The Definition of GOOD

CAPTAIN AMERICA

We just got back from seeing a movie and, true to form, it was a superhero movie from the comics. Alan is antsy, he can't sit still, so it takes something like one of the heroes he's worshipped since childhood to get him in a theater, and there have been a lot of them lately, a good percentage leading up to "The Avengers," Marvel's superhero coalition that is going to save our world next May. Alan was a great collector at one time, selling his collection for a lot of money at a time when he needed the money more than he needed the books. He knows all of the characters, all of their back stories, but he likes to watch my reaction to their reincarnations, since I'm a newbie with them.

I tend to like them all. I like movies and if superheroes are going to get us into a seat, I'm ALL for them. I liked Superman--of course, even I knew Superman, and bit by bit we've seen them all. Each one of them has some dimension that sets them apart from the rest. Superman, the tortured "Boy Scout," Spidey has troubled teen-ager all sewed up. Batman--well he was the best psychopath I'd ever imagined until I saw WATCHMAN--which captured that area for good. I loved WATCHMAN for its wickedness. I cheered the Hulk, Daredevil amazed me and Thor could have charmed away my chastity--if it had existed at my old age. Each one had one dimension or another, but none of those movies made me cry. Today, at the close of CAPTAIN AMERICA, I bawled like a baby.

Why? I wasn't sure myself. I don't cry at movies. Alan cries at movies and has cried at a lot of them, as does his daughter and a lot of his family. They bill themselves as "Leakers," but I'm not one of those. I sit through movies, laugh a lot, but I don't cry. So WHY was I crying? Then it hit me. Steve Rogers was a character who was just GOOD. Good as in pure, sweet, giving, NOT tortured or conflicted--just good! I loved him when he was a scrawny runt being beat up time and time again in Brooklyn but taking his beatings--and I loved him when he explained to his dream girl Agent Carter that you couldn't run away. I loved him when he kept getting rejected for the military but he needed to join because "other guys were over there dying and he should be, too." I loved him when he was the only one who fell on the dummy grenade in training when a whole bunch of his so-called buddies ran and hid, guys he didn't even like all that much but that he was willing to die for anyway. I loved that he was waiting for the right girl and that he didn't know what "fondue" meant and had to have Stark tell him. I loved that he was always willing to stick his neck out but he even accepted being pidgeon-holed into selling war bonds and looking like an idiot and an ass because that was what he was told to do. He was simple, uncomplicated, and GOOD! When it ended I cried because he didn't get his first date.

Don't let the critics scare you. This Marvel movie defines goodness in the same way that WATCHMAN defined wickedness, and I'm willing to bet most of you will be glad you saw it. It is a thing of beauty. It is GOOD.

(Now I want a Sonic Screwdriver AND a Captain America Shield for Christmas. If it works for me, I can be good, too.)

Mari Sloan
Copyright August 2011

:-)