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Captain America Dead at 66
jas_public writes to mention ABC news is reporting that comic book super hero Captain America has apparently tackled his last mission. "It ends a long run for the stars-and-stripes-wearing character, created in 1941 to incarnate patriotic feeling during World War II. Over the years, an estimated 210 million copies of "Captain America" comic books, published by New York-based Marvel Entertainment Inc., have been sold in a total of 75 countries. But resurrections are not unknown in the world of comics, and Marvel Entertainment editor in chief Joe Quesada said a Captain America comeback wasn't impossible."
Dead at 66?
According to the Captain America Wikipedia page (far more in depth than the encyclopedia britannica page I might add!), Steve Rogers was born on July 4, 1917 in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York City, to Irish immigrants Sarah and Joseph Rogers.
Anyway, lets hope this original & innovative storyline is as lucrative as the "death of Superman" thing DC ran a while back.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
Nice Lone Gunmen-ing the title there, Sherlocks. So much for me being surprised now when I read it.
Watch the Teaser Trailer for "The Lightning Thief" Her
That's a fine way to start the day. Log on to the computer and find out Captain America is being killed off? Why don't you shoot my dog too?
Now only Jack Bauer Can save us against the evil that confronts the United States.
I just heard some sad news on cnn. Famed costume advernturer Captain America was found dead in his home at Timely Comics. Even if you are not a comic book fan you probably enjoyed his defeat of the nazis and his relentless persuit of freedom for all americans. Truly an American Icon. He will be missed.
With Captain America dead, the terrorists have won.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
I read about this earlier, and the whole thing bothered me. Supposedly the death of their oldest hero is supposed to "resonate" more with people. I'm trying to figure out how that works when they explicitly state that there's the possibility of a ressurection. Death sort of loses its meaning when you can continually return from it without consequence (see Dragon Ball Z).
Thunderclone: ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE! ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE!
Nowhere near as cool as this guy: http://www.internationalhero.co.uk/c/capcana1.htm!
Excuse me! There are some of us out here who haven't read Civil War yet! Ugh.
The friendly article didn't seem to mention the future of the comic, will it continue without the main actor? His son Junior? Hitler the real father?
Or maybe they can pull a Lost-stunt by drawing pages and pages of Captain America's flashbacks.
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
I've got that issue... It was going to be a massive collector's item...
Then they brought him back...
[[ BATTLESTAR GALACTICA SPOILERS ]]
Of course I'm not sure what the big deal is... Starbuck just died and there's no media hoopla about that.
I have the first Captain America, he fights the German Donald Duck. Guess who wins.
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
Maybe they could do a back-story series, something along the lines of "The Adventures of 2nd Lieutenant America".
Our sinister plans are coming along just fine.
Without colorfully decked out heroes to inspire patriotic thoughts, America's youth will now turn to video games, skate boards, meaningless text chatter and enormous quantities of junk food to fill the empty hole in their lives.
Hmmm?
Already doing that, are they?
Dang.
Well, perhaps we need to demoralize the younger set. We have an offer to kill Barney the Purple Dinosaur. Kids still like him, right?
Wait, the KIDS want us to kill him?
That's it. I'm going back to Eddoria.
I guess it's hard to market a character so closely identified with the most hated nation since Nazi Germany.
So Captain America is gone - or maybe he isn't.
Surprise, surprise.
Not only isn't it final, it's a cliche.
i am wondering if it is to much for me to ask for some semblance of reality injected into the comic industry. With the frequency that characters are killed, resurrected, killed again, cloned, or brought in from another universe, i highly doubt that Cap will make it more than 6 months before someone finds him under a rock somewhere, most likely with amnesia if i had to guess.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
According to Wikipedia:
Rogers attempts to enlist, only to be rejected due to his poor constitution.
Then
A U.S. Army officer looking for test subjects offers Rogers the chance to serve his country by taking part in a top-secret defense project -- Operation: Rebirth, which seeks to develop a means of creating physically superior soldiers. Rogers volunteers for the research and, after a rigorous physical, combat training and selection process, is chosen as the first human test subject
So he was not fit to be enlisted, yet strong enough to participate in this rigorous physical, combat training and selection process?
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
he won't be dead for long, he'll be brought back to life with faddy near future nanocloning techniques, shipped in from some alternate universe, or his nephew Duddly W Dickens will take over the role
Death in comic books is always nearly kinda sorta semi perminent.
Test your net with Netalyzr
America's already dead, the Captain of it may as well follow.
Or am I being too curmudgeonly?
Never give in--never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to conviction
PFFAAGH!
I laugh at you!
Is this the Capt. America that fought the Red Skull, or the Capt. America that fought the Red Skull?
I can tell by the perplexed looks upon your pale faces that you don't realize that there was another Capt. America, in the 1950s!
Drag yourselves back to your mother's basement to dig out your old comic books and you will disgust yourselves almost as much as you disgust me.
I laugh at you again. No, better yet, I spit on you.
SIGNED Red Skrull
We have always been at war with Eurasia!
What really peeves me is that I've been reading Cap regularly for a while now, and I was just trying to by the next issue like I always do but all the frigging collectors and speculators bought them first. So a bunch of people who couldn't care less have it and I don't.
--Chag
I never read much Captain America, but I read a good number of other Marvel comics. Frankly, getting sniped seems like a pretty damn weak death for someone so badass. It just doesn't seem fitting for a superhero to get taken out by a single dude with a rifle.
He gets shot walking out of a courthouse? I kinda thought he would have sacraficed himself for the greater good. Or died a glorious death in combat against the forces of evil. Pretty lame way to kill him off in my opinion.
Some new young guy will show up with super powers and become the "new" Captain America. This stuff happens all the time, see Green Lantern.
Marvel Database is the best place to read about this kind of stuff. (20,000+ articles)
That's Captain America's point. He stands for what America was, not what it is now. That's why he's been leading the rebel faction throughout Civil War. Captain America's death is symbolic of the death of the American principles and ideals for which he fought for so long. If America has become a monster, then either Captain America must defeat it, or he must die fighting it, because to do otherwise would be to negate his own identity.
Plus, it always shifts a shitload of comics and gets mainstream press attention when you kill off a big name like this. Even if you then just casually bring him back to life a few months later.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Its clear the old Captain America doesn't really symbolise what America stands for any more.
I'm picturing a Baron Harkonnen from the Lynch Dune movie, drenched in blood and oil. His superpower would be the ability to fly at 50,000 feet in an invisible plane, and destroy his enemies (along with anyone else who happened to get in the way), with radioactive munitions.
His weakness, which all superheroes have, would be his incredible stupidity.
I gots ta ding a ding dang my dang a long ling long
Why was this tagged as news? Anything that is posted here is technically "news", but frankly updates on the comic book world shouldn't get an additional "news" tag. The only way that would make sense is if Slashdot was a site dedicated to irrational childhood fantasies... oh wait! Seriously though, if Slashdot editors are going to post these sorts of stories (which I have no problem with), they should be more judicious when choosing tags. Otherwise they are meaningless.
I guess this was inevitable. I haven't seen the kind of garbage cans whose lids we used to use a shield when playing Captain America as kids recently either.
Damn I'm old!
That said, Cap will be back. Steve Rogers was not the only Captain America and he won't be the last. William Naslund, Jeff Mace, a "fake" Steve Rogers, and most recently, John Walker briefly took the mantle of "Captain America" from Rogers. I am sure another Marvel hero will assume the role of Captain America in his stead.
As a collector of the series, I am disappointed as Steve Rogers has been the one and only Captain America in my opinion and he can never be replaced, no matter who wears the costume.
We want some answers and all that we get
Some kind of shit about a terrorist threat
- Ministry
66 huh? So we are expected to believe that it's a coincidence that just 1 year after his pension benefits kick in he suddenly dies. I think not. Just a little too convenient...
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
So, Captain America dies. He, a hero burned in the popular imaginary as a *defender* the multiple freedoms people are naturally entitled (note the operative word there, defender, as in "a fighter who holds out against attack"). He that, even to the ones (like me) that didn't read the comics, is known to portrait the very image of America, the World Police, the Shield of the free world. He that used all his strengths to defend the world against the Nazi and the commies, armed with nothing more than a shield and his will to do the right thing. Dead.
Maybe it is just coincidence that he is dead now, right when the vision of an U.S.A holding the high standards of freedom and fighting the good fights is vanishing every intervention, every occupation, every bad move in the fragile international relationships. (And I say "the vision" because, even U.S.A. making some bad movies between the end of WWII and the fall of The Wall, the fear of the communism was enough to impair the sight of the so called Free World, forgiving every single American mistake on that time, from Indochina to Central America, from Africa to South America).
I doubt the artists behind the comics would be courageous enough to make such a statement, to kill a superhero only to make a point. But the could have done. Captain America doesn't represents U.S.A anymore, America a long time ago gave up of the "land of free and home of brave" motto, gave up the "land of opportunities" ideal to embrace a no holds barred savage capitalism, where companies have the same rights but none of the duties of the natural people and can leverage their immortality to get rich at the expenses of the less favored. If Captain America was a real person in the real world, it would probably be fighting with all his strengths to restore to America everything that was lost in the past 60 years. But he isn't, so he is better off dead.
Jack Bauer is a better hero for U.S. now, anyway. Rest in peace if you can, Captain America, knowing that everything you fought for is about to be thrown away for 30 pieces of silver.
I will no doubt be offending fans of Captain America with this post, but frankly, I'm glad he's gone. I never liked Captain America for one very important reason: he took the place of the superhero who should have served as a patriotic, shield-wielding warrior -Captain Canada. What I'm trying to say is this: Captain Canada should have been the super hero with the shield. Think about it. If we are picking an item to represent the policies of the US, is a shield really the right one? Wouldn't a stealth missile be more appropriate? Canada's policies are much more defensive, and America's much more offensive -Captain Canada should have the shield, not Captain America. On top of that, Canada has the god damn Canadian Shield! The "Shield" is part of our countries geography!
Spock slipping in the shower
Faith: n. -- That human impulse that drives them to steal appliances when the power goes out
Captain America was the main casualty of the "Civil War" over government registration [and control] of superheroes, a storyline which dealt with (as much as can be in the comics) the security-vs.-civil rights, slavery and related political issues. His death represents how "the terrorists have won", in this case, domestic ones driven by their xenophobia.
What Captain America's Purpose was during the Infinity Gauntlet / War series?
Seriously, what could he have done against Galactus or Thanos?
It's worth pointing out that Civil War ended with Captain America surrendering after realizing the pro-registration side was right.
Proud member of the American Non Sequitur Society. We might not make much sense, but boy do we love pizza!
I can't believe mainstream media (not Slashdot) actually got in on reporting this. Didn't they learn anything from "The Death of Superman?"
This isn't even the first time Captain America has been killed off... sheez.
The smoking and burgers finally caught up with him. I guess he really was an american.
I read he surrendered after realizing how much damage a war was making, not because he thought he chose the wrong side. (But I didn't read the comic, it's just something I read in some random webpage)
errera hunamum ets
Surviving members of 'Captain America's Red, White, and Blues Band' will re-unite for the first time since the late '60s to play at the funeral, with Nick Fury taking Cap's place on lead shield.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Some folks, those who actually read comics, have been slogging through this particular story arc for the better part of a year. One of those frustrating "cross-over" event stories, that involves every comic on the shelf, so there's no escape.
A Year. A year of waiting and guessing and theorizing about the big ending, which is still a month or so away.
So now, the ONLY people who give a crap just got a big steaming pile of **SPOILER** handed to them thanks to a too-soon press release and an unthinking media that, in spite of a multi-Billion dollar comic book movie market, still thinks no one's reading them enough to care if they ruin entire plots in the headlines.
Jack Bauer Dies on 24 This Season!
Lost Is Really On An Alien Planet!
The Cheerleader Dies on Heroes!
Harry Potter Becomes Evil In Final Book!
you'd figure at least here in geek-land, a little more care would be taken.
Is that Dead == Dead forever, or is that dead == "marketing dead" like Captain Marvel, Superman, Jean Grey/Phoenix/Jean Grey/Alien Substitute/Dark Phoenix/cough, etc... etc...
I used to be a massive comics reader up until the late 80's when I quit reading all together. What did it? It was the combined fiascos of the Marvel crossover series Inferno where some a$$wipe decided to unwind the entire history of Kitty Pride and Illiana (Cyclops little sister) with an "oops, it was all a group hallucination? Or was it? Well, nobody remembers or knows...(spooky music)", and the even more retarded History of the DC Universe two-issue comic that essentially said. "Hi there. You know that last 40 or so years of comics you've been reading? It's all shit, just forget about it, never happened." Atleast with Crisis, they tried to consolidate things within the framework of the existing story arcs. The "History" re-write was just a plane cop-out.
That, then combined with the sheer greed of the comic greed of comic book publishers ("Hey, buy our 94 versions of this SPECIAL!!!! issue number 113, each featuring a different minor sub-character, and each one featuring a different foil cover and unique hologram!" for $8 each... no, there is no normal version offered this month) pretty much not only killed reading comics for me, but has prevented me from encouraging my kids to read comics. On the rare occasion that I do take them to the comic store, they get one or two each, I'm down $15-$20 and I seriously consider launching my own comic company that does 4-color on pulp paper. What's the point.
On second hand, comic companies can go f' themselves. My kids reads web comics anyways now, so why should I worry about it.
It was only a matter of time. He was replaced by Team America a while back. Fuck Yeah!
I'm sure Marvel's already working on a "Return of Captain America" line involving four people all claiming to be Cap - a black man in adamantium body armor, a young boy, a cyborg, and an energy being.
But resurrections are not unknown in the world of comics, and Marvel Entertainment editor in chief Joe Quesada said a Captain America comeback wasn't impossible."
I think what he meant to say was, "You know, guys, why don't you all fans out there buy whatever copies of the comics you can get, and maybe we'll see so much profit that we'll decide to bring the thing back..."
Why would you cancel something if you intend to make it come back? To generate attention, I guess.
Captian America was a bit different than your gadern variety superhero. He didn't fight super villians, evil geniuses, and/or monsters/aliens. He fought for civil liberty, freedom, and rights. Analogies of those at times, but those were his core reason to fight.
Imagine then the writers dillema when they realize in order for Captian America to fight for those things, he must fight America itself. Instead of be faced with that overwhelming irony, they took the easy way out and killed him off. I would have preferred they make a stand and actually had Captain America turn his shield on the White House for a few issues. Mr. Smith goes to Washington squared.
R.I.P.
Captain America
1941-2007
Crushed by Irony
I think he realized that his actions (taking a super-powered war to the streets) were proving the pro-registration side right.
Proud member of the American Non Sequitur Society. We might not make much sense, but boy do we love pizza!
- Marvel dead : Dead for the rest of the issue, possibly not resurrected until the next issue. Roughly equivalent to "Mostly dead is partially alive"
- DC dead : Actually dead, but resurrected "later," typically in the next series.
- Dark horse dead : Really, really dead. As in, the permanent kind.
Yes, there are plenty of exceptions,Not the slashdot story, but the Marvel one. Didn't we see this at least once already?
i speak for myself and those who like what i say.
lol. I havent read a comic since jthm but that was a mighty funny post.
I'd like you to give my love to my family and friends."
...he was delicious.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
He soars in to locate America's greatest suspected enemies, then escorts them to a third world country that is friendly to the US, so they can be tortured endlessly until they die. If they live, he takes them to Guantanamo Bay where they can be imprisoned without charges and held indefinitely "because someone thought they might possibly be guilty of something".
Its kind of a change from what America used to stand for, but it probably reflects the way the US is seen these days by a lot of foreigners a bit more accurately.
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
America a long time ago gave up of the "land of free and home of brave" motto
Remember, the last line of the national anthem isn't a motto, it's a question:
"O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
o'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?"
Every generation has to ask themselves the question; every generation has to work to make the answer "yes".
I nominate Elric of Melnibone as a replacement for Steve Rogers, recently deceased Captain America. I believe that he the best representative for the USA.
Captain America is dead!
His friend,
Captain Obvious.
Army Invites Kiefer Sutherland To Give Anti-Torture Speech
He was defeated by Batman. No one beats Batman.
NO ONE. He's the goddamn Batman.
Obligatory reference to "X-Men: Death Becomes Them"
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/218160
"Oh, like none of you have ever died before!"
While the main universe Captain America may be dead the thing being ignored is that the Ultimate universe Captain America is still, apparently, alive. It's just that since Mark Millar is so busy writing the excerable Civil War (although, honestly, I haven't read it, I avoid these cross-overs like the plague) and never managing to get it out on time that he can't be bothered to not write The Ultimates and fail to get it out on time.
Again? *yawn* Well, I guess third time's the charm.
(Mild sacrilege coming up: Jesus died to save the world from its sins and arose from the dead on the 3rd day. Jack Bauer died to save the world and was back on his feet in 20 minutes. And he's done it twice.)
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
They just put a lot of plot time into bringing the Red Skull back to life. So they're going to kill off Captain America just as his nemesis is getting back into the game? I don't think so.
I kept hearing the lyrics to that old Kinks song in my head over and over today.
You're either an idiot, 10 years old, or just have amnesia. The Democans are just the same as the Republicrats.
Nader was a complete fucking idiot for saying that six years ago, before My Pet Goat, Katrina, Iraq, waterboarding, wiretapping, etc etc. Saying there's no difference now makes Nader, as incredibly stupid as he was at the time, look like a genius by comparison.
Better get out the word that someone might be killing costumed crimefighters.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
This isn't even the first time he's "died".
If parent is a troll, then troll = truth.
"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."
A good friend of mine asked me to think about a country where the citizens were well armed, had formed militias, and were taking responsibility for the defense of their communities.
Iraq in 2007 fails only the "well regulated" part of the above definition.
Apparently Captain America no longer symbolised the new American ideals.
Instead, he will be replaced by The Punisher:
"...the Punisher is a vigilante who considers killing, kidnapping, extortion, coercion, threats of violence and torture as acceptable crime-fighting tactics."
[Source: Wikepedia]
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
Captain Wales! Fighting evil and supervillians in the valleys!
I wrote my first program at the age of six, and I still can't work out how this website works.
So they can coin it in when he is resurrected.
With the continuing villification of steroid use in society how long was a guy who basically got so juiced up by the government in the 40's that he literally survived being frozen in a block of ice and STILL woke up to be an Uber-mench supposed to fly?
Also I agree with the "Irony of fighting against the government to save America" being the real thing which did him in.
On the topic of super heroes dying, there was a great riff on this in the She Hulk series where She Hulk needs to have the testimony of a ghost in court in order to clear someone of a murder rap. The court of course doesn't believe the testimony of a dead person to be viable, so she brings in The Thing and asks him "How many times have you died?" ergo proving that death is a temporary condition and shouldn't prevent someone from testifying in court.
I'm a fiscal conservative, it's a pity we don't have a political party anymore
from wikipedia link, above:
...
In 1945, during the closing days of World War II, Captain America and Bucky try to stop the villainous Baron Zemo from destroying an experimental drone plane. Zemo launches the plane with an armed explosive on it, with Rogers and Barnes in hot pursuit. They reach the plane just before it takes off, but when Bucky tries to defuse the bomb, it explodes in mid-air. The young man is believed killed, and Rogers is hurled into the freezing waters of either the North Atlantic or the English Channel (accounts differ). Neither body is found, and both are presumed dead.[22]
He [returned] in The Avengers #4 (March 1964), which story explained that in the final days of WWII, Captain America fell from an experimental drone plane into the North Atlantic Ocean and spent decades frozen in a state of suspended animation.
-- Boycott Shell
Don't you see? With "Cap" dead, now we must become Cap. That's the point.
Avengers, Assemble!
I heard he died of breast cancer.
Empowered with the light of the patents and the congress and the Big Companys.
He will prosecute the infamous piracy.
It's interesting to me that they kill off a big character like Captain America while simultaneously bringing Captain Marvel back to life (though still riddled with the cancer that will eventually kill him again), the very character they claimed would always be dead.
At this point, Marvel's comics are subsidized by Hollywood, existing as a kind of incubation chamber for the next Summer movie. They need to breathe some life into the old characters, and the easiest way to do that and to grab headlines is to kill off a major icon.
I think it's a great idea.
You post extreme examples from combat zones. If you have no opinion on Iraq, why not pick examples that include the troops in the US (perhaps Tailhook or the USAF Academy)? So, to not put words in your mouth....do you want the troops to remain in Iraq? In perpetuity?
And your example does not work....Perhaps yelling at someone that you will kill them vs pointing a firearm at them would work. Both are threats...one is more extreme than the other. Your example causes physical harm in both cases (and both would likely be treated as criminal).
The law HAS to draw a line somewhere. One level is criminal, the other civil. Even among the two levels, the law further refines distinctions. This is how we show a person is responsible for their actions. By comparing their actions to the "reasonable person" standard, and then look at any other factors (ie is it connected to employment in some way? This is required for sexual harassment under EEOC guidelines and the law). Simply reading Maxim magazine in the park does not equate to sexual harassment, but at work it is likely to if someone complains. But if you grab the genitals of anyone (if it was not welcomed!), no matter if it were in a job location, you will have committed sexual assault.