Saturday, March 29, 2014

Captain America #17 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

The idea that Dr. Mindbubble (Weapon Minus) was created to counteract the various Weapon Pluses (Captain America, Wolverine, etc.) is pretty awesome.  I'm guessing that the point was that S.H.I.E.L.D. could use his mind-control powers to take over the Weapon Pluses if they got too dangerous, though it's unclear how S.H.I.E.L.D. planned on controlling Dr. Mindbubble (particularly given his actions in this issue).  Also, it's unclear how Dr. Mindbubble became allied with Iron Nail.  Was Iron Nail himself maybe a Weapons Plus project?  I guess we'll see.

Remender does a great job showing Steve's grief when he discovers that he essentially delivered a bomb (in the form of Nuke) into the Hub.  Rather than just making it grief, though, it ties into Steve's questioning of his entire modus operandi, at the urging of Jet Black.  I think Remender goes a little far in suggesting that Steve would ever think that Punisher might be right, as he does here, but I do buy that he might find some "Zola pragmatism" attractive, particularly given his current mental-state.  After all, Jet suggests that Cap might've been right when he came close to killing Nuke, a point seemingly underscored by the devastation at the Hub.  If Remender doesn't overplay this hand, I'm interested to see where we go with Steve's re-assessment of his non-lethal tactics.

The only reason that I'm giving this issue only three stars is that I feel like Remender went the cheap way in making the banker so overzealously evil.  Few people think of themselves as truly evil.  I think that it would've been better to have the guy narrowly obsessed with profits rather than making him into someone who seemingly wanted as many people as possible saddled with bad loans, as he's portrayed here.  It's a relatively minor complaint, but I'd be lying if I didn't say that I rolled my eyes at one point.

*** (three of five stars)

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