Captain America

• Title: Captain America #14
• Comic Vine: link
• Writer: Ed Brubaker
• Artist: Patrick Zircher, Mike Deodato, Jr.

Captain America finds himself fighting the new Scourge, but long before Sharon Carter can arrive to tell him it’s one of his friends under the mask Steve Rogers figures out who is trying to kill him.

Most of the comic centers around Cap’s fight with Scourge and the immediate aftermath involve Sharon Carter’s actions to save the man she loved. It’s clear Cap can forgive her for using lethal force to take down a former friend, but the question that lingers as the issue comes to a close is whether Sharon will ever forgive herself.

The episode is a weird mix of art by Patrick Zircher and Mike Deodato, Jr. The two styles don’t really mesh all that well giving the comic a somewhat unsatisfying feel. The story itself works well, setting up more conflict and guilt for Cap with the loss of another friend (although I’ve never been a fan of D-Man and didn’t even know he was even alive somewhere in the Marvel Universe so it’s not like Codename: Bravo did this to the Falcon). Worth a look.

[Marvel, $3.99]

• Title: Captain America #12
• Comic Vine: link
• Writer: Ed Brubaker
• Artist: Patrick Zircher

As S.H.I.E.L.D. doctors try to help Diamondback, who has slipped into a coma after the beatdown from the new Scourge, Captain America and Dum Dum Dugan set out to get a little revenge by attacking an underground HYDRA base and learning the secret of the S.H.I.E.L.D. leak.

We get a couple of revelations here including Sharon Carter‘s discovery of the leak within S.H.I.E.D. to be a brainwashed Henry Gyrich as well as a look at the face of the man wearing the new Scourge costume – Dennis Dunphy.

Although the inclusion of Gyrich and Dunphy does nothing to help sell me on the story, there’s certainly enough here to pick this one up including some good inner monologue from Cap during his attack on the HYDRA base and the art by Patrick Zircher whose action sequences really pop. Worth a look.

[Marvel, $3.99]

• Title: Captain America #11
• Comic Vine: link
• Writer: Ed Brubaker
• Artist: Alan Davis

Dum Dum Dugan and Diamondback discover that someone out there, posing as the new Scourge, is killing former terrorists and minor super-villains who are now protected witnesses for S.H.I.E.L.D. Okay, it turns out they aren’t that well protected.

A little digging into the leak leads to the discovery of an even bigger problem when Captain America finds a HYDRA infiltrator in to the echelons of S.H.I.E.L.D. Meanwhile the group tries to narrow down the list of potential targets the new Scourge may hit next which leads to a confrontation between the assassin and Diamondback and the murder of another witness.

I like the inclusion of Dugan and Dimondback here, the later (given she’s a former super-villain) will have a real stake in the case. Scourge, in one for or another, has been around forever in the Marvel Universe to help trim the fat. I’m intrested to see how writer Ed Brubaker uses the character in this new arc. Worth a look.

[Marvel, $3.99]