First thing’s first: Chris Evans is much more delightful and tolerable as Captain America than as Johnny Storm in Fantastic Four.

As much of a comic book fan that I claim to be, I am not familiar with the heritage of Captain America. My knowledge does not go beyond what I know from the collectible Marvel trading cards that are currently in storage at my parents’ house in Texas. My allegiance in the comic book world is with any and all X-teams — but this is a good thing.

Captain America: The First Avenger is a streamlined, straightforward hero story that flows in the same vein of Spider-Man: down-on-his-luck scrawny awkward/geeky boy wants to fulfill his “greater-than-himself” purpose in life, but can’t because — well — he is scrawny, awkward and geeky.

In the movie set in a fictitious WWII ’40s, Steve Rogers (Evans) is a weakling with the greatest intentions (side note: the CG effects brilliantly transform Evans into an 18 year old who looks like a skinny 5th grade punching bag). He wants to be a soldier to fight the evil Nazis, but a grocery list of ailments and physical defects prevents him from doing so — until Dr. Abraham Erskine (played by the great Stanley Tucci) steps in.

After he fails at physical training at the helms of the crotchety and snide Colonel Chester Phillips (Tommy Lee Jones), but proves himself in a “take one for the team by jumping on a grenade” moment, Erskine along with Tony Stark kin Howard (Dominic Cooper) poke and prod him in a special machine that transforms him into an All-American buff super soldier — and the look works in the context of the movie as well as real life. Chris Evans, when coiffed and preened, is the epitome of an American Golden Boy.

Does the whole “scientific transformation” scenario sound familiar? It probably does, considering it’s similar to Peter Parker’s incident with the spider bite — except Steve’s expedited puberty experimentation was voluntary.

Thus begins Steve’s journey of great power and great responsibility. Despite the fact that he can run fast, has bulbous muscles and has the immunity system of a super-vegan, they use him as a celebrity poster child for patriotism; touring the world on a USO pony show– which isn’t exactly what he wanted.

Once he reaches his breaking point, a hot looking Army dame Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell) helps him break out of the fluffy patriotic circus and go fight the bad guys: HYDRA, a terrorist organization that is more evil than Hitler’s army and led by a Johann Schmidt (Hugo Weaving), who later reveals himself as Red Skull — a man who is in desperate need of a Risperdal and Kiehl’s moisturizer.

For such a straight-forward hero story, there is a lot involved.

People will flock to Captain America this weekend because 1.) It presents itself with a lot of summer-friendly action, 2.) It’s a comic book movie and 3.) it has Chris Evans’s pretty face. Chances are, people won’t say, “I’m going to see this movie because it looks patriotic! Go America!”

The moral of this story, through the lens of director Joe Johnston, is: “Do the right thing” — not in a Spike Lee sense, but in a selfless sense. Captain America teaches us to be the good guy and to think about others before yourself — it’s a very ethical anthem that borders on the line of after-school specials and one of those “Knowing is half the battle” PSAs from G.I. Joe. Oh yeah, Captain America hates bullies as well. (He must be keeping up with the oh-so-popular trend of teens calling each other bitches and hos on the Internet.) He wants to fight these bullies. Ergo the evil Red Skull.

Speaking of the resident villain, my friend Jojo noticed that throughout the entire movie, Red Skull really doesn’t do much. He just takes credit for other people’s work, says mean stuff, kills people heartlessly and then tries to sneak away as much as possible. He also seems to get off of his minions (who look like gimps from Pulp Fiction) shouting “Hail HYDRA!” whilst pumping not one, but TWO fists in the air. He’s just in it for the popularity. He’s kind of like “The face of HYDRA” — much like Emma Watson is “The face of Lancome.” All in all, besides his scary red face and affection for Hot Topic apparel, Red Skull is a bit of a wimp. (Side note #2: Jojo told me that he is responsible for the death of Peter Parker’s parents.)

Throughout the movie, Cappy does good things and forms a band of merry men that is like a United Colors of Benetton army with an ethnic variety pack of dudes. They fall by the wayside as we see these really lame battle montages which provide absolutely no adrenaline — and the other battle scenes aren’t that impressive either. They’re entertaining, but nothing to pop a boner over. And is the metal used to make Cappy’s shield REALLY called “vibranium”? Really?

Before the lukewarm battle montages, there’s also a montage of Cappy doing his bidding as the USA spokesmodel set to uber-patriotic music of the ’40s. Fun stuff. More enjoyable than the battle montage. Perhaps the movie would have worked well as a fabulous two-hour montage of stuff set to the clean-cut, pin-curled & pompadour’d art direction that gives us a generous dose of the 1940s “THE FUTURE IS NOW!” aesthetic.

Captain America works well as a hero story. Evans does justice to a time-honored superhero who has the best moral compass in the Marvel universe. He leads by example. He’s a good dude. In the Avengers movie lineage, it’s better than Ang Lee’s Hulk and is five steps behind Thor. It’s not strong, nor is it at the caliber of something like — let’s say — Green Lantern, but it’s an integral cog that fits in perfectly with the massive assembly of superheroes coming to us in 2012 (a.k.a. The Avengers).

P.S. I could be cruel and tell you to wait until after the credits for something special — but I will save you the trouble: don’t do it. If you do, you’ll be stuck in a theater with musty smelling fan boys who don’t know better.

Captain America: The First Avenger opens in theaters today.

That said, the wolfie bo-hunk is just one minuscule part in the werewolf trend that is clawing (again, pun intended) its way into pop culture.

New Moon will soon be followed by The Wolfman (in theaters February 10, 2010), a more refined movie illustrating the classic werewolf tale with high wattage stars like Emily Blunt, Benicio Del Toro, Hugo Weaving and Anthony Hopkins.

Wolves are going to be so hot come winter – just wait.

Even Prada has jumped on the lycan bandwagon with their wolf-esque F/W ’09 collection. With a dark ominous palette and textures that are suitable for a full moon, it’s a blatant collection fit for the hairy beast.

And did you see those Bob Basset leather paw shoes featured in T Magazine?

Then there’s the Heads Will Roll video by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs with the dancing werewolf in a suit.

We can even go as far as to mention Spike Jonze’s interpretation of Maurice Sendak’s (in theaters October 16) children’s book, Where the Wild Things Are. Even though they are not werewolves per se, they are furry – and that’s close enough.

What’s next? A Teen Wolf remake? I certainly hope not.

The timing of this forecasted wolfmania couldn’t be any better. Vampire fatigue is definitely starting to set in (with the exception of True Blood). You can thank the upcoming Twilight knock-off The Vampire Diaries for that.

Optimus Prime (voiced by Peter Cullen) gives Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) a fatherly lecture in a cemetery – because that’s the perfect place for a fatherly lecture

From the moment I saw a caveman on the screen in the opening scene of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, I knew I was in for a bittersweet treat. Yes, you heard that right: caveman. No I am not getting this confused with the lukewarm comedy film Year One (very disappointing by the way), I am talking about our favorite robots in disguise. Autobots. Decepticons. Shia. Megan. The whole shebang – and a shebang it was…sort of.

The second chapter of this robotic saga brings us up to speed with Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) and his hot, to-good-for-him, girlfriend Mikaela (Megan Fox). He’s going to Princeton, she’s working at a bike shop that requires her to wear Daisy Duke shorts and lip smacking make up. He finds a piece of the Allspark cube from the first movie hidden away in his battle wounded hoodie. He picks it up and that’s when all hell breaks loose.

The little fragment sparks (no pun intended) Sam’s inner Raymond Babbitt/John Nash and he starts seeing these characters and becomes an idiot savant in his Astronomy class. Turns out that the fragment of the Allspark implanted clues in his head to where the Decepticons can find a big ol’ machine that can blow up the sun. In turn, Megatron (voiced by Hugo Weaving) returns from the dead to get some revenge and another ancient badass robot named the Fallen (voiced by Tony Todd) is there with him.

Let me back up for a second.

So it turns out the whole Transformers phenomenon goes way back into time before Megan Fox was getting compared to Angelina Jolie and when men wore loincloths (which would explain the aforementioned cavemen). The Fallen was a part of that crew and he got exiled for wanting to blow up suns and making the whole universe a land suitable for Emo and Scene kids.

Yes, the plot is pretty much your basic “take over the world” storyline with transforming cars. All in all, it’s a muddled storyline eclipsed by really cool and complicated CGI that is too much for the eyes to take in.

Nonetheless, once they figure out Sam has the key to the sun obliterator. The Decepticons go after him with a vengeance, which makes the Autobots spring into action.

Luckily, the Autobots (Optimus Prime, Ironhide, Ratchet and some new annoying twin bots named Mudflap and Skids) have created this budding ro-bromance with a new top secret sector called NEST which includes Josh Duhamel’s character and his band of merry men (Tyrese is included in that mix – and by the way, when is he gonna come out with a new album?).

After all of this is set up, we all get to have an eyegasm of intertwined robots and – all together now – Megan Fox sans Ugg boots and sweats.

One of many scenes in which LaBeouf and Fox run.

Ultimately, the formula went like this: Explosion. Robot. Fight. Transform. Actors run. Repeat that for 144 minutes and you got yourself a sequel with Michael Bay’s name written all over it.

I had a multitude of Transformers when I was a young lad. When I played with them in my suburban home in San Antonio, TX, my fight scenes were more elaborate and exciting – maybe it’s because I often did cross toy product wars with G.I. Joe and sometimes my sister’s Barbie dolls, but that’s neither here or there.

At one point I stopped caring about whether or not Sam was going to get a magical Matrix to (possible spoiler alert) to save a Transformer’s life whose name rhymes with Schmoptimus Crime. Even when the super-Decepticon Devastator showed up on the screen I wasn’t that excited. I had this particular Transformer toy when I was a child. It was basically six construction vehicles (appropriately called Constructicons) that formed together and made a gigantic robot (much like Voltron). It was fluorescent green and purple and it was SO cool. The movie version of the Devastator was like a hybrid of a robotic dog and a vacuum cleaner. Very disappointing.

Bumblebee (voiced by Mark Ryan) kicks some Decepticon boo-tay

This ride of seizure-inducing transforming fight scenes and gratuitous explosions was quite exhausting. And how necessary was it to bring in Isabel Lucas as a evil temptress that weighs as much as a bucket of air? If it was an attempt to produce another hottie, they failed miserably. Fox has the monopoly on that.

Thank God John Turturro (he’s back as the irritating Agent Simmons) and newbie Ramon Rodriguez (who plays Sam’s roommate Leo) were there to provide comic relief amongst the gag-worthy “Who’s going to say ‘I love you first’?” battle between LeBouf’s and Fox’s characters. Honorable mention goes to Julie White and Kevin Dunn as Sam’s kooky parents.

Without a doubt I am a fan of LaBeouf and I admire the signature Spielberg boy-and-alien friendship with the endearing yellow Camaro Bumblebee, but even LeBeouf’s “He’s the next Tom Hanks” charm didn’t give me the summer blockbuster joyride I had with the first one.