Captain America’s a rather curious blend these days, mixing provocative, big statements with a distinctly old-school tone and feel. Granted, the recent controversy over the use of Republican slogans in the racist Watchdog movement’s demonstration was an unintentional way of bringing one of the book’s lower-key arcs back into the spotlight, but there’s a general canniness to the way the old and new are combined here, which doesn’t always play out in the way that would be expected. The resolution to the ‘Death of Captain America’ scenario had the retrograde step for the book being the headline attraction, with Steve Rogers’ return all over the news-stands, while the unexpected element of allowing Bucky to retain the title and shield was relegated to a footnote. The outcry over the first part of Two Americas has shown the delicate balance that Brubaker is striking, injecting modern relevance into an apparently traditional tale of Captain America battling a separatist movement.

This second instalment continues to present an outwardly conventional face, with Bucky’s plan to infiltrate the Watchdogs going awry and the insane 1950s duplicate of Steve Rogers receiving an unexpected addition to his arsenal, but there a degree of subversiveness under the surface. Much of the conventional feeling comes from the artistic partnership of Luke Ross and Butch Guice. It’s hard to pinpoint whether the pencils or Guice’s heavy, near-noir inks imbue the book with it’s old-school vibe, but there’s an interesting feeling of the middle of the twentieth century in the Falcon’s attempted flight trough the fire escape of a run-down hotel. The narrative has given the fifties Cap the upper hand, and the art reflects this by adding an element of his lost era to the action.

What sets the book above its pulp inspirations is the occasional moments of sophistication, such as the 50s Cap’s fleeting recognition that the world he desires is long gone or continued re-writing of Bucky’s origin to increase the character’s plausibility. The stand-alone components of Brubaker’s Captain America may sometimes slip of the radar, devoid of reference to the broader Marvel Universe, but there’s a steady vein of richness running through the apparently inconsistent book.

This week: Reviews of Captain America #602, Dark Avengers #13 and Thunderbolts #140 – and some Comics Daily-endorsed T-Shirts! (continue reading…)

With the return of Steve Rogers announced, most people assumed that the question posed in the title of this book was a bit of a foregone conclusion. However, anyone who felt a bit smug about that gets to eat their own words now, because as it turns out, the answer wasn’t what everyone expected. And since this does take place after an issue that isn’t actually out yet, I’ll extend a spoiler warning: stop reading now if you’re waiting for Reborn #6.

The rest of you, though, can keep reading.

So. The news that Rogers won’t immediately re-assume the role of Captain America was, for what it’s worth, something of a twist. Whether this is a genuine act of deference or merely killing time to allow for a more public return during Siege is less clear – but for now, we’re free to enjoy the potential stories it opens up. Will Steve take on a new identity? Will Bucky give it up before the classic Avengers team reassembles? It isn’t immediately clear, and that, in itself, is an impressive quality in a comic, because it means that Brubaker’s plotting and characters are well-formed enough to throw doubt on company character politics – even when there’s a Captain America movie in the works.

The issue itself, while posed as an epilogue to Reborn, is actually more of a segue back into the regular series, with Brubaker writing and Guice on art. The content, though, marks it out as something particularly special, with a fantastic grasp on the role of Captain America and how it applies to both Bucky and Rogers. Brubaker infuses Rogers in particular with an unusual sense of melancholy about being Captain America – and not just because of what he thinks is in store for Bucky if he re-assumes the role. There’s one fantastic scene where Steve watches Bucky in action, and when he steps in himself, it’s shown as not so much as a natural response, more as an entirely mechanical one. Would that all superhero comics were capable of such nuance.

Although Reborn ultimately came over as a bit underwhelming, this issue reminds us exactly how Brubaker managed to make Captain America into such a high-selling title in the first place. Yes, it’s been out a couple of weeks now, but despite the title of this one-shot, it’s worth picking up for plenty of reasons far beyond the mere plot it contains. It’s really the kind of character piece that can be enjoyed over and over.

This week: Capsule reviews of The Brave & the Bold #30, Cable #21, Captain America Reborn #5, Dark Avengers #12 and X-Men Legacy #230! (continue reading…)

This week: Vengeance of the Capsule Reviews! Covering Anti-Venom: New Ways to Live #1 (the second stupidest-named comic on stands this week), Batman and Robin #4, Captain America: Reborn #3 and Vengeance of the Moon Knight #1! (continue reading…)

[We don't normally say it, but since this is a big event: Beware. Spoilers are ahead.]

Okay. There’s this series, right. It’s intricately plotted, tightly dialogued and it isn’t afraid of playing the long game when it comes to handling its myriad secrets and mysteries, leaving its fans hanging for months, even years before revealing the whole picture. It’s truly unique in its field, with a multi-faceted cast and a brilliantly consistent level of quality. Just when you get a handle on where it’s going, it yanks the rug from under you. Somehow, against the odds, it’s managed to stretch beyond the genre-ghetto that spawned it and truly enter the public consciousness without ever compromising the singular vision of its creators. And we all know what that series is.

Yes, I like Lost as much as the next person. And the next person is apparently Ed Brubaker, because for reasons I can’t begin to comprehend, he’s managed to replicate one of Lost’s most memorable plot points wholesale. And we’re not just talking homage, here, we’re talking “oh, that’s a good idea, I can use it.” And we know this because the issue delights in using the same wording – that’s THE SAME, not SIMILAR – that Lost itself uses to distill its often complicated concepts into simple, comprehensible slices of dialogue. “Steve Rogers has come unstuck in time,” says Armin Zola. “[They] kept referring to me as The Constant,” says Sharon Carter. “We have to move the island,” says The Falcon. Well, maybe not that last one, things are already starting to blur a little.

Now, let’s be fair – Lost didn’t invent the “unstuck in time” concept. Slaughterhouse Five did it way earlier, for one. But it didn’t have a “Constant” like Lost did and Cap does, nor was Slaughterhouse Five the basis of a massively prominent TV series watched by millions over the last 5 years. Let me be clear: I am in no way questioning Brubaker’s credibility as a writer – everyone gets their ideas from somewhere, after all. I am, however, questioning his timing and judgement. Was now the right time to do an  “unstuck in time” plot? And was there really no better way to refer to these concepts than the same way Lost does? The story itself isn’t bad, but it undoubtedly suffers when considered against the wider cultural context of its release.

And what of the story? Well, it’s… okay. Hitch’s pencils are as good as ever, though the scenes of WW2-era Cap make Reborn look far too similar to the Millar/Hitch Ultimates for comfort. In a book where the originality of the writing already feels compromised, it doesn’t help to have large swathes of the artwork looking like re-purposed Ultimates offcuts. The prominent use of both Mighty and Dark Avengers cast members takes the book outside Captain America’s usual insular world, justifying the story’s spinning-out into a miniseries, but the additional grounding in the Marvel Universe means that it lacks the timeless quality of Brubaker’s run to date. It’s all a bit, well, underwhelming.

One thing you can’t fault it for, however, is delivering what it was supposed to. If you want to know what happened to Steve Rogers, well good news: there’s no dodging it here. And the question of how they’ll get him from where he is to where he should be does sound like a story I want to read. The only thing that remains to be seen is whether the rest of the series can give me something to worry about that takes precedence over how similar its plot points are to Lost. It’s not impossible, but really, that shouldn’t have been this big of a distraction in the first place.