The State of Captain America comics

As I eagerly await viewing the Captain America Winter Soldier movie today (in America), I have been pondering that state of Captain America in the comics now. Cap's star in the comics has definitely risen over the years. In the Bronze Age, he was at best a B-list hero with some occasional moments of greatness (the Englehart and Byrne eras were particularly good)

but during the 80's and 90's the character sort of languished.

But now, Cap is definitely a A-lister. In part due to the fantastic run Ed Brubaker had on the series but mostly because of his prominence in the movies. So, how are Captain America comics now? To answer that question, I thought would sample some of the current stories to see.

First up Captain America 16 (the main title) vol 7 by Rick Remender and Pascal Alixe

It might seem a bit unfair to use the 16th issue of Remender's run for this sampling, but as it was marked as a #1 in the Marvel Now banner, I figured it would make for a good example, because the purpose of such issues is to give new readers a place to jump on, right?

Well, the first thing you'll notice about this book is Captain America is pretty much absent from the entire issue. Instead, Remender focuses on a character of his own creation, Jet Black, the daughter of Arnim Zola, who is a remnant of the Dimension Z storyline that many readers found off putting. And I must admit, while I was a fan of the Dimension Z storyline, I will agree it seemed to run a bit long. When it finally ended, I dropped the series. So, seeing that the issue was basically a Jet Black solo story really put me off. One, because this felt like a wasted opportunity to get the people who were unhappy with the Dimension Z storyline back on board (and the sale figures make it look like that's a good 20K of people) and two, because Jet Black runs around in one of those costumes that seems like it was created during the worst of the 90's comics era when super heroines were all running around in thongs.

There is even a point when one of the characters in the story calls her out on her costume which I guess is Remender's attempt to pacify criticism, but all it really does is make it more awkward. Outside of that, the art isn't so bad. While Alixe doesn't always make the best composition choices for his panels (like the 3rd water tower panel above) his illustrative skills are quite good.

The story itself is a setup for another multi-issue storyline which introduces an agent of a cabal called the Iron Nail called Tsar Sultan (which I think is a lazy name...) In an attempt to get Black to join the Iron Nail, Sultan causes Jett Black to confront visions of her father and the Red Skull who question her new found allegiance to Captain America.

Overall, this is a pretty disappointing introductory issue, so I give it one star.

Next Up, All New Invaders 1 by James Robinson and Steve Pugh

 My love of the Invaders is well documented on this blog, and over the recent years, I've watched Marvel revisit the title, usually with dismaying results.

But as he's proven in the past, James Robinson has a great knack for breathing new life into Golden Age characters. I see a lot of fans say it's because he respects the source material (which I'm sure is true) but mostly I think Robinson prefers to write stories where characters grapple with remorse, regret and familial obligation and those are themes easily applied to Golden Age characters. Also since such stories carry more gravitas than your average "Can we trust Magneto!" comic, when does Robinson engage in fan service, it feels more substantive and noteworthy.

After a two page prologue with Kree fighting an Imperial Guardsman in the desert, Robinson reintroduces readers to Jim Hammond, The Original Human Torch, who is now working as an auto mechanic in a small town in Illinois. This gives us a vista that is  physically removed from the normal New York Marvel universe and echoes the folksy tone of the book.

Of course, it's not long before the Kree we saw in the prologue show up looking for an artifact that was used by the Nazis in World War II. In explaining what they are looking for, the Kree give us a nice flashback with the Invaders and a few surprise guests:

At the cost of revealing his true identity and alienating his friends in the town, the Torch fights back against the Kree. Outnumbered and overpowered, the Kree seem unstoppable until the end when  Captain America and Bucky show up to join the fight.

It's a pretty standard beginning to a superhero story but where it shines is in the dialogue. Unlike many other Marvel writers who are write dialogue that makes their heroes sound like Starbucks baristas, Robinson's characters have a voice that sounds fitting.  The art for this series is from British illustrator Steve Pugh, whose has been around since 1990 is probably best known for his work on Hellblazer and Animal Man. He doesn't have a lot of experience drawing your standard superhero fight comic which makes for some weird choices during the battle scenes:

On the flip-side his faces are more expressive than you typically see in Marvel comics today which compliments Robinson's dialogue skills.

 I was pretty satisfied with this comic and will continue buying the rest of the (mini?) series. I give it 4 stars.

The last entry in this post is the most disappointing.

Avengers Endless War OGN by Warren Ellis and Mike McKone

Warren Ellis is one of those writers who can sometimes turn in great work with some very creative ideas. I've been a fan of work at times (Doom 2099, The Authority, Planetary, Transmetropolitan, Hellblazer, Thunderbolts) as well as a detractor (Ultimate FF, Iron Man, Secret Avengers) His work is a real mixed bag of good and bad (imo) with the bulk of his good stuff being his personal projects or superhero work from early in his career. He's made statements that suggest he doesn't have the same level of personal appreciation for superhero comics that someone like Grant Morrison has. And I suspect his apathy to the genre has only gotten worse over time. As a result, some of his worst work for the big two has a phoned in feel to it. Still, knowing all that, I sort of expected this maiden launch of Marvel's OGN line to be one of those places where Ellis might shine again.

Instead, this ended up being 120 pages of what felt like a movie tie-in. With a price tag of $20 (for the digital version) that works out to be cheaper (per page) than most current Marvel comics, but a LOT of this book feels like padding. For one thing, there are 35 pages of scenes where the Avengers are just standing around and talking, like this:

And quite a number of panels everywhere where nothing is happening...like weird mini-pinups

I almost get the feeling that this was supposed to be a Annual or Giant-size comic (60 pages?) and at the last minute the project was increased to become this longer OGN.

Looking at those pages above, you may notice, as other fans have, that there is a certain stiffness to the illustrations. While I didn't find it as off putting as a lot of other people, it is a little curious. I don't think I remember Mike McKone drawing like that in the past. I think it's a result of extra pages being rushed out. Compare the face of this girl in the first scene of the comic:

 

With this scene with Steve Rogers

I'm also a bit confused by who was the target audience for this comic. On first glance I figured it was the fans of the Avengers movie since the costumes and lineup (the Hulk is included here) seem to fall in line with the movie. But they do weird things like color Hawkeye's hair blonde and give Iron Man gold and grey (?) armor and add Ms. Marvel to the mix that, again, makes me think somewhere, this was originally going to be set in the regular Marvel universe.

Whatever the audience, this book will probably not entertain them. And it seems the ratings on Amazon back this up. I've seen quite a number of people refer to this as Endless Snoretime and I think that's about right. I give it 1 star.

I'm going to wrap it up here. To those of you going to the movie this weekend, let me know what you think of it!

- Jim