Anyway, for me the most intriguing larger question raised by this analysis is: to what extent should we interpret the treatment of historical events in a superhero text as generalizable commentary on those events? By nature, the superhero genre presents a fantastical, hyperbolic alternative to the real world that allows its audience to indulge certain power fantasies. So what should we take from incredibly contrived scenarios like the USO sequence in CAPTAIN AMERICA? We have a super-soldier who, for reasons poorly motivated by the plot, has become a song-and-dance man in the middle of the war. This is, by any standard, a waste of his ability. Increased sales of war bonds IS a drop in the bucket within the context of the film, in which Cap is depicted as someone who could practically win the war singlehandedly. The situation is so overdetermined, it’s impossible to find a legitimate real-world correlative.

I agree that the USO sequence is played for laughs, but it’s not as clear to me that the film is dismissing the value of the real USO, or even the USO in the film. I thought the song-and-dance routine was a (pretty good) pastiche rather than a parody. Also, I didn’t detect any cynicism in that shot near the end of the film where kids play “Captain America” in the street with a garbage can shield. Rather, it struck me as a poignant tribute to Cap’s legacy — so all that Cap propaganda was, in the end, good for something after all. Just because Cap was wasting his time with the USO doesn’t necessarily mean the USO was a waste, or, going much further, that media has no effect on culture.

Another brief example to support my point: everyone was eager to read THE DARK KNIGHT as a defense of the Bush administration’s surveillance tactics. This of course, presumes a correlation between George W. Bush and Batman that most people would probably reject. In the world of THE DARK KNIGHT, Batman is a (relatively) unimpeachable force for good, therefore his use of surveillance, no matter how the film tries to complicate it, is ultimately acceptable. Most people wouldn’t say the same about the U.S. Government. Of course, I’m not saying we should never look at superhero stories as allegories or trenchant political critique, but applying the Manichean logic and “stacked deck” moral scenarios of traditional superhero texts to the real world can obscure their primary value, as wish-fulfillment.

Thanks for the thought-provoking post!

And as for sexism, I’m having a tough time not recognizing the film’s poster as Captain America with a young girl in a short red and white striped skirt…

(The presence of period-appropriate sexism is fine, for me — the acknowledgment that Peggy would have worked very hard and faced a lot of closed doors to get to where she was felt totally appropriate — but filmmakers still ultimately choose what to show and what not to show. They clearly chose not to have any other female characters of substance (no nurses, WACs, etc.), and they chose to place gendered insults in the soldiers’ mouths instead of any other kind of mockery.)

I hardly think it’s fair to give a film released in 2011 a pass on sexism because it’s set in the 1940s. Depicting time-period-accurate sexism is one thing; having barely any women with speaking roles, one of whom has no purpose but as troublesome seducer, is something else entirely.

I must disagree. To say that the film’s central conceit is to devalue the transformative power of entertainment in popular culture in favor of masculinist action and “heroism” is perhaps a facet of interpreting the sequence, but I don’t think it gives the whole picture.

The film is generally interested in creating a constructed past, a history that reflexively depicts the way the media and popular culture have processed American involvement in World War II. The polished CGI imagery which comprises the vast majority of the mise en scene seems indicative of this. It doesn’t seem like historical accuracy would be at the forefront of a superhero movie where the villain is a megalomaniacal Nazi with a bright red skull.

The montage of Captain America selling war bonds seems to be a commentary on how entertainment propaganda was very much needed in 1942 and 1943, and how the hero of the film is a product of political propaganda as well as a “hero” of the square-jawed, Hitler-socking variety. Its negative coloring only serves to let Captain America fully embody his comic book origins, but I don’t believe that means it fully rejects the position of theater the character also serves.

As far as sexism is concerned, the film once again is dealing with an historical moment where such gendered representations would be commonplace. The film’s interest in reflexively imagining a constructed vision of America in the early 1940s would have to depict that sexism in some way. And it’s no small thing that Carter is in fact an intelligence agent who enjoys knocking out misogynistic Army recruits with a stiff left jab.

These are some hastily scrawled notes based on a single viewing, and I welcome any and all counterarguments!