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Location: center of despair to the left of depression
Posts: 13,318
Captain America died.
Captain America returns.
It is comicbooks.
What makes it fun to read is the HOW. I have not been buying the original books but I have been picking up the TPBs and this "return" is different. It deals with the heroes / friends of Cap and his villians whom are as emotionally attached to him as his friends.
Its been a good read. Breaking down the mystery and the emotions behind it have been good. From Tony Stark's torn emotions to the whole thing to Bucky's torn emotions at becoming the new Cap.
As for the heroes reacting to Bucky being Cap. the recent New Avengers summed it up most. Spider-man is stunned because Bucky SHOTS a villian in the head to stop from killing a hostage. Yes- all know that the armored helmet would block a fatal shot but this is Captain America using a gun in a possibly fatal shooting.
I knew Cap would return but not how and I am enjoying it as it unravels.
As for the heroes reacting to Bucky being Cap. the recent New Avengers summed it up most. Spider-man is stunned because Bucky SHOTS a villian in the head to stop from killing a hostage. Yes- all know that the armored helmet would block a fatal shot but this is Captain America using a gun in a possibly fatal shooting.
I knew Cap would return but not how and I am enjoying it as it unravels.
I'm personally surprised that anyone who knew Cap would be surprised. Sure, he's a "boyscout"...but he was a soldier before he was Cap. I'm sure he was involved in more than one fatal shooting.
Yes, hostage vs War is different in all ways (situation, time, pressure, morals, etc.), but still, the point remains that the original had it within him to kill.
Yes, hostage vs War is different in all ways (situation, time, pressure, morals, etc.), but still, the point remains that the original had it within him to kill.
Indeed, I remember back when I was collecting--many years ago--the organization ULTIMATUM has hijacked a plane and were holding the passengers hostage. Cap infiltrated the base, at one point dressing in an ULTIMATUM uniform. He found the hostages, and took out one of the guards with his shield, but the other began firing at the crowd.
Cap took him down with the Uzi he was carrying as part of the disguise, without hesitation. He felt awful afterward and set about trying to redeem himself, but he absolutely didn't hesitate to use lethal force when there was absolutely no other option.
__________________ Ari Marmell
aka
Mouseferatu
--Rodent of the Dark
Jack7, you don't seem to know jack about Captain America. To start -- he has shot people before, as Mouseferatu noted (and ISTR Golden Age Cap comics not being terribly concerned with the lives of Nazi soldiers). Cap's changed a lot, but since it's an ongoing serial story, the changes are cyclical, so he tends to come back to similar positions over time.
I won't comment on your apparent visions of "leader" and "heroic", though.
__________________ - Bob Huss
[H]e's dead and poisoned and possibly insane on another plane. It's a very stylish death, but a definitive one. - Piratecat
Indeed, I remember back when I was collecting--many years ago--the organization ULTIMATUM has hijacked a plane and were holding the passengers hostage. Cap infiltrated the base, at one point dressing in an ULTIMATUM uniform. He found the hostages, and took out one of the guards with his shield, but the other began firing at the crowd.
Cap took him down with the Uzi he was carrying as part of the disguise, without hesitation. He felt awful afterward and set about trying to redeem himself, but he absolutely didn't hesitate to use lethal force when there was absolutely no other option.
This was during Mark Gruenwald's (longish) tenure on the comic. He was the definitive Cap writer for me, and a lot of the folks who are fans of him today base their notions of Cap on Gruenwald's version, even though many don't know it. It is somewhat painful for me to say the name to someone who claims to be a Cap fan and they're like "who?" Except for perhaps John Ostrander, he's the most underrated of prolific comic storytellers, and that's a shame in an age when comics are overrun with a cult-of-personality mentality directed towards obnoxious, unremittingly-negative, fan-exploiting writers who produce as many misses as hits.
My ambivalence on Cap's resurrection has to do with my desire to see the Marvel and DC canons move in a new direction--you know, evolve. Torches get passed, stories end and begin. It's not just an endless time warp perpetually staggering characters through time. Iron Man was in the Korean War...no, make that make that the Vietnam Conflict...no make that Desert Storm....And Cap? Cap was in ice for twenty years...no, thirty...no, fifty....
Eh, there were about 6 different versions of Superman by the 1990's...not including the original evil one. (That one didn't sell well, so the character was rewritten as a hero...the rest is history.)
The problem with passing the torch is that it fails miserably with flagship characters.
You can pass the torch with Green Lantern and the Flash, because they are actually second string. But any attempt to do so with Superman or Batman alienates people... some of them not even current readers. You can bounce the Beast and Iceman around between teams, retcon their history to heck and back, but changes to Spider-man and Captain America freak out large segments of the population.
Personally, I wish they would just start over completely every 5 years. Wipe the continuity clean for real. But continuity wipes drive teh hardcorez collectors bat-guano loco. It is as if knowing a cumbersome, impenetrable, often contradictory and frequently silly continuity makes them special, and the removal of that barrier to entry is a sin against them.
I think it would be the best solution, however, as you can always be a bit more risky with a specific version of a "mythic" character that has a 5-year lifespan. And it allows comic book writers to actually plot and tell stories that have a beginning, middle, and end. This is why "Elseworlds" style graphic novels often rock on toast.... creative freedom. Inject some of that into the actual comics.
Whenever they do a "continuity wipe" they always set right about reintroducing the entire rogue's gallery and muddying the waters right back up. A real reset with some simpler, cleaner storytelling for a few years would be something to see.
The problem with passing the torch is that it fails miserably with flagship characters.
You can pass the torch with Green Lantern and the Flash, because they are actually second string. But any attempt to do so with Superman or Batman alienates people...
Like anything else, it's all in the execution. You make some arbitrary exceptions for Green Lantern and Flash, but in actuality the former torch-passing was far more divisive than the latter because of the difference in how it was handled.
Bucky was unfit to receive the torch because just prior to that he was a mentally-manipulated assassin, terrorist, and mass murderer. This is "One More Day" magic-wand-waving at its worst.
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Personally, I wish they would just start over completely every 5 years. Wipe the continuity clean for real. But continuity wipes drive teh hardcorez collectors bat-guano loco. It is as if knowing a cumbersome, impenetrable, often contradictory and frequently silly continuity makes them special, and the removal of that barrier to entry is a sin against them.
I agree that a periodic reboot is what comics really need. Every couple of generations, do what DC did with the transition from the golden to silver age. Again, the fans will accept or reject based on quality. I don't think it's unreasonable that fans feel their buy-in is an important element.
Like anything else, it's all in the execution. You make some arbitrary exceptions for Green Lantern and Flash, but in actuality the former torch-passing was far more divisive than the latter because of the difference in how it was handled.
Well, I disagree. The torch-passing in GL has not been the problem (it's happened more times than any other high profile character). It was specific decisions made about Hal Jordan that flipped people out all over the joint.
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I agree that a periodic reboot is what comics really need. Every couple of generations, do what DC did with the transition from the golden to silver age. Again, the fans will accept or reject based on quality.
And if some percentage of the audience does reject.... they can pick it up again next switch.... But that won't happen because ultimately the suits are too risk averse and all industries that rely on paper are WAY too cost restrictive right now.
Maybe once we finally get paperless right we'll see real innovation.
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I don't think it's unreasonable that fans feel their buy-in is an important element.
It is entirely unreasonable when they deliberately use it as a bludgeon to keep new people out of the hobby and to short circuit actual growth in the kinds of storytelling that can be done.
Well, I disagree. The torch-passing in GL has not been the problem (it's happened more times than any other high profile character). It was specific decisions made about Hal Jordan that flipped people out all over the joint.
I'm not sure what you're disagreeing about. If you say that it was a specific decision that fans disliked, then you are indeed saying it was the details of the execution, not the basic concept of torch-passing, that was displeasing. And that was my premise.
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And if some percentage of the audience does reject.... they can pick it up again next switch.... But that won't happen because ultimately the suits are too risk averse and all industries that rely on paper are WAY too cost restrictive right now.
Maybe once we finally get paperless right we'll see real innovation.
Well, the upshot of the superhero movie craze is that every character is a valuable IP. The only reason to kill them is to bring them back on a high note--kinda like the McRib sandwich's "limited time" availability.
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It is entirely unreasonable when they deliberately use it as a bludgeon to keep new people out of the hobby and to short circuit actual growth in the kinds of storytelling that can be done.
Part of the weird nature of the cult-of-personality attitude in comics is the idea put forth by folks like Warren Ellis and Mark Millar that the fans should learn to check themselves and accept the hand they're dealt--after all, rockstar comic writers write what they want to write, not what others want to read. If I think it's messed up in countless ways to have Spider-Man and Wolverine in the Avengers, or I don't like seeing a bone-breaking brutal Ultimate Cap or a cannibalistic Ultimate Hulk, well I should just keep my objections to myself. I happen to think that's nuts. If I hate what's being done with the New Ultimate Mighty Avengers, it really doesn't gladden me that new fans are being attracted. I want the New Ultimate Mighty Avengers to fail.
Furthermore, I'll posit that a price tag of $5 for 32 flimsy pages of padded stories that play out over excessively long arcs for the benefit of trade-paperbacking has a lot more to do with the dwindling number of readers than the grousing of detractors like myself.
Well, the upshot of the superhero movie craze is that every character is a valuable IP. The only reason to kill them is to bring them back on a high note--kinda like the McRib sandwich's "limited time" availability.
I, for one, would welcome the McRib being trapped in an iceberg for 50 years...
Side note: I was actually in one of the original McRib taste tests back in the 1970s. For the record, I hated it.
Ditto Magic Shell ice-cream topping.
Years later, both were still around...but at least the latter had improved.
Sure, he's a "boyscout"...but he was a soldier before he was Cap. I'm sure he was involved in more than one fatal shooting.
His entire career in the Army is as Cap; he's picked for the experiment because he's so totally unfit to be a soldier that he's been rejected.
He and Bucky kill people many, many, many times over in the war years. You wanna see mass carnage? Tie up Bucky or threaten Cap's life; either one gets you a death sentence from Bucky. One time he thinks Cap has been killed, so he sends an entire U-Boat to the bottom of the ocean.
I'm not sure what you're disagreeing about. If you say that it was a specific decision that fans disliked, then you are indeed saying it was the details of the execution, not the basic concept of torch-passing, that was displeasing. And that was my premise.
Let me clarify:
It was specific decisions made about Hal Jordan decades after he passed the torch the first time that flipped people out all over the joint.
My only point was that people can accept Green Lanterns who are not Hal Jordan and any number of Flash characters, but they seem unable to accept Batmans who are not Bruce Wayne as anything other than a temporary situation.
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Well, the upshot of the superhero movie craze is that every character is a valuable IP. The only reason to kill them is to bring them back on a high note--kinda like the McRib sandwich's "limited time" availability.
Actually... no. The movies themselves are the meaningful revenue stream, AFAICT. The comic doesn't need to be there at all anymore, since the only characters who get movies are the ones who have been pop culture icons for a LONG time. And I think it's telling that the movies only succeed when they start from scratch. Even continuing off previous movies as Superman Returns did is a big mistake.
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Furthermore, I'll posit that a price tag of $5 for 32 flimsy pages of padded stories that play out over excessively long arcs for the benefit of trade-paperbacking has a lot more to do with the dwindling number of readers than the grousing of detractors like myself.
True. But the legitimately consumer unfriendly atmosphere in comic book shops and new customer unfriendly nature of the stories don't help.
The nice thing about being a modern myth is that you're very accessible. Everyone gets the idea right off the bat. Deliberately keeping those characters stuck in a soap operatic level of nonsensical plots for 20, 30, or 50 years eliminates that benefit handily.
That's why the movies succeed while the comics continue to fail.
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I missed that the first time through.
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