How fandom reinterpreted Captain America’s politics for the 21st century.

copperbadge:

wintercyan:

hellotailor:

In the 2011 Captain America movie, Steve Rogers’ first mission after getting his supersoldier powers is to go on a propaganda tour.

Rather than saving kittens from trees or battling supervillains (or fighting the Nazis, which is what he actually signed up to do), Steve ends up as a USO performer, touring with a team of chorus girls.

Each night, they perform a song called “Star Spangled Man,” during which Captain America punches a Hitler lookalike on the nose and implores the audience to buy war bonds. The whole thing is a perfect parody of 1940s sepia-toned Norman Rockwell patriotism, and Captain America—or rather Steve Rogers, behind the mask—grows to hate it. He wanted to do his duty back when he was an undernourished, asthmatic artist, but now he’s a muscle-bound Adonis, it turns out his main job is to sell comics and appear in propaganda movies.

Captain America: The First Avenger follows a pretty typical superhero storyline: an underdog character gains superpowers, battles adversity while trying to do the right thing, suffers a loss, and finally defeats the bad guy. Of course, the movie ends with Cap crashing his plane into the ocean and waking up in 21st-century New York , but the lack of a happy ending is the only major departure from the traditional superhero narrative.

The interesting part is how Captain America’s fandom chooses to interpret him not just as a character, but as a symbol.

“Star Spangled Man” is a perfect example. In the movie, it’s a cheesy musical number that’s used to illustrate Steve Rogers’ growing frustration with being a “performing monkey” rather than a real soldier, but fans remixed it to have a more nuanced meaning. Ryan Sanura recorded a haunting acoustic cover of the song, inspired by a fanfic by author and Marvel fan Sam Starbuck, in which Steve Rogers comes across a modern-day interpretation of the song. “It’s not an anthem to raise money for a war or get enlistment numbers up,” Steve realizes. “It’s a cry out for help. Who’ll rise and fall, give their all for America?” In the 21st century, the answer is no longer clear.

[READ MORE]

An article on Steve Rogers as Marvel’s most politically engaged superhero, written pre-CA:TWS; it’s fascinating to consider those of the article’s predictions which came true in the movie (and the aspects of the movie which the article didn’t manage to predict), the speculations on the fandom’s interactions with and influence on the source material, and the description of the fandom’s ongoing mission to redeem Marvel’s villains.

I was also happy to see a reference to copperbadge, whose works in the Captain America fandom I’ve come to greatly appreciate (and whose original fiction novel Trace I enjoyed reading recently – go check it out, guys, it’s free!).

Oh, and do yourselves a favour – don’t forget to check out the music tracks embedded in the article for ultimate feels.

I thought I had reblogged this but according to my drafts NOT SO MUCH.
 D:

Oh, hey look, it’s a fandom-positive article about how fans and their transformative works can expand and enhance themes in a canon and give them broader, greater meaning to their audience. Also namedrops Sam, so it’s pretty much awesome.

How fandom reinterpreted Captain America’s politics for the 21st century.

I’m confused about what Beethoven was doing in the black composers post. He was German.

ficklefandoms:

deadcatwithaflamethrower:

takingbackourculture:

By golly gee! I keep forgetting that Black people didn’t exist until the Fresh Prince of Bel Air came on television! Or that Black people existed in anywhere else than Africa even with slavery going on 🙂 My apologies.

Anyway, here’s proof that Beethoven was Black:

“… Said directly, Beethoven was a black man. Specifically, his mother was a Moor, that group of Muslim Northern Africans who conquered parts of Europe—making Spain their capital—for some 800 years.

In order to make such a substantial statement, presentation of verifiable evidence is compulsory. Let’s start with what some of Beethoven’s contemporaries and biographers say about his brown complexion:

Beethoven2

(Louis Letronne, Beethoven, 1814, pencil drawing.)

"Frederick Hertz, German anthropologist, used these terms to describe him: ‘Negroid traits, dark skin, flat, thick nose.’

Emil Ludwig, in his book ‘Beethoven,’ says: ‘His face reveals no trace of the German. He was so dark that people dubbed him Spagnol [dark-skinned].’

Fanny Giannatasio del Rio, in her book ‘An Unrequited Love: An Episode in the Life of Beethoven,’ wrote ‘His somewhat flat broad nose and rather wide mouth, his small piercing eyes and swarthy [dark] complexion, pockmarked into the bargain, gave him a strong resemblance to a mulatto.’

deathmaskdeathmask2
Beethoven’s death mask: profile and full face

C. Czerny stated, ‘His beard—he had not shaved for several days—made the lower part of his already brown face still darker.’

Following are one word descriptions of Beethoven from various writers: Grillparzer, ‘dark’; Bettina von Armin, ‘brown’; Schindler, ‘red and brown’; Rellstab, ‘brownish’; Gelinek, ‘short, dark.’

In Alexander Thayer’s Life of Beethoven, vol.1, p. 134,  the author states, “there is none of that obscurity which exalts one to write history as he would have it and not as it really was. The facts are too patent.” On this same page, he states that the German composer Franz Josef Haydn was referred to as a “Moor” by Prince Esterhazy, and Beethoven had “even more of the Moor in his looks.’ On p. 72, a Beethoven contemporary, Gottfried Fischer, describes him as round-nosed and of dark complexion. Also, he was called ‘der Spagnol’ (the Spaniard).

Other “patent” sources, of which there are many, include, but are not limited to, Beethoven by Maynard Solomon, p.78. He is described as having “thick, bristly coal-black hair” (in today’s parlance, we proudly call it ‘kinky’) and a ‘ruddy-complexioned face.’ In   Beethoven:  His Life and Times by Artes Orga, p.72, Beethoven’s pupil, Carl Czerny of the ‘School of Velocity’ fame, recalls that Beethoven’s ‘coal-black hair, cut a la Titus, stood up around his head [sounds almost like an Afro].  His black beard…darkened the lower part of his dark-complexioned face.’

  BeethovenCweb

Engraving by Blasius Hofel, Beethoven, 1814, color facsimile of engraving after a pencil drawing by Louis Letronne. This engraving was regarded in Beethoven’s circle as particularly lifelike. Beethoven himself thought highly of it, and gave several copies to his friends.

Beethoven, the Black Spaniard

(read more here)

They whitewashed BEETHOVEN?  O_O

Thank you, history/fact-checking Tumblr.

I now feel the need to go burn every white-skinned image of Beethoven I can find.

whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat

https://www.tumblr.com/audio_file/iamshadow21/91102766541/tumblr_n2r5oa5ro91qetycb?plead=please-dont-download-this-or-our-lawyers-wont-let-us-host-audio
http://iamshadow21.tumblr.com/post/91102766541/audio_player_iframe/iamshadow21/tumblr_n2r5oa5ro91qetycb?audio_file=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.tumblr.com%2Faudio_file%2Fiamshadow21%2F91102766541%2Ftumblr_n2r5oa5ro91qetycb

rubydreamer:

[…]Winter Soldier is this crazy, dark, RoboCop-type figure who is somewhat human but mechanised, completely messed up. Slightly human but completely tortured and completely manipulated, but crucially mechanised. So I said you know what, I’m gonna do something completely crazy and dark for the Winter Soldier, and I’m just gonna go for it. I hadn’t worked with these directors before, and away from picture I just wrote a suite for the Winter Soldier that was about six or seven minutes long that I spent ages on and treated it like a record. The idea being that if I get this vibe right, if I nail this six or seven minute thing which I think is the essence of the character and it’s super radical and it’s not that traditional and not completely orchestral because I want to save some of that for Captain America, let’s just see what these guys say. I played it for them really loud, and after they were finished there was a bit of a silence, and then Joe [Russo] went “I love it! Awesome!”

–  Henry Jackman on theme music he composed for the Winter Soldier character 

(Warning: the track is indeed weird and creepy and unsettling and so totally fucking awesome)

This entire soundtrack is amazing, and worth your time.