Captain America

So what are your thoughts about it?

The comic or the movie?

Aw fuck it, my answer is the same either way: I'm a huge fan.

But still, if this is about the movie, you should go to the Film subforum.

I'm talking about the comics.

Well, I liked the Steven Engleheart run, (which should be essential for potential readers of the comic,) but I haven't really read anything else with him... (Unless you count Avengers, which I have read a ton of.)

I think Cap is one of those characters that's best either in a team book or as the foil in someone else's book. For example his "No you move" speech came from a Spider-Man comic, not his own.

I can pretty much second everything Zeal said. Cap's function in the MU is very similar to Supes in the DCU (The The Cape) and he works best if he have other heroes as foil for him.

I don't know why, but I had this weird dislike for Cap when I was young. Possibly something to do with a dislike of American patriotism, possibly because I saw him as being like that annoying guy from Buffy. I spent a decade gradually realising how awesome Cap is.

I adored Cap when I was younger but fell out with comics in general for a good many years. I totally fell for Cap again when he was painting murals on Cable's island utopia thing. As much as I still love him to pieces, I don't really like his solo works. He really comes into his own when he has a team to bounce off of, whether it's being gay being the idealistic foil to Tony's "the ends justify the means" tendencies or getting totally embarrassed in public by Clint, or whatever else, it really brings out the different nuances of his character. And having him just show up in other heroes' titles, out-awesome them, and leave never gets old.

It's exactly like I've said before regarding Superman. They're hard characters to write an ongoing series for because being Lawful Good makes it hard to take him seriously when a problem he stands against doesn't get solved. The reason they work will in limited series is because they get to show off, solve some problems, and be generally awesome. In an ongoing series, where a status quo has to be maintained, you eventually start to wonder why this guy with all of these fancy ideals and great power/tactical genius hasn't done anything more than respond to the latest world-threatening crisis. Not only that, but since they're supposed to be uncompromisingly noble, you have to constantly hand out a Conflict Ball or Idiot Ball in order to give them personal problems.

There are exceptions, of course. The recent Nova series was an excellent lesson how to make a Lawful Good hero interesting...but then, they had to remove him from Earth to do so.

He should have stayed dead! I hate the conflicting "he's a normal man" against the "supersoldier serum, so special!" I hate this whole "normal man" role people keep trying to force him into. He's not supposed to be a normal man, he's supposed to be a super soldier. But honestly I don't think he's a bad character, but I think he was better off going down the path of Captain Marvel.

Frankly, I only started reading cap when brubaker's run started and frankly it was one of the best comics I ever read. And I think exactly the opposite you guys do, whenever people write cap with other people, while showing his main strength(his tactical genius) ends up being cheesy patriotic stuff or Show, Don't Tell (They always keep drawing attention to cap and saying out loud how he's the best of the best and an example to humanity).

I'm not american maybe that's why I think it's cheesy but I doubt it'd be different if I were.

Then again maybe it was because he died and the whole civil war thing but that's the impression I got from whenever Cap was in a team book instead of his own, he also seems much more generic and a bit of flat character when most people write him, brubaker's cap was an interesting lead and frankly the only reason cap is one of my favorite heroes is because of that series.

Ok, I'm sorry if I'm too gushy but I really think that

Same reason.

Part of being a leader is having the morale of your troops. The best part about Captain America (and any other Cape) is that they're the character who reverses the Darkest Hour.

Especially in the Marvel Universe, where half of your superheroes are dickheads. I've always liked Cap because he was one of the few heroes that actually wanted to save the day.

My problem is that they keep talking about him but in the end he's totally dumb or useless.

I was going to say that but it was 3AM and I was a little tired so I forgot to say what I meant after the show don't tell part, Brubaker's cap is just as good as he is anywhere else but he actually deserves all that praise there.

There are probably many examples of cap being written right but since I only started reading marvel comics that aren't x-men from after avengers disassembled I wouldn't know, so when I say those things I mean "recently" not "ever since the first avengers comic".

That there's your problem. I've read a ton of Classic Avengers, and I can safely say that over the years, Cap has proven his worth in spades, being both useful, a great leader/tactician, and a valued member of the team, and like others have been saying, being with all of those other character's brings out other parts of him that you might not otherwise see.

I just want to clear out that I don't think cap is a bad character, as I said he's one of my favorite super heroes and even if people write him bad I like to see him just because of him being a cool looking almost Badass Normal character.

I want to read his older stories but it's going to take a while until I actually get to read older avengers\cap stories.

When I was a kid I didn't like Cap, because I assumed he was just a "patriotic propaganda" superhero and didn't care to read him.

As I got older, though, I learned more about the character, and now I have a deep respect for him. Him going to war against America itself in the name of the values America was supposedly built upon didn't hurt, either.

I'm reading the Sam Wilson run by Nick Spencer now now.

Rating: ****

CAPTAIN AMERICA: SAM WILSON: NOT MY CAPTAIN AMERICA TPB 1# by Nick Spencer is probably my second favorite run on the story after Ed Brubaker's take on the man. I'm a long time fan of all incarnations of the character but I like it best when they either get into the meat of Steve Roger's persona or the contradictions of the American Dream. Sam Wilson as Captain America was controversial in certain Marvel circles for various reasons but even among progressives, there was the question of, "Why does he need to be Captain America? Isn't Falcon an established hero in his own right?"

Honestly, Sam has never gotten the respect he's deserved as one of Marvel's hero. He got called Captain America's sidekick, had that whole decades-long period where he was a pimp rather than a social worker (due to the Red Skull brainwashing him), and he was first offered a spot on the Avengers because of Affirmative Action. Honestly, Steve, what the hell was that about? He's a character that never quite got his shot at the A-list and making him Captain America with his own book is a good chance to show why Sam Wilson is a fundamentally different sort of man than Steve Rogers while simultaneously being every bit as good.

So why four stars instead of five? Well, this book is preachy. Deliberately so and if you're reading Captain America then you should probably have at least LITTLE politically charged content. Sam Wilson fights the Sons of the Serpent (KKK) who are illegally patrolling the Mexican-American border, fights against a super-greedy Objectivist CEO version of the Serpent Society, and also has him constantly put down by the public for taking various stands as Captain America. It even gets him fired from SHIELD.

I really enjoyed the return of Diamondback (Captain America's version of Catwoman) while being annoyed she was now a stripper. Diamondback is a great character and I hope she continues being part of the story. I also like how Misty Knight has become part of Sam's book. I wasn't aware her and Danny had broken up but I think they'd make a great couple. I also like the retconning of D-man from being a mentally ill and homeless wanderer (From Civil War: Frontline) to someone who is back to something of his old self.

In short, I'm very much enjoying this take on Captain America and wouldn't mind if Sam Wilson were to permanently become *A* Captain America. Make it like the Green Lantern Corps with multiple holders.

8.5/10

I think I've read through half of Brubaker run. Winter Soldier and Death of Captain America are great, after that I feel "meh" except for the time Bucky gets into the Russian gulag.

Captain America has died in Captain America #700. And it is one of those deaths that can't be undone!

As you probably know, he was frozen and woke up in a destroyed world. He was sent back via time travel, to the very point when he was frozen, and destroyed the missile that started the war, dying in the process. The explosion destroyed the iceberg, and so the other Captain America was released, and will not wake up in the future again. So yes, he will still be around, but a time travel clone has died, so what I said above is technically true

I love shenanigans!

Read his book if you wanna find out.

edited 18th Apr '18 12:13:48 AM by Eldritcho

So, do we know what Sam is doing?

Sam had a date with Misty Knight, and it turned into a fight with vampires in the sewers. Who says that romance is dead?

Now, seriously, Misty Knight should be starring a Daughters of the Dragon comic, or leading a Heroes for Hire team. Using her as the casual love interest of someone else is completely wasting the character.

While I agree, Sam and Misty are actually a couple I can get behind. They make a lot more sense than Iron Fist and Misty who I have difficulty imagining having a conversation not related to kung fu or ninjas.

Plus I've actually liked her missions with Sam. The one where she takes down a robot sex ring which caters to cape chasers in Spencer's Captain America was great.

The Misty/Danny story in Secret Love shows how those two can work as a couple. They beat up ninjas and dragons, then relax with take-out, kung fu movies, and Danny doing Misty's hair. That was such a cute, sweet story. Secret Love was one of the best Secret Wars comics.