Captain Glock America

And so, the new Captain America will carry a gun.

This is not the same Captain America who has been around since the 40s. He was killed off a few months ago, of course. It remains to be seen if he will be brought back to life during the bloated administration of the current Marvel Comics President. He will be back, undoubtedly. It's just a matter of timing, hype and sales.

So, a new white guy with identical physique will step into a shiny variation of the same costume, well-armed to take on the world. This is not the symbol of America as the character was created to be. The defender of our ideals that needed only a shield to deflect attacks on our apple pie and baseball. The new one will be more of a reflection of where we are as a society, I suppose. But without even a fictional symbol of our idealistic values, do we even care to become better than we are?

Cap has been replaced before. He has long been part of the government in some capacity, at least as a semi-official spokesman. Spats with the ever-changing administrators have, more than once, lead to Steve Rogers giving up the mantle of Captain America. His temporary replacement in the late 80s turned out to be a violent sociopath, not that such qualities stopped him from continuing his superhero career. And the original would return and all would instantly be made right again.

This is just the latest swirl in the downward spiral that is modern comic-crafting. (Don't get me started on the overblown Civil War that lead half-assedly to Captain America's death.) The golden rule for mainstream comics: Every character must be "bad-ass." Those too quiet, too wimpy, too light-hearted, and, heaven forbid, too goody-two-shoes... all must be replaced with someone so shiny and awesome that they will sell every single variant cover we can slap them on!

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Marvel Exec: "Speedball? Whoa, too goofy! We can't be seen with that! Bring in the phoney-baloney angst and make him hurt himself all day long! My god, I'm brilliant!"
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I suppose the writers have to take most of the blame. They do have all the real power. They could fight bad decisions forced on them, or be bold enough to walk away. But it doesn't happen. They just aren't good enough as artists to write with subtlety. Or worse, they feel they can't be seen writing with subtlety. They all feel they much make a lasting impact; they must leave a legacy. Better to be known as the nutbar that destroyed a decent comic than not to be remembered. But they must not realize they aren't truly leaving permanent work. It will all be undone, retconned and wished away. I don't remember what writer killed off Superman. All I know is Superman is around now, and that story was terrible.

It's a sad state of comic books today, when the status quo is look upon as the worst enemy. It's really not. It's really not. But here's to the new Captain America, wavin' the flag and bustin' some caps in evil's ass.