Broken Frontier

In a story of political mystery and intrigue, Captain American fights through AIM and AID in a search for weapons of mass destruction and a damaged Cosmic Cube.

Last issue saw Cap, Agent Sharon Carter, and SHIELD stop the AIM splinter group, Advanced Ideas in Destruction (AID) and their terrorist plot to blow up New York City. However, they quickly learned that New York wasn’t the only target. This issue sees Cap and his SHIELD team travel to Paris, while a second team goes to London, in a desperate attempt to keep any other bombs from exploding. Not only that, but the recent murder of his arch-nemesis the Red Skull and the theft of the Cosmic Cube have left Captain America questioning not just who is behind these nefarious plans, but also some of his own memories from World War 2.

Marvel has tried a few different things with the character of Captain America in recent years. They moved him to the Marvel Knights line and brought in Jon Ney Reiber to introduce him to the real world. He fought real world terrorists in real world locations. Then Marvel decided they didn’t like that approach, so they brought in Robert Kirkman to throw Cap squarely back into the superhero world. But after the previous storylines, Kirkman’s story could be seen as too cartoonish. Thankfully, Ed Brubaker has arrived and found a great medium between the 2 extremes. Craftily, he has brought in the issues of terrorism and national security to the superhero world in a realistic way. He captures the dialogue of both the SHIELD and AIM agents in a way that explains the intricacies of the goings on without talking down to or over the head of the reader. He handles multiple characters without a problem, and his transitions between scenes are easily understood. In reading the book, the only thing that proved to slow the pace of the book down was a scene between Steve and Agent Carter in the streets of Paris that drags on a little too long.

The two artists on the book match incredibly well with the story that Ed Brubaker is telling. As the artist for the present day portion of the tale, Steve Epting’s work feels very realistic. His Captain America looks and moves like one would expect. Even standing still his mannerisms just feel right. And the other characters, Sharon Carter, Nick Fury, Union Jack, and numerous SHIELD, AIM and AID agents are much the same. For the flashback pages, Michael Lark’s work matches the realistic feel of Epting’s pages, yet adds the sense of grandeur that comes from being flashbacks of Captain America in World War 2, highlighted by the use of black and white. And Frank D’Amata’s coloring accentuates all of the artwork perfectly. He makes excellent use of shadows and gives the book a real sense of intrigue with the darker shades he uses.

All in all, this positive review comes with one caveat. Recently, Marvel has made statements that those who were not fans of the recent “Sins Past” storyline in Amazing Spiderman will not be happy at the end of this story arc. So even though I am looking forward to what this stellar team has in store from here on out, there are the beginnings of a sense of dreaded apprehension as to what exactly is planned. Yet, that shouldn’t prevent you to pick up this book.

- Sam Moyerman