The Mourning After

First off, if you're dying to read some professional coverage of Cap's death, click here for an interview with the writer of the issue in question, Ed Brubaker, or here for an article about the continuing media coverage, including Cap's death being featured on The Colbert Report.

Now it's time for some more thoughts about all of this Cap bruhaha by your Humble Blogger. In reflecting on the events of the past few weeks, vis-a-vis Steve Rogers, I worked myself up a bit last night when I remembered how ignomoniously he's been treated of late. From the "I guess the A on his forehead stands for France" jokes that started up after his surrender in Civil War # 7, to the interview in Civil War Frontline # 11 where some dolt of a reporter took him to task for not knowing what MySpace is or following the sexploits of Paris Hilton, right through to the rotten vegetables hurled his way just before he was shot... he seemed to really get the short end of the stick lately. One of the nice aspects of Captain America # 25 was the job author Brubaker did providing background on Cap's heroics, from World War II forward, so there's no doubt in my mind that Bru at least holds the deceased in high regard. He even allowed him to die a hero's death, since he put himself between a sniper and an innocent victim, rather than simply being shot unawares. I'm just not so sure the rest of Marvel's braintrust has as much respect for the shield-slinger.

I also started considering where Cap fits in the current Marvel hierarchy. When Superman was killed in 1993, there was no doubt in anyone's mind that he was one of the top two most recognizable superheroes of all time, neck-and-neck with Batman. On the day when that story broke the mainstream media in half - OK, I exaggerate! - you would've been hard-pressed to find anyone who didn't know who Superman was, including his secret identity, the name of his girlfriend, his origin, and probably even the newspaper he worked for! That's a pretty deep level of penetration outside of the comic industry, when you think about it.

By contrast, I suspect a great majority of the people who read, watched or heard any of the news stories yesterday probably reacted, in part, with, "Hmmm... so Steve Rogers was Cap's secret identity.. I did not know that!" We all know Superman was rocketed to Earth as a baby from the dying planet Krypton, but how many people knew Cap was a product of the Super Soldier Serum in World War II and then got stuck in a block of ice until the modern age? If Sharon Carter had been named as the person who unwittingly shot him, how many John Q. Publics out there would've thought, "Wait a minute! How could his longtime, off-and-on girlfriend ever sink to that level?" My point being, while I imagine a lot of people have heard of Captain America at some point in their life, I bet they knew very little about him.

Had Marvel Comics killed off Spider-Man yesterday, I think you could argue that would've been roughly on the same level as what DC did in 1993. (And we'd all be even more certain that the character was coming back in the short term, too!) That's no slight on Cap; it's just reality. What bothers me about them gakking Cap is that, like Superman, he represents something noble that seems to be almost looked down upon these days. Supes is often referred to as "the big blue Boy Scout", and Cap has a similar reputation, at least among fans. I personally think nobility in heroes is a fascinating trait, especially when you write stories that stretch them to their limits in terms of facing tests of that inner character strength. For the past decade and a half, though, comics have spent a lot of ink knocking down various icons, and I worry that some part of this decision within the House of Ideas stemmed from not wanting to have to tell tales about a man so "out of touch with modern reality." As I've written before, Brubaker was doing a great job in this series of showing just how relevant Cap could still be in the 21st century. But maybe The Powers That Be at Marvel didn't agree?

Anyway, I personally hope Steve Rogers comes back at some point, if the story can be done well, and he can come back intact. I don't need a gritty, driven version of the character; if that were to happen, I'd say, "Leave him dead!" And if more fans come into the industry as a result of this, then I guess it had to be a good thing.