Captains Courageous

[colonel_green]

Four scans from Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier #3, and four from Captain America: Patriot #1.


In the penultimate issue of Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier, wherein Ed Brubaker takes the newly-returned Steve out for a spin all by his lonesome.  Last issue saw Steve get his powers neutralized by Machinesmith, who is figuring out how to reproduce the serum so that he can mass-market it (I've never bought the idea that the serum was some kind of Holy Grail, but whatever).  Scrawny Steve is a bit in trouble.  Eventually, Machinesmith decides he doesn't need Steve anymore and orders him killed.





The flashbacks are a followup to the start of the issue, where we saw l'il Steve constantly being beat up by poor douchebags in his neighbourhood.



Meanwhile, Marvel throws some work Karl Kessel's way with Captain America; Patriot, a four-issue miniseries about the original Patriot (Jeff Mace), who became the third Captain America.  The first issue is basically the origin story of the Patriot, as we see him put on the costume after seeing one of Steve's exploits as a reporter.  At the end of the issue, we find Jeff being interrogated in 1946 by people wondering what he was doing in Boston at that point in time.  He says he got a tip that something bad was going down there.




But since that isn't an option, instead he puts on the costume and completes the mission as Captain America, saving the local politician running for Congress.  One of his two interrogators thinks it's suspicious that he was the only person around when Cap II was killed.



 

Comments

[freezer]

Wait, got that backwards: Iron Cap and "That Panel" preceeded Cap losing the SSS.

Back to the "Serum as Holy Grail" thing, I've never been able to figure that one out. Yeah, no one's been able to duplicte it, but since the stuff seems to come with Steve's DNA (seriously: All of the Red Skull's Steve clone bodies had the stuff), all you'd need is some of Steve's blood and you could farm as much of the stuff as you needed.

[colonel_green]

I can see it as having been really significant in World War II; there was some tech that was more impressive (the Human Torch), but that wasn't mass-produced. These days, though, everybody from the government to some kid working with spare parts and scrap iron can make something more powerful than the serum makes Steve.

[psychopathicus_rex]

One reason that people are so obsessed with it may simply be that Captain America is a pretty damn big deal in the MU, and the thought of a serum that can get you up to his level is pretty exciting to most people. It's all marketing - I mean, if you look at it objectively, the Super-Soldier Serum is just a REALLY good steroid that has permanent results. Big deal; there are probably fifty mad scientists in the MU that could whip up something like that. Add the little detail that the SSS is what made Cap the way he is, though, and it instantly seems a LOT more attractive, because the thought of having a personal army of Cap-level asskickers makes your average supervillain feel all warm and fuzzy inside.