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Marvel Comics will be doubling down on Captain Americas in April, as both the original Avenger Steve Rogers and his successor Sam Wilson will headline their own respective comic book series. Arriving in June, Captain America: Symbol of Truth will be helmed by writer Tochi Onyebuchi and artist RB Silva, and will see Wilson pick up a new shield and once again become the iconic hero.
May’s Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty will be written by Jackson Lanzing and Colin Kelly, with Carmen Carnero on art duties. Both series will kick off in a single issue, Captain America #0, which will see Rogers and Wilson unite after longtime foe Arnim Zola launches an explosive attack, forcing both heroes to examine what it means for both of them to be Captain America simultaneously.
“With our story, what we really wanted to start looking at was, how has America changed? What does it mean to be a patriot now?” Kelly said to Entertainment Weekly. “Cap can’t turn his back on America, neither of the Caps can, because the idea is good. The core is good and worth fighting for, but both need to wrestle with what that means in the year of our Lord 2022.”
“We’ve seen Sam Wilson deal with the legacy of Captain America and race in very inward terms with regards to America: What does it mean for America to accept a Black Captain America?” Onyebuchi added. “One of the things I’m teasing in my book is, what does it mean for the rest of the world to accept a Black Captain America? That’s another part of the equation. If Captain America is in many ways a mimesis of America, with all the good and bad pathologies, what does that mean for the way in which America interacts with the rest of the world?”
Rogers and Wilson have had a long history of operating as the star-spangled Avengers over the years, with last year’s The United States of Captain America expanding on the idea by roping in former heroes who carried Cap’s signature shield. A few new faces were added, as the roster grew to include several other heroes who had assumed the title of Captain America in their parts of the US.
Wilson’s stock in Marvel’s live-action universe grew last year in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, a Disney+ series that saw the Avenger–played by Anthony Mackie–step up to become the next Captain America after Rogers had passed the identity and shield on to him.
The show’s head writer Malcolm Spellman will be tackling the next Captain America movie with Mackie, and he has big plans for the hero’s solo feature film debut.
