Captain America: Civil War

Captain America has fallen into a clash with his government and his friends, and the people close to him are paying the price. The life of Cap's girlfriend, Agent 13, is torn apart as her superiors use her divided loyalties against her. Elsewhere, a new villain emerges; the Red Skull begins to make himself known; and the Winter Soldier again comes face-to-face with Cap. But which side will he choose? Plus: James Buchanan Barnes, Captain America's one-time partner Bucky, faces his first Christmas of the 21st century - and the truth of the terrible things he was forced to do as the Winter Soldier. And with Cap caught in a conflict he can neither take a side of - or understand - what moves can he make to try to redeem himself?!
Collecting Captain America #22-24 and the Winter Soldier: Winter Kills one-shot.

I love Captain America, so almost any graphic novel with him is going to be good for me. That being said, I found this one to be a little confusing. That's not so much the fault of this book, but has to do with the fact that this was just one TPB in a long story. There's not much that can be done, except for me to get caught up on this particular Captain America comic as a whole.

Civil War is a 2006-2007 Marvel Comics crossover storyline built around a self-titled seven-issue limited series written by Mark Millar and penciled by Steve McNiven, which ran through various other titles published by Marvel at the time. The storyline builds upon the events that developed in previous Marvel crossovers, particularly Avengers Disassembled, House of M, Decimation, and Secret War. The tagline for the series is "Whose Side Are You On?"

I definitely fall on Cap's side of things in this whole fight.  Having not read any of the other Civil War graphic novels, I'm not sure if I can really make a fair assessment, though.   

Women of Marvel: Celebrating Seven Decades

Part of Marvel's 70th Anniversary Celebration, this one-of-a-kind collection places the spotlight on the House of Ideas' extraordinary fighting females and their astonishing adventures! Spider-Woman, Sue Storm, Ms. Marvel, Kitty Pryde, Rogue, She-Hulk, and more will grace the pages of this keepsake edition. Join us in celebrating the triumph of Marvel's leading ladies in handpicked classic reprints, as well as brand-new features and retrospectives on these fantastic female phenoms!

It was fun reading Marvel stories from seven decades.  Although, since artwork is one of the biggest reasons I read comics, I have to say I'm glad to see the artwork evolve so much.  This is a great collection, and I always love seeing women featured in comics because it just doesn't happen enough. 

The 1940's: The women featured in this section were Black Widow (Clair Voyant), Namora, and Venus.  I can't say I loved any of these stories, but it was definitely interesting seeing what comics were like back in the 40's.

 The 1950's: In this section we find Lorna the Jungle Queen and a bunch of different female protagonists from romance comics.  I really enjoyed the Jungle Queen ones, and it's actually something I'd like to read more of.  The romance comics made me laugh a bit, but it's not anything I'd want to read regularly.

The 1960's: The 1960's featured Black Widow (Natasha Romanoff) and Mary Jane.  I didn't enjoy the comics from this decade as much, because it seemed like the writer was trying to spoon-feed me what was going on.  One of the upsides to graphic novels and comics is that you can use the pictures to help tell the story, but the writers didn't utilize that.  There were things like, "Oh!  A bright light exploding in front of us!"  Instead of just letting the picture speak for itself.

The 1970's: This decade had an X-Men story that featured Jean Grey (kind of) and a Ms. Marvel story.  Jean Grey has never been a favorite of mine, so I wasn't too enamored with the X-Men story.  I enjoyed the Ms. Marvel story more.

The 1980's: Featured Elektra, Invisible Woman, and She-Hulk.  I've always loved Elektra--she's one of my favorite characters in the Marvel Universe.  Around this portion of the graphic novel was where I started to get annoyed.  The book had a Daredevil store that "featured" Elektra.  There were Elektra comics in the 80's, so you'd think that a book titled Women of Marvel would pick a graphic novel that was more about the woman than the man, but no.  The Fantastic Four story was good, and I'm liking She-Hulk more and more.

 





The 1990's: With Psylocke, Jubilee, and Silver Sable.  The X-Men story with Psylocke and Jubilee was a little confusing, and I wasn't really loving it although I do think Jubilee is a fun character.  I'd never really run across Silver Sable in my reading, and I liked her a lot.  I'd read more comics with her in them for sure.

 

The 2000's: Featuring Araña, X-23, and Lyra (She-Hulk).  This is when I got to the main reason I read comics: the amazing artwork.  It was so well done here, and you can see the huge changes even from the last decade.  I really enjoyed all three of these, and it made me want to read more.  The stories ended in cliff-hangers, but I think that's because most of the graphic novels nowadays have story arcs of at least 3 comics, and we were only getting 1 here.