I’m a huge Cap fan, but I never even heard of this film, nor has it been re-aired on cable TV. I watched it on Hulu last night, and it was actually pretty good (compared to the mind-numbingly awful made for tv version from 1984.)
Apparently, the 1990 version was released in theaters, but I don’t remember seeing any ads for it nor hearing about it in any theaters. Did anybody get to watch it in its original run?
Actually, it was not released in theaters, at least not in theaters - from your Wiki link:
‘The film was intended for release in the summer of 1990, to coincide with the 50th anniversary of Captain America. Posters appeared in movie theaters displaying the superhero’s iconic shield and teaser trailers were created, some of which even appeared during screenings of Tim Burton’s Batman, but the film never materialized. Several release dates were announced between fall 1990 and winter 1991, but the film went unreleased for two years before debuting direct to video and on cable TV in the United States in the summer of 1992. It was given a limited theatrical release overseas.’
I recall watching about a half hour of it on a Saturday afternoon on WGN one year. It was execrable. As was the made-for-TV version to which you alluded.
Let’s hope third time’s a charm.
I’ve not seen the notorious first Fantastic Four film, however. I’d watch a half hour of that, I think. Only on WGN on a Saturday, afternoon, natch.
If it DID play in theaters, I never heard about it.
In any case, Cap’s creator, Jack Kirby, had to fight like hell to get his name in the credits… and later said the movie was so awful he wished he HADN’T.
I saw it as a lad, on TV. It’s definitely B film-making. The very similar quality The Punisher is probably a little bit better, but only because it doesn’t need as much in the way of special effects.
I didn’t. IIRC, the only indoor theaters to play it were in Puerto Rico (I may be confusing CAP with Punisher).
I don’t even remember it being in the theaters.
Did you see Captain America (1990) in the theaters?
On a related note, have you ever slammed a finger in a car door, had the door lock on you, and spent 97 minutes trying to get free?
I remember seeing this on cable tv when I was a kid. I don’t remember much of it.
I have the original FF movie on VHS, I bought it on ebay from Eqypt. I met Stan Lee once and he was amazed anyone had a copy, he signed it anyway.
Edited to add: The movie was terrible.
Meh, we’re all spoiled since Spiderman raised the bar. Back in the day, we had Lou Ferrigno painted green and dotted eyes TV Spiderman, and we liked it! If they even got the costume and names right, it was huge.
I still love the old Hulk! Although rare, sometimes SyFy will show a marathon and I’ll watch as much of the day that I can afford to waste.
So you’re saying that it’s like the Star Wars Holiday Special, only not as good?
I remember seeing the posters and getting psyched, only to be reminded of Marvel’s on screen history.
Yeah, I actually prefer the Lou Ferrigno Hulk to the new Hulks. At least he was a real guy. The new ones just look like big cartoons.
Let’s just say that a cameo appearance by Bea Arthur would have helped.
Cause the Hulk in the comics looked so much like a real guy? 
He’s 10’ tall and about 8’ wide, very green (or grey…or red…or blue, even?) and wears purple pants. What about that screams “Real Guy”?
I mean, c’mon man, purple pants! 
I remember reading a Starlog article about it which included a bit about the costume’s rubber ear pieces. Because of that, the ears were highly noticeable when I saw it on HBO later.
I tell you, the rubber ears were the least of that movie’s problems. Making the Red Skull Italian could work for the sake of the movie, I guess, though I don’t know why they’d change his nationality when the character is so closely tied into WWII Germany.
Having Captain America pretty much have his ass handed to him on his first mission instead of building him up as an American super soldier, then losing to the Skull in a fight blows his credibility out of the water and he never recovers.
Then the bit where he runs away, turns around and takes someone’s car. He does that to Ned Beatty and a woman. Seriously, how unheroic is that?
It never played in theaters but I do remember a teaser trailer being shown in theaters. I also used to have a theatrical movie poster.
The movie has so many problems.
Lisping, running away, can’t fight worth crap Cap is the biggest. Italian Skull- somehow a tragic figure?- is the second.
But there’s one good scene. Skull is meeting with his cabal and reveals in a very cool-ly evil speech that he was behind most of the political assassinations of the second half of the 20th century.
The Roger Corman version was never actually released; it escaped via bootlegs.
I think I’ll stick to reading a recap.
I used to own that one on video tape.
It was hilarious fun!
In an MST3K kinda way.
I “own” it, in that I was given it, watched it, had no hilarious fun, built some robots from spare parts on my satellite – a vacuum cleaner and a gumb… what was I doing with a gumball machine on a satellite… anyhow, they just sat there and groaned-- no clever comments, realized that I’d started it a couple of times, and could never finish it (and heck I finished The Horrible Live-Action “Justice League Movie”/Sitcom! Gaaaah!)… so I lent it to a friend and never asked for it back.
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