Hi. I've recently become interested in Captain America and I have a few questions.
1.) Regarding the earth 616 Cap, what would you suggest as the top 5 "must read" Captain America stories for someone who hasn't read much on him?
2.) Regarding Ultimate Captain America, what are the main differences between him and the 616 Cap? I've heard that UC is more brutal, and is sometimes portrayed in ways that make him appear to be an assassin, and one reviewer on amazon said, "He's not the upstanding citizen that you would expect." So what are the main differences between normal Cap and Ultimate Cap in terms of their morals and conduct?
3.) In your opinion, is it worth it to spend money on comics that Ultimate Cap appears in?
Thanks in advance for any answers.
1) Idk about a top 5, but you've gotta think "Secret Empire", the Nomad arch, Brubaker's run, and maybe some early WWII stuff to get a sense of the character's roots would be in there. I've been wanting to check out "Man out of Time", by Mark Waid, which I've heard is good. Also, most of Cap's history is intertwined with that of the Avengers, so I guess great Avengers stories with Cap in them might be worth a look.
2) The main difference is that 616 Cap is the product of decades of comic history and character development, while Ultimate Cap was created to be part of the Ultimate line's version of the Avengers in 2001, which was purposefully made to be cynical, "cinematic", and run by a shady government agency, because that's what would attract new readers, apparently. It's no surprise that the writer, Mark Millar, also co-created the Authority, another dreary authoritarian fantasy. Unfortunately, this series seems to have significantly influenced the movies, but I digress.
Ultimate Cap is more aggressive and explicitly "old-timey" then 616 Cap. He's often seen as a parody of the original, or a critique of American foreign policy.
3) The Ultimates and Ultimates 2 are definitely worth it for the action.
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