The Sentinel of Liberty

Among Saturday’s other cinematic blather, we also touched on the well-deserved hoopla surrounding Captain America’s 70th birthday, and the proposed film to be directed by Joe Johnston.  Since Johnston’s The Wolfman (not to be confused with The Wolf Man, of which it is a remake) is getting kicked around the block in certain circles, I’m not sure if the latter is cause for celebration or not, but I did like one of his efforts, Hidalgo, very much.  And I find it extremely encouraging that the film has been announced as The First Avenger: Captain America.

Here’s the thing:  I’ve been a Cap fan for decades, but I always liked the character—who, let’s face it, represents America at its best—better than his actual book.  (Standard disclaimer:  I bought and read Marvel Comics religiously up through the mid-1980s, but my frame of reference ends there, so I can’t comment on anything done since.)  I became a regular reader of Captain America just before Jack Kirby’s return in #193, while simultaneously catching up on his earliest Silver Age adventures, reprinted from Tales of Suspense alongside Iron Man’s in Marvel Double Feature.

I was as excited as anyone else when King Kirby returned to the fold from D.C., yet in retrospect, I think the decision to elevate him to writer-artist status—presumably a condition for his return—was a mistake.  Kirby’s visual prowess was undimmed, but I didn’t really care for his writing in Captain America, The Black Panther, or The Eternals, although I did buy all three books faithfully, albeit not Kirby’s short-lived 2001.  It’s perhaps just as well, then, that Kirby’s “triumphant” return didn’t last all that long.

Similarly, as I look over the preceding Captain America covers on the invaluable Cover Browser website (http://www.coverbrowser.com/), I don’t see any individual ones, let alone sustained runs, that stand out in my memory.  But I still find I’m excited by looking at these issues, many of which I later acquired.  They feature fun villains (e.g., the Stranger, Mr. Hyde, the Scorpion, the Serpent Squad, the Yellow Claw and, of course, Cap’s arch-enemy, the Red Skull) and have nice cover art, although at some point the interiors fell to Frank Robbins, probably one of my two least-favorite pencillers, along with Carmine Infantino.

The point is that as much as I liked Cap, I always preferred seeing him as a member, and often the leader, of the Avengers, rather than in his solo title (and even that he shared for years with the Falcon).  This is partly just my bias in favor of team books, which I’ve consistently preferred.  In fact, setting aside brief bursts of glory like Steranko’s Nick Fury and Starlin’s Captain Marvel and Warlock, and several underdogs that I championed to no avail (e.g., Super-Villain Team-Up), The Avengers was my favorite book over the long haul.  Through the many changes of roster down the years, Cap was a pretty consistent member, and always seemed to me like the heart and soul of the group.

I’m not sure why they’re referring to Cap as “The First Avenger” when he wasn’t a member of the original team:  Thor, Iron Man, the Hulk, Ant-Man, and the Wasp.  He didn’t get discovered, defrosted, and recruited until #4, although that’s pretty early.  Maybe they mean “First” chronologically, since as a Golden Age WW II superhero (whose exploits I enjoyed, for far too short a time, in another beloved team book, The Invaders, once again initially penciled by the dreaded Mr. Robbins), he certainly predated the founding members.  Since Cap’s alter ego, Steve Rogers, was one of the few Marvel superheroes who had actually fought in uniform—a distinction I believe he shared with Ben (The Thing) Grimm and Reed (Mr. Fantastic) Richards of the Fantastic Four—that military background helped make him eminently suitable to lead the Avengers.

Perhaps his finest hour came during the era of “Cap’s Kooky Quartet,” beginning in #16, when every remaining founding member (the Hulk was already long gone) left for various reasons, although all later returned at one time or another.  It was left to Cap to hammer out a viable team with three new, and comparatively weak, members, Hawkeye and the mutant siblings Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch, all of whom had ironically been villains before.  Bereft of the raw power of Iron Man and Thor, they had to make do as much with their wits and Cap’s leadership skills as anything else, which led to some great storytelling, to which artist Don Heck (Shellhead’s co-creator, let us remember) was eminently well suited.

There’s talk of Johnston’s Hidalgo star, Viggo Mortensen, playing Cap.  He was terrific as Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings, so God knows I’m not knockin’ the guy (and we’re both part Danish, so rock on), but despite his being born in Manhattan, it’s a little hard for me to envision him as the quintessentially all-American Sentinel of Liberty.  I’d love to be wrong, though, and to see both him and the film be a resounding success.  Time will tell.

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