They had the racks that I've set my eyes on for years. I perused the section and knew that Captain America returned in this week's issue: so I bit the bullet and purchased issue #695. Yikes, $3.99. I forgot they cost this much now. For that same price, I could get probably 300 pages of comic book story, for whatever comiXology has on sale. But instead, I paid 3.99 for 20 pages of story.
These days, the ads in print comic books are really just ads for other comic books. I don't mind this at all: I don't need my comic books to tell me that I can wear Spider-Man underwear, available TODAY at my nearest department store, or to tell me that there are Thor Ring Pops, now with MEAD FLAVOR!
Anyways, that's a long introduction just to tell you that I got serials last week. I won't be getting them regularly, but it's fresh off the press, so let's talk about. . .
Captain America #695
"Home of the Brave," Part 1
by Mark Waid and Chris Samnee
This story is broken up into two parts: one right after Cap was unfrozen, and then 10 years later, after he defeated the impostor in Secret Empire. It's told through the lens of a small town in Nebraska, and you get a sense of who Captain America is.
It's a good character piece, framed through this one town's interaction with Cap. There's a letter at the end that explains Mark Waid's vision of Captain America as well. To Waid, he's different from other Marvel heroes, because he's not this person who's driven by tragedy to do good. For him, he doesn't need a tragedy to do the right thing; you do the right thing simply because it's the right thing, and when you work together it does make the world a better place. This is a man with such a strong moral compass that you understand why he leads others. That, and his super-sweet acrobatic abilities!
My standout moment from the issue is Captain America's lesson about who protects whom. The strong protect the weak, simply because they can do it. That's how the world ought to work, and you see him directly practice it. He protects Donna, a schoolgirl, from a bullet, which ricochets and shoots down the pole of the American Flag. Right before the flag falls, he picks it up, and then covers Donna in it, urging her to protect the weak. It never touches the ground, simply because you never let the American flag touch the ground.
So much panache. So much style! If only the real world were so simple.
BONUS PANEL: Steve shows up at a Capt. America celebration, as Steve, and another attendee mistakes him for a cosplayer!
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