The Forgotten Super-Soldiers, Part 1

By: Arnold T. Blumberg
Date: Wednesday, November 06, 2002

We all know the tale - in the darkest days of the 20th century, America was preparing for war. Choosing a young man to undergo an experimental augmentation procedure, the government engineered a "super solider" for the purpose of creating a new kind of superhero - a patriotic icon who would rally the nation and lead us to victory against the Axis forces. The name of that hero would be Captain America, and the young man they chose...was black.

Bet you don't remember that last part, do you? That's because it's taken sixty years to reveal THE TRUTH, but now Marvel has recruited a team to take on that daring mission - to uncover the story behind the first man to take the super-soldier serum...and it wasn't Steve Rogers! In this new six-part mini-series, we meet the African-American test subjects who were used by the military in the early stages of the super-soldier project. Cast aside by their own country during a time of intense racial segregation, their role in the saga of Captain America can now be told, thanks to the efforts of writer and VIBE editor Bob Morales, and artist Kyle Baker.

According to Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada, the "black Captain America" was an idea originally mooted to appear in another form.


"We were discussing the ULTIMATE universe and how we were going to present Captain America," says Quesada. "The concept at that point was that knowing what we know today about how the US government treated African American military men - Tuskegee and things like that - it would only make sense that Captain America could be African American. Our CEO, Bill Jemas, had come up with [the idea]. The problem was we still have many licensees that use the image of Captain America. We couldn't radically depart from that image, so the idea was scrapped."

Soon, however, the concept resurfaced when another historically-based mini-series became a big success.

"A lot of [this] had to do with the success of ORIGIN, which told the history of Wolverine," says Quesada. "We're continuing in the spirit of that and doing a couple of projects like this - in another one, Garth Ennis is writing the actual origin of the Punisher. It's not exactly what you think; there's more to it. We're doing a few projects [like this] where we take a modern day view of these 40-year-old characters for the most part and add a little twist to make them more interesting and relevant today. Because of the success of ORIGIN, we wanted to give this story the exact same kind of treatment."

Eventually it was decided to tell the tale in the primary Marvel universe instead of its ULTIMATE offshoot.

"Finally we thought, 'Why don't we just do this in regular continuity,'" says Quesada. "Nothing in the history of Captain America says that something like this couldn't have happened before Steve Rogers. We found a nook in history and we took full advantage of it. It's definitely in continuity; we're not back-pedaling on this."

Despite the potentially controversial addition to the legend of Marvel's World War II hero, Morales encountered no difficulties with the publisher when developing the story.

"Marvel was open to anything that made sense in terms of
real world history," says Morales. "Our story happened not to really mess with Marvel continuity; it just worked out that way."

Morales does admit, however, that there was added excitement in adding an "unknown" chapter to the history of the Marvel Universe.

"More anxiety than excitement," says Morales. "It's a very intense story. Dealing with [racial] issues seriously is the texture of the series, but not its main point."

Part of the intensity is due to Baker's digitally painted artwork, which Morales agrees is key to the tone of the series.

"Kyle's exaggeratedly lush and cartoony work was the style he used for our VIBE cartoons," says Morales. "It buoys a really disturbing tale and makes it more disturbing."

Next time, Morales and Quesada discuss the weight of continuity and the lasting impact of THE TRUTH.

TO BE CONTINUED