Watch the Captain America the First Avenger Full Trailer Now!

Here it is! The first full trailer for Marvel and Paramount‘s Captain America: The First Avenger movie! The more I see, the more excited I am for this movie. I’m invested. I really want Cap and Thor to work out beautifully like Iron Man or X-Men and not like Daredevil or Ghost Rider. Still, we live in an amazing age. We comic book geeks are getting to see our heroes on the big screen and they’re given the weight and respect we know they deserve. Sure, I watched the live action Captain America tv series as a kid and ate it up (same with the live action Spider-Man and Incredible Hulk series). They did fine with what they had in their day, but they certainly haven’t aged well (although I have to say Long Live Bill Bixby!).

So far, we have an intense Thor trailer. A very cool X-Men: First Class trailer. And now we have an ass-kicking Captain America: the First Avenger full trailer. It’s going to be really easy to geek out this summer.

After watching the trailer take a peek below for a few comments and screen grabs on what you just witnessed.

I can’t post this article without making a few interesting notes about the little goodies they hand us fanboys (and girls) throughout the trailer…

1. “Now, Mister Stark.” Not only was Howard Stark, Iron Man‘s dad, present at Captain America‘s birth, he pulled the switch that created the super solider, at Dr Erskine‘s (Stanley Tucci) command. At least now we know where Tony got his love of expensive sunglasses and that Risky Business glare. Sure, that’s something that was not in the comics, but I don’t mind. I believe it will add to the richness of the Avengers movie backstory, showing how they were destined to come together, their origins intertwined, even a generation before. Now if only 20th Century Fox would let go of their rights to the Fantastic Four enough to put Nathaniel Richards in that room as well…
2. Bucky and the Howling Commandos in action at Cap’s side. No, he’s not a kid and he doesn’t have booties, blue buttons up the front of his tunic, and a little mask. He looks like someone who could hold his own against Cap in a fight… which he may have to do if they ever make use of some of Ed Brubaker‘s future versions of the character. But that’s a few sequels away, I’m sure…
3. Speaking of the Howling Commandos, it’s great to see Dum Dum Dugan in his bowler hat rocking a big gun, but where’s the ageless Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson)? I realize black soldiers weren’t necessarily stationed with whites during certain parts of the war, but I’m really hoping to see Nick Fury and his Howling Commandos take the screen at one point, as unlikely it would be to have a black man lead a bunch of white men into battle at that point in history. But it would certainly say something about Nick Fury‘s qualifications if the people who put him in command looked beyond his race…
4. A night shot with a building that says “Modern Marvels“. Hmmm… I wonder if we’re looking at an early Stark Expo, like the one in Iron Man 2?
5. Tommy Lee Jones is pitch-perfect as the colonel barking out the mission plan to create a super soldier that will “personally escort Hitler to the gates of hell”. Perfect casting even if he only has that one bit of dialogue in the film.
6. Fans at San Diego Comic-Con last year have an idea of what the Red Skull (Hugo Weaving) is getting lit up by in that shot just before we see the armies of Hydra assembled for battle. We also know that the room he’s standing in has a direct connection to the Thor movie, coming out in May.
7. Some shield slinging action! The most unlikely precision projectile weapon ever produced actually does look cool in these shots. One can only hope that there is at least a passing reference to Vibranium and Adamantium for us geeks. How about Wakanda? Maybe? Yes? No?
8. Some scenes in a frosty arctic locale? Possibly a shot from near the end of the movie?
9. And while the first clear shots of Skinny Steve Rogers seemed a little off-putting at first glance, subsequent scenes where he’s moving or doing something/anything look completely natural and real, and usually when he’s wearing a hat of some kind. Otherwise he looks like a bit of a bobble-head in those still frontal shots. They need to cut those down. Don’t let those shots linger and Evans will be believable as a scrawny punk.

 
Captain America: the First Avenger hits theaters July 22nd, 2011 (while we’re at San Diego Comic-Con?!).