Broken Frontier

Ed Brubaker and Steve McNiven’s Captain America #1 is the perfect introduction or jumping-on point for new readers.  For those, on the other side, who have followed Steve Rogers from Captain America to man-out-of-time and finally to Super-Soldier, expect nothing less than a great and fresh story from this series’ first issue.

The bulk of this issue serves the one major purpose of reacquainting the world to Steve Rogers as Captain America.  Brubaker further reintroduces friendly and well-known faces like Nick Fury and Dum Dum Dugan, and also the sinister, new Baron Zemo.  The story is not, however, all fun, games, and reminiscing about the good ol’ days.  Rogers is, almost out the gate, confronted by a deadly serious ghost from his past, one that plans to reap his revenge on his old ally.  By returning Rogers to the mantle of Captain America, and for all intents and purposes having a blank slate on which to write, Brubaker is able to take full advantage of Rogers’ history, both known and unknown.

The most exciting part of this first issue, hands down, is McNiven’s art.  Each page is beautifully drawn, often with fresh ways of breaking the frames, regardless of whether Steve Rogers is reminiscing or caught in a present-day firestorm.  McNiven is a master at positioning the human figure into scenes that take full advantage of the sequential format.  Rogers, Fury, and their newly rediscovered enemy are positioned so well in the action scenes that their forms appear to be dashing across the page.  The two page spread of Cap throwing his mighty shield, furthermore, emanates raw, kinetic energy as it crosses the scene and collides with street-poles and heads alike.  There is much to enjoy in the quiet scenes, too, where McNiven pencils some amazingly expressive faces and detailed backgrounds.

With what Brubaker accomplished over the past few years writing Bucky wielding the shield, I have no doubt his new take on Steve Rogers will be a refreshing direction for the original Captain America.  Both new and old fans alike have much to enjoy here, in the first issue of Captain America.