In an earlier post, I tackled the connection between Steve Rogers’ transformation into Captain America as a government sponsored PED initiative, and while I still stand by that assertion – and the way in which America’s sponsorship of PED use to “escort Adolf Hitler to the gates of Hell theoretically absolves them of blame because it’s for “the greater good – there is something additionally eerie about the emergence of Captain America when examining it through the narrative of Captain America: First Avenger.
Before delving too deeply, let’s first say that this addition to this segment of superhero stories that will ultimately compose The Avenger is rather solid for the first one hour and forty minutes – until the producers remind you that their ultimate goal is to elicit your cash for the aforementioned superhero crescendo. Some hints throughout the film – like the search for Oden’s treasure room or the emergence of Howard Stark as a main character – were subtle enough that the focus of attention could be Steve Rogers and his transformation from strong-hearted weakling to warrior with an equivalent body. At the same time, the final moments of the film that thrust Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) onto the screen seemed a bit too blatant of a teaser – and almost serves as a plea for everyone to see The Avengers – lest they had forgotten that’s what this wave of Marvel characters was ultimately destined to converge into.
That aside, the film is successful because there is much less time spent on an origin story and more time spent on watching Captain America exterminate bad guys and rescue good guys. A good origin story should be appreciated; at the same time, less interesting origin stories should be bypassed in favor of the reasons that the character is successful. Here, Rogers’ issues are readily apparent. He’s too small to join the army, and this emasculates him because he has an ancestry of enlistment. Moreover, his inability to join clashes with the radio-rhetoric that “every able-bodied young man is lining up” to defeat the Nazis. As the seemingly only person who is unfit to join Uncle Sam in his march against Hitler, Rogers repeatedly attempts to enlist by forging his papers and fabricating various identifications. His efforts are all for naught until his application is gleaned by Dr. Abraham Erskine (Stanley Tucci), who admits him into the armed forces in order to bring him into the hands of the “Strategic Scientific Reserve,” where he will be injected with a serum that will transform Rogers into Captain America.
While Captain America does well to avoid belaboring the origin story, its brevity impelled the eeriness hidden beneath the narrative – namely the use of a form of genetic modification to engineer the an “army of super soldiers” for the United States Army. As some subterfuge prevents the creation of an army, Rogers is the sole product and is initially relegated to a widget in advertising campaigns geared toward increasing bond sales. Certainly, this is a clever addition to the superhero genre inasmuch as the storyline, at first, makes Captain America less a superhero and more a propaganda-peddling cartoon – which is what the original Captain America was (the very first issue in 1941 depicted Cap punching out Hitler).
Despite the cleverly intelligent references to its own literary history, there is one major issue skirted over within the film: the similarities between the successful serum created by Erskine and the atrocities committed by Dr. Josef Mengele, the resident doctor at Auschwitz whose sobriquet “The Angel of Death” was rather ironic in that his selecting of certain prisoners most often saved them from immediate extermination but exposed them to torturous surgeries and experiments used to further the study of eugenics and the possibility of creating an ubermench – or superman.
A refugee from Germany, Erskine seems well aware of the atrocities occurring in various labor camps, and it is suggested that he left his position in the Nazi regime because “The serum amplifies the inner qualities of its taker, as well as their physical attributes. Good becomes great… bad becomes worse.” Granted, he is speaking specifically of Johan Schmidt (Hugo Weaving), but as Schmidt represents the evil within the Nazi ideology, Erskine’s sentiments can be applied to the entire Reich. Likewise, Erskine seemingly erases any overt connection to the Nazis in a minor history lesson where he notes, “One of the things that people always forget is that the first country the Nazis invaded was their own,” thus establishing himself as an outsider brought into their web of annihilation and conquest. However, his service for them – if a connection be made to the future Nuremburg trials – is that one cannot blame orders for one’s actions.
Throughout the first half of the film, Erskine is portrayed as nothing less than noble and sincere in his quest to vanquish evil from the Earth. At the same time, this utopia lies within the creation of a serum capable of creating an army of benevolent soldiers, who will – ideologically strike down evil, not perpetuate it. Not a bad idea on the outset, but the successful serum also needs tests and subsequent modifications. These tests rely on subjects, something that Erskine confesses when he informs Schmidt that the “serum [is] not ready.” The only way for Erskine to know whether the serum was ready or not was to have tested it previously, no? Perhaps he used primates or canines, but the Nazi rhetoric suggests that he probably would have used human beings.
So, Schmidt ignores the warning and injects the serum, thus becoming the Red Skull and ultimate villain of Captain America: First Avenger. And it seems, this is when Erskine flees Nazi Germany, where he lands in the arms of the United States. But here’s the snag. While Steve Rogers was a successful experiment, how did Erskine move from an immature serum with dastardly side effects to a successful serum? More than likely through further tests and experiments. Perhaps this is why Colonel Chester Philips (Tommy Lee Jones) initially suggests that Rogers “will be useful to [Erskine] – like a gerbil.”
One issue here is the symbol that Captain America personifies. His creation in itself is viewed in a positive light because he took down Hitler (in the comic) and prohibits the Red Skull from annihilating the Eastern seaboard. The potentially larger issue here is how the curse of omission rears its ugly head in this superhero narrative. We’re only privy to the result – the heroics of Captain America, the ubermench. But the road to this creation is one seemingly paved with carcasses of the unfortunate, perhaps even those who were swayed by the desire to serve their country but were too diminutive to be of any use of the battlefield – like Rogers was prior to his run in with Erskine.
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