Trial of the Incredible Hulk (1989)

Bill Bixby always wanted to give the incredible hulk a concluding season; he was a person who wanted closure even more so than fans, the opportunity to do a television movie with Nicholas Hammond who played Peter Parker in the television series ‘Amazing Spiderman’ was once on the table.  Bixby help led the way to get a deal made, the problem became time,  it was 1983, and Lou Ferrigno’s film career had taken off, with two theatrical released Hercules movies and contract with another movie at that time. The window to shoot the movie was lost, and so was invested interest. When licensed contracts were up with CBS, Bixby was able to get on board and sell a picture deal with NBC with the interest that the television movie would be a backdoor pilot should enough interest get made and the network decides to pick it up.  Unfortunately, neither of the team up films got picked up for a series, but fans got a glimpse of the world of DareDevil , twenty-six  years before

Netflix made their streaming debut. With Matt Murdock in his black ninja outfit trying to take down Wilson Fisk the King Pin, with characters like Turk running around the streets of New York.  This film brought forth 3 important firsts, it was the first time the character of DareDevil was in black, he was later given a black outfit about four years later in the man without fear series by Frank Miller and Trial of the incredible hulk was the first ever cameo appearance by Stan Lee, he played a juror in the jury box.  It was also the first and only time the Hulk wore his trademark purple shorts when flipping the Jury box.

The year is 1989, and Trial of the Incredible Hulk hit the small screen just one month before the theatrical release of Tim Burton’s Batman.  It was a golden era for the comic book fans, which only got better with the exploding popularity of comic books at the start of the 1990s. The Return of the Hulk showcased the first ever live action team up of superheroes and opened the eyes of a potential possibility of exploring this untapped world. There would be future television movies to follow, Fox had Generation X, and CBS attempted a Justice League of America television movie (that aired only overseas), both received less than stellar reviews, trial was not a critical darling, but it has become a beloved fan favorite over time.  

This would also mark Bill Bixby’s third attempt as director for a film, he had directed many television episodes for various series in the past in addition to being just a seasoned actor.  It was also the boom of VHS, with camcorders and decks being so affordable, the concept of video being everywhere and consumer friendly did not escape him as a director.  He wanted to showcase this awareness and almost vicariously through John Rhys-Davies’s Kingpin who took on the role of a film director; that mirrored the composting interests of Bixby the Director.

Agents of Shield SEASON ONE (17 - 22)

No longer an oversight commission for the Avengers, and with the Director of Shield believed dead. Coulson and his team are now outlaws as Hydra has infiltrated Shield . So with limited resources and being continuously on the run, the final episodes brings closure and some questions. The Guest House (GH-325) serum that regenerated the injuries that Skye had sustained, had its discoveries made  too late to be stopped and only Coulson and Skye knows the truth. Sometimes the simplest of answers is to follow the money; Deathlok and the all the  high tech  weapons at the clairvoyant's disposal had to be funded and

created by someplace, and the common thread has always been Cybertech. And that mission reveals the very first Deathlok model - Shield Agent Garrett.  Upon the apprehension of Garret the remaining top brass of Shield that includes Victoria Hand got executed as double agent Grant Ward is an Agent of Hydra and Garrett's own protégé.  After breaking into the fridge for Shield's classified findings, weapons and most dangerous felons. We get one last backstory, spoken about in Avengers (2012) in a carry away line between -

Tony Stark and Steve Rogers, regarding a cellist Coulson was dating being his only viable last of kin. A dangerous infected person locked away in the fridge was obsessed with Coulson's love interest and the team has to come out of hiding to secure her safety and risk Coulson's level 7 secret of being dead to the world. On the heels of that story Grant has returned back to the team, because of Skye's encryption to GH-325 files, after he jettison the science team deep to the ocean floor and killing the liaison  officer for Providence the strong hold base of Fury that was off the books to Shield.  Now with the discovery of Grant as double agent from the liaison's dead body.

Skye leaves a clue with a team as she goes with him to evade suspicion. Long story short, Raina and her team enhance the only vial of GH-325 they possessed and save Garrett from certain death as his Deathlok parts were fading, the genesis not only boosted Garrett back from the dead but opened his mind to spiritual and cosmic natures of the universe as well as giving him super human strength and endurance. Using Alien tech of an 084 Garrett is blasted to nothingness by Coulson, and Fury makes an appearance rescuing Fitz /Simmons from the Ocean floor, Fitz suffering brain and neurological damage from lack of prolong  oxygen will live. As Fury gives Coulson his toolbox, making him the official director of shield as he now goes underground to route out Hydra  from the shadows.

Grant Ward is captured and Mike Peterson aka Deathlok is a no longer under the control of Hydra, looking to slowly make amends for his past sins, Mike Peterson will go his own way. The questions we are left  with is Daisy's past, she shares an unknown connection with Raina the woman in the Floral dress, who also claims to know Daisy's father. Seeing first hand the breaching insanity of Garrett under the influence of GH-325, our last segment leaves us with Coulson carving out the same Alien symbols on a giant wall as the show draws to a season end.

The series gets to return with a continuing story as the next earthbound MCU story would be Avengers: Age of Ultron. in the spring of 2015. So Season two would display how the team has faired in the wake of their present circumstances. With the story of the Avenger's connection being made in the final episodes of the second season.

Captain America Winter Soldier (2014)

The sequel was written by Hollywood's screenwriting duo of
Christopher Markus and Stephen Mcfeely, and making their MCU debut are Anthony and Joe Russo as the film's Directors.  Producer Kevin Feige who approached the Russo's after negotiations with F. Gary Gray broke down as director, it wasn't until after watching the second season's finale episodes of the network series Community. That Feige hand picked the brothers, he was impressed with their blend of genre parody, The Russos’ came into the initial meeting and had pitched a political thriller type of film, which was heavily influenced by films like
Three Days of the Condor, a film that coincidently starred Robert Redford.

For the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Captain America: Winter Soldier was the fifth film to be nominated for an Academy Award for visual effect. All three Iron Man movies and the original Avengers movie had all received an Oscar nod. Surprisingly, it was not a film that reached the Billion dollar club at the box office, there are only 8 out of the 23 Films that would have reached that bench mark. To give a better perspective of the whole cinematic landscape there are exactly 47 films in total that have grossed over the Billion dollar mark.  Winter soldier falls into 119th place in highest grossing films of all time.

Steve Roger's List of things missed to experience

As the name headlining the film, Steve Rogers has gone through a series of transitions; saving America from Hydra, by destroying all of Tesseract designed super weapons. He has been on ice for nearly seventy years, to return as a man out of time. He uncovers that Shield has re-developed those same weapons to fight the Chitari invasion, as a provision if the Avenger initiative would fail. Only to discover now, about four orbital crafts with a million guns pointing to the earth that can take out one million select targets  at  one time; each with surgical precision. That is in accordance to Nick Fury's pitch, as an implied deterrent, but as a means to exact peace and compliance between hostile countries. A tactic of fear similar to what he fought against in the Second World War just coated with the American banner. While this film was presented during the Obama administration it was in the wake of Edward Snowden and the NSA scandal, and with the history of the cold war to lean into, Markus and McFeely merged an espionage political thriller that shakes the core of the status quo, while it continues to maintain an identity of a superhero film that is grounded in structure of reality.  This structured reality would carry on into further earthbound MCU movies and couple of seasons of Marvel's Agents of Shield.

Captain America II (1979)

Given an extended title
Captain America: Death Too Soon, Returns actors Reb Brown and Len Birman to their original roles.  This unlike its predecessor focused more on the action and adventure of Captain America as he faces against a unknown foe named Miguel played by iconic character actor Christopher Lee. A revolutionary General of unknown origin demanding to extort money from the US government as he ransoms the lives of the population of Portland.
Sharing the underlying  secluded fear of a small town towards an outsider as seen in Jordan Peele's Get out, without elements of horror. Death too soon manages to hold your attention by offering a mystery box of town that is not quite right nor hospitable.
The biggest change was the recasting of  an up and coming actress Connie Sellecca who would appear in Arthur Hailey's Hotel and the Greatest American hero (made re-popular by a shirt commonly worn by Sheldon in 'The big bang theory'), two series that would make here synonymous in 80's television and later made for TV movies.

Captain America, the character at this time was usually associated with riding a motor bike and that image was due largely from this movie and the toy marketing that followed. Playing on the 70's stunt hero Evil Knievel, the viewers were given chases and stunts performances on Captain America's superbike including a paraglider sequence. Where as the imagination is not too different from today's fast and furious 9 trailer seeing a car swinging on a bridge cable line like Tarzan. The film was catering to the fan boy base on its modest budget and television restraints.  The plot once carried out was very straight forward and no surprising twists or turns, but an attempt to create a well crafted scenario that allows our hero to go this journey and unravel the mystery of a town in order to stop a terrorist type of extortion.
The biggest misstep is the movie's opening, Steve Rogers is man enjoying life  along Venice Beach taking to his passion of sketch artistry, and stopping crime on the side. The sequence becomes too dated to its era and is a blurring sore spot for this movie to get any real traction for its audience.