| It's the Captain America Cartoon |
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While trying to net myself a free console recently, I had to sign up to the Blockbuster.co.uk free trial and select a batch of DVDs I had some vague interest in watching. To be honest I was struggling to find the required 20 that I liked the look of, and quickly began clicking anything and everything I saw. One of these random clicks saw Captain America - Volume 1 land in my basket, and sure enough it turned out to be one of the three DVDs comprising my initial batch. Despite never really liking Captain America, and despite the fact it cost me nowt to rent, I felt like I had to watch the DVD, because otherwise this free trial, this golden, once in a lifetime opportunity would be wasted, and I could never get it back What I saw was cartoon lunacy far eclipsing any I'd witnessed before. He-Man, Thundercats, G.I. Joe - you think they're nuts? Trust me, you haven't seen anything until you've seen Captain America's animated exploits. Fortunately today you take a little step closer to that crazy little dream coming true as we take a look at...  Back in 1966 the England football team weren't the only ones to be trouncing the Germans, as Marvel launched everyone's favourite (and the only) star spangled, shield tossing hero into the world of cartoons. Unlike the amassed people of England, however, Marvel have refrained from spending the past 40 years ramming this fact down the throats of every poor fucker unfortunate enough to be within earshot, and for good reason. Because the Captain America cartoon is shit. Now I know that's neither big, nor clever to say that, but I'm sorry, it had to be done. Oh sure, I could have gone all fancy on you and written proper big words an' that, but this is not the time for beating around the bush. A dog turd painted pretty colours is still a dog turd, and the Captain America Cartoon is the biggest dog turd of them all. And therein, as with the vast majority of the stuff we look at on this site, lies its brilliance. The episode we're going to look at today - "Zemo and the Masters of Evil" - is actually three concurrent episodes combined to form one splendid, if abso-fucking-ludicrous, whole. As well as Cap it also boasts guest appearances from his Avengers pals, Thor and Iron Man - another two Marvel superheroes who barely merit a "meh" on my interestometer. The Avengers, for those of you who don't know your slightly more obscure comic book teams, are kind of the Marvel equivalent of the Justice League, albeit without the big hitting heroes. Where the Justice League is led by Superman, the mightiest being on the planet, the Avengers are led by Captain America himself who, let's call a spade a spade, is a bloke with a big frisbee. Okay, it might be an indestructible frisbee, but it's a frisbee all the same. I’m not fully up to speed on my Avengers lore, but I believe ages back Cap made the unexpected move of recruiting the then savage Incredible Hulk into the team's ranks. Okay, granted the Hulk might be a handy guy to have your back in a fight, but he's hardly likely to be a huge asset in carefully co-ordinated battle plans, is he? I never read any of the comics, but I'm assuming the pre-battle meetings went something like this: Cap: Okay guys, this is the big one. The Red Skull has taken over a US munitions dump and got his filthy Nazi hands on an atom bomb. He's going to drop it on New York unless we stop him. You all ready? Iron Man: Shit, yeah. Cap: Good. Okay, Thor, I want you to launch an attack from the air, taking out these gun turrets here and here. Vision will be providing back up to help fend off any incoming fighters, and monitoring the front entrance to make sure no-one escapes. Thor: That's nice. Cap: Iron Man, you and Hawkeye will be attacking on the flanks at these doors here and here, while I make my move and nail the Red Skull via the rear entrance. Iron Man: Haha. Rear entrance. Gay! Cap: Shut the fuck up. Okay, everyone ready? Hawkeye: What about the Hulk? Cap: What? Oh, yeah. Hulk, you can launch an underground attack, entering via this old subway line, and emerging here inside the main compound, where we believe Red Skull has his hostages. Hulk: ROOOOOOOAAAAAAR! HULK SMASH! Cap: Hmm. Okay, tell you what, bit less complex, you take out these missile platforms here and here, but wait for Thor's mark first so you don't trigger any alarms before he's had a chance to-- Hulk: ROOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAR! HULK SMASH! Cap: Okay, tell you what, you just go batshit crazy and smash shit up like you always do, and fuck the consequences. Hulk: ROOOOOAAAAAAR! OKAY. Cap: Okay, Avengers assemble! Iron Man: We're already assembled. Why do you always say that when we're already assembled? Cap: Shut it, cripple. I won't tell you again. What was the guy thinking? It'd be like sticking a balaclava on a grizzly bear and appointing it to the SAS. I bet at least half the issues were spent with the other Avengers trying to talk the Hulk out of smashing them ass first through walls. I think the comic cover below says it better than I ever could.  But we're not here to debate the merits of having the Hulk in your superteam, we're here to review the Captain America cartoon, so let's get it on! The episode opens as a jet plane lands on what the voiceover tells us is a "deserted tropical island", despite the fact there's hundreds of people living there. The pilot climbs out and delivers a newspaper to Zemo, ruler of the island, whose identity is concealed behind a vaguely cock-like purple hood. Zemo is carried about by the natives everywhere he goes. They even kneel down in a big line in front of him, turning their own hunched backs into a path for him to walk on. Here is a guy worthy of respect, you might think. Here is one serious bad-ass villain with powers so terrible all men must bend to his will. Right? He must've done something pretty damn bad-ass to be getting that kind of service. You'd think so, wouldn't you? Turns out he's a scientist who invented what he claims to be the world's most powerful weapon. You know what it is? Do ya? Huh? Huh? Glue. I kid you not. Okay, calling it glue is perhaps doing it and Zemo an injustice. It's strong glue. Like really strong glue. Think of the strongest glue you've ever encountered. You thinking of it? You picturing it in your mind? Well you're not even close to how strong Zemo's evil glue is. And yes, it's evil glue, Captain America himself says so later on. Oh granted, it doesn't do anything evil aside from being really very sticky indeed, but its evil is evidently inherent enough for Captain America to have smashed through Zemo's window ten years previously and hurled his shield through a vat of the stuff, sending the whole lot pouring out over its creator’s head. While logic might dictate that a few litres of superglue poured over someone's head and face might clog up their airways in some way, Zemo escaped with just having his hood stuck to his face. Apparently he wore the hood to protect his identity from his victims. His victims of glue. His words, not mine. Don't shoot the messenger. Anyway, satisfied he's put an end to Zemo's "infernal glue" and that having a hood stuck to his face is lesson enough for the guy, Cap fucks off back to Avengers mansion, leaving Zemo to go into hiding on his tropical island, where he very slowly plots his revenge over a number of years. Must've been a bastard getting through passport control with that hood on. "No, look, I already told you I can't take it off!" Back in the present, Zemo thanks the pilot for coming all that way just to bring him a newspaper which he only spent four seconds reading - just long enough, in fact, to see a big picture of Captain America in it, causing him to go into a bit of a hissy fit and declare the time has come for him to take his revenge. Zemo assembles the three Masters of Evil to help him lure Captain America into his trap. A word of advice for anyone looking to start their own team of supervillains - don't aim too high with the name. I mean The Masters of Evil sounds impressive, but when your team roster includes a guy dressed as a knight and someone called The Melter, you're setting yourself up for a big fall. Zemo's plan is simple: stick all kinds of shit together. Sure enough, using their combined powers of melting stuff, holding a lance and emitting low level radiation, The Melter, The Black Knight and third Master of Evil, Radioactive Man succeed in bringing the entire city to a sticky standstill. The citizens of New York are almost certainly doomed to some moderate inconvenience and having to walk home with no shoes on. But wait, who's that running for what seems like a fucking lifetime towards the scene? It's Captain America, no doubt wishing he had Batman's money to get himself a Capmobile. I swear, upwards of a minute is spent showing the same looped animation of Cap running towards the scene. That kind of factual accuracy I could well do without. Aware of his own limitations and the fact that this is some seriously sticky glue he's dealing with, Cap has brought Thor and Iron Man with him for back-up. Just as well he did, because from this point onwards Captain America contributes nothing useful to the entire story. The Radioactive man shoots some glue at Thor, but the cunning God of Thunder manages to avoid it by standing absolutely still. There's a lot of standing absolutely still goes on in the Captain America cartoon. It's 90% comprised of people standing absolutely still, in fact. Sticking them down with evil glue seems largely unnecessary. It's not like they were moving much to begin with. "You missed!" scoffs Norse God, Thor, in a public school educated English accent. But while the glue may have missed one target, it's found another...  Remember what I said about him contributing nothing useful? Two seconds into the battle and he's had his knees glued to the pavement. Captain, I salute you. Iron Man almost takes the poor bastard's arm off trying to yank him free, before The Melter turns up and reminds him he's the only one who can melt through the hero’s iron suit. Quick as a flash, Iron Man fucks off, conceding defeat without a moment's hesitation, completely forgetting the fact his suit is equipped with lasers, rockets and enough other deadly high tech shit to turn The Melter into a smear on the glue-sodden streets of NYC. Captain America, for his part, has now loudly announced that he recognises the glue and realises "Zemo must be alive!" which means he just left the geezer for dead after their previous encounter. How much time would it have taken to have just checked he was breathing then phoned the police to come round pick him up? Not much, but then Captain America was no doubt fully aware of one very important fact - inventing stickier than average glue is not a crime. You may have noticed I completely skipped over the bit about Cap recognising the glue. Some things just aren’t worth the bother. Having had a complete change of heart, Iron Man announces he’ll attempt to rescue Cap by cutting a section out of the pavement using the jet boosters in his shoes. This is despite the fact that The Melter is standing right next to them both listening to the conversation. Iron Man is as good as his word, and succeeds in freeing Captain America, albeit with 3 tonnes of concrete still glued onto his feet. I’ve no idea how he managed to unstick his knee, but he did. Just deal with it. I’ve had to. Iron Man finds a tow truck which somehow managed to escape being glued to the ground unlike every other vehicle in the whole of New York, and tows Captain America back to his lab.  “It’s almost like waterskiing – on dry land!” Cap exclaims excitedly, winning the award for the most obvious thing anyone has ever said in the history of the world ever. You know, I still don’t understand why he didn’t just slip his feet out of his shoes to escape. Is there a huge flaw in the logic of that which I’m just failing to spot? “Captain America has escaped!” cries The Melter, having just watched the entire rocket boot/tow truck episode unfold slowly before his very eyes. A Master of Evil, perhaps, but a mere rookie when it comes to reacting quickly to visual stimuli. Zemo turns up in a helicopter shaped like a gargantuan space cock, and treats us to a minute long monologue about how his evil cronies won’t have let him down, and how he’s going to have his glorious revenge on Captain America at long, long last. Boy is he in for a disappointment.  That’s him expressing his disappointment. Well come on, if you had an opaque hood glued to your face preventing anyone seeing your expression you’d have to up the body language ante a few notches too. Meanwhile back at Iron Man’s lab, Cap has got his knee stuck again, and there appears to be no way of unsticking it. Or is there? Turns out Iron Man knows a guy who knows a guy. That guy is none other than Paste Pot Pete, the world’s greatest authority on pastes and adhesives. That’s a proud fucking boast right there. Not just pastes or adhesives. Pastes and adhesives. You don’t get no half measures with Paste Pot Pete, and as luck would have it, he owes Iron Man a favour. I’ve no idea why. Iron Man flies off the left hand side of the screen, then immediately flies back on again, carrying a huge barrel of “Super Dissolver”. Presumably Paste Pot Pete lives in Iron Man’s lab somewhere, quietly enjoying his unrivalled knowledge of solvents. Even Thor, who’s turned up from nowhere, is surprised at how quickly Iron Man has returned. He even says so, but is completely ignored by the other two heroes, who are probably both still annoyed at him fucking off and leaving them in the lurch like that. Despite the fact that the guy who invented “Adhesive X” (as they’ve all suddenly started calling it) has spent the last decade trying to find a way to counteract its effects, the “Super Dissolver” manages to remove it in seconds. Paste Pot Pete, you truly are the Mac Daddy of pastes and adhesives, and I’ll fucking chin anyone who says different. Cap comes up with a cunning plan, involving switching the tankers of Adhesive X for the Super Dissolver, knowing full well that those pesky Masters of Evil won’t be able to resist giving the already stuck fast city a wholly unnecessary second coat. Sure enough that’s exactly what they do, inadvertently freeing everyone in the process. Check out this shot of Radioactive Man spraying the Super Dissolver around.  How did those guys get stuck in that position? Is one of them Peter Parker, caught off guard before he could sling on his Spider-Man costume? Just another mystery the Captain America cartoon will take to its grave. Everyone now unstuck, it’s time for the Avengers boys to deliver a dose of ass-whupping to the Masters of Evil. Despite managing to get himself shot at point blank range in the face with a stun gun, Thor eventually succeeds in defeating the Black Knight by bashing his skull in with his mystical hammer. No finesse that Thor. Captain America is about to face off against the Radioactive Man but instead elects to run away and leave Iron Man to trap him in some ridiculous invention I can’t even be bothered explaining. It’s basically a big lead bandage, which he wraps the villain up in, then attaches to a physics defying lead covered balloon, causing him to float away. I know, I know, let’s just move on. There’s only one Master of Evil left – The Melter, who has now been renamed The Mysterious Melter for purely alliterative reasons – and once again poor Iron Man is left to carry the can. Now this is where the cartoon shrugs off the final scraps of reason and logic and plunges headlong into madness. The Mysterious Melter is the only person on earth with the power to melt Iron Man’s armour, so what does he do? He melts a lamp post, in the hope it’ll fall on Iron Man in such a way as to somehow trap him. This is despite the fact the lampost is about twenty feet away, and just kind of slowly folds in on itself after being hit by The Melter’s melting beam. Iron Man doesn’t move a muscle, but still The Melter proclaims “Quick thinking, Iron Man, but you’ve only gone from the frying pan into the fire”. Weirdly, when he says this, The Melter sounds exactly like Bill Cosby. Or at least he sounds exactly like Bill Cosby would, were he an entirely nonsensical supervillain called The Mysterious Melter. Electing to forego his on board arsenal, Iron Man takes a page from the A-Team’s book of using everyday objects to defeat the bad guys, and manages to trick The Melter into melting a fire hydrant and giving himself a damn good soaking. This, it appears, is enough to defeat him, and Iron Man whisks him off to jail. Meanwhile, Zemo still stands next to his helicopter, patiently awaiting the return of the Masters of Evil. The guy literally hasn’t moved a muscle since we last saw him. Maybe he can’t go anywhere if he doesn’t have the naked backs of crouching tribesmen to walk on, I dunno. Zemo quietly chuckles to himself about what he’s going to do to Captain America, until…  An indestructible shield smacks him squarely in the teeth. Even after years of supervillainy and living in the jungle with a hood stuck to your face, you just know that’s going to be the most painful thing to have ever happened to you. I mean think about it - it’s the sharp end of a metal disk hurled by someone with superhuman strength from about fifteen feet away. Cap’s determined he’s going to kill this poor fucker one way or another. Incredibly Zemo has enough life left in him to take a brutal and harrowing beating from our red, white and blue hero, before the pilot from the very start of the episode pops up and shoots Cap in the back of the head, apparently killing him. Zemo and the pilot make their escape, just as Cap springs back to life without so much as a by your leave. It looks like there’s no way to stop Zemo’s weird flying penis thing, until Thor reappears and decides to make himself useful. “Spin, my might mallet, spin!” he cries, twirling his hammer round his head and making me laugh until I wept. At first I thought he just planned to knock the ship out of the sky, but no, Thor has something much more elaborate in mind.  An “all consuming space warp”, which whisks Zemo and the pilot to parts unknown, where they are doomed to spend the rest of eternity, neither living nor dead. Let’s put things into perspective here, shall we? The guy invented glue. That’s all. Okay, he got a bit misguided after Captain America smashed through his window and tried to kill him, but then wouldn’t you be keen to get your own back for that too? You’re a small businessman, you’ve just come up with the product which is going to guarantee your company’s long term success, what you don’t want is a member of the Avengers showering you in shards of glass then tipping your life’s work over your head and leaving you for dead. That’s just not on. Anyway, that was that - Captain America facing off against Zemo and the Masters of Evil and living to tell the tale, although if I was him I probably wouldn’t bother, since he comes out of it looking like a right asshole. As an extra special treat for reading all the way to the end, click here to download the intro to the cartoon, complete with theme tune. I think the line “all those who chose to oppose his shield must yield” are perhaps my favourite lyrics ever. |