You've watched two "Hulk" and two "Iron Man" movies, and just saw "Thor" earlier this year; now it's time to watch Chris Evans fill out his costume in "Captain America: The First Avenger" before all four heroes team up in the superhero smackdown "The Avengers" next year.

"Captain America" tells the story of Steve Rogers (Evans), a scrappy but spirited 98-pound weakling who repeatedly tries to enlist in the military during World War II. He is finally accepted into an experimental program that transforms him into a super soldier known as Captain America. Cap wages war against the Nazis' occult science division, HYDRA, which is led by the evil Red Skull (Hugo Weaving).

Unlike, say, the recent CGI-heavy "Green Lantern," "Captain America" is a different kind of superhero movie, focusing on the early days of the Marvel universe. Read on to find out what separates this Avenger from his fellow cinematic superheroes.

1. "Captain America" is a rare superhero period piece.

In the early days of script development, "Captain America" was set half in the '40s and half in the present day, but the filmmakers came to believe that both stories were getting the short shrift. According to producer Kevin Feige, director Joe Johnston "was very much in support of the full period and, because it is an origin story, it just made sense to set it in the '40s. Because there were so many other comic book movies out there, we knew it would stand apart and separate us from the pack. If you look at the top 20 movies of all time -- even 'Harry Potter' is almost period in its vibe -- they are almost all period."

2. The filmmakers looked to "Raiders of the Lost Ark" for inspiration.

Over 90% of the film is set in the 1940s, so Johnston drew inspiration from classic period adventures that worked on-screen. "We used 'Raiders of the Lost Ark' as a template for a lot of reasons," says Johnston."It still feels contemporary today and absolutely fresh after 30 years. I wanted 'Captain America' to feel like that. It wasn't a film made in the '40s; it was a film about the '40s made today."

3. There were more than a few potential Captain Americas.

Evans is not new to the superhero thing -- he played the Human Torch in two "Fantastic Four" movies -- but he had to be convinced to suit up as "Captain America." "We screen-tested about 12 or 15 potential Captain Americas," says Johnston. "We kept saying that we wished we could combine two guys -- we'd like one guy's face and another guy's acting == but Chris was always at the top of the list. He had said no because he was concerned about doing another superhero movie, but we just kept after him."

4. Tommy Lee Jones is scary funny.

Tommy Lee Jones steals more than a few scenes as Colonel Chester Phillips with his sardonic remarks and crusty demeanor. "I found the most effective way to direct Tommy Lee Jones is just to laugh at him," says Johnston. "He's actually very funny and has a great sense of humor, but nobody laughs at him because I think people are kind of afraid of him. He's the sweetest guy in the world." Adds Jones, "I get to yell at some people, order guys around, and say something funny every now and again. It's a good time."

5. That skinny 98-pound guy on-screen is actually the bulked-up Evans (most of the time).

There are a few ways the filmmakers could have handled the scenes featuring a scrawny Steve Rogers, by using body doubles or starving Evans prior to shooting a la Christian Bale in "The Machinist." But most of what you see is really Evans' buff body after a lot of downsizing digital magic.

"When we started the process of creating skinny Steve, we didn't know how we were going to do it," says Johnston. "We knew we had to take him from six feet and 180 pounds to five-foot-seven and 98 pounds. We experimented with a lot of different things, but the most effective way was to photograph Chris himself and shrink him down using digital effects because that way we keep his performance. There are a couple of shots when it is a head replacement -- when Chris is lying on a table and doesn't require much movement -- but most of it is Chris."

6. We're not talking "Chicago," but there is a musical number in "Captain America: The First Avenger."

Singing and dancing doesn't always go over super well in superhero movies (think of that one awkward scene with emo Peter Parker in "Spider-Man 3"), but the filmmakers actually pull it off with a gung-ho American musical number in "Captain America." "Joe embraced the idea and liked the idea of a musical number," says co-writer Stephen McFeely. "We always knew from the start that Cap wasn't going to sing and dance -- he was sort of overwhelmed and felt out of place on the stage. He had little choreography and had to read off of cue cards. When Chris found out we were doing something like this, he said, 'Am I singing and dancing?' Had we gone that way we might have been more concerned, but we were pretty confident. That song has been in all of our heads for the better part of a year."

7. Captain America has a lot of battlefield experience beyond what you see on-screen.

"In 'The Avengers,' Cap has to be the world's most seasoned soldier," says co-writer Christopher Markus. "If you only show him have one adventure in the preceding movie, you aren't going to buy that guys like Iron Man would want this 22-year-old to lead after just one battle. We had to load into our movie the sense that Cap is an incredibly seasoned veteran by the end. The film jumps forward a few years a few times, so there are certainly unseen adventures."

8. Even though "Captain America" uses converted 3-D, it still pops.

"We always intended it to be a 3-D movie, but we shot it in 2-D with a separate pass -- the left-eye pass -- which made it a lot easier to convert to 3-D," says Johnston. "I shot it to look like 3-D in 2-D, basically. With Shelly Johnson's photography and Rick Heinrichs's production design, the 2-D looked 3-D to me. It had an amazing look before we started converting any of the film to 3-D, and now it looks even better. The story is so strong that it works in 2-D, 3-D and will work on DVD, Super 8 or slides [laughs]."

9. Women who can handle their machine guns are hot in any era.

Instead of the usual damsel in distress, "Captain America" features Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter, a woman who seems to know her way around a firearm. "I'd practiced with a gun before, but nothing ever on this scale," says Atwell. "Then Joe, who always liked to have a bit of fun and then see if he could push it further, said, 'What if we got you a machine gun? I really think we should make Peggy something special.'"

Atwell got a little more than she bargained for, but rose to the occasion like the pro she is. "So they brought out this machine gun," she continues, "and I almost fell over the first time I fired it -- it's so in your face, and there are bits of shells and powder going everywhere, and giving off all this heat. I wondered how I was ever going to do it without flinching. It took a few weeks of being able to fire it without blinking, just concentrating and being able to relax into it. Eventually I was able to feel like it was an extension of my arm. I have to say, in the end, I was rather pleased with myself."

10. Steve Rogers is more relatable than other superheroes.

"Joe always said what attracted him to this project is that Steve essentially is a normal person," says Feige. "After the procedure he has a great body and is at the peak of human endurance, but it's still human endurance. If he's shot, he could get killed. He can run faster, he's stronger than your average Joe, but he's not a Norse god, he doesn't have a green ring or an iron suit, so I think that's why the action scenes in the movie are as exciting as they are because at any moment something horrible could happen to Cap. We hope that we can make all of our heroes -- whether they are from Asgard or a billionaire industrialist -- relatable to our audience, but with Steve Rogers it is easy... That wish fulfillment of seeing him struggle, endure and emerge victorious is what going to the movies is all about."