This issue—written by David Kraft, who wrote the Spider-Man team-up in issues #265-266, and featuring similar over-the-top dialogue and exposition—is situated in the world of professional wrestling, which turns out to be a passion of Bernie Rosenthal's but is completely alien to Steve Rogers. (Whether you're more like Bernie or Steve in this respect, you'll... Continue Reading →
This fill-in issue calls back to one of Captain America's first solo stories after coming out of the ice, and like the last issue it has a strong theme: prison reform and the rehabilitation of convicted criminals. (Note the striking cover by writer Al Milgrom, which was curiously similar to Frank Miller's cover to Amazing... Continue Reading →
This issue wraps up the story begun in the previous one, in which Captain America faced Batroc the Leaper and Mr. Hyde and ended up in quite a pickle, as shown in the opening splash page below—and as you would expect, Cap remains defiant as ever. Poor Mr. Hyde is frustrated by how strong... Continue Reading →
This issue and the next are a return to traditional superheroics after the presidential diversion of the last issue as two classic villains—at least one of them beloved on this blog—team up to face Captain America, who continues to adjust to his new life as Steve Rogers, freelance artist, with new friends and neighbors in... Continue Reading →
These three comics finish up Captain America's search for the Falcon that began in the last issue, and which also brings in the Hulk for a cross-over at the end—and we find out who the mystery Jim is who the Falcon went looking for in the first place! Captain America #229 opens where the last... Continue Reading →
These three issues reintroduce another Golden Age Timely Comics hero to the book, and Captain America has a Superman/Captain Marvel moment when he discovers a comic book character with a strikingly familiar origin to his (and I'm not talking about his own portrayal in the Marvel Universe version of Timely Comics). All of this... Continue Reading →
No, you didn't stumble onto my The Tao of Iron Fist site. (Not yet, at least.) Much more than your average guest appearance, this issue near the end of Iron Fist's first 15-issue series (following nearly a year's run in Marvel Premiere, all collected here) is more like an issue of Marvel Team-Up or Marvel... Continue Reading →
These three issues finish out Jack Kirby's "Madbomb" storyline, with which he began his return to writing and drawing Captain America earlier in 1976. As I explained earlier, Kirby's 1976-1978 run was light on explicitly ethics-related content, so I cover these issues in batches and fairly quickly. In fact, the most interesting part of these... Continue Reading →
We have reached the conclusion of "The 50s Cap Saga," the storyline which began in issue #153. To summarize (most from the last issue): the Captain America and Bucky from the 1950s, who were cryogenically frozen after they became unhinged and went from fighting Communists to attacking anyone they regarded as not "real Americans," were... Continue Reading →
These two issues of Captain America continue the storyline with the Red Skull that began in issues #101 and 102, now that the villain knows about Captain America's love for Sharon Carter. More important, Cap finally learns Sharon's name (as does the reader)! Maybe now he can stop calling her "girl" and "lady" (not that... Continue Reading →
THE VIRTUES OF CAPTAIN AMERICA 