Captain America. Marvel Comics’ Superman, although he’s really just a star spangled man with a plan. He may be a super soldier, but he’s also just a man, capable of being beaten and broken. If you shoot him, he bleeds. Still, he’s the guy that strives to do what’s right, and when Captain America throws his mighty shield, all those who chose to oppose his shield must yield.
They must, but they often don’t, and Cap has to work for his victories. It’s incredibly hard to do the right thing all the time, and sometimes it’s even hard to know what the right thing is. That’s why the symbolic guys like Cap need to be appreciated more than the flashier, edgier superheroes. There’s getting the job done and there’s getting it done in a way that inspires others to help. We’ve seen him do amazing things in the movies – we’re about to see more with Captain America: The Winter Soldier, but let’s go back to where he came from and show you some of Captain America’s greatest moments in comics.
Captain America's Greatest Moments in Comics
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1. The Debut
Joe Simon and Jack Kirby gave us a star spangled hero punching Adolf Hitler square in the face in 1940, a year before Pearl Harbor, out of moral outrage at Nazi Germany. Good on 'em, and great for us. Hitler sucked.
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2. Man Out of Time
The Avengers found Captain America encased in ice, frozen in suspended animation, and it reintroduced him to a new generation as the man most capable of leading Marvel's big-name super-team into the future. Adjusting to 1960s culture was tough!
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3. Cap's Kooky Quartet
Such was the faith in Cap's leadership that we realized we didn't need the big guns to have Avengers - Cap made the team a halfway house to reform ex-mutant terrorists Quicksilver & Scarlet Witch as well as the loudmouthed carnie criminal Hawkeye. It was dysfunctional, but hey, that's three less bad guys to fight.
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4. Capwolf
One time, Captain America got turned into a werewolf by a hot bikini-clad scientist named Nightshade. How is that not a great moment?
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5. Taking On Thanos Alone
Cap hasn't had a great history of being written well in "event books" (*coughCivilWarAvXcough*), but during "The Infinity Gauntlet," Thanos killed everybody else with godlike powers, but Captain America still stood tall against him in a doomed effort. That's strong stuff.
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6. Captain America Refuses To Run For President
American disillusionment with the government led them to rally for their symbolic hero to run for president and clean things up, but Cap would not exploit that opportunity for power which would inevitably compromise what he represents. However...
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7. Ultimate Captain America Becomes President
... we can't forget the Ultimate Comics version of Cap, who actually won the presidency of a shattered United States in a surprise write-in campaign... and he stepped up to the plate and took office. Why? Because they needed him, and Ultimate Cap leans heavy on the swagger.
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8. Ultimate Cap Beats The Hell Out of Giant-Man
Cap's "put on the suit" taunts in Marvel's The Avengers stem from Ultimate Cap kicking the shit out of Ultimate Hank Pym, a prick who put his own wife in the hospital. Cap barked at him to use his growth powers so he could completely let loose the whoop-ass on that piece of trash.
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9. Ultimate Cap Insults France
The most famous Ultimate Cap moment is when he yelled "You think this letter on my head stands for France?" when asked to surrender, referencing the French capitulation to the Nazis. Ultimate Cap is much bigger on that kind of John Wayne machismo.
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10. Regular Cap Respects France
Illustrating the differences between the Main ("the 616") and the Ultimate Universes, 616 Steve Rogers reflects on the nuanced situation in World War II France rather than dismissing an entire nation as cowards - a direct response to #9s notoriety.
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11. Cap Quits Being Cap
Steve Rogers is a man of principles, and he's not one to bend them. In fact, when pressured to become an official government agent at their beck and call, he gave up the colors rather than dilute the integrity of the American ideal - the president represents the government, but Cap represents the people. He's no stooge.
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12. Cap Picks Up Thor's Hammer
Even after quitting as Captain America and donning red, white, and black as The Captain, Steve Rogers remained worthy enough to lift and wield Mjolnir, which is something very few people can boast.
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13. Superman Defers To Cap
In the JLA/Avengers crossover, the progenitor of all superheroes everywhere, the Man of Steel, puts Cap in charge of both teams for their climactic battle. That means Captain America is a better leader than anyone in Marvel and DC combined.
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14. Cap Lends His Shield To Superman
While mentally coordinating the Avengers and Justice League in a massive battle against impossible cosmic foes via the Martian Manhunter's telepathy, Steve maintained some representation on the front lines by giving his shield to Superman, who probably didn't need it, although it made him that much more dangerous.
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15. Cap Sacrifices His Life to Save a Stranger
Civil War was far from Cap's finest hour, and the ending saw the public turn on him once he surrendered to authorities. He never went to trial, though, because he stepped in front of a bullet that was going to hit one of his arresting officers, giving his life for the American people he'd been forgetting during the whole event. That changed some tunes.
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16. Bucky Barnes Becomes Captain America
With Steve Rogers presumed dead and gone, James Buchanan Barnes was at a loss, especially after Steve had freed him from decades of Russian brainwashing that made him the Winter Sodlier. He eventually picked up the mantle to maintain the Captain America legacy, and he was definitely a different yet still worthy brand of Cap.
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17. Steve's Secret Avengers
When Steve resurfaced from being trapped reliving his old life, he was content to let Bucky stay Cap while he attempted to do something different - like being Nick Fury. Commander Rogers ran SHIELD (for which he was very ill-suited - see also his earlier problems with compromising integrity) and started up a covert ops team of Secret Avengers, which endures to this day.
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18. Breaking More Brainwashing
Steve was recently trapped in Dimension Z, a brutal alternate reality ruled by Arnim Zola, for a matter of minutes, but it felt like 12 years to him. In that time, he raised a boy named Ian, only to have Zola mind-control him to kill his father. Steve's earnest dedication to the boy was able to break through the programming... only to be shattered when Steve's girlfriend Sharon Carter showed up for the rescue and shot the boy.
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19. Cap Stands Up To The Illuminati
The braintrust of the smartest and most cunning heroes of the Marvel Universe meets in secret to take on ugly but necessary tasks, the latest of which is killing other Earths before they kill ours. Cap couldn't stand by and let that happen, and Dr. Strange wiped Cap's mind as a result - a secret that will come out in this year's Original Sin event.
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20. I Command You To Wank
This list is done. I'm sure you have opinions about what I left out, or whether or not Capwolf is worth a mention. Therefore, I command you to wank about them!
