Bronze Age Babies: Discuss: Captain America on TV

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Discuss: Captain America on TV

Karen: The two Captain America TV movies starring Reb Brown -the less said about, the better?

20 comments:

Edo Bosnar said...: I remember these, and remember that even then I did not like them. That video clip you posted confirmed my first impressions (and good lord, that costume looks so ludicrous - I wonder if they had to do multiple takes because the people on the set just burst out in spontaneous laughter). There does not seem to be any redeeming value, not even camp appeal. So yes, the less said, the better...; April 17, 2012 at 7:46 AM
Anonymous said...: I love the second one, great plot for a teevee super hero movie. I think Reb Brown did a great job as earnest Steve Rogers. I quite like these and wish it had been picked up as a series as intended. And wow, Connie Selleca is drop-dead gorgeous!

--Maa alias Anonymous, likely odd man out again; April 17, 2012 at 8:33 AM
david_b said...: Yep, I remember hearing them announced and waiting for them to come on. A bit of a letdown obviously, but at that junction it was still super cool to see the likes of Spiderman, Cap, then Doc Strange each have their turn on live-screen.

Overall, I still scratch my head when I think how hard it is to effectively convey Cap's costume on screen, from the cowl to the shield. I look at the 60s Batman, and at least, the cowl and cape looked pretty spot-on. Same for how Reeves did Supes. It ends up being more the man inside and how he carries himself than the costume.

But in both this and in the 90s Cap movie, it just never seemed to look plausible. Luckily the recent big screen seems to have a better mix of action and costumed scenes with Evans. It looks like they finally got it right.; April 17, 2012 at 9:00 AM
Anonymous said...: I'll take Reb Brown over Chris Evans any day.

--Matt alias Anon; April 17, 2012 at 9:13 AM
Chuck Wells said...: Chris Evans was actually pretty good in Captain America.

Reb Brown was great years later in Uncommon Valor alongside Gene Hackman, but he sucked out loud as Cap.; April 17, 2012 at 10:02 AM
dbutler16 said...: These were on TV just before Captain America: The First Avenger came out. I recorded both of them. The first one was so bad, I just deleted the second one withot watching it. This guy was no Captain America. I don't mind a few liberties, but the character was just a whiny hippie, and the story was nothing like what I could imagine for Captain America. It definitely looked and felt like a made for TV movie.; April 17, 2012 at 10:08 AM
Inkstained Wretch said...: I have a vague recollection of seeing the first Reb Brown film when it first ran on TV. I must have been, what, 10, at the time? I remember thinking that Captain America didn't seem like a superhero at all. He was just a guy in a silly-looking biker suit with a big frisbee on his arm. Quite a letdown for this Avengers fan.; April 17, 2012 at 10:11 AM
Roygbiv666 said...: Ditto on the disappointment. I couldn't understand why the costume change and that gawdawful transparent plastic shield.; April 17, 2012 at 10:31 AM
david_b said...: Ah, it was 'the 70s'....; April 17, 2012 at 10:40 AM
William said...: I thought these movies were awesome when I was a kid. I especially liked the second one because they got his costume right. In the first one he looked more like Jack Kirby's character "Fighting American" instead of Jack Kirby's character "Captain America". Which reminds me, Kirby also created another American flag costumed character, The Shield. (I guess when Kirby found a theme he liked, he stuck with it).

Obviously, these old Marvel TV movies (with a TV budget) aren't going to hold up over time. The style, the "special effects" and the overall production quality look extremely dated. That being said however, the TV Captain America movies were still better than the 90's Cap theatrical (straight to video) movie with the rubber ears and the Italian Red Skull.; April 17, 2012 at 10:43 AM
Roygbiv666 said...: The Shield was the creation of Harry Shorten and Irv Novick, not Simon and Kirby: http://pdsh.wikia.com/wiki/Shield; April 17, 2012 at 11:15 AM
Anonymous said...: Matt alias Anon,

You didn't like Chris Evans performance? I confess that I was skeptical about his acting ability when he got the part. But he stepped up his game. I was blown away when I saw the movie. I thought he gave a really subtle, nuanced portrayal that transferred the soul of Steve Rogers to the screen for the first time. Evans would have been the last guy I expected that from, but he delivered.

Frankly, I'll take the 1943 serial over those TV-movies. They're worse than Howard The Duck.

James Chatterton; April 17, 2012 at 11:34 AM
david_b said...: Matt:

TOTALLY agreed on Evans.. I didn't like him much as Johnny Storm (although he did bring some nice charm..), so I was concerned with selecting him as Cap.

But he delivered on-screen great, also looking to bring the right chemistry to the new movie.; April 17, 2012 at 11:42 AM
Anonymous said...: Chris Evans was decent, but I felt like he was intimidated by playing Steve Rogers. It seemed to me the whole movie I could hear him thinking, Must be serious, must be earnest, must be sincere. I preferred Reb Brow's non-acting style of acting. I also prefer the plot of Captain America 2: Death Too Soon.

--Matt alias Anonymous; April 17, 2012 at 12:31 PM
Anonymous said...: Now you're trashing Howard the Duck?!; April 17, 2012 at 12:33 PM
Anonymous said...: Re: Kirby/Shield--I rhink you mean Secret Life of Private Lancelot Strong or whatever it was called. They had to cease and desist due to similarities (copyright infringements) to Superman.

--Matt alias Anonymous; April 17, 2012 at 12:36 PM
Fred W. Hill said...: I wasn't impressed by any of the live action Marvel specials, etc. of the late '70s. The Hulk was alright, at least if you accepted that it was only loosely based on the comicbook character. The same applied to the tv Captain America and perhaps I would have gone along if only they'd found a way to make him interesting. Instead, I just found myself bored; an episode of Mannix or the Rockford Files would have been far more enthralling. Admittedly, the idea of a see-through band on Cap's shield was an inspired idea, but not one that would ever go over well in the comics unless someone could just do a magic ping to the vibranium in the shield so that it still looked the same but Cap could now see through it. But since Stan came up with the idea of Cap throwing it like a frisbee (one of his earliest prose stories for Timely), Cap has used his mighty shield far more often for offense than for defense.; April 17, 2012 at 2:24 PM
William Preston said...: Am I wrong that the Dr. Strange TV-movie was actually a step above those other ones? (Actually, the Hulk TV-movies, especially the one with Mariett Hartley, were quite good.) I recall thinking the scene with Dr. Strange in the mystic realm was pretty cool.; April 17, 2012 at 7:30 PM
Roygbiv666 said...: Re. the Shield, my bad:
http://www.toonopedia.com/shield2.htm
"Joe Simon and Jack Kirby (Young Romance, Newsboy Legion) were the ones who created the new Shield character — appropriately enough, since they were responsible for both the original Shield's biggest competitor, Captain America, and Cap's most prominent 1950s knock-off, Fighting American. "; April 17, 2012 at 10:03 PM
Rip Jagger said...: I want to like these more than I do. I saw them recently and found them painfully slow, especially the second one which despite Christopher Lee is dreadful. The climax of that movie is terrible, with the pacing of a drunken slug!

Reb Brown is not a good actor, but he sure looks like Steve Rogers. I did like how they emphasize the bike in both movies.

Rip Off; April 18, 2012 at 5:23 AM