Captain America #247

[iamrman]

Previous creative teams meddled with Cap's origin and made a right mess of it. Along come Roger Stern and John Byrne to set everything right.

I forget the specific details, but I believe Roy Thomas got it in his mind to fix a continuity problem with Cap's origin that didn’t need fixing. Then Steve Gerber came along and added his own spin on it, which only complicated matters.

Comments

[cainofdreaming]

Gerber? I guess we should consider ourselves lucky that Steve's origin didn't involve any anthropomorphic animals or elves with guns until this correction.

[bewareofgeek]

Alice might not believe it, but I bet Norton will...

Nice touch with the "Sal B. Was Here" graffiti, too. :)

[thanekos]

Unironically characterizing John Byrne as helping to " fix " someone else's " meddling " with a fictional character is a very good joke.

[mastermahan]

Remember when Spider-Man and Dr. Octopus got their powers in the same explosion? Or when Sue was just a kid when she first met adult Reed?

Classics all.

[zylly]

The previous origin definitely needed to be jettisoned. It just didn’t feel right at all.

[beyondthefringe]

Of all the people who don't need excess complications in their origin, Steve Rogers is definitely up there. And yet, as with any character, it just keeps getting piled on, retconned in, retconned out...

[zylly]

There's definitely the constant need to tinker. Multiple attempts to create other super soldiers pre and post Steve, making it part of the Weapon X (sorry, weapon plus) program, memory issues...

A mess for what should be very straight forward.

[huntleyhaverstock]

The recent, and really excellent, J. Michael Straczynski run on CAPTAIN AMERICA has half of its narrative set during teenaged, pre-Serum Steve's life in NYC. It's nifty character-building stuff, especially in its exploration of the idea that this pre-Cap Steve still has a shield of sorts -- the diverse community of people who are there to help him because he shows up for them, too. And it does a great job of fleshing Steve out without contradicting anything else I've seen about the character, nor needlessly complicating anyone else who might want to write him in the future.

The only possible retcon material I've seen there thus far is Steve rattling off an improbably Mr. Burns-ian list of simultaneous ailments including asthma, heart palpitations, high blood pressure, anemia, and diabetes. (The latter seems like it would have killed him long before we meet him in those flashbacks, but the series does establish that he's not eating much, which could compensate for his lack of access to insulin.)

[zylly]

I've definitely been enjoying that, to the point of finding the flashbacks even more interesting than the present. It really shows who Steve was as a person long before he got any Super Soldier Serum in his veins. An excellent look at this past.

I think without a doubt, the Serum saved Steve's life.

[mazway_75]

Man, this run really deserved to go on longer...

[huntleyhaverstock]

Interestingly, the evil fascist Steve who was a secret Hydra agent created by the Cosmic Cube a while back insists his name is Steven Grant Rogers, and goes by "Grant." At least according to the most recent Uncanny Avengers miniseries...

[icon_uk]

Well, there's a deep cut for you!

[starwolf_oakley]

A CBR article says the audience doesn't know much about Steve's life before he took the Super Solider Serum. So Roy Thomas expanded that into *Steve* doesn't know much about his pre-serum life.

https://www.cbr.com/the-abandoned-an-forsaked-captain-america-had-a-brother-who-died-at-pearl-harbor/