel hero.
Speaker 2: I yeah, I've done some I will say, light research
Speaker 2: on his history, and I feel like it's the same
Speaker 2: reason that it's like hard to make Superman a fun
Speaker 2: character to watch, where it's like he's just.
Speaker 3: I agree to.
Speaker 2: Like, he's just kind of featureless. I don't know, I'm
Speaker 2: who's your favorite superhero? If you're like, even if you're
Speaker 2: like compartmentalized your politics and blah blah blah, who's your
Speaker 2: I'm still I'm still missus spider Man.
Speaker 3: I'm big on spider Man as well. I enjoy Batman
Speaker 3: in some of the movies. Okay, I mean I have
Speaker 3: two superhero movie tattoos. One of them is from Batman
Speaker 3: Returns and one of them is a Spider Verse movie.
Speaker 3: So I'm not like I like a superhero movie. I've
Speaker 3: always been like a you know, big action movie head.
Speaker 3: I don't have the same affinity for the MCU as
Speaker 3: many people do, but I've seen almost all of them.
Speaker 3: I see most of them in theaters, with a few
Speaker 3: exceptions for boycott reasons that I'll go into later. But yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: I have engaged lightly with the MCU. But when this
Speaker 3: movie came out, I was just like Captain America, who Pass?
Speaker 3: So I didn't see it until I don't know, maybe
Speaker 3: four or five years later, because by then there were
Speaker 3: other like the MCU starting to really be built out.
Speaker 3: So I was like, Okay, I guess if I want
Speaker 3: to remain culturally relevant, I have to see these movies.
Speaker 3: So I started to go back and watch the ones
Speaker 3: I hadn't seen before. But anyway, that was the only
Speaker 3: other time I had seen this. I had seen this movie,
Speaker 3: So it's been about a decade or more since I've
Speaker 3: watched it. I forgot most things about it, okay, And
Speaker 3: there was a lot that I didn't realize would be
Speaker 3: present that we would have to discuss on this episode.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is. It is a pretty intense one, and
Speaker 2: I guess for listeners that are expecting a complete, full
Speaker 2: deep dive on Captain America, we're doing this episode on
Speaker 2: a fairly quick turnaround due to the poll of it all,
Speaker 2: so we won't get into everything. But I think that
Speaker 2: for listeners of the show that sort of want our
Speaker 2: take on how this presents America an American propaganda, we
Speaker 2: hope you will leave satisfied. Yeah, I feel like you
Speaker 2: could write a whole thesis on I mean, there's so
Speaker 2: there's so many books about Captain America. I think a
Speaker 2: lot of like if if I thought you were more
Speaker 2: interesting might be interesting to me, But I mean I
Speaker 2: am very interested in you know whatever, like American symbolism
Speaker 2: and selling, you know how basically the how colonial products
Speaker 2: are are sold back to people, and Captain America is
Speaker 2: a part of that. I just it's not one that
Speaker 2: was ever designed to work for me, right, but but
Speaker 2: let's let's get into it. Let's get into it because
Speaker 2: this movie was, while not as financially successful as I
Speaker 2: would have expected for something that became so big, definitely
Speaker 2: has a massive cultural impact, specifically this version of the character.
Speaker 2: Because there are many versions of the character, some of
Speaker 2: which have more complexity than others. This one, you know,
Speaker 2: they have the cooperation of the Pentagon, so yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: don't well, I mean we've talked about that many times,
Speaker 2: but very relevant to today. So let's get into it.
Speaker 3: Yes, let's take a quick break first, and then we'll
Speaker 3: come back for the recap. And we're back, Okay. Here
Speaker 3: is the story of Captain America, the First Avenger. We
Speaker 3: open on present day, somewhere in the Arctic question mark, sure,
Speaker 3: a strange ship or something has been discovered. It's lodged
Speaker 3: in the ice, and inside some guys discover Captain America's
Speaker 3: famous shield. Then we smash cut to Norway nineteen forty two.
Speaker 3: We meet Johann Schmidt played by Hugo Weaving. He is
Speaker 3: an SS officer and head of Hydra, the rogue science
Speaker 3: division of the Nazi Party, and he busts into some
Speaker 3: kind of fortress and steals the tests erect, which becomes
Speaker 3: very relevant in other MCU movies.
Speaker 2: I can't even with the test arract. I honestly like
Speaker 2: the second he opened a box, like because at first
Speaker 2: it's it's kind of engaging, it's kind of fine, and
Speaker 2: for me, the second the box is open and it's
Speaker 2: a glowy blue thing, You're like, and this is where
Speaker 2: the movie will leave me and never get me back
Speaker 2: because I just hate it. Oh my god. I mix
Speaker 2: up the tests eract, which I'm vaguely aware of, because
Speaker 2: doesn't that remain like a thing the whole time?
Speaker 3: Pretty much? They keep like losing it and needing to
Speaker 3: go back and find it or something I've done.
Speaker 2: Okay, I remember that it's like relevant at least in
Speaker 2: other ones that I've seen, or it's I'm pretty sure
Speaker 2: it's in Captain Marvel maybe. Anyways, I don't know. Anyways,
Speaker 2: I always confuse it with the avatar version of it,
Speaker 2: which is an obtainium. Oh their secret goo. Anytime there's
Speaker 2: like a secret goo, I'm just like, ah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: you are reminded that ultimately, and this isn't even necessarily
Speaker 2: like a fault of the storytelling, but it's like, ultimately,
Speaker 2: these stories are written for children, and that's why there's
Speaker 2: all sorts of mysterious goos, and I just cannot be
Speaker 2: convinced to take them seriously.
Speaker 3: Look, I don't mind a secret goo. In fact, I
Speaker 3: might even go so far as to say I like
Speaker 3: a secret goo.
Speaker 2: I'm more of an ooze girl. I'm personally no, this
Speaker 2: is yeah, the plot goo. I just I just I
Speaker 2: can't do it. But sure, that's okay, that's okay.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So John Schmidt comes in and steals the Tesseract.
Speaker 3: We cut to the US. It's still nineteen forty two,
Speaker 3: where the rest of the movie take place. We meet
Speaker 3: Steve Rogers played by Chris Evans.
Speaker 2: Sort of Evans like by Chris Evans head and Leander
Speaker 2: Deni's body. I will not I promise, I will stop
Speaker 2: harping on this, but I gasped I gasped. It was
Speaker 2: so twenty eleven. I was trying to like piece together.
Speaker 2: I didn't look up any behind the scenes footage because
Speaker 2: I kind of liked my version better. Words how I
Speaker 2: pictured they shot it. I picture first they shoot the
Speaker 2: whole scene with Chris Evans balancing his head on a
Speaker 2: pile of tennis balls, and then they shoot the whole
Speaker 2: scene again with Leander Deny wearing like kind of a
Speaker 2: gimp mask that is like covered in chroma key, and
Speaker 2: then they're like, yeah, we'll figure it out.
Speaker 3: I like it.
Speaker 2: That's how they shoot it all twice, and then it
Speaker 2: still looks horrible. I know that that's definitely not how
Speaker 2: they did it, but it made me laugh so much
Speaker 2: to think about Sebastianstan doing the scene horror twice, not
Speaker 2: Sebastian Stan being horrible.
Speaker 3: I like him, but he's in Itania for crying out loud.
Speaker 2: He's literally in Itania, and no one talks about that enough.
Speaker 2: It's an underrated performance.
Speaker 3: Hmm, yeah, he is so. Anyways, Steve Rogers is trying
Speaker 3: to enlist in the military because he really wants to
Speaker 3: fight for his country in World War Two, but he's
Speaker 3: scrawny and chronically ill and he can't fight for shit
Speaker 3: because he gets in a fist fight with a guy
Speaker 3: in an alley and gets absolutely pummeled.
Speaker 2: He gets in a fight for being a fucking loser
Speaker 2: at a movie there. I mean, I guess they're both
Speaker 2: being losers, but he's just like, wait, man, America's awesome. Man.
Speaker 2: I'm like, yeah, yeah, he should have had his ass kicked.
Speaker 3: He should have had his ass kick I agree, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: but anyway, Steve's best friend, Bucky Barnes played by Sebastian
Speaker 3: stan comes to his rescue. Now, Bucky has successfully enlisted
Speaker 3: and he gets shipped off tomorrow, while Steve Rogers has
Speaker 3: tried five different times to enlist but keeps failing the
Speaker 3: medical physical exam. Stephen Bucky then go to like a
Speaker 3: World's Fair science expo kind of thing hosted by.
Speaker 2: More propaganda stuff and also very funny bad CGI. They
Speaker 2: look like they like visit a screensaver.
Speaker 3: Yeah it looks really phony, but this event is hosted
Speaker 3: by Stark Industries. We meet Howard Stark aka Tony Stark's father.
Speaker 2: Who I was genuinely shocked. That's not Rammy Malick, you're
Speaker 2: telling you, that's.
Speaker 3: You don't recognize him as Dominic Cooper of Mama Mia Fame.
Speaker 2: I had to be reminded and I was like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I actually I do remember him as Dominic Cooper of
Speaker 2: Mama Mia Fame. Now, I guess I don't really associate
Speaker 2: Mama Mia with men who aren't stealing Scar's cart.
Speaker 3: Well, Pierce Brosnan Firth erasure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess if I'm ranking my Papa Pias, I'm
Speaker 2: going stellin Pierce Colin, I think, But I forgot Dominic
Speaker 2: Cooper's in it. But yeah, I just he looks I think.
Speaker 2: It's also like the way I just he looks so
Speaker 2: much like Ramy Mallagan to me in this movie.
Speaker 3: But there's a resemblance, you know, it is not him. Yeah, Anyway,
Speaker 3: he's there doing shit. The whole thing with Howard Stark
Speaker 3: is that he's this brilliant mechanical engineer. But Steve isn't
Speaker 3: paying attention to any of that. He's so distracted because
Speaker 3: he wants to fight for his country so bad it's
Speaker 3: consuming his every thought. And then Stanley Tucci enters the
Speaker 3: movie and overhears Steve telling Bucky about how much he
Speaker 3: wants to fight for his country, and then Stanley Tucci
Speaker 3: approaches him. His character's name is doctor Erskine, and he
Speaker 3: works for a special science division of the US military, and.
Speaker 2: He wants to shoot Steve full of plot goo different
Speaker 2: plot gou not test erect well, because the test reactor
Speaker 2: is a solid.
Speaker 3: It's a cube.
Speaker 2: Versus it's a little shy. It's a light bulb in
Speaker 2: a box.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, yes it. Meanwhile, doctor Erskine has a serum
Speaker 3: that is way more, way closer to plot goo. I
Speaker 3: would say he has the go. Okay, he's got the
Speaker 3: he's got the go. And also he it's Stanley Tucci
Speaker 3: doing an accent, which I also did not see coming.
Speaker 3: Every everything about Stanley Tucci was a surprise to me.
Speaker 3: In this movie. He's doing a German accent, as is
Speaker 3: Hugo Weaving. Yes, and you love to see it.
Speaker 2: I guess, I guess shrug, I guess I'm ambifalent towards it.
Speaker 3: Right, Okay, So doctor Erskine is so impressed that Steve
Speaker 3: is that dedicated to trying to enlist that he approves
Speaker 3: Steve's enlistment form right. Then we cut to Hydra's secret
Speaker 3: layer in the mountains, Schmidt and his associate, doctor Zola
Speaker 3: played by Toby Jones, put the Tesseract through some machine
Speaker 3: and are able to harness an incredible amount of energy
Speaker 3: from it, which they can use to develop advanced weapons
Speaker 3: and likely win the war.
Speaker 2: Did this scene remind you of I Frankenstein. I couldn't
Speaker 2: stop thinking about I Frankenstein during this scene.
Speaker 3: Well, I haven't seen it nearly as many times as you,
Speaker 3: so it's like not in my brain at all. But
Speaker 3: it did remind me of the Spider Man two scene
Speaker 3: where yes, doc Oc is like precious tritium blah blah blah,
Speaker 3: and then he becomes doc.
Speaker 2: Ok that's true. Yeah, I was thinking of the I
Speaker 2: Frankenstein scene where where Bill Nyhey brings the rat back
Speaker 2: to life.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Sure, real eye Frankenstein will remember.
Speaker 3: Yeah, sorry about it.
Speaker 2: That's okay.
Speaker 3: I'm a fake fan, fake fan anyway. Okay, So cut
Speaker 3: to Steve at basic training or something. Yeah, the commanding
Speaker 3: officer is Tommy Lee Jones. I'm sure his character has
Speaker 3: a name, but I don't care about that. Yeah. He
Speaker 3: says that at the end of the week they're going
Speaker 3: to choose one man to turn into a super soldier.
Speaker 3: And we're like.
Speaker 2: Right right by.
Speaker 3: Also, Agent Peggy Carter played by Haley Atwell, is also there. Yes,
Speaker 3: she supervises all of the operations for this science division.
Speaker 3: What that means exactly, we don't know. It's so vague.
Speaker 2: Yes, and again for comic book heads, we are just
Speaker 2: covering the version of Peggy that appears in this film.
Speaker 2: I know that she had like her own television show,
Speaker 2: but we're just going to talk about Peggy and like
Speaker 2: her comic conception versus this movie.
Speaker 3: Yes. Then we get a montage of Steve and the
Speaker 3: others training, and Steve is not good at all of
Speaker 3: the physical things like running and push ups.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's getting bullied, even though the reason that he
Speaker 2: says he wants to serve in the American military is
Speaker 2: that he hates bullies. And you're just like, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: maybe you are a good candidate. Grow up right.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, he is not good at all of the
Speaker 3: physical strength and endurance tests. But what he lacks in
Speaker 3: brute strength he makes up for in smarts and courage.
Speaker 3: So he is the one who is selected to become
Speaker 3: the aforementioned super soldier via this serum, a plot goo
Speaker 3: that doctor Erskine had developed. The doctor also mentions that Schmidt,
Speaker 3: the Hydra guy, had also taken the serum in the past,
Speaker 3: but it was before the serum had been perfected. And
Speaker 3: also Schmidt is evil and deranged, so there were some
Speaker 3: side effects when he took the serum. And we'll put
Speaker 3: a pin in that.
Speaker 2: We'll put a pin in that. I will say. I
Speaker 2: was like the the like visual representation of this sequence.
Speaker 2: I was like, huh, that's like more visually interesting than
Speaker 2: ninety percent of Marvel movies.
Speaker 4: There.
Speaker 2: It's like this weird montage oh okay, of Hugo weaving like,
Speaker 2: you know, getting getting gooey.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I thought that was hideous to look at.
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't think it was beautiful to look at,
Speaker 2: but it wasn't like a blobby screensaver, which is how
Speaker 2: I think of Marvel movies aesthetically, Just like a random
Speaker 2: void where someone's screaming my father. That's most of them.
Speaker 3: Sure, yeah, yeah, okay, So an agent Carter and Steve
Speaker 3: head to a facility for him to have the super
Speaker 3: Soldier serum injected into him, and maybe the two of
Speaker 3: these characters are flirting a little bit along the way.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And then when the procedure is over. Steve is
Speaker 3: a foot taller, he's jacked, his cells are really good.
Speaker 4: Now, I was I wish that in a in a
Speaker 4: cooler world, in a more cronin burgie world, he should
Speaker 4: have come out like covered in Now I'm being pro goo,
Speaker 4: he should have come out covered in some sort of
Speaker 4: birth goo.
Speaker 2: He's too smooth when he comes out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and he's also wearing a shirt that fits him perfectly.
Speaker 2: In spite of going in with Jeremy Strong's body. Like
Speaker 2: it's just interesting, like it's yeah, I mean, I get
Speaker 2: it's it's just a movie moment, but I was like, man,
Speaker 2: he's too smooth. Give me something to give me, give
Speaker 2: me something to consider.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you want him to be covered in placenta or something.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I want to be reminded that this was an
Speaker 2: extremely painful thing, which is sort of reference. But also
Speaker 2: I thought that was very funny where he's screaming in pain.
Speaker 2: He says no, no, it's a it okay, it okay,
Speaker 2: and they're like, okay, cool.
Speaker 3: Keep going. Yeah. Well, anyway, he emerges and he is
Speaker 3: sexy as hell, and Agent Carter is like, oh the
Speaker 3: oh buh. Yeah, but there are spies in their midst
Speaker 3: clearly Hydra minions who Schmidt had sent to steal the
Speaker 3: serum and murder doctor Erskine.
Speaker 2: But it's important to remember that at this point in history,
Speaker 2: at this consequential point in history, the Minions were in
Speaker 2: the cave in the North Pole. The Minions. A lot
Speaker 2: of people say, why aren't the minions in this movie?
Speaker 3: People keep asking that.
Speaker 2: And it's because canonically they were in the cave, so
Speaker 2: they were not involved in either world War that we
Speaker 2: know of.
Speaker 3: I wonder if that because they're in like either an
Speaker 3: Arctic or Antarctic cave. I wonder, yeah, if it's near
Speaker 3: wherever Steve Rogers ends up.
Speaker 2: I want I do you know, I really hope for
Speaker 2: the Minions that they that they do not. I mean,
Speaker 2: they wouldn't fuck with Captain America. He's so boring and
Speaker 2: he's too good.
Speaker 3: The Minions only evil.
Speaker 2: That's like, I mean, he's not even I don't know,
Speaker 2: Captain America isn't even good, but he's definitely not like
Speaker 2: Minion grade. Because the Minions they choose evil rulers, but
Speaker 2: they also choose guys with like charisma and also just
Speaker 2: people with charisma. Let's not forget scarlet overcoat.
Speaker 3: Sure, anyway, do you don't You don't think that Chris
Speaker 3: Evans has Riz as Captain America in this movie.
Speaker 2: I think Chris Evans has Riz as a person. I
Speaker 2: don't think he has Risk as Captain America. I find
Speaker 2: Captain America is like un fixably boring.
Speaker 3: Okay, So where we differ there, I guess is that
Speaker 3: I find again, I find Captain America as a concept
Speaker 3: really fucking boring. But I will say I generally enjoy
Speaker 3: him in the movies that he's in, which is so
Speaker 3: many of them interesting, not as much as I enjoy
Speaker 3: other characters. Sure, and I do not enjoy these movies
Speaker 3: from a Bechdel cast point of view. But if I'm
Speaker 3: just watching them for entertainment value, I'm not having a
Speaker 3: bad time, I think.
Speaker 2: If I'm choosing, I mean, I think it's hard to
Speaker 2: outdo Robert Downey Junior in charisma, and I definitely enjoy.
Speaker 3: I enjoy Tom Holland Spider Man.
Speaker 2: I've never seen Tom holland Spider Man.
Speaker 3: They're quite good.
Speaker 2: I'm sure he's good. I'm sure he's good. I just
Speaker 2: haven't seen it.
Speaker 3: Anyway, there are spies there are hydrospies, so Steve goes
Speaker 3: after them, and because he's so strong and fast, now
Speaker 3: he's able to defeat them. And now this science division
Speaker 3: of the US military knows that Hydra is a big
Speaker 3: threat to them, so they make plans to go after Hydra,
Speaker 3: and Steve wants to go with them, but they're like, no,
Speaker 3: you can't because of reasons, right, So instead they have
Speaker 3: Steve become Captain America, which is an Uncle Sam type
Speaker 3: military recruitment figure doing propaganda films and live shows all
Speaker 3: over the US to sell.
Speaker 2: War bonds, which I could like, this is the point
Speaker 2: where I'm like, Okay, I know, ultimately, just because of
Speaker 2: what this franchise becomes, that this movie isn't going to
Speaker 2: comment on that. But it feels like, you know, in
Speaker 2: a movie that is you know, only made possible because
Speaker 2: of the American military, so therefore it cannot meaningfully critique
Speaker 2: the American military. This was such an interesting opportunity to
Speaker 2: comment on a arc and propaganda totally and and does
Speaker 2: seem to want you to think that, like it's sort
Speaker 2: of goofy what's happening, even though twist what you're watching
Speaker 2: is basically just the contemporary version of that. But I
Speaker 2: was like, oh, man, like, if if this movie was
Speaker 2: allowed to be interesting, which it just like isn't from
Speaker 2: moment one because of who's bankrolling it. What a missed opportunity.
Speaker 3: Totally, especially because the imagery that's presented during this sequence
Speaker 3: is so heightened and cartoonish that it almost seems like
Speaker 3: it would be in a political satire film.
Speaker 2: I'm so curious on like, I don't know anything about
Speaker 2: Joe Johnston that we haven't just like covered vaguely in
Speaker 2: the other Joe Johnston movie we've covered, or the other
Speaker 2: two Joe Johnston movies we've covered he did. He started
Speaker 2: with HONEYE Shrunk the Kids, Let's not Forget.
Speaker 3: What, Oh my gosh, I forgot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and and we've also covered Jumanji. I think those
Speaker 2: are his. They're two really big movies. He also directed
Speaker 2: The Page Master, which I loved as a kid, and
Speaker 2: I don't remember. I think people think it's bad, but
Speaker 2: I was as a child, was like that was my
Speaker 2: Macaulay Culkin movie. Anyway. Sure, yeah, I don't really know
Speaker 2: what Joe Johnston's politics are or if he's trying to
Speaker 2: sneak something in there or not, but Yeah, it feels
Speaker 2: very intentional the way that that's filmed, and then it
Speaker 2: proceeds to not comment on it at all whatsoever except
Speaker 2: to say, I mean again, it's like the fact that
Speaker 2: Captain America did that is presented as kind of an
Speaker 2: embarrassment to him, but not because of what he's saying
Speaker 2: or promoting, just because he'd rather be actually fighting.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because he's like not living up to his potential
Speaker 3: as a super soldier.
Speaker 2: Right, there's never a critique of like, you know, it
Speaker 2: only looks silly because it's like you're saying, like it
Speaker 2: is him squandering his potential, not because what they're saying
Speaker 2: in the way they're saying it is like pernicious and yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3: Yes. So to that point, Steve is like, Ugh, this
Speaker 3: isn't satisfying work. I want to fight. And then he
Speaker 3: learns that his best friend Bucky was among a group
Speaker 3: of soldiers who were either captured or killed. So Agent
Speaker 3: Carter and Howard Stark fly Steve to I think Austria
Speaker 3: so that he can try to rescue Bucky if he's alive. Yeah,
Speaker 3: So Steve aka Captain America because he's now also becoming
Speaker 3: Captain America the superhero. He parachutes out of the plane
Speaker 3: and sneaks into some facility where he finds Bucky and
Speaker 3: a bunch of other American soldiers. Yeah, Schmidt blows up
Speaker 3: this facility for again reasons that I definitely understood. Yes,
Speaker 3: and then he and Captain America have a face off,
Speaker 3: literally because pulls his face off to reveal that he
Speaker 3: is Red Skull.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm a cynic, and that moment is awesome.
Speaker 3: No, it's great. I loved it.
Speaker 2: I love to see it. And it's like, you know
Speaker 2: that this movie is flawed in so many ways, but yeah,
Speaker 2: it's it's never I'm never unhappy to see a Nazi
Speaker 2: get his ass beat, and that way you know it
Speaker 2: is it is very effective. I don't know if you
Speaker 2: planned to get into this. I didn't get too deep
Speaker 2: into it, but I did feel the need to just
Speaker 2: sidebar really quickly to say Steve, Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes.
Speaker 2: I think, like, even not as a fan of these movies,
Speaker 2: I am well aware of the overwhelming shipping fan fiction
Speaker 2: culture there is around these characters. It's called stucky duh.
Speaker 3: Okay, I'm not super aware of this specific pair being shipped.
Speaker 2: Oh it's listeners, correct me if I'm wrong. But I
Speaker 2: did a little bit of scanning in archive of our
Speaker 2: own and other fan sites, and Stucky is a thing
Speaker 2: Stucky I and I think that this movie does kind
Speaker 2: of and I don't mean this in a negative way.
Speaker 2: I think that this movie really opens the door for
Speaker 2: that because I find the relationship. You know, if I'm
Speaker 2: just like watching this like movie brain, I'm watching Steve
Speaker 2: and Bucky, and I'm like, they have such a loving friendship.
Speaker 2: And I think, as with a lot of these shipping pairs,
Speaker 2: even if they are not canonically queer characters, it's it's like,
Speaker 2: it's so rare to see men have an affectionate friendship,
Speaker 2: which these two do.
Speaker 3: True.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so just shouting out that existence because you know,
Speaker 2: any any queer representation in this movie you will need to,
Speaker 2: you know, do some work to get there. But the
Speaker 2: Stucky community was holding it down in the twenty tents
Speaker 2: and possibly still today. I don't know what they're up to.
Speaker 3: Sure, yeah, one of them is dead. What spoiler, well,
Speaker 3: Captain America or he either dies or he goes back
Speaker 3: in time or something.
Speaker 2: Oh oh the character. Oh sorry god, I was like no,
Speaker 2: they're not.
Speaker 3: The actors are still both alive.
Speaker 2: I was like, wait, unless this happened today, No, I will.
Speaker 2: I had to check with Grant, because no matter how
Speaker 2: wonderful a man is, they always do want to remind
Speaker 2: you what happened in Marvel movies. And he told me,
Speaker 2: and I vaguely remember this because I did see the
Speaker 2: last of Andrew's movie. Yeah, he like travels back in
Speaker 2: time to be with Peggy at the end, and then
Speaker 2: he and then Anthony Mackie gets promoted to Captain America.
Speaker 2: And that's a whole other conversation.
Speaker 3: Yes, indeed.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Anyway, so Red Skull has revealed himself Red Skull because
Speaker 3: I guess the side effects of the early version of
Speaker 3: doctor Erskine's serum made his face look like a skull.
Speaker 3: That's okay, hence Red Skull. And then he makes a
Speaker 3: little speech about something I don't know. I I was
Speaker 3: also having a hard time paying attention in that moment,
Speaker 3: and then he pieces out back to the Hydra secret Layer. Okay,
Speaker 3: So then Captain America and Bucky escape and then triumphantly
Speaker 3: returned to the US military base with all of the
Speaker 3: captured American soldiers it's like four hundred of them, and
Speaker 3: then there's also one French guy and one British guy there. Sure, sure,
Speaker 3: And Tommy Lee Jones is like, what I thought you
Speaker 3: were killed in action, Captain America. I guess you really
Speaker 3: are a super soldier. And Peggy is like, hey, sexy boy,
Speaker 3: I'm so glad you're back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then they basically promote him to like god truly,
Speaker 2: like they just give him carte blanche on the entire military.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's a national hero and he is given like
Speaker 3: general patent levels of military power.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And so he and his military buddies make a plan
Speaker 3: to go back in and destroy Hydra weapons factories and
Speaker 3: shit like that, and then they also still need to
Speaker 3: find schmid Slash Red Skull and his secret base and
Speaker 3: kill him before they leave. Captain America gets his famous shield,
Speaker 3: and he also manages to piss off agent Peggy Carter
Speaker 3: when she sees him kissing another woman.
Speaker 2: Which is an interesting sequence.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we'll talk about it. Yeah, but anyway, we get
Speaker 3: a montage of Captain America and friends blowing up a
Speaker 3: bunch of Hydra shit. Red Skull is pissed, and then
Speaker 3: Captain America and his friends jump onto a moving train
Speaker 3: to capture doctor Zola, the Toby Jones scientist, fighting some
Speaker 3: bad guys along the way, and then oh no, Bucky
Speaker 3: falls off the train into a ravine and probably dies
Speaker 3: or maybe he becomes the Winter Soldier in the next movie.
Speaker 3: Who can say?
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, it's part of why watching this movie
Speaker 2: in the modern day gets really diminishing returns, because living
Speaker 2: in the future, you know that, like this franchise refuses
Speaker 2: to kill anybody. So it's like, I don't know, maybe
Speaker 2: I did get emotional in the cinema when you're like,
Speaker 2: oh no, Steven Peggy, when are they going to see
Speaker 2: each other? But you're just like, they are never gonna
Speaker 2: let these motherfuckers die. As long as there is a
Speaker 2: dollar in the world, these characters will live.
Speaker 3: It's true. Yeah, it's true. Yeah. There was a whole
Speaker 3: movie about how half of the characters quote unquote die,
Speaker 3: and then the second the next movie is about how
Speaker 3: they do all this shit to go back in time
Speaker 3: and reverse the timeline so that they all live again.
Speaker 3: I don't a lot of what happens.
Speaker 2: I remember people being like the snap, the snap changes everything,
Speaker 2: And then the next movie came out and they're like,
Speaker 2: never mis kidding, The snap.
Speaker 3: Did not really change anything. Yeah yeah. So anyway, Captain
Speaker 3: America doesn't know that his best friend survived and would
Speaker 3: go on to be in a bunch of other MCU movies,
Speaker 3: so he's really really sad. But they were able to
Speaker 3: capture doctor Zola on this mission and Tommy Lee Jones
Speaker 3: interrogates him and finds out that Red Skull plans to
Speaker 3: blow up all of the United States, so the stakes
Speaker 3: are high and they really got to stop this guy.
Speaker 3: So then Captain America and company head to the secret
Speaker 3: Hydra Basse because Toby Jones told them where it is,
Speaker 3: and Captain America is captured and brought to Red Skull,
Speaker 3: except that maybe that was part of the plan because
Speaker 3: his buddies come in and save him. I don't know,
Speaker 3: but there's like a big third act fight. Agent Carter
Speaker 3: is there. She's not mad at Captain America anymore, so
Speaker 3: she gives him a big smooch and says, go get it.
Speaker 2: Get which if that doesn't encapsulate an allegedly feminist character
Speaker 2: from twenty eleven, show me what does.
Speaker 3: Exactly, And then he jumps on a plane that's taking off,
Speaker 3: which is full of bombs that Red Skull plans to
Speaker 3: drop on different major cities in the US. Captain America
Speaker 3: and Red Skull fight. At some point, the Tesseract gets
Speaker 3: dislodged and Red Skull picks it up and disappears. And
Speaker 3: not that we know this from this movie, but it
Speaker 3: creates a wormhole and he's sent to some faraway planet.
Speaker 3: Because this character shows up again in Avengers Infinity War
Speaker 3: and Endgame, I think I believe you. Thank you so much. Anyway,
Speaker 3: Captain America is still in the plane and he gets
Speaker 3: in the pilot seat, but in order to save New York,
Speaker 3: where this plane is headed, he has to sacrifice himself
Speaker 3: and crash the ship into the ice somewhere. Wait a minute,
Speaker 3: was that what the opening of the movie was all about? Yes,
Speaker 3: but we're not sure. But we're not sure. But we're
Speaker 3: not sure how he gets from being almost to New
Speaker 3: York City to somewhere in the arctic tundra within a
Speaker 3: few seconds. But I guess we're not supposed to think
Speaker 3: about that. Cut to Steve waking up in a hospital room,
Speaker 3: it seems like it's still the nineteen forties and there's
Speaker 3: a Brooklyn Dodgers game playing on the radio. But wait,
Speaker 3: something isn't right. This game already happened. So he's like,
Speaker 3: where the hell am I? What's going on? He runs
Speaker 3: out and into Times Square and surprise, it's twenty eleven
Speaker 3: and Nick Fury played by Samuel L. Jackson famously up
Speaker 3: to inform him that he has been asleep for almost
Speaker 3: seventy years. I guess he was like frozen in the
Speaker 3: ice and that preserved him. And he's like, oh shucks,
Speaker 3: I had a date with Peggy. I was so close
Speaker 3: to losing my virginity the end, And.
Speaker 2: Does he ever lose his virginity? I don't remember. I
Speaker 2: don't remember. Maybe he knows, maybe none of my business. Maybe,
Speaker 2: And then there's a post credit sequence where Steve is
Speaker 2: hitting a punching bag and absolutely nothing happens.
Speaker 3: The end.
Speaker 2: They hadn't quite they hadn't quite cracked in.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: All right, let's take a quick break and then we'll
Speaker 2: be right back.
Speaker 3: And we're back.
Speaker 2: A few things stick out to me with and and
Speaker 2: again I am not in any manner of authority on
Speaker 2: history surrounding World War Two, no, I, but I did
Speaker 2: a little bit of research just to sort of flesh
Speaker 2: out the way that this period is represented versus what they're.
Speaker 3: Actually what actually was going on. So just roughly what
Speaker 3: we see in this movie, and Kitlyn please correct.
Speaker 2: Me, because I was half asleep and missed this. So
Speaker 2: we meet Steve Rogers, who you know, is a character
Speaker 2: who was invented by Jack Kirby and Joe Simon explicitly
Speaker 2: to be the antithesist to Hitler. The first image of him,
Speaker 2: he is punching Hitler in the face, which is something
Speaker 2: that is replicated in the movie. But we meet him
Speaker 2: as a character who really wants to enlist in the military. Right,
Speaker 2: did this happen in World War Two? Yes? However, two
Speaker 2: thirds of the and I'm pulling this from the National
Speaker 2: World War Two Museum, two thirds of Americans who served
Speaker 2: in the military during World War Two sixteen million people.
Speaker 2: Two thirds of those people were drafted, so only about
Speaker 2: one in three were volunteers. There also was a far
Speaker 2: more diverse coalition of soldiers than we see. It was
Speaker 2: a majority white coalition, but there were over one million
Speaker 2: black soldiers, which I don't think we see represented proportionally,
Speaker 2: as well as hundreds of thousands of Hispanic Americans as
Speaker 2: well as Native Asian and Filipino Americans. We see very
Speaker 2: little diversity in this But I think that the point
Speaker 2: that has really aggressively hit on in this movie is
Speaker 2: that Steve Rogers wants nothing more than to fight for
Speaker 2: his country, and we don't really see another point of
Speaker 2: view represented, even though those other two in three you
Speaker 2: would imagine may have more complicated feelings toward the draft.
Speaker 2: This is something that I'm sure is handily addressed. There
Speaker 2: is nothing, if not a trillion movies about World War Two,
Speaker 2: but in a product this big, and I think, especially
Speaker 2: because this is a movie that is marketed at kids,
Speaker 2: this is a very particular, i think, very nationalistic way
Speaker 2: to portray this period in time that I think, I mean,
Speaker 2: I had to double check these numbers to be like,
Speaker 2: I know that you know, unlike other wars that the
Speaker 2: US was an aggressor in, had a far lower level
Speaker 2: of volunteer than World War Two. Vietnam is the example
Speaker 2: that comes directly to mind, right, But the fact that
Speaker 2: you know two and three people were drafted versus the
Speaker 2: only perspective we see presented here feels very playing into
Speaker 2: the idea of the quote unquote great American hero where
Speaker 2: we're given kind of a very vague backstory and it's
Speaker 2: just inherently a American and this is this is not
Speaker 2: an ideology that's exclusive to America. It's any nationalistic structure.
Speaker 2: There's many many countries that do this, but this is
Speaker 2: the American one. So I just thought that that was
Speaker 2: worth pointing out that it is. You know, the perspectives
Speaker 2: we see are very skewed in favor of the join
Speaker 2: the Draft, which is literally what Captain America represents explicitly
Speaker 2: at one point in the movie. And I have some
Speaker 2: of this for later on, but there are a few
Speaker 2: quotes given by Chris Evans and I'm like, he was
Speaker 2: so young, and then I look at it and I'm like,
Speaker 2: he was twenty nine. He could read. But there are
Speaker 2: this repeated pattern I think that is reflective of how
Speaker 2: America is perceived by itself and by and globally that
Speaker 2: you can find in the press tours for Captain America
Speaker 2: products that try to distance themselves from what is very
Speaker 2: explicitly being put on screen to be like, oh, he
Speaker 2: doesn't really stand for America. He stands for goodness, which
Speaker 2: is not what we'll get into that more. But I mean,
Speaker 2: I think that part of the reason that this is
Speaker 2: an effective piece of propaganda is it's attempting to directly
Speaker 2: correlate being American with being good for sure. So anyways, yeah,
Speaker 2: astorical how they present the draft anyways.
Speaker 3: Definitely, Yeah, I as we were talking about a little
Speaker 3: bit earlier, because it had been so long since I've
Speaker 3: seen this movie, I completely forgot how much pro US
Speaker 3: military propaganda is present and presented completely earnestly without any
Speaker 3: sort of commentary or satire or anything like that. Again,
Speaker 3: not that a huge studio superhero movie that was made
Speaker 3: in cooperation with the US government would do anything like that, course,
Speaker 3: but I was still kind of shocked by how like
Speaker 3: in your face this movie is as far as it's
Speaker 3: like hyper pro military industrial complex rhetoric. And it got
Speaker 3: me wondering about World War II propaganda that was circulated
Speaker 3: around the US, since that's what we see Captain America
Speaker 3: doing as his first job. So I did a little research.
Speaker 3: I'm not an expert on this topic, so I might
Speaker 3: be oversimplifying things, but basically, there was a ton of
Speaker 3: propaganda going around the US during World War Two. This
Speaker 3: happened in World War One as well, but it was
Speaker 3: things like films, radio broadcasts, posters, advertisements, magazines, leaflets, cartoons,
Speaker 3: comic books, live shows. Basically any type of media that
Speaker 3: was available at the time was used to distribute propaganda
Speaker 3: by the US government to promote pretty extreme American patriotism
Speaker 3: in order to get Americans to support the war effort.
Speaker 3: So the idea was to persuade people to be more
Speaker 3: blindly patriotic, because that makes people easier to control and exploit.
Speaker 3: So propaganda was used not only to kind of broadly
Speaker 3: encourage intense American patriotism, but also more specifically to get
Speaker 3: people to enlist in the military, to offer their labor
Speaker 3: in factories and victory gardens and gathering scrap metal and
Speaker 3: things like that. People were propagandized to be frugal with
Speaker 3: their use of different materials so that those materials could
Speaker 3: be used for the war. People were propagandized into buying
Speaker 3: war bonds, which is what we see Captain America selling
Speaker 3: in the movie when he's turned into this like Uncle
Speaker 3: Sam type figure. So, yeah, I was just curious about that,
Speaker 3: and I'm also interested to learn more about how the
Speaker 3: pro patriotism slash arguably pro American nationalism propaganda from that era,
Speaker 3: like how it influences modern day patriotism and nationalism in
Speaker 3: the US, because I have a feeling that they're connected.
Speaker 3: And it's also maybe partly why this very pro America,
Speaker 3: pro military movie from relatively recent years is set during
Speaker 3: this era of World War Two.
Speaker 2: Right, That's that's really interesting. I did not go down
Speaker 2: that line of study, but yeah, I mean that that
Speaker 2: totally scans. I hope that I'm like afraid that the
Speaker 2: history has been like, well, actually.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I know, and we probably right, But this
Speaker 3: is a movie podcast, not a history podcast.
Speaker 2: Yes, there are other sources for this, but we're trying
Speaker 2: to just contextualize the version of history that this movie
Speaker 2: is presenting, which is very in line with what we
Speaker 2: learned in American public schools, or at least what we
Speaker 2: learned in American public school at the time. That is
Speaker 2: also very moving target. But it's interesting how much American
Speaker 2: propaganda is referenced inside of the movie and then how
Speaker 2: much is going on within the production, right, Because I'll
Speaker 2: go back to that Chris Evans quote, and this was
Speaker 2: something that came back up last year when the Anthony
Speaker 2: Mackie Captain American movie came out, which we can talk
Speaker 2: about because there was a boycott on that movie at
Speaker 2: Captain America Brave New World that we should talk about
Speaker 2: the context of. But there was a quote from Anthony
Speaker 2: Mackie that is similar to a Chris Evans one, but
Speaker 2: I think because Anthony Mackie is a black actor, it
Speaker 2: was taken out of context and treated quite differently. But
Speaker 2: I'll just share getting to that, like Captain America being
Speaker 2: an overt representation of American propaganda and that existing during
Speaker 2: times where America is not very popular, and how it's presented,
Speaker 2: so Anthony Mackie says last year January twenty twenty five,
Speaker 2: For me, Captain America represents a lot of different things,
Speaker 2: and I don't think the term America should be one
Speaker 2: of those representations. It's about a man who keeps his word,
Speaker 2: who has honor, dignity and integrity, someone who is trustworthy
Speaker 2: and dependable. And again I very much disagree with this representation.
Speaker 2: But of course, you know this was taken up by
Speaker 2: the right wing as like Anthony Mackie hates America, blah
Speaker 2: blah blah, and then he to me hilariously, was clearly
Speaker 2: forced to apologize for this in an Instagram story using
Speaker 2: comic sands, and he's like, let me be clear, I'm
Speaker 2: a proud American and taking on the shield blah blah blah.
Speaker 2: So he was forced to apologize. It is very similar though,
Speaker 2: to something that Chris Evan says way back in twenty
Speaker 2: eleven that I also disagree with. But I think it's
Speaker 2: interesting that this is a through line in the twenty
Speaker 2: first century. He said, I'm not trying to get too
Speaker 2: lost in the American side of it. This isn't a
Speaker 2: flag waving movie. It is red, white and blue. But
Speaker 2: it just so happens that the character was created in
Speaker 2: America during wartime when there was a common enemy. Even
Speaker 2: though it is Captain America. I've said it before it interviews.
Speaker 2: I feel like he should just be called Captain Good.
Speaker 2: You know. He actors should not be allowed to speak.
Speaker 2: You know, he was created at a time where there
Speaker 2: was this undeniable evil, and this guy was kind of
Speaker 2: created to fight that evil. I think that everyone could
Speaker 2: agree that Nazis were bad, and he cap just so
Speaker 2: happens to wear the red, white and blue. Now the backbends,
Speaker 2: this poor man is doing to do. This is just like,
Speaker 2: never listen whatever. Actors are wonderful, but should they be speaking.
Speaker 2: I don't know. Sometimes no, But it's interesting that both
Speaker 2: of them are sort of trying to do this gymnastics
Speaker 2: routine against acknowledging what is very clear about this character,
Speaker 2: and in doing so sort of like hitting the nail
Speaker 2: on the head of what we're supposed to take away
Speaker 2: from Captain America. America good and in the case of
Speaker 2: that Chris Evans quote, you know, presenting probably the version
Speaker 2: of history that he learned in American schools that you
Speaker 2: just that you just talked about. Caitlin is like, well,
Speaker 2: we can all agree that Hitler was bad. Absolutely true.
Speaker 3: Of course, of.
Speaker 2: Course Hitler is famously history's greatest monster. And that does
Speaker 2: not mean that America being opposed to Hitler means that
Speaker 2: America is you know, uncomplicatedly good. We understand this, but
Speaker 2: it's just like, it's so funny to me that he
Speaker 2: said this isn't a flag waving movie when literally the
Speaker 2: first end credit tile his uncle Sam. You're like, yeah, bro,
Speaker 2: this is this is like one of the most flag
Speaker 2: wavingest movies that we have. Yes, yeah, I mean I
Speaker 2: think we're like just sort of pointing out the obvious
Speaker 2: in all these different ways. But like the framing of
Speaker 2: it is so interesting because it it's like you're also
Speaker 2: sort of being gas lit by the cast across decades,
Speaker 2: right of being like, well, this isn't an American movie. Meanwhile,
Speaker 2: he's wearing your red wing blue shield. The movie is
Speaker 2: sponsored by the military, and he's it's actually, this is
Speaker 2: just a movie about being a good, awesome guy. You're like, right, right, right.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's not unlike the propaganda that Americans were
Speaker 3: force fed.
Speaker 5: It's the same at the time, and it's the same too. Yeah,
Speaker 5: it's the same shit, and it's like this it's it's
Speaker 5: also the same character. So it's just like silly that
Speaker 5: And I think that, you know, audiences today are kind
Speaker 5: of wiser to it in general.
Speaker 3: Well, I was thinking about this the subsequent Captain America movies.
Speaker 2: Which tell me more because I kind of didn't want
Speaker 2: to learn.
Speaker 3: Well, I can't tell you a lot because I did
Speaker 3: not have time to rewatch them's, but I do think
Speaker 3: thank you so much. But I do think that they
Speaker 3: get less and less pro American military propaganda as they go.
Speaker 3: I have a pretty decent handle on Captain America's Civil War,
Speaker 3: because I have watched that one multiple times, but I
Speaker 3: don't really remember Winter Soldier at all. That's the second one,
Speaker 3: Bucky Barnes, right, Yeah, so he survives falling into the ravine,
Speaker 3: he gets captured, and he's given maybe like different plot
Speaker 3: goo or something to turn him into the Winter Soldier,
Speaker 3: which is he becomes a bad guy, but then he
Speaker 3: becomes a good guy again eventually blah blah blah. Again,
Speaker 3: I don't remember the specifics, so mcu heads don't come
Speaker 3: for me.
Speaker 2: Also, there is, just for what it's worth, there is
Speaker 2: like a disagreement on whether just going back to like
Speaker 2: the enlistment versus draft, there is a disagreement on whether
Speaker 2: Bucky volunteered or drafted. It's interestingly, and maybe this is
Speaker 2: actually relevant what we're talking about. I think that that
Speaker 2: we're first told he was drafted, and later that's revised
Speaker 2: to he enlisted, which feels intentional. But there's two versions
Speaker 2: of the story. The original one was that he was drafted,
Speaker 2: which shockingly, actually there was more nuance when this character
Speaker 2: was created maybe than there is now.
Speaker 3: There you go all this to say, the sequels are
Speaker 3: a bit foggy in my brain, but I feel like
Speaker 3: once we start getting the movies where Captain America is
Speaker 3: in modern times, there's less of an overt pro American
Speaker 3: military sentiment in those movies. But the main thing I
Speaker 3: wanted to talk about regarding the sequels, which is something
Speaker 3: we've already alluded to, is the fourth movie that came
Speaker 3: out last year, the Anthony mackiew one called Brave New World. However,
Speaker 3: I did not see that movie because there was a
Speaker 3: call for a boycott because it features a character named
Speaker 3: Sabra who is in the comics as a mosad age
Speaker 3: who is framed as a superhero, so not a villain.
Speaker 2: Ah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So when it was announced that this character would
Speaker 3: be included in Captain America Brave New World, I think
Speaker 3: that announcement was made in twenty twenty two, people protested
Speaker 3: and Marvel responded by being like, no, don't worry, We're
Speaker 3: taking a new approach to that character. Sabra is not
Speaker 3: Masad anymore in the movie. She works for the US government.
Speaker 3: But that was not good enough because simply the inclusion
Speaker 3: of this character at all, considering the history and the
Speaker 3: context of this character and the fact that she was
Speaker 3: played by an Israeli actor in the movie. Tells you
Speaker 3: what you need to know about Marvel Studio's stance on.
Speaker 2: Well and again, it's like when you consider the fact
Speaker 2: that they work so closely, not only with with Disney,
Speaker 2: but with I mean they're owned by Disney and they
Speaker 2: literally work with the American military. Of course they are
Speaker 2: not going to take any meaningful critique seriously. And there's more.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yay, yeah, okay. So Marvel Studios has broader ties
Speaker 3: to Israel because it was founded by a guy named
Speaker 3: Avi Arad, who was also the former chairman and former
Speaker 3: CEO of Marvel Studios. Before that, he was the chief
Speaker 3: creative officer of Marvel Entertainment, which was the predecessor to
Speaker 3: Marvel Studios. And he is Israeli. He was born in
Speaker 3: Israel in nineteen forty eight, which is the same year
Speaker 3: as the Nakba. He is a former member of the
Speaker 3: IDF and he remains deeply, deeply pro Israel. So the
Speaker 3: founder of Marvel Studios is a raging Zionist. Well, it's
Speaker 3: something I did not know until quite recently.
Speaker 2: I just learned it. Well, Jesus fucking Christ, there you go,
Speaker 2: there you go. Yeah, also worth mentioning because we're talking
Speaker 2: about American propaganda that you know, if you haven't seen
Speaker 2: the most recent UN report on Gaza, that is confirmed,
Speaker 2: not that the US is going to meaningfully recognize as
Speaker 2: the highest level, but that there have been over seventy
Speaker 2: thousand people killed by Israel in Gaza, of course assisted
Speaker 2: by the US, and twenty thousand children. So I mean,
Speaker 2: protesting a Captain American movie is It's a small thing,
Speaker 2: but it is. It is meaningful because it's like you
Speaker 2: are protesting propaganda. Yes that I didn't realize how to
Speaker 2: its core that propaganda is, but thank you for that
Speaker 2: very frustrating fact. Yeah, yeah, I think that. On that note,
Speaker 2: it's worth acknowledging, which we've talked about in a number
Speaker 2: of episodes, the Marvel military industrial complex, which is not
Speaker 2: limited to Marvel movies, but they are. They certainly do
Speaker 2: stand out and something that we have talked about the
Speaker 2: development of the military's involvement in Hollywood sort of started
Speaker 2: with their recognizing the success of Top Gun and forming this, yeah,
Speaker 2: forming this industry around Top Gun. So we talk about
Speaker 2: that in our Top Gun episode. But you know, by
Speaker 2: the time that this movie comes out, there was already
Speaker 2: precedent for this because the American military had been involved
Speaker 2: in Iron Man in two thousand and eight, so from
Speaker 2: the very beginning of the MCU, the military was present.
Speaker 2: I'm pulling here from a piece in Inkstick Media from
Speaker 2: last year by Ashley Gate just a little bit of
Speaker 2: reference to the movies that they single out as being
Speaker 2: made with not just the endorse of, but financial support
Speaker 2: from the US military. Are as follows this movie Captain
Speaker 2: America and its sequel. I believe the first one Captain Marvel,
Speaker 2: which I don't think we talked about on our Captain
Speaker 2: Marvel episode, and that is one that I would like
Speaker 2: to redo at some point, and Iron Man one and two,
Speaker 2: so that only seems like five. Maybe they meant both
Speaker 2: Captain America sequels. I'm not totally sure. In any case,
Speaker 2: those are the Marvel movies that were made not just
Speaker 2: with the approval but the financial support. What does that mean?
Speaker 2: We will remind you, and I'm quoting from the piece here.
Speaker 2: By subsidizing military hardware, allowing media conglomerates to film on
Speaker 2: military basis, and facilitating the recruitment of off duty soldiers
Speaker 2: as extras, the Pentagon validates the movie script and weighs
Speaker 2: in to approve the final film with advanced viewings. So
Speaker 2: we will probably never know. But if there was ever
Speaker 2: a version of this script or a version of the
Speaker 2: conception of this movie that involved a critique of American propaganda,
Speaker 2: it was long, long, long gone before it reaches people,
Speaker 2: because the Pentagon gets to sign off on this, which
Speaker 2: means that we're seeing something that is explicitly shaped by
Speaker 2: the state, and that is propaganda. Yeah, it's a really
Speaker 2: it's a really interesting piece and we can also and
Speaker 2: I'll just send the link. You know, it goes very deep.
Speaker 2: I know we've talked about it in the I think
Speaker 2: we've talked about it with Transformers movies, with Top Gun,
Speaker 2: with Marvel.
Speaker 3: Independence Day, question Mark.
Speaker 2: Possibly that sounds familiar, I think so, Yeah, because Lindsay
Speaker 2: was on for that episode. Yeah, there's there's a lot
Speaker 2: of history with me. And that's also I think it's
Speaker 2: important to mention a fairly recent development. Top Gun came
Speaker 2: out in the eighties. So even though you know this
Speaker 2: movie is poking a little bit of fun at the
Speaker 2: you know, very prodicious and effective propaganda machine in the
Speaker 2: US of the nineteen forties, it's only become more entrenched
Speaker 2: in Hollywood since then. And if we're like taking an
Speaker 2: even further step back to Disney bought Marvel, you know,
Speaker 2: like in the early Bob Iger era, so whatever, the
Speaker 2: two thousands, but during the forties, during this time that
Speaker 2: this movie is taking place, in both Disney and Marvel
Speaker 2: as separate entities were creating US propaganda. One, I mean,
Speaker 2: Captain America debuts in nineteen forty, shortly before the US
Speaker 2: enters the war, so almost as a like, the movie
Speaker 2: is referencing an Uncle Sam like promotional tool to encourage enlistment,
Speaker 2: and Disney basically put all of their production on hold
Speaker 2: to make propaganda, you know, short propaganda films, which is
Speaker 2: I think some of the only like frequently discussed World
Speaker 2: War two propaganda or at least that I've learned about,
Speaker 2: is like Donald Duck fighting Hitler and all that stuff.
Speaker 2: All Right, So both of these entities, even before they
Speaker 2: were like merged to create this very boring influential movie
Speaker 2: with the US military, we're doing work for the US
Speaker 2: military that just presents the narrative that serves the American
Speaker 2: military machine, you know. And I'll say again, all of
Speaker 2: this is true, and it's great to see someone punch
Speaker 2: Hitler in the face night after night, but we have
Speaker 2: to be able to contain multitudes here.
Speaker 3: Yes, well, and this propaganda extends to certain plot points
Speaker 3: or characters in the movie, And yeah, I'm sure there
Speaker 3: are ones that I am forgetting or maybe even missed,
Speaker 3: But two big ones that I clocked are basically the
Speaker 3: movie presenting the idea of of technologically advanced bombs that
Speaker 3: you drop on an entire city that can kill hundreds
Speaker 3: of thousands of people at once. The US would never
Speaker 3: do that. That's something that the Nazis would do. That's hi, Tricia.
Speaker 3: And not to downplay the abject horror of what Nazis
Speaker 3: did do, but this movie doesn't seem to want to
Speaker 3: admit that the US what kills civilia do something like
Speaker 3: that and did do something like that.
Speaker 2: I e.
Speaker 3: Hiroshima and Nagasaki killing hundreds of thousands of civilians. So
Speaker 3: the movie just like taking atrocities committed by the US
Speaker 3: and making that something that the enemy would do. And
Speaker 3: then I also feel like the movie tries to kind
Speaker 3: of rewrite history with its treatment of the Japanese American
Speaker 3: character in the movie. The character's name is Jim Marita
Speaker 3: played by an actor named Kenneth Choi, where in the
Speaker 3: movie he becomes good buddies with Captain America and he
Speaker 3: becomes a war hero, omitting the fact that Japanese Americans
Speaker 3: were put in internment camps during World War Two.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean truly locally. I portions of Griffith Park
Speaker 2: in like our own community, were used as Japanese internment
Speaker 2: camps and it is still just wildly under discussed in
Speaker 2: the US. Yeah, Like, you're totally right, Like there's all
Speaker 2: of these things that are presented over half a century
Speaker 2: later at the time. By the time this movie comes out,
Speaker 2: with full knowledge of you know, the Pentagon is well
Speaker 2: aware of the atrocities that America has wrought on other
Speaker 2: nations and its own people. But they gave money to
Speaker 2: Captain America so that they could use a fucking military
Speaker 2: bunker or whatever the hell. I just it's miserable. I
Speaker 2: wanted to touch on just really quickly, and I've done nowhere
Speaker 2: near a deep dive to this for comic book fans
Speaker 2: that it does seem like in the you know, over
Speaker 2: eighty years of this character has existed, there have been
Speaker 2: moments where there's been at least an attempt at introspection
Speaker 2: on the part of this character. One thing that I
Speaker 2: found interesting and didn't go very deep into, but there
Speaker 2: was a series of Captain America comics in the seventies
Speaker 2: in which nineteen seventies Captain America is fighting nineteen fifties
Speaker 2: Captain America. So they're literally, yeah, like Captain America is
Speaker 2: at war with himself and there, I mean, they're.
Speaker 3: So war much.
Speaker 2: I guess self war like whatever. I mean. I didn't
Speaker 2: get too deep into it, but there have been, you know,
Speaker 2: in the nearly century that this character has existed, writers
Speaker 2: and people who have tried to sort of reckon with
Speaker 2: what has this character represented versus what does this character
Speaker 2: represent now? Because you know, characters like this and I
Speaker 2: like whatever. Read Raw Dog if you want to know.
Speaker 2: But like, you know, these symbols, of these nationalistic symbols,
Speaker 2: they do have changing meanings as time goes on, and
Speaker 2: it's interesting to see that conversation happen. I'll just leave
Speaker 2: it at that, because clearly that is all very absent
Speaker 2: from this movie, but I will acknowledge that it seems
Speaker 2: as if in comic book world there have been and
Speaker 2: it seems like this is also true for characters like Batman,
Speaker 2: like Spider Man. You know, over in a character that's
Speaker 2: existed for nearly one hundred years, there's going to be
Speaker 2: some change in some conversation, sure, but I think it
Speaker 2: is very telling that the most culturally impactful version of
Speaker 2: this character pretty much just retains the values of the
Speaker 2: original unquestioningly. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Shall we talk about Agent Peggy Carter?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Sure, Okay, So I'm more or less just kind of
Speaker 3: recapped the main beats that she's in, so just to
Speaker 3: kind of go through those. She's initially introduced at the
Speaker 3: basic training camp where she's like, I'm the supervisor of
Speaker 3: the science club or whatever. Some guy, some soldier that
Speaker 3: is her subordinate, immediately undermines her, which is perfectly believable given.
Speaker 2: The time and probably still now, but yes.
Speaker 3: Right, and then she responds by punching him to show
Speaker 3: us the audience that she is a strong, independent woman
Speaker 3: hashtag Yeah, so that's our first impression of her. There's
Speaker 3: a scene in the car a little bit after that
Speaker 3: where she is taking Steve to the facility to get
Speaker 3: his super soldier gu injected into him, and he's talking
Speaker 3: about how because he's so small and skinny, no one
Speaker 3: respects him or takes him seriously parentheses because he doesn't
Speaker 3: embody traditional ideals with masculine masculine ideals y.
Speaker 2: Right, which is also you know, at least again as
Speaker 2: far as I understand, probably accurate to the time for sure. Also,
Speaker 2: you know, it's the movie is not interested in Steve
Speaker 2: Rogers until he is traditionally big and brawny and embodies
Speaker 2: the quote unquote all American ideals. So it's like, even
Speaker 2: though he is presented as you know, like lovable and good,
Speaker 2: inherently good, regardless of what he physically looks like, the
Speaker 2: version of him we celebrate very squarely matches. We don't
Speaker 2: celebrate Chris Evan's head on Jeremy Strong's body. And I
Speaker 2: think that's intentional for sure. And Peggy Carter isn't really
Speaker 2: romantically interested in him until he looks like that, because
Speaker 2: he's a head on a pile of tennis balls. Like
Speaker 2: the scene where they're in the car, Oh my god,
Speaker 2: the scene where they're in the car, every angle Steve
Speaker 2: Rogers looks like he is a completely different size. I
Speaker 2: watched that scene. It's the only scene I watched twice.
Speaker 2: It was the only scene I found interesting every new angle.
Speaker 2: There's one scene where he looks he just looks a
Speaker 2: different dimension and his head changes size from angle to ankle.
Speaker 3: It is so.
Speaker 2: Just just really uncanny and like it's it's the Polar
Speaker 2: Express in that car, but you're you're totally right though
Speaker 2: with it. Anyways.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, he's talking about how he's not respected because
Speaker 3: of his perceived lack of masculinity. Yes, Agent Carter responds
Speaker 3: by saying, I know what that's like to have every
Speaker 3: door shut in your face, parentheses, no one respects me
Speaker 3: in this field that I'm in because I'm a woman. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And then Steve responds by being like, yeah, I guess
Speaker 3: I just don't know why you would want to join
Speaker 3: the army if you're such a beautiful dame or woman. Agent,
Speaker 3: you're not a dame. And then she's like, wow, you
Speaker 3: have you have no idea how to talk to a woman,
Speaker 3: do you? And he's like he.
Speaker 2: Says, no, well, no, I mean it's like I don't know.
Speaker 2: It's like there's with Peggy. It's like if you're watching
Speaker 2: with your brain like sort of only softly on, you
Speaker 2: can see you can see the redeeming qualities where you know,
Speaker 2: on its face, you know he is drawn too, and
Speaker 2: like also seems to have a good deal of professional
Speaker 2: respect for Peggy, who is it like hyper competent at
Speaker 2: her job, is confident and like, you know, there, I
Speaker 2: see the argument in any number of early twenty tens
Speaker 2: clickbait that she is an inherently feminist character because she,
Speaker 2: you know, has a job that she is very good at.
Speaker 2: She is drawn to slash quote unquote rewarded with the
Speaker 2: romantic lead of the movie without having to compromise her
Speaker 2: professional position.
Speaker 3: Sure, sure, I'm sure again very twenty tens. Yeah, ideals.
Speaker 2: Sure, I mean, because it's like, ultimately, this is a
Speaker 2: degree of feminism that the Pentagon is signed off on.
Speaker 2: So like when you're like, what what does it mean?
Speaker 3: Right, So just a few more examples of this like
Speaker 3: version of feminism, I guess we'll call it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: This scene in the car ends with they're they're kind
Speaker 3: of flirty because they're talking about like, oh, finding the
Speaker 3: right partner to dance with. And the point here is
Speaker 3: that she is clearly being poised as Captain America's love interest.
Speaker 2: But he's got to get big first.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah, exactly following his transformation when he becomes a
Speaker 3: super soldier. There's a chase action sequence where Peggy is
Speaker 3: shooting some bad guys and she hits some of them.
Speaker 2: She oh, yeah, she does that classic mixed fee's article
Speaker 2: thing she gets to do, like she gets to do
Speaker 2: one thing. She gets to do one thing, and it
Speaker 2: usually is a kind of cool thing. Unfortunately, she then
Speaker 2: is sort of immediately jettisoned from the scene afterwards, which is, yeah,
Speaker 2: for sure what happens.
Speaker 3: Because what happens is there's a car driving, like one
Speaker 3: of the bad guys is driving a car toward her.
Speaker 3: She's aiming, ready to fire. We've already seen her like
Speaker 3: put a bullet right in a different bad guy's head,
Speaker 3: so we're pretty confident that she can do it again. Yeah. However,
Speaker 3: Steve pushes her out of the way to quote unquote
Speaker 3: save her from being hit by the car, and she
Speaker 3: angrily responds, I had him like I could have done it,
Speaker 3: you know, and he's like sorry and then runs off
Speaker 3: and we follow him. So he basically literally shoves her. Yeah,
Speaker 3: he shoves her out of the story. But it's feminists
Speaker 3: because she didn't like it.
Speaker 2: I don't know it's like, you know, whatever in the
Speaker 2: warped world that this movie is prothetic. I mean, like
Speaker 2: Peggy Carter's shooting Nazis. That's cool. I like that. I
Speaker 2: like to see that. But it's just it's so like
Speaker 2: it is wild how it happens. I think like three
Speaker 2: times where she is present at the like very beginning
Speaker 2: of an action sequence and then is very intentionally removed
Speaker 2: from said action sequence. We're often cutting back to her
Speaker 2: in a work capacity, you know, like she is. We're
Speaker 2: like we cut back to her and she's got like
Speaker 2: a corkboard and she's she's doing corkboard tasks, but she
Speaker 2: doesn't get to participate.
Speaker 3: Right in very like she's on the periphery kind of thing. Yes, yeah, totally.
Speaker 3: Then there's a scene where after we are starting to
Speaker 3: get the sense that they are starting to like each other,
Speaker 3: Captain America gets jealous because he thinks that Peggy and
Speaker 3: Howard Stark are fricking because he doesn't know what fondue is. God,
Speaker 3: So he's jealous, but he responds in such a way
Speaker 3: where he's maybe he just like kind of retreats into himself.
Speaker 3: He doesn't have an outburst. But when the same thing
Speaker 3: happens for Peggy. She responds very irrationally and.
Speaker 2: Hilarically because she almost like shoots him.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because what happens here is that Captain America returns
Speaker 3: from the rescue mission where he has saved four hundred soldiers,
Speaker 3: and this random woman who we don't know, throws herself
Speaker 3: at him because he's a hero, and she kisses him,
Speaker 3: which Peggy sees.
Speaker 2: Which she says she's doing for all of the women
Speaker 2: in America because we can't, Oh, well, all the women
Speaker 2: in America aren't aren't here though.
Speaker 3: I have to sexually assault you on their behalf, I.
Speaker 2: Mean yeah, yeah, which obviously is like not how the
Speaker 2: movie views it, but objectively that is sort of what
Speaker 2: that is.
Speaker 3: What's happening anyway, So Peggy sees this, he sees she
Speaker 3: sees them kissing, and now she's jealous, and we understand
Speaker 3: why she might be hurt, of course, but she gets
Speaker 3: so pissed off as if they are already in a
Speaker 3: monogamous relationship, which they are not, and that like he's
Speaker 3: cheating on her, which he is not, because again they're
Speaker 3: not in a relationship. But she's so mad that she
Speaker 3: shoots at him I'm sure he's got the shield that's
Speaker 3: made of vibranium, and she probably knew that she wasn't
Speaker 3: going to kill him, but like her reaction is so
Speaker 3: outsized compared to his, when basically they think the same
Speaker 3: thing is going on with one another, that they're like
Speaker 3: romantically interested in someone other than each other. Yeah, so
Speaker 3: it feels like the movie is saying, well, she's a woman,
Speaker 3: so of course she's going to behave hysterically, especially compared
Speaker 3: to how the man reacts in the same situation. And
Speaker 3: then what happens right after that scene is Howard Stark
Speaker 3: saying to Steve something like us men will never understand
Speaker 3: what's going on in a woman's head.
Speaker 2: For sure. Whatever. Yeah, this is so as far as
Speaker 2: Peggy goes. I mean, we're presented with a pretty like
Speaker 2: basic version of this character in this I did a
Speaker 2: little bit of reading about who Peggy is in the
Speaker 2: wider Marvel world. She is not involved from the job
Speaker 2: of Captain America. In fact, she's introduced about twenty five
Speaker 2: years after Captain America in the sixties. She is a
Speaker 2: member of the French Resistance as a teenager. Prior to
Speaker 2: meeting Captain America, and then after Captain America's flocks off
Speaker 2: to the Cave or whatever, she works with Howard Stark
Speaker 2: and has a long history with the Shield Organization, which
Speaker 2: is of course the Marvel espionage kind of CIA Pentagon approved. Cool.
Speaker 2: They're definitely cool. They're not doing anything fucked up. And
Speaker 2: Nick Fury's there, right, Nick Furies Cool. So anyways, like
Speaker 2: she has more of a character, and I know that.
Speaker 2: I'm sure there's a ton of specifics that I am
Speaker 2: not aware of. It's also fleshed out not just in
Speaker 2: the comic books, but in the TV series Action or
Speaker 2: Agent Action Carter Agent Carter, which also stars Hailey Atwell
Speaker 2: and apparently Chad Michael Murray. Oh, Chad Michael Murray is
Speaker 2: in the MCU. Wow, did not know that.
Speaker 3: I know that.
Speaker 2: But she she appears all over the MCU, and I
Speaker 2: think she is sort of presented as this, you know,
Speaker 2: I think she's presented as a feminist ideal throughout a
Speaker 2: few different generations. The version we get of her here
Speaker 2: is the twenty tens version, which is you know, and
Speaker 2: actually Haley Atwell mentions this in her conception of or
Speaker 2: her interpretation of the character. I'm pulling this from Scholarly
Speaker 2: Journal Wikipedia.
Speaker 3: I copied and pasted the same quote.
Speaker 2: The Ginger Rogers quote. You know that she can do
Speaker 2: everything in Captain America does, but backwards and in heels,
Speaker 2: and so that is, you know, I think again, I
Speaker 2: don't think that that is an anti feminist statement or
Speaker 2: anything like that, but I do think it is a
Speaker 2: very particular way of like in some ways, there's an interpretation.
Speaker 2: I guess that this is having your cake and eating
Speaker 2: it too, right, where you have a character who's shaped
Speaker 2: and conceived of as being progressive for women. I'm gonna
Speaker 2: hold off on the word feminist. I guess its progressive
Speaker 2: and also still is very much, you know, abiding by
Speaker 2: the beauty ideals of both that time and our time.
Speaker 2: And I will say that that is also very true
Speaker 2: for Captain America. I think, sure, there's a lot of
Speaker 2: aggressive gender conformity in this movie, and it is not
Speaker 2: I don't even think Peggy Carter is necessarily catching it
Speaker 2: worse than Captain America. However, Captain America is the one
Speaker 2: that gets to execute the plot, and Peggy Carter, I
Speaker 2: think we're told, we're led to believe she is far
Speaker 2: more involved in the plot of the movie than you know,
Speaker 2: screen time wise and action wise, she actually is.
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly like And this is like, I feel like,
Speaker 3: pretty specific to the early two thousand because I think
Speaker 3: by the time we get to the late twenty tens,
Speaker 3: this we have Captain Martin has already shifted a little bit, right,
Speaker 3: But in twenty eleven, we're seeing we've moved past the
Speaker 3: idea of a woman in an action movie simply just
Speaker 3: being there to be the love interest of a man
Speaker 3: who gets damseled and has to be saved and otherwise
Speaker 3: does nothing.
Speaker 2: For the most part, for the most part, because I mean,
Speaker 2: we're still the early Nolan and Batman movies are not
Speaker 2: too far behind.
Speaker 3: Us, true, true, true, true, Yeah, but we are seeing
Speaker 3: we are starting to see a shift. So yeah, maybe
Speaker 3: we haven't fully moved past it, but we are starting
Speaker 3: to see a shift where, oh, we can't just damsel
Speaker 3: a woman. We have to let her participate in some
Speaker 3: of the action. We have to let her be smart
Speaker 3: and sassy or something like that. We can even give
Speaker 3: her a gun, we can even let her shoot some
Speaker 3: people and stuff, But ultimately we can't let her move
Speaker 3: the story forward in any meaningful way. We can't really
Speaker 3: give her any characterization outside of some very surface level stuff,
Speaker 3: and then also being the love interest of the male hero,
Speaker 3: we can't give her any interiority or stakes or anything
Speaker 3: like that. So yeah, it's reflective of an interesting I
Speaker 3: guess time in like representation of women in action movies.
Speaker 2: It's a very in between e moment, and you're totally right,
Speaker 2: like by the end of the decade, the goalpost has shifted.
Speaker 2: But I mean, yeah, I just really want to So
Speaker 2: listeners were planning on, like before the end of the year,
Speaker 2: sort of doing this series on the main feed where
Speaker 2: we like revisit a movie that centers on a character
Speaker 2: of a marginalized gender from every year of the show
Speaker 2: as a part of our ten year celebration, Sean, and
Speaker 2: I'm like very eager as much as I know I'll
Speaker 2: find them infuriating to go back to Wonder Woman and
Speaker 2: Captain Marvel, because I mean, for and those are very
Speaker 2: different discussions, but just from the framework of like what
Speaker 2: does Pentagon approved feminism and how does that sort of
Speaker 2: evolve over time, I think it is like very telling. Anyways, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think that I understand why Peggy was a well
Speaker 2: received character at the time. Because I think that this
Speaker 2: type of character was still considered fairly novel, like a
Speaker 2: woman having any agency in an action movie. Not to
Speaker 2: say it was unheard of, but it was still I
Speaker 2: think quite rare. So I understand why look like we're
Speaker 2: sometimes we cling to things because YadA YadA, because there's
Speaker 2: no alternative, at least in mainstream media. But I think, yeah,
Speaker 2: with the with the benefit of time, this is you know,
Speaker 2: state of her feminism, So what is it really what
Speaker 2: does it mean? What is she being feminist in service
Speaker 2: of et cetera. But yeah, and again same with Captain Marvel.
Speaker 2: You know, this character has been around for twenty five
Speaker 2: years less, but that's still a really fucking long time. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and I'm sure that if you're a big fan of
Speaker 2: the comics there are examples that provide pushback or more
Speaker 2: contacts that I'm just not aware of. But the Peggy
Speaker 2: we get here. You know, I appreciate that haileyatt Well
Speaker 2: seems to really be doing everything she can with this character,
Speaker 2: but she's just kind of not given enough and I
Speaker 2: don't think that her actions have enough meaningful bearing on
Speaker 2: the plot to you know, consider her, you know, on
Speaker 2: par with Captain America, and it totally makes sense why
Speaker 2: people are kind of shipping Bucky and Captain America together
Speaker 2: more their relationship has more stakes and more time to develop,
Speaker 2: so right.
Speaker 3: And then by the end of the movie, again Peggy
Speaker 3: Carter is she gets over her being so furious at
Speaker 3: Steve Rogers that she shoots at him four times because
Speaker 3: she sees like film footage of Captain America looking at
Speaker 3: a picture of her in his lockett or something.
Speaker 2: I don't find I'm like, does.
Speaker 3: Captain America have a Lockett but he's looking at a
Speaker 3: picture of her?
Speaker 2: No, no, I wrote, I wrote down his masculine lockett.
Speaker 2: I think it's supposed to be like a compass that's
Speaker 2: basically a Lockett.
Speaker 3: Oh sure, yes, boy lockett.
Speaker 2: It's definitely not girly lockett that he has.
Speaker 3: Yes, So she's not mad at him anymore. She's like, Wow,
Speaker 3: he does love me. And then at the end she
Speaker 3: is sort of a part of the big like third
Speaker 3: act battle more so than.
Speaker 2: Other women in Marvel movies. I will say, but.
Speaker 3: Like, definitely one's from around this era, aside from oh
Speaker 3: my god, what the hell is this Scarlett Johansen character's name,
Speaker 3: I don't black Widow.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, well black Widow. Yeah they acted like Black
Speaker 2: Widow invented febinism in twenty twelve.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we're right. Yeah. But anyway, so Peggy is in
Speaker 3: the big battle sequence at the end, but I was
Speaker 3: also kind of confused by that because she's not really
Speaker 3: a soldier. She's a supervisor, so I don't know why
Speaker 3: she's in combat. But whatever, it's a movie and I
Speaker 3: don't understand. I'm not mad that she's there, but she's
Speaker 3: shooting her gun. She kills some people, but then gets
Speaker 3: relegated to like strictly love interest again when she's like,
Speaker 3: go get him.
Speaker 2: That so annoying, and then.
Speaker 3: Gives him a big smooch and then Tommy Lee Jones
Speaker 3: is like, I'm not gonna kiss you parentheses, yucky, that
Speaker 3: would be gay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they have to get a no homeow moment in
Speaker 2: because it's twenty eleven. Uh huh.
Speaker 3: And then at the very end, she's on the radio
Speaker 3: with Steve as he's sacrificing himself and crashing the plane
Speaker 3: and she's crying and that's all she gets to do
Speaker 3: with the end.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a it's a weird in between place to
Speaker 2: find a woman in a in this genre because she's
Speaker 2: treated like a damsel in distress at more than one point.
Speaker 2: But I wouldn't categorize her as a damsel in distress.
Speaker 2: It's like this bizarre gray area that she's experiencing that
Speaker 2: it's like, I don't know what to make of it,
Speaker 2: but but there it is. Nonetheless there is. I also
Speaker 2: didn't know that she like her younger sister, and then
Speaker 2: later niece becomes another Captain America love address because he's
Speaker 2: a mortal question Mark. There's someone named Sharon Carter.
Speaker 3: Okay, that's kind of none of my biziness. I kind
Speaker 3: of does because he's like kind of cryogenically frozen I
Speaker 3: guess when he crash lands in the ice, but also
Speaker 3: his cells are improved from the goo, and so I
Speaker 3: think he's able to like regenerate and heal and live longer.
Speaker 3: Question Mark. Then I don't know a regular passion.
Speaker 2: I'm just like, there's we talked about this on another
Speaker 2: recent episode where I'm like, I reach like critical mass
Speaker 2: on lore and I'm just like, I, you know what, Like,
Speaker 2: I'm just dealing with the text you've put in front
Speaker 2: of me. I'm not doing homework to watch a movie
Speaker 2: I don't even like. But that's not true. Actually, we
Speaker 2: did kind of a considerable amount of homework for this movie.
Speaker 2: We don't even like, that's our job. What else?
Speaker 3: What else? What else?
Speaker 2: I don't really have a ton else.
Speaker 3: I honestly don't have much else, as aside from just
Speaker 3: pointing out that this is a very white cast.
Speaker 2: Yes, and to speaking to your point. When there are
Speaker 2: non white characters, it is often to make an ahistorical point.
Speaker 3: Right yeah. With the Japanese American character yeh, Jim Rita.
Speaker 3: And then there is a black character who also is
Speaker 3: a part of Captain America's inner circle of soldier buddies.
Speaker 3: We learn a couple of things about him, such as
Speaker 3: he went to Howard University, and he knows how to
Speaker 3: speak German and French. What his name is I don't know,
Speaker 3: because if the movie says it, it's not enough times
Speaker 3: for the audience to remember. And he also is just
Speaker 3: again very much on the periphery. He is a tertiary character,
Speaker 3: as is Jim Marita. And then we don't know anything
Speaker 3: else about them, yay.
Speaker 2: And then every other character is white, and every other
Speaker 2: character is white, and it will remain that way in
Speaker 2: the MCU for some time. And also I mean, this
Speaker 2: is we're running out of time. And also I'm trying
Speaker 2: to stay as focused on this single movie as we can,
Speaker 2: because otherwise it becomes an eight hour of saga. But
Speaker 2: just speaking to like well, I do think it is
Speaker 2: generally positive that the diversity of Marvel movies increased as
Speaker 2: time went on. I think that the reason at least
Speaker 2: to be that Black Panther and the Ryan Coogler installments
Speaker 2: of Marvel are considered to be kind of from what
Speaker 2: I can tell, the meaningful level of inclusion of black
Speaker 2: actors is because there is representation behind the camera as well,
Speaker 2: which is why I think a lot of and this
Speaker 2: isn't even exclusive to Marvel, but why a lot of
Speaker 2: blockbuster representation. I'm also they gave Star Wars ends up
Speaker 2: falling flat or ends up not being meaningful because there
Speaker 2: is very little representation behind the camera, which generally leads
Speaker 2: to people of color in front of the camera getting
Speaker 2: a very very raw deal. Yes, and it does seem
Speaker 2: like based on what I have done some very light
Speaker 2: research on sort of what happens with Anthony Mackie throughout,
Speaker 2: But again I know that there's also a TV show
Speaker 2: that I think attempts to contend with some of the
Speaker 2: institutional racism in America. I don't know how effectively it
Speaker 2: does it. I will not be watching the show.
Speaker 3: Sorry, is that the one with Red Hawkey what's his name?
Speaker 2: No? No, it's not with your I don't think Jeremy
Speaker 2: Renners involved. There was there was a there was a
Speaker 2: Winter Soldier, The Winter Soldier and Captain Whatever. They had
Speaker 2: their own series on Disney Plus got it. But unfortunately,
Speaker 2: I think by the time that even happened, everyone was
Speaker 2: so sick of superheroes that, like, by the time they
Speaker 2: even attempted to say anything, for the most part, most
Speaker 2: people had checked out because they'd watched forty five boring movies.
Speaker 2: So anyways, uh yeah, this is still early in the
Speaker 2: Marvel MCU. It is very white and not really asking
Speaker 2: why that is, But it's because it's just presenting a
Speaker 2: false version of history where everyone was white and volunteered.
Speaker 3: To be a soldier.
Speaker 2: Yes, all right, it does not pass the backdel task.
Speaker 2: It just doesn't close. It just doesn't. Peggy it Miss
Speaker 2: Peggy Smurf.
Speaker 3: She's the only woman in the movie except for that
Speaker 3: other woman who sexually assaults Captain America.
Speaker 2: Yes, and she does so on behalf of all women questions.
Speaker 2: She of course, I think she actually does have a name,
Speaker 2: but it doesn't pass the Bechdel test no nipple scale,
Speaker 2: What do we think?
Speaker 3: Honestly, I can't think of a reason to give it
Speaker 3: any more than zero nipples.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess I'll give it a half nipple. I'm
Speaker 2: going to give it a half nipple because Peggy Carter
Speaker 2: is not a completely helpless, damseled character, which I think
Speaker 2: is meaningful enough even for the time this is released
Speaker 2: into to give that creative decision a nod, even though
Speaker 2: it ends up playing into a lot of erasure of
Speaker 2: what could be more active. And it's pentagon to proof feminism.
Speaker 2: So what does it mean? But I'll give it a
Speaker 2: half for that. I do think that that is at
Speaker 2: least unusual enough fair.
Speaker 3: I will meet you there.
Speaker 2: Okay, fine, Yes, amazing. So one nipple total for Captain America.
Speaker 2: I'm not I don't know I'm gonna I'm not gonna
Speaker 2: give it to anyone. I'm just gonna put it on
Speaker 2: the floor. I'm gonna throw it into the ravine behind
Speaker 2: Bucky Barnes.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Great, I love it. Yeah, well that's our episode
Speaker 3: on Captain America.
Speaker 2: Everyone, and you know what, you know what you sickos
Speaker 2: on the Matreon. That was an interesting conversation, So if
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Speaker 2: Bechtel Cast.
Speaker 3: Indeed, and with that should we.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go put my head on jermy Strong's body. Okay,
Speaker 2: kinky okay, also bye bye. The Bechtel Cast is a
Speaker 2: production of iHeartMedia, hosted and produced by me Jamie Loftus and.
Speaker 3: Me Caitlyn Dorante. The podcast is also produced by Sophie Lichtermann.
Speaker 2: And edited by Caitlyn Durrante. Ever heard of Them?
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Speaker 3: our artwork in fact are designed by Jamie Loftis, Ever
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