Star-Spangled Man with a Plan: Captain America

I remember when the first Spider-Man movie came out – it marked the beginning of the superhero movies as we know them today, at least for my generation. (I’m a 90s kid, a millennial, a college student, and also the only female voice you’ll find in this project; take a look at my references page!). After Spider-Man, the studios fumbled around for a bit with this newfound power (and, you know, the newfound responsibility…) until they oh-so-fatefully decided to make Iron Man. Everything changed, and before we knew it, we were gearing up for the Avengers. And suddenly Captain America, Thor, Black Widow, and Nick Fury were household names. Today, we await one of the biggest movies of the year, and arguably the biggest Marvel Cinematic Universe movie to-date – Captain America: Civil War, hitting US theaters in a blaze of shield-throwing, tear-jerking glory on May 6th. A Marvel fan myself (DC? Me? Never!), I remember when I first became aware of the Star-Spangled Man with a Plan himself; it was in 2007, when Marvel made headlines in every major news outlet by killing Captain America in the comics. Well, it was specifically Steve Rogers they killed (more on that later), but no one outside of the comic book world saw it that way at the time. This was like killing Superman, except more of a statement and more of a controversy to those who saw it that way. And it wasn’t that hard to see it that way, either. You see, everything Captain America does – anything he endorses, or fights, or chooses, or says, or feels – makes a statement in one way or another, whether his writers want or intend for him to or not. Killing him was a painful blow to many Americans, even if they’d never picked up a comic book before in their lives. Before you get depressed, however, don’t worry – Steve came back to life, and Captain America remained as strong a symbol as ever throughout it all.

1939: A Star-Spangled Sucker-Punch

After all, he was created in 1939 by Jewish writers Jack Kirby and Joe Simon, who wrote for Timely Comics (what Marvel was originally named) in New York. Steve Rogers, Cap himself, was drawn in blond-haired, blue-eyed, strapping Aryan perfection – the spitting image of what Hitler would have gone bananas over. Before he was a Mr. Universe specimen, however, Steve was a scrawny, sickly young man from New York city who wanted nothing more than to defend the world against Nazis by joining the US army. His bravery earned him the attention of a secret project creating super soldiers – they’d supply the muscle, but above all, they needed soldiers with a good heart and a strong moral compass. Well, if there is one thing Steve Rogers has always had, it’s a good heart. And if there’s another thing he’s always had, it’s a strong moral compass. He’s also always had a fantastic uniform, but I digress. He was the man for the job, and his story broke on the cover of his very first issue, which was published before the United States had entered World War II. What was Captain America’s first act upon entering the comic book world? Punching Hitler right in the kisser, of course. With the super soldier serum bringing him to peak physical perfection and super strength, Steve Rogers took everything Hitler idolized, and turned it against the Fuhrer. Captain America knew what needed to be done, and in the real world, the US was soon to follow suit.

Before we head further into the territory of star-spangled spandex and spoilers, let me first say that I, like many others, have really come to appreciate the character of Captain America since his Marvel Studios trilogy began. These movies prompted me to look into his many, many comic book stories and eras, and to get a more authentic and informed view of this unique superhero – a national icon. When Captain America: The Winter Soldier hit theaters in April 2014, I was absolutely won over by the idea of Captain America. I watched the film countless times, and what stood out to me was how analogous it was with the Snowden, uh, “scandal”, shall we say. The film came out only a few months after Edward Snowden was making headlines and doing press – being named a communist traitor by some and a patriot by others. The rhetoric of Steve Rogers in The Winter Soldier hits home to this day, naming such a surveillance program “holding a gun to everyone on Earth and calling it protection” and reminding us that “the price of freedom is high”, among other applause-inducing statements. Comparing the NSA “era”, if you will, to Captain America: The Winter Soldier was such a fascinating endeavor that I was inspired to see what other eras of American history he dealt with, and how.

The 1940s: If Scooby Doo had a Shield and an American Dream

In the early days of Captain America, the comics were kooky, kitschy, and full of that inherently cheesy 40s intrigue. The villains were, first and foremost, Nazis, but extended to all kinds of, rather unfortunately, racially-charged enemies like the Japanese. Russian and German stereotypes abounded (in terribly corny renditions of German, I might add, as someone who speaks the language – can’t have it all, I suppose). Considering Pearl Harbor, Captain America in this case was a reflection of his times, not only in terms of current events, but current sentiment. This bled over into the post-WWII climate, of course, because Captain America wasn’t just born to fight Nazis! He was born and bred to fight any enemy of the American Dream, and in the McCarthy era, well, you know who that enemy was. Cap became the Commie Smasher, taking out spies and Russian sleeper-cells, and exposing Communist schemes with his super skills. This is where the Captain America timeline gets confusing, however, because he gets frozen in icy waters during a dangerous mission while still in the midst of World War II. This is retroactively written, and is “canon” as far as the Captain America Earth 616 story is concerned. (Side note: it’s not just the Marvel universe, it’s the multiverse. There are a few main universes going on, but you see, having multiple universes makes it very easy for Marvel to kill a character in one, but have him or her going strong in another. It also makes pretty much any bizarre storyline explainable – chalk it up to crossed timelines or parallel universes. The main universe, which I focus almost exclusively on here, is Earth 616. It’s the mainstage, so to speak).

But back to the botched mission where Cap becomes, as the cinematic Tony Stark/Iron Man names him, “Capsicle”, and has to wait a few years before he can be thawed and resume his mantle. That mission is fateful in more ways than just giving Steve Rogers a convenient place to hang out for a while, because it also marks the death of his kid-sidekick, the foul-mouthed and endearingly pugnacious Bucky Barnes. It’s kind of like the death of Uncle Ben – it has a massive effect on Steve’s psyche and is an event to which he often emotionally returns. The difference is that, unlike Uncle Ben, Bucky doesn’t stay dead. More on that later.

The 1950s: In Soviet Russia, Spandex Wear You

Now, I know what you’re going to ask: so while Cap is frozen in the ice, how is he also fighting communists…? Well, Cap of the 1950s, it turns out, was not in fact Steve Rogers all along! It was William Burnside, a man whose existence explains not only the fact that there was a Captain America running around while Steve Rogers was frozen, but also makes the propagandistic nature of Captain America in the 1950s much more understandable – after all, William Burnside is known in the Marvel universe as “psychotic 1950s Cap”, and becomes a villain in his own right later on (they call him the “Grand Director”, and if that doesn’t ring of the KKK, I don’t know what does). So, interestingly, William Burnside’s somewhat retroactive existence (it gets far more confusing considering he had his own version of Bucky as well, because the actual Bucky Barnes was dead, remember?) softens the blow of the Red Scare era of Captain America. Fans of what Captain America stands for can live with the fact that during those years he was a bit of a hyper-patriotic, commie-smashing nutcase. William Burnside is characterized as the fanatical, misguided Captain America – always striving to be worthy of the name and the shield, but forever missing the mark. Well, we can’t all be Steve Rogers.

1963: There Can Only Be One

Speaking of Steve, 1963 marked the year he was thawed from his icy cocoon and proceeded to join the Avengers as one of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes! Eerily coincident with the year of the rightful Captain America’s de-icing is, of course, the assassination of JFK. Though I was quite obviously not alive at that time, the impact of JFK’s death marks, to me, the end of an era in terms of perceived American innocence and naivety – at the very least in a political sense. Steve Rogers has always embodied a fresh and perpetual sense of the American Dream, even to a fault, and it was as though 1963’s tragic events called for a reboot of good ol’ American freedom – an order which Steve Rogers has always been eager and willing to serve up. Now the leader of the Avengers, Captain America was the hero we needed and deserved in 1963.

The 1970s: The Pervasive Grip of Disco and Nixon

The 1970s saw Steve Rogers joined by Sam Wilson, the Falcon, as his villain-fighting partner. As one of the original African American superheroes, debuting in 1969 just a few years after Black Panther, the Falcon was the perfect partner for Steve. His humor, outspokenness, and strong-headed conviction often made him, out of the two, the character who said what we were all thinking. His treatment by villains was marred by the lingering, post-Civil Rights movement racism, and such degrading speech is one of the things Sam fought against. What also pervaded the 1970s Captain America comics was a post-Watergate disillusionment. Cap of the 70s handles the Watergate scandal by introducing a villain who is implied to be ol’ Dick Nixon himself. Imagine Steve Rogers’ shock and dismay. He hangs up the mantle for a while because he is so disappointed and broken by the state of the American government, an entity which he has for so long faithfully served. Watergate was a shock. It was depressing for many reasons, one of which being the near-impeachment and resignation of a president – a national embarrassment and fiasco that proved our leaders to be as petty as the common folk. Much like the effect the scandal had on modern American history and sentiment, Watergate was a point of no return for Captain America in terms of what he believed and who he fought for. It was for the People, no longer the regime.

The 1980s: When People Thought Their Candidate Choices Were Bad

What could fix the state of the nation? What kind of president did the people cry out for? A Sentinel of Liberty? A national icon? A star-spangled man with a plan? You see where I’m going with this…in the 1980s, Captain America was asked, in the Marvel universe, to run for president. Though coated with a layer of 80s cheese, Captain America in this era still dealt with the feelings of the day. The people demanded to have Steve Rogers, now having resumed the mantle of Cap, as president. In an eloquent and respectful speech, he declined the candidacy – one which he surely would have won, had he chosen to run. And ain’t that the rub? Everyone knew it, and Cap, without so explicitly stating it, confirmed the fact that good people just don’t seem to run for president. Perhaps looking for a fellow like Steve Rogers is setting the bar a tad high, but if there’s one thing modern Americans can have faith in, it’s that our leaders almost without fail will let us down. I don’t think it was always so, and Cap certainly didn’t, but the rhetoric of his patriotism has noticeably shifted in focus – rather than fighting for, as he once did, what America is, he fights for what it can be.

The Early 2000s: The Weight of the Nation Grows Heavier

That’s why I think the 9/11 remembrance arc (beginning in 2003), was as authentically Captain America as it possibly could have been (yes, we’re skipping the 90s, because it was kind of a cultural void anyway, wasn’t it?). If you want to be caught all choked up with a comic book in your hand, read Captain America: The New Deal. The weight of the tragedy is poignantly and tastefully explored by the hero most appropriate to feel the sorrow of an attack on American soil. His new enemies in this arc are of course terrorists, but their characterization isn’t as polarizing or hyper-patriotic as one might expect from, well, the perspective of a man named Captain America.

The first volume of the story takes special care to establish the fact that Steve Rogers respects and fights for every American – no matter their ancestry, culture, or religion. While such characterization may not have represented popular sentiment in 2003 (or even today), Steve Rogers gets us all right in the feels when he helps a Muslim American and another grieving American reconcile their differences as countrymen; Steve reminds them who the enemy is, and, more importantly, who the enemy is not. The issue itself takes a brave stance, and, as I said, is as reflective of Captain America and his strengths as it possibly could be.

The Mid-2000s: Winter is Coming

I think, over the last decade or so, that pop culture in general has trended toward the darker and grittier. The light-hearted, all-is-right-with-the-world stories don’t draw as much mass appeal as they did in some earlier eras of American pop culture. For Captain America, writer Ed Brubaker’s famous run with the Winter Soldier is one such gritty, dark, and more “real” story in recent comic book history. Imagine finding out that your sidekick, who you’d thought tragically died defending the country in WWII, had been picked up and bounced around by Nazis and Soviets as a brainwashed puppet assassin. It’s not such a happy reunion, especially once said sidekick regains his memories and has to grapple with the crimes he’s committed for his anti-American handlers. It’s a real trip into the moral grey area of Captain America, since it handles both war crimes and prisoners of war in the same package, and revitalizes Cap’s classic Soviet and Fascist foes, with the fight being more personal than ever. This arc is pivotal for Steve Rogers especially, though, because the death of Bucky Barnes was already a defining moment in his life – the return of Bucky Barnes (as a brutal, living weapon, nonetheless!) turned that moment on its head and changed Cap’s universe forever. Steve Rogers, you see, is the ultimate hero – he’s morally convicted, strategic, selfless, self-disciplined, and as pure as the driven snow. Bucky Barnes (new and improved, less Kid Commando and more Soviet stealth master), is the perfect foil for Steve – he’s morally wavering, impulsive, reckless, hot-headed, and permanently marked with the blood of innocents. Steve brings people together and helps them sort out their differences (we saw that in Captain America: The New Deal). Bucky has a bit of a mean streak, and single-handedly (er, metal-armed-ly) takes out an entire bar’s worth of men for dishonoring Steve’s name. He’s loyal to a fault – we have to give him that.  

2007: The Death of Steve Rogers, or as I like to call it “Captain America Gets a Gun”

Well, you may say, good thing they chose Steve Rogers and not Bucky Barnes to be Captain America! That could’ve been said until the fallout of Civil War, which resulted in the death of Steve Rogers, but not Captain America. How? Bucky had to fill those patriotic shoes and wield the shield for quite some time. Now, the death of Captain America was not your every-day Marvel comic issue. As I said, on that day in 2007 I remember the hue and cry and the headlines of many a news outlet that Captain America was dead. To many, it felt like a statement. “The Death of the Dream” they called it, and that stung many an American, from comic book fans to your average radio talk show listener (there was a lot of weighing-in of opinions, let me tell you). Why did Marvel need to kill Steve Rogers? The worth of his status as a national icon was perhaps felt for the first time since his creation. The war on terror was on the forefront of many minds and the pain of 9/11 hadn’t faded (nor will it ever, I imagine, but this event wasn’t even a decade after). Surely at least one bald eagle shed a tear over the comic book death of the Sentinel of Liberty. Now, any reader of comics would have just known that Steve Rogers wasn’t gone for good (if they brought Bucky back, after all, there was no way Steve was permanently out for the count). The interim period, however, provided us with the whirlwind ride that was “Bucky Cap” (an awful moniker which even ol’ Buck himself addresses, but it stuck, so I’m using it).

Our new Sentinel of Liberty wore a darker, more “tacti-cool” suit, carried a gun among other weapons and gadgets, and, oh yeah, used to be an assassin for the US’ two greatest enemy regimes. Right. So you can see why there may have been some skepticism when Bucky became Captain America, but by the end of his run most people thought he did the job quite well. True, he got his companions into a lot of trouble, true, he was not the most diplomatic or tactful Cap, and true, he always believed that he fell short of Steve, and almost purposely fulfilled that belief. True, that once his identity was revealed he was put on trial and sentenced to time in a Russian gulag, and the only way after that that he could go on living was to return the shield to Steve (who graced the Marvel universe with his presence once again), fake his death, and become once more the ghostly operative he used to be (this time as a good guy, though). The anti-hero Captain America we found in Bucky Barnes, though, proved that the star-spangled mantle isn’t wearable only by Steve Rogers – Captain America, it turns out, cannot die. We can’t all be Steve Rogers, obviously. But Bucky Barnes’ ascension to spandexed shield-wielder proves that you don’t have to basically be a saint to be the protector of freedom and the American Dream, for while “trigger-happy” and “foul-mouthed” may describe Bucky, “saintly” certainly does not.

Freedom or Security Becomes Freedom for Security

Civil War, of course, deserves its due. It was, after all, the cause (in a roundabout way) of the death of Steve Rogers. A massive Marvel event that extended to basically every corner of the universe, Civil War was loved by some and hated by some, but either way it was universally-known. For anyone who doesn’t have the slightest inkling as to what the Civil War itself was, in a nutshell, it was the fight between registering superhumans with the government (and by superhumans I mean anyone who had any kind of supernatural “ability”), or, well, not registering them. Let’s think about it – the original superheroes wore masks and had aliases and identities and telephone booths to change in. They juggled their day jobs with their secret crime-fighting lives. Even the original days of Captain America saw Steve Rogers hiding his true identity – in fact that’s why he took on Bucky as a sidekick in the first place, because the little whipper snapper walked in on Cap’s not-so-secure changing room and discovered his true identity, insisting that in order to keep mum, he had to be allowed to work with the hero. So, in Civil War, you can imagine why it wouldn’t go down so well with a LOT of super-

heroes that suddenly they would be forced to be documented and publically-known as superhuman, inhuman, mutant, genius scientist, super spy, or weapons master. How is one supposed to have a promising career as a secretary or part-time photographer when they can’t secretly support themselves on the side by fighting crime?

Anyway, Steve Rogers, once a real government-championing man, believed that this forced

registration was wrong. Very wrong. Like, “do not under any circumstance give in” wrong. On

the opposing side was Tony Stark, who was all for it. Boom, Civil War. How did it turn out?

Awful. Steve was torn up over the relationships it destroyed in the Marvel universe, and the

horrors of war between superpeople. So he gave in, which was an incredible example of Steve

Rogers realizing that the right thing to do, although not agreeable to his world view, was to sacrifice

his fight to stop the fight altogether. Though in terms of might he probably would have won, he gave

up the fight simply to see it ended, and was shot while walking the steps to his day in court. Cap was 

all about freedom, Tony was all about security – the age-old battle that suggests people always think

the two are exclusive. Sadly Steve Rogers, at least for a time, lost his freedom and his life as a

result of this war.  

Shocking! The Cap Movies Marvel Doesn’t Want You To SEE

1979 gifted us with Captain America film the first. He drove a van with a motorcycle in the back for special occasions. If you think that’s bad, wait until you see his helmet. If you hadn’t guessed, this is a story very loosely based on Captain America – the character is named Steve Rogers, but that’s one of few similarities. An all-American meathead, Reb Brown, portrayed our star-spangled-ish man with a half-baked plan in this TV B-movie. A lull, and then Marvel struck (out) again with the 1990 film iteration of Captain America, this time with a man named Steve Rogers who actually is from World War II, does get enlisted in a super-soldier project, fights a villain named the Red Skull, is frozen until a later date, and has a girlfriend named Sharon who’s directly related to his wartime girlfriend. Even with all these similarities, it’s hardly a Cap story, with Red Skull being an Italian fascist (couldn’t find a German for the role?) who has assassinated various important Americans since the 1940s (maybe it was actually the Winter Soldier and they just didn’t know it yet) and Cap once again cast as a brutish, all-American bro in an ill-fitting uniform.

Fast-forward through the decent Spider-Man movies, the awful Daredevil attempt, FOX’s X-Men, the (in my humble opinion) also awful Hulk franchise (seriously, what is the appeal of the Hulk?), the excellent first Iron Man film and the subsequent beginning of the Marvel studios Golden Age, until we reach Captain America: The First Avenger. Compared to the other big Marvel characters’ movies (Thor, Iron Man), Captain America was ‘aight. Compared to its Cap predecessors it was the Titanic. The period-piece nature of the film didn’t jibe with everyone, but what made it the Captain America origin movie we deserved was the casting of Chris Evans as Steve Rogers (and the dedication to the actual comics, minus, for one thing, the fact that Bucky Barnes was no longer the spunky kid sidekick, but instead Steve Rogers’ cool, very much grown-up, friend. He still dies though. And then doesn’t die). Captain America really became cool himself in the Avengers movie, which gave the entire superhero movie industry a facelift – no one had imagined that many heroes working so well in one movie, complete with mega-star actors, effects, action, humor, and a story. Chris Evans’ portrayal of Steve came into its own in this movie, asserting him as (almost) the leader of the Avengers by the end of the film. The audience was ready for more Cap and boy oh boy did they get it with Captain America: The Winter Soldier in 2014, which is arguably Marvel’s best movie to-date.

Complete with unbelievably well-choreographed fight sequences, a killer musical score, an excellent cast, and a compelling storyline, Captain America the second (barring those first two disasterpieces), knocked it right out of the park. Something about a story where our Sentinel of Liberty goes rogue against his organization to protect the nation and the world against a government surveillance and intelligence gathering system that metes out punishment based on people’s digital activities just resonated well with us in 2014…oh right.

2015: It's a bird, it's a plane, it's the Falcon...it's Captain America!

Currently (in Earth 616) the mantle of Captain America is once again not held by Steve Rogers, but by someone we met earlier: Sam Wilson! While Bucky brought a gun – and other assorted assassin gadgetries – to the table during his run as Cap, Sam brings a set of wings and his trusty Falcon sidekick Redwing. Imagine Cap’s shield being thrown from the air; I think it would land a pretty mean hit. Now, as with anything Marvel does that strays from the realm of what fanboys think they are comfortable with, giving an African American hero the mantle of Captain America got, unfortunately, a sizable amount of people in a tizzy (shame on them). Luckily for the rest of us, Marvel ignores such bigotry and pushes forward with an incredible new Captain America/Falcon hybrid in Sam, who still works closely with his old friends Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers. Why not have the shield bounced around between the three of them? As I said before, it’s true that not everyone can be Steve Rogers, but that’s not necessarily what the idea of Captain America is about. After all, if Cap couldn’t evolve and meet the times, how could we expect any American to?

2016: Cap’s Not Angry, Just Disappointed

Captain America: Civil War is being released in just a few days, and as you may recall, this is quite a contentious story. Two sides’ worth of people who should be friends, should treat each other as family, are up in arms over the politics that divide them. What’s hard to grapple with about Civil War is that both sides make valid points, and yet find themselves polarizing as well. In gearing up for the movie, Marvel has encouraged fans to “choose a side” – for some of us, it’s easy. We’re Team Cap or Team Iron Man all the way (take a guess at my team affiliation). For others, the choice is not so black and white, and many would sooner not choose at all. I think this concept of allies divided, with the one-side-or-the-other choice putting everyone between a rock and a hard place, finds itself timely with a certain similar occurrence in the USA today… Yes, Cap does it again, finding relevancy with the American sentiments of the day. Dr. Mark D. White, in his book “The Virtues of Captain America: Modern Day Lessons on Character from a World War II Superhero”, believes that the               significance of Captain America as a unifying force is not to be overlooked. Cap reminds us what ties and values we share, as opposed to what divides us. Being forced to make a choice doesn’t always mean that the issue is black and white. So as you go to see Civil War (which I’m sure you now will, if you’ve read this far), be gentle on your friends who are on the opposing team – and maybe try to understand their side. I think such an approach might come in handy in the USA sometime soon (think around November). And if you’re at a loss, just ask yourself – what would Steve Rogers do? Well, on second thought, faced with such an election, he’d probably hang up the mantle again. But don’t worry, Captain America will always be back when we need him. The dream never actually does die.