Things about this:

  1. So, a Golden Age period piece isn’t what I was expecting, but it really worked well. I love all the touches establishing this as the Marvel Universe – Phineas Horton’s original Human Torch at the World’s Fair; Dum-Dum Dugan (oddly not named) as one of Captain America’s soldiers; Tony Stark’s dad; etc.

  2. I also like how the movies are doing worldbuilding in a way that is clean but internally building. Of COURSE they’re doing the Cosmic Cube as an artifact relating to the Norse gods – it makes it tie back into the Skull’s Nazi background better AND creates a reason for Thor and Captain America to be in the same universe. And OF COURSE the Red Skull has the same super-soldier thing as Captain America. And OF COURSE Hydra is the Skull’s organization, not a random totally unaffiliated thing. It’s just really well done, by someone who understands how to do this stuff.

  3. So with a lot of super heroes, when they have a sequel movie, it’s not clear what the sequel has to offer – aren’t you just telling the same story yet again? But Captain America 2 can very clearly be a different movie; the first is about becoming a hero in war, the second can be about adapting to a world that’s not your own and becoming a hero in a time of peace. I almost think it’s a pity that the Avengers will be out before CA2, because the Avengers almost invariably will have to deal with that theme a lot, and it really deserves to be dealt with at leisure, not as one element of a crowded multi-hero movie.

  4. Basically, I am just really impressed with Marvel Studios. The Hulk movie wasn’t super-awesome, and Iron Man 2 was a bit samey, but they’ve basically made three excellent-to-very-good superhero movies and two okay-to-decent ones, and in doing so have managed to weave together a fictional universe coherently and sensibly, such that the Avengers movie I thought was insane a year ago now looks like it could be really kind of excellent. So, yay them. It’s too bad they can’t get back the rights to Spider-Man, so that instead of Sony fucking around with another dumb-ass origin story, we could have something good.