Captain America: The First Avenger

(Some content added on July 1, 2016 - I rewatched the movie, and realized I had more to say about this film.)

As always, please avoid reading if you don't want spoierls.

My favourite Avenger's story begins in Captain America: The First Avenger (which I'm sure so many of you have seen by now). I love Steve Rogers' humble beginnings.

Steve is a small, quiet American boy whose one goal is to be able to fight for his country in World War II. Unfortunately, due to his size and health complications, they don't want him. He is more disappointed when his best friend Bucky is accepted.

When a doctor assisting the army realizes how badly Steve wants to join, he lets him in. Everyone seems doubtful and confused when the poor young man can barely keep up in exercises. They prove their reason for choosing him by tossing a grenade at the group. While all the qualified soldiers run for cover, Steve willingly throws himself on the grenade. They see that he has the kind of patriotism and selfless personality that they want for their new project.

Using gamma technologies, Steve is turned into a super soldier, the perfect fighting specimen. A human weapon. (And at this point he turns into the real Chris Evans which is soooo hot!)

Agent Peggy Carter seems to become his handler of sorts, while Howard Stark creates weapons for Steve and the army. Things go downhill when the army takes their new weapon and parades him around in shows in order to promote support and conscription. All Steve wanted to do was save people and defend his country, but instead he becomes a showpiece made to better the image of the army. He feels even more ashamed when they have him do the show for soldiers in the field in order to increase morale. They hate that he's not a real soldier. And so does he.

When Bucky's unit goes missing, Steve pushes to finally become a real soldier. He ends up in a struggle with Hydra, in order to rescue his friend and fellow soldiers and to retrieve the Tesseract, which Hydra plans to use for weaponry. Bucky fights right along side him until his tragic end in the fight.

Even at the end, Steve's selfless nature comes out. He willingly takes himself down to destroy Hydra's chance of getting their weapon, even if it means he loses the love of his life.

And then he wakes up in an artificial setting made to convince him that he is okay (and possibly that none of this had ever happened). But he is too clever and he breaks. Captain America is now in our modern times (as we know him in the Avengers movies) trying to deal with everything that has happened to him.

I love that Steve isn't your generic superhero, so full of himself. He is a Christian, he is selfless, he is brave, he is humble, he is everything that America stood for and was founded on. His story is unique. It's not even your typical superhero origin story, where someone discovers it gains powers that they then use to save their city. No, Steve becomes a soldier in order to protect the world.

The relationship between Steve and Peggy is beautiful, and it happens so subtly. The way that his personality continues to impress her, and her faith in him as a human being bring them together in a way that emphasizes the friendship and love over the ramble and attraction, and I adore it! Even when they're mad at each other, they can't deny their feelings. I hate that they never get their dance. It breaks my heart.

It has a very different feel from other Marvel movies, I find, but I really love Cap.