Mike Gold: The Wrong Captain America

Mike Gold

ComicMix's award-winning and spectacularly shy editor-in-chief Mike Gold also performs the weekly two-hour Weird Sounds Inside The Gold Mind ass-kicking rock, blues and blather radio show on The Point, www.getthepointradio.com and on iNetRadio, www.iNetRadio.com (search: Hit Oldies) every Sunday at 7:00 PM Eastern, rebroadcast three times during the week – check www.getthepointradio.com above for times and on-demand streaming information.

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11 Responses

  1. George Haberberger says:

    “I”m just a kid from Brooklyn” is a line from the first movie. If not for the movie, there wouldn’t a statue in Brooklyn or anywhere.
    With exceptions concerning Bucky, the movies have been pretty faithful to the comic. Sometimes more faithful than whatever the current iteration is. In fact, when I read your headline, I thought you would be writing about Nick Spencer’s current version.

    I’ve been reading comics since I was about 10 years old and started because of the George Reeves TV show. That show did not adhere slavishly to the comics of the time but that’s what got me started, so adaptions can be a good thing.

    • Mike Gold says:

      As I pointed out above, George. I don’t mind movies making changes as long as they’re not egregious; as I said, it’s called an “adaptation.” And I agree that without the movies there would be no statue – although I don’t believe there was a big budget wide release Gumps movie then Andy’s statue went up in Lake Geneva. There’s also a Popeye statue in Chester Illinois, but the Sailor of Spinach has had a fairly continuous presence in the mass media from the days of Betty Boop. And there’s a statue of Superman in Metropolis Illinois. All three of these statues resemble the character in their comics form, allowing for adaptation to three dimensions. The forthcoming Captain America statue follows the movies and not the Simon and Kirby creation as they envisioned it and as has been deployed in comics for at least 70 of his 75 years… and is still used in flashback. And will probably return someday, unless Marvel changes its habits.

      • My problem with the statue is, I don’t believe the movie version of the costume will last more than a couple films. Once Marvel Studios changes it (or somehow loses the rights to the series), will the statue be updated? No, I agree with esteemed Mr. Gold that the iconic version should be immortalized, as it will be the version the public will always recognize over the ages, no matter what redesigns are regularly made.

        I’m still upset that DCE produced a slew of variant covers celebrating 75 years of the Flash, and not one of those covers featured Jay Garrick!

    • Mindy Newell says:

      I’m with you on this one, George!!!!!! And Mike, dearly beloved friend and editor, I think you’re wrong on this one.

  2. Mindy Newell says:

    In a related story, I’m very pissed of and upset, as I heard on NPR this morning that Marvel is introducing a new IRON MAN….a girl.

    Hey, I get it. Diversity and all that, and hearts in the right places.

    But IRON MAN is TONY STARK.

    • Mike Gold says:

      Mostly. Not always. And I believe Iron Man is about to be Doctor Doom.

      We will note that Supergirl is not Clark Kent. Spider-Girl has been a few people, but not Peter Parker. Batgirl is not Bruce Wayne. Batwoman is not Bruce Wayne. The several thousand Green Lanterns are not Hal Jordan, and Hal Jordan is not Alan Scott.

      So, tell me. Do you really think Captain America has been in Hydra all this time?

      • George Haberberger says:

        While Mike make a very good point that Batgirl, Supergirl, Spider-Girl and other versions of popular characters did not replace their original counterparts. But I believe those versions were created for crass commercial and economic reasons and so, understandable. A black female teenage Iron Man sounds like an obvious attempt to be diverse for diversity’s sake and in my opinion also crass. Will black female teenagers start reading comics because of this character? Doubtful. Who will read it? Maybe some people who are already reading comics, but certainly not all of them. It is social engineering and while that in not necessarily a bad thing, I think it is a futile thing because it is not organic.

        • Mindy Newell says:

          Again, I’m with you, George!

          • Mike Gold says:

            I appreciate your point, George. Howsoever, comic books are a commercial medium. Or at least, they’re supposed to be: the folks at Harvey or Charlton or ACG might feel differently. Everything is done for crass commercial and economic reasons… or by mistake. We are fortunate to have the latter.

            I certainly agree that such a move is unlikely to bring in a significant onslaught of new readers – recent history backs that up. But rest assured: Tony Stark is Iron Man, Steve Rogers is not an agent of Hydra, Aunt May will never truly die (comic book deaths are fleeting matters), and Superman really is a nice guy.

            Batman, not so much.