Marvel Masterworks: Captain America, Vol. 5

Marvel Masterworks: Captain America #5

by Stan Lee, Gene Colan (Illustrator), Frank Giacoia (Illustrator)

Collects Captain America #125-136

Genres: Comics, Marvel, Graphic Novels

239 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Stan Lee (born Stanley Martin Lieber) was an American writer, editor, creator of comic book superheroes, and the former president and chairman of Marvel Comics.

With several artist co-creators, most notably Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, he co-created Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, Thor as a superhero, the X-Men, Iron Man, the Hulk, Daredevil, the Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Scarlet Witch, The Inhumans, and many other characters, introducing complex, naturalistic characters and a thoroughly shared universe into superhero comic books. He subsequently led the expansion of Marvel Comics from a small division of a publishing house to a large multimedia corporation.

Reviews

[Beatrice · Rating 2 out of 5]

Comics are not really my thing and most of the "plot twists" were predictable, but Captain America is always my precious smol son, and I would read anything related to his saga ♥️

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

For someone who killed off Bucky because he didn't like kid sidekicks, he sure dwells on him and creating replacements for him. This volume is from 1970-1971. In 1970, Marvel editorial policy capitulated to reader complaints so that the stories took at most two issues to tell. this didn't really work with Lee's epic scope and fit better with what he described as the "hangnail" approach that was generally foreign to his methodology. While Cap gives an excellent speech about how the country was founded by dissidents and that he is unwilling to speak out against student rioters, Lee portrays a group called the Diamond Heads, whose leader turns out to be a white member of the Maggia (Marvel's mafia) as comparable to the Ku Klux Klan but modeled on the Black Panthers, which is offensive, ahistorical propaganda. Later on, Cap tells the Mole Man that the world is tired of war, which sounds awfully naive considering that the Vietnam war was at its hype, and as naive fifty years later. Perhaps he could have at least clarified the comment since I think it is true that most people are tired of war, but most governments are not.

Lee does do a good job wrapping stories that seem like one-offs together into a sequence. Cap feels rejected by S.H.I.E.L.D., so he storms out and buys a motorcycle, and the threats he encounters are eventually tied up into something larger. On the other side, some of his idea are retreads of retreads. In Tales of the Watcher (in [[Marvel Masterworks: Marvel Rarities]]), we got retreads of several Lee's stories about men being incredibly ugly and rejected by women rewritten by his brother, and this volume ends with the same old story with a guy with the ridiculous name of Erik Gorbo turning himself into an ape man using his scientific knowledge (which is literally just injecting himself with apes' blood, shades of the Whizzer getting his power from mongoose blood) and S.H.I.EL.D. resources. At least this time the Mole Man isn't portrayed as the bad guy, but S.H.I.E.L.D. as the aggressor, albeit in ignorance.

I was surprised that Lee was still writing this title at this point. He had delegated most other titles besides The Fantastic Four, The Amazing Spider-Man, and The Mighty Thor to others, and Captain America wasn't his character (although the first story he ever published was a Captain America text story in the fourth issue of Captain America Comics back in 1941).

There is a lot to like in these issues that covers up for the weaknesses, including learning more about Sam Wilson's personal life and Gene Colan's artwork, but this was definitely a title that Lee needed to relinquish to others. It's still better than the Tales of Suspense run with its pastiches of Golden Age stories with all their corniness, but, at least for this title, Lee was running out of things to say with the character.

[Ross Kitson · Rating 3 out of 5]

A solid entry with the standard spectrum of tales from the advent of the 70s in Caps own comic. In here we get We have civil unrest plots, urban Harlem crime, some solid superhero stuff with Strucker, the Red Skull, and a pseudo Bucky. SHIELD are always lurking mainly to encourage moping about Sharon. There’s defunct a feel of the time: as well as civil rights, a be Vietnam with the Mandarin, a-strange reference to the KKK in a falcon tale, and Harlem. It was good to see MODOK being viable.
Gene Colan’s work was excellent as al acts. He is not an artist I loved a a child bit as andadult 45y later I think his adeptly is perfect .

[Jdetrick · Rating 2 out of 5]

Why is Stan Lee still writing this? The stories are retreads of past issues (or issues from other titles) and they're all boring.

[Nicolas · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a transitional set of stories, and I'm looking forward to the next batch. I'm hoping this is the end of whiny Cap ("Peggy betrayed me, wah. SHEILD betrayed me, wah-hah. And so on.)
Sam Wilson is back and we see him in the Captain America suit for the first time. Then after one last attempt at making Bucky happen again, Falcon officially becomes Cap's partner and the co-headliner of this book. I had a good time with these issues and am ready for more.

We talked about this over on Comic Book Coffee Break: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJoI8...

[Relstuart · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful quality book. Some nice classic comic book art. And some good writing though this is written for a younger audience than comics are written for today.

"This nation was founded by dissidents. By people who wanted something better. There is nothing sacred about the status quo -- and there never will be!" Captain America

[Little Timmy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent collection of the first silver age Captain America stories. These stories of the relaunch of Captain America into the modern era are must reads for fans of early Marvel Comics. Very recommended

[mel · Rating 2 out of 5]

did not like how they likened that group to the kkk so i dropped a star…also the last issue is just extremely random sorry.
read issues #126, #130-136