Phase Two outrage

[dragonfly]

I was rewatching Avengers and it occurred to me to wonder why Captain America, of all people, showed any outrage on discovering that SHIELD was trying to create weaponry out of tesseract technology. Stark, yes, we know about his about-face wrt selling weapons technology. Banner spent a lot of time trying not to be a weapon for the U.S. military, so he makes sense, too. But Captain America was involved in a nearly-global conflict where superior technology was coveted and prized and it wasn't at all obvious that the good guys were going to win. I now blink at that scene where he slams some gun-thing down on the table and confronts Fury with what Phase Two was. I'm really not convinced he should be that upset.

On an unrelated note, it appears that plastic didn't have widespread use until the 1950s. So Cap came from a world before plastic. FWIW.

Source: https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=114331762

Could I have a "context:technology" tag?

Comments

[dragonfly]

So the thing he slammed down in front of Fury that he found was a captured Hydra weapon? See, that puzzles me even more. You're in a war, some of your enemy's weapons get captured, and then you're upset with your superiors for trying to figure them out and exploit them?

[liviapenn]

But it isn't 1944 any more. Hydra is defeated and gone. There's no war going on in 2012 that could justify a giant secret program to use Nazi technology to create weapons of mass destruction even *more* powerful and destructive than atomic bombs. What could possibly justify that? -- That is Steve's initial, emotional response.

[dragonfly]

Yes, it clearly is his emotional response. And it takes me back to my initial skepticism. I'm not convinced that he would share our horror of weapons of mass destruction. I think this is well worthy of some research into attitudes of the time, particularly of soldiers.

[liviapenn]

Hm, whereas I feel exactly the opposite: I think modern/younger people are so used to these things being an established part of history, we're much less horrified/emotionally affected by it than someone from Steve's era (or pre-World Wars) would be.

[dragonfly]

And, I take it back that this is worth some research. It probably isn't, when it comes to understanding the Captain America of the movie(s). Canon established Cap's reaction, so that's his reaction. I just said it felt suspect to me, and it still does, but it is what it is.