Captain America II: Death Too Soon is a 1979 American made-for-television superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character Captain America, directed by Ivan Nagy and starring Reb Brown. The film was preceded by Captain America earlier the same year. It was aired on CBS in two one-hour slots. The first part aired on November 23, 1979, and the second aired the next night, leading into the conclusion of Salem's Lot.
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Plot
Steve Rogers (Reb Brown) is first shown sketching a portrait of Mrs. Shaw (Susan French), who complains to him about a gang of muggers who have been stealing the proceeds from cashed Social Security checks; she denies having cashed hers. He bids her to do this in order to set a trap for the muggers and springs the trap as Captain America.
In the meantime, a freelance revolutionary terrorist calling himself General Miguel (Christopher Lee), planning to fight an unspecified war, kidnaps Professor Ian Ilson (Christopher Cary) and forces him to resume his research in manipulative gerontology. Ilson has managed to formulate both a chemical that accelerates aging and the antidote to the same chemical, and Miguel, posing as the warden of a prison in Oregon near Portland, plans to use the chemicals in question to hold Portland hostage for a multimillion-dollar ransom.
Ultimately, Rogers and Miguel directly clash face-to-face, and when Miguel throws a glass bottle of the aging accelerant into the air, hoping it will shatter against Captain America's body, the Captain throws his shield to stop the attack, where it shatters the bottle in such a manner that the aging accelerant splashes them both. However, the Captain only receives a minor amount and thus only ages a month. Miguel, on the other hand, ages to death in less than a minute.
Cast
Reb Brown as Steve Rogers / Captain America
Christopher Lee as General Miguel
Connie Sellecca as Dr. Wendy Day
Len Birman as Dr. Simon Mills
Katherine Justice as Helen Moore
Christopher Cary as Professor Ian Ilson
William Lucking as Stader
Stanley Kamel as Kramer
Ken Swofford as Everett Bliss
Lana Wood as Yolanda
Susan French as Mrs. Shaw
Release
The film was released on home video on April 20, 1994.
The film was released theatrically in France in 1980 and had a special film festival screening in Finland in 2014.
Cancelled TV series
Both Captain America and Captain America II: Death Too Soon were intended as pilots for an ongoing Captain America TV series, but Universal Television lost the rights not long after the movies were produced and the licensing fees had increased to $50,000 per episode in comparison to The Incredible Hulk having licensing fees of only $2,500 per episode.