Blog 2.0

By Andrew A. Smith

Scripps Howard News Service

'First Avenger' lifts the best of comics' Captain America

Captain America: The First Avenger, premiering July 22, looks to be the best comics-to-film movie of the summer – which is saying a lot – but is also loaded with fun facts:

* This movie is the fifth appearance of the Living Legend of WWII on film, but the only one to be remotely accurate . . . or even good.

A 1944 Captain America serial was unlike the comic books of the time, as it depicted Cap with a red star(!) on his chest, no shield, no sidekick and he was, of all things, a stateside district attorney (instead of a U.S. Army private).  

Captain America and Captain America II: Death Too Soon aired on CBS in 1979, both starring Reb Brown and jettisoning the World War II connection completely. They were awful.

A 1990 Captain America starred Matt Salinger and, of all things, an Italian Red Skull. (He’s a Nazi. His name is Johann Schmidt. He was Hitler’s right-hand man. He’s German!) It was so bad it went straight to VHS.  

* Some recent Marvel movies have had oblique references to First Avenger. Partially-constructed shields appear in both Iron Man movies. The Incredible Hulk mentions the wartime Super-Soldier Formula, which is what creates the Star-Spangled Avenger.

* This movie returns the favor. The subtitle The First Avenger is a hint to where all these movies are heading: The Avengers in 2012. Also, Howard Stark – Tony Stark’s father, who was significant in Iron Man II – is part of the Super-Soldier science team in First Avenger.

* Incidentally, The First Avenger subtitle was added to become the whole title when the movie was distributed in areas where America isn’t particularly popular. But it turns out that even countries like France wanted the full title, because Captain America is such a well-known brand. Now the Captain America part will be dropped from the title in only three countries: Russia, Ukraine and, oddly, South Korea.

* In the comics, sidekick James “Bucky” Barnes was a teenager in the war (albeit a lethal, highly trained one). In the movie he appears to be old enough to volunteer for service. To my mind that’s an improvement, since the “child endangerment” aspect of Robin-like sidekicks always bugged me.

* Beginning in 1963, Marvel’s Sgt. Fury and the Howling Commandos told the tales of a fictional U.S. Ranger group in World War II. To explain how Nick Fury could remain active into the 21st century, Marvel has explained that his aging has been scientifically retarded. However, the movie version of Fury, played by Sam Jackson, will sidestep the aging question entirely by Fury not appearing in World War II in First Avenger, although the Howling Commandos will.

Speaking of the Howlers, it appears Captain America and Bucky will lead them. Of the comic-book squad, only two appear in the movie: Cpl. Timothy Aloysius “Dum Dum” Dugan, a huge Irishman, and Gabe Jones, an African-American trumpet player. The team is fleshed out by a Japanese-American, Jim Morita; an Englishman, Montgomery Falsworth; and a Frenchman, Jacques Dernier. All three have their roots in the comics as well.

Stan Lee created Morita and his Nisei (American-born Japanese) squad in a 1967 Sgt. Fury to recognize the efforts of patriotic Japanese-Americans in WWII. Falsworth was the wartime Union Jack, England’s answer to Captain America, created in a 1976 Invaders, another title set during the war. Dernier first appeared in a 1965 Sgt. Fury as the French Resistance liaison for the Howlers.

* Cap’s wartime sweetheart was French Resistance fighter Peggy Carter, who will be played by Hayley Atwell as a conflation of various female characters. Their bittersweet romance probably won’t leave a dry eye in the house.

* One surprise is Arnim Zola, a Skull henchman and Nazi scientist who eventually transfers his consciousness to a robot. Another is the appearance of a Cosmic Cube (hinted at in Thor), a weapon that didn’t exist in the comics until 1967. I suspect it will play a role in Avengers, too.

* Hydra, a nation-less terrorist organization, predated al-Qaida by decades with its first comic-book appearance in 1965. In the comics, Hydra was founded by surviving Axis players near the end of World War II, which makes their appearance in the movie in conjunction with the Red Skull entirely consistent. Their creed is eerily modern: “Hail Hydra! Immortal Hydra! We shall never be destroyed! Cut off a limb, and two more shall take its place!”

Art above:

1. Chris Evans plays Captain America in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, from Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment. He is seen here in full combat regalia. Photo credit: Courtesy of Paramount Pictures and Marvel Studios © 2011 MVLFFLLC. ™ & © 2011 Marvel. All Rights Reserved.

2. Dominic Cooper plays Howard Stark in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, from Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment. In both the comics and the movies, Howard Stark is based loosley on Howard Hughes and Walt Disney. Photo credit: Jay Maidment / Marvel Studios © 2011 MVLFFLLC. ™ & © 2011 Marvel. All Rights Reserved.

3. Chris Evans plays Steve Rogers (center) with the Howling Commandos, who are somewhat different from the comics version of the First Ranger Attack Squad. Bruno Ricci plays Jacques Dernier (third left from center), Kenneth Choi plays Jim Morita (second left from center), Neal McDonough plays Dum Dum Dugan (first right from center), Sebastian Stan plays James "Bucky" Barnes (second right from center), JJ Feild plays Montgomery Falsworth (third right from center), and Derek Luke plays Gabe Jones (fifth right from center) - in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, from Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment. Photo credit: Jay Maidment / Marvel Studios © 2011 MVLFFLLC. ™ & © 2011 Marvel. All Rights Reserved.

4. Hayley Atwell plays Peggy Carter, center, in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, from Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment. Peggy is a U.S. Army officer present at Captain America's birth and is, as they said in the 1940s, both a tomato and a tough broad. Photo credit: Jay Maidment / Marvel Studios © 2011 MVLFFLLC. ™ & © 2011 Marvel. All Rights Reserved.

Hugo Weaving plays Red Skull in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, from Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment. Photo credit: Courtesy of Paramount Pictures and Marvel Studios © 2011 MVLFFLLC. ™ & © 2011 Marvel. All Rights Reserved.

Stanley Tucci plays Dr. Abraham Erskine in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, from Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment. In the comics, Erskine is a Jewish scientist smuggled out of Germany during the pogroms, and is based loosely on Albert Einstein. In fact, in the comics, his security codename is "Reinstein." Photo credit: Jay Maidment / Marvel Studios © 2011 MVLFFLLC. ™ & © 2011 Marvel. All Rights Reserved.

At left, Chris Evans plays Steve Rogers in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, from Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment. In this scene, Evans poses in a position lifted straight from the comics. Photo credit: Jay Maidment / Marvel Studios © 2011 MVLFFLLC. ™ & © 2011 Marvel. All Rights Reserved. At right, Steve Rogers staring in disbelief at his new body is a familiar scene in such comics as "Tales of Suspense" #63. Courtesy Marvel Comics

Contact Andrew A. Smith of the Memphis Commercial Appeal at capncomics@aol.com.

By Andrew A. Smith

Scripps Howard News Service

July 26, 2011 -- With the arrival of the Captain America movie, Titan has released two excellent books shining a light on the character’s creators.

For those just coming in, Cap was created in 1941 by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, in a story lifted almost intact for the movie. While Kirby died in 1994, his partner is still very much with us at age 97, as demonstrated by his new autobiography, Joe Simon: My Life in Comics ($24.95).

Given that comic books more or less came into being in the 1930s, Simon’s Life in Comics is also the story of the industry. He was present for most of the major events in the history of comic books, and was the cause of a few of them. For example, Simon was the first editor at Marvel Comics (called Timely in the 1940s), where he hired a teenager named Stan Lee. Simon worked with nearly every major creator through the 1960s, co-created entire genres (including “kid gang” comics and romance books) and worked for publishers as small as Crestwood and as huge as the company we know today as DC Comics. “Simon and Kirby” was such a recognizable franchise that the duo received royalties (which was unheard of in the 1940s), were the first to have their names on the covers of comic books as a sales tool and today have an entire archives series devoted to their works.

And as much insight as Simon’s book gives us to comics personalities like Bob Kane (creator of Batman), Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster (creators of Superman) and Will Eisner (creator of The Spirit), he also managed to be around for a lot of non-comics twentieth century history. Which is how he managed to run into comedian Sid Caesar, actor Cesar Romero, boxer Jack Dempsey, writer Damon Runyon and other luminaries.

One can easily glean from the book how Simon managed to be so popular. His easy, affectless prose reveals an affable, flexible, generous and optimistic personality. Add to that Simon’s obvious creativity, and he was no doubt a lot of fun to be around. Since most of us will never have the fortune to meet him, this book is the next best thing.

The next best thing after the autobiography are the comics Simon created, and Titan has collected one of the oddest and funniest titles he and Kirby ever did.

Simon and Kirby left Captain America Comics with issue #10 in 1942, after an acrimonious dispute with publisher Martin Goodman. So when they heard Goodman was going to revive the Living Legend in 1953 (Cap had been canceled in 1950), it rubbed salt into a still-open wound. But the proactive Simon, always looking to turn a negative into a positive, had a brainstorm. He quotes himself as saying to Kirby, “You know, there’s no reason we can’t do our own character again. They can’t corner the market on patriotism, after all. Why don’t we show them how it’s done?”

Thus was born Fighting American at tiny Prize Comics, another star-spangled hero in the tradition of Simon and Kirby’s own Captain America … sort of. Naturally, the powerful pencils for which Kirby was known were present, and as bombastic as they ever were on Captain America. But something was different this time: a sense of humor. Fighting American was so over the top in Red-baiting, Commie-bashing, flag-waving hoo-ha that it was practically a parody of itself (and of Captain America).

“Sure, the book was full of Commies and offbeat villains,” Simon says in the foreword to Titan’s new Fighting American collection ($19.95). “But it also poked fun at the whole superhero thing.” The ever-earnest and jingoistic Fighting American (and his sidekick Speedboy) battled characters like Poison Ivan and Hotsky-Trotski with the same campy seriousness Adam West would affect in the Batman TV show more than a decade later.

The Fighting American trade paperback collects every story in the series, which ran only seven issues (with a two-issue reboot), but was still around longer than the Captain America revival, which died in 1954. (Cap wouldn’t become the popular fixture he is today until his second revival in 1964.) And even 60 years later, the humor and inventiveness shine through every page of Fighting American.

Both books offer welcome insights into both Simon and Kirby. Creating Captain America alone would be enough for most, but for this pair it was just a beginning.

 Contact Andrew A. Smith of the Memphis Commercial Appeal at capncomics@aol.com.