This file created by Jess Nevins, jjnevins@ix.netcom.com. Amalgam Annotations: Super Soldier #1 (corrections/additions to my errors/omissions are welcome) p 1 What we have here is a very neat merging of the origins of two of the most recognizable superheroes of all. From DC we get the Superman portion - an alien rocket landing in 1938 (the same year that Superman debuted), superpowers derived from solar radiation, and the big red S on the Super-Soldier's shield. From Marvel we get the Captain America portion - a puny 4-F civilian who volunteers for an army experiment and is made into a supersoldier. Of course, there are some differences in the Amalgam Universe - the alien rocket contains a corpse, rather than a living Kryptonian baby; the Army finds the rocket, rather than a couple named Kent; and the Army injects an alien cellular sample into the 4-F volunteer, rather than a supersoldier formula. But Captain America, in Marvel Continuity, was also given a dose of radiation, like Amalgam's Super-Soldier, designed to trigger the super-soldier serum. p 2 More Variations On A Theme: in Marvel Continuity the surprise visitor to the Super-Soldier experiments was a Nazi agent, who managed to kill the creator of the super-soldier serum, which explained why Captain America was the only super-soldier. Here, the Super-Soldier's uniqueness is due to those alien cells. As well, in DC Continuity Jimmy Olsen is Superman's pal, as well as being a reporter. In Amalgam he was the Super-Soldier's "official press flak." He also has replaced Bucky - in Marvel Continuity Bucky was the Golden Age Captain America's sidekick. But then he died. In DC Continuity a lame plot device called the "Spear of Destiny" is the excuse for the heroes not having quickly halted World War 2. I'm thankful that Waid doesn't indulge in any of that nonsense here; Jimmy Olsen says that "by March of 1942, Super-Soldier had the war all but won nearly single-handedly..." which, if you think about it, is more or less the effect that somebody like Superman or Captain America would have on World War Two. Realism is too much to ask for in superhero comics, but internal logic isn't; Waid's got it here. In Marvel Continuity Captain America's shield is round, with stripes and a star in the middle; in Amalgam his shield is the same shape as the symbol on the chest of the DC Continuity Superman. Otherwise the Super-Soldier's costume is pretty much the same as Marvel Continuity Captain America's. As Sean McDonald pointed out, Captain America's first shield, the one used only in his first 2-3 appearances, wasn't round, but actually had a shape somewhat closer to Super- Soldier's shield here. This is true; what happened was that after Cap's first appearance, MLJ Publications, publishers of _The Shield_, brought suit against Marvel, charging copyright infringement. Marvel buckled under and changed the shape of Captain America' shield. p 3 What you've got here is Waid using a plot device/character that most every true Captain America fan remembers with fondness - The Sleeper! (Mr. Waid, Mr. Gibbons, I got an endorphin rush just from seeing the cover of _Super-Soldier_ #1. *Thank you*) Y'see, early on in the Silver Age, soon after Captain America had been revived, Jack Kirby also revived the Red Skull - Captain America's historical nemesis. And, along with the Red Skull, Kirby created the Sleeper robots - robots that the Nazis had hidden, near the end of the war, to be reactivated at some later date. The Sleeper robots - which began appearing roughly every two years or so for the next two decades - looked pretty much _exactly_ like Ultra-Metallo does here. Of course, the name "Ultra-Metallo" hearkens to the DC Continuity villain Metallo, who (at least post-Crisis, post-Zero Hour) is an evil cyborg (thanks to Mark Coale for correcting my original error here). I'm not sure where the "Ultra-" portion of his name comes from, though; perhaps from the Golden Age Superman villain the Ultra-Humanite? (although the Ultra-Humanite has almost nothing in common with either Metallo or Amalgam's Ultra-Metallo). A further bit of comic synchronicity here is that the pre-Crisis Metallo worked for a criminal organization named Skull. Once again, Mark Waid shows his grasp of comic book arcana. Both Trevor Barrie and Rick Hodge suggest that perhaps the Marvel half of Ultra-Metallo is the villainous robot Ultron - but except for the name and being a robot, Ultron really has very little in common with Ultra-Metallo. The Super-Soldier's "death" on this page resonates with the Marvel Continuity past of Captain America; Captain America's sidekick Bucky was hanging on to a runaway rocket when it exploded, killing him. Captain America got there too late (providing future Captain America writers with years of trauma to exploit) and fell in the North Atlantic, freezing solid. Here, the cause of the Super-Soldier's being frozen is the fight with Ultra-Metallo. Jimmy Olsen makes mention of Lex Luthor - the arch-enemy of DC Continuity's Superman - and his "war-ending K-bombs." This becomes significant in a few pages. p 4 Suddenly the events in _Bruce Wayne, Agent of SHIELD_ become clear. It's just a shame that the writers couldn't coordinate things better. As we saw in _Bruce Wayne, Agent of SHIELD_, HYDRA is the Amalgam (and Marvel) Continuity criminal super-organization, and enemy to the international police force SHIELD. They are led (in Marvel Continuity) by the Red Skull, Captain America's arch-enemy. Here, in Amalgam, they are led by Lex Luthor. Lex is green, and looking rather shriveled; he is obviously meant to be the Green Skull, the villain of _Bruce Wayne, Agent of SHIELD_, a combination of the Red Skull and Lex Luthor. The only problem here is that the Green Skull of _Bruce Wayne_ doesn't look, act, or sound like the Lex Luthor/Green Skull of _Super-Soldier_. p 5 In Amalgam Universe the Daily Planet's editor is Jimmy Olsen; in DC Continuity it's Perry White, who in Amalgam Universe has been merged with Marvel Continuity publisher J. Jonah Jameson to become the J. Jonah White, the publisher of the Daily Bugle. Note that Amalgam Jimmy Olsen is called "chief" - the name that DC Continuity Jimmy Olsen always called Perry White. Jimmy Olsen fought his way free from the HYDRA thugs - perhaps he wasn't just Super-Soldier's press flak, but became the Super-Soldier's sidekick for real? From what he says to "Kent" here, he seems to know the Super-Soldier's secret identity, which is much more similar to Marvel Continuity Bucky's relationship to Captain America than to DC Continuity Jimmy Olsen's relationship to Superman; Bucky always knew who Captain America was, while Jimmy Olsen never knew who Superman was. "Sharon Carter" - in DC Continuity Clark Kent's love interest is, of course, the reporter Lois Lane. In Marvel Continuity Steve Rogers' (Captain America) love interest is SHIELD Agent Sharon Carter - a blonde woman. Waid has merged the two here, keeping Sharon Carter's name and appearance and Lois Lane's job and original attitude towards DC Continuity Clark Kent - "Kent, you spineless worm." p 6 "Kent" jumping into the storeroom to change into the Super-Soldier is, of course, straight out of Superman's past - he practically invented that particular cliche'. p 7 In Marvel Continuity the Avengers found Captain America floating in the North Atlantic (well, actually, the Sub-Mariner found him first, but that's neither here nor there right now) and defrosted him, back in "real time" 1963 (I don't know when Marvel is claiming he was defrosted now; Marvel has its flaws, to be sure, but at least they don't illogically monkey with time the way DC has). In Amalgam Continuity it was the Justice League - Avengers who thawed him after "five decades" - which would make his reactivation date 1992. p 8 Mark Coale points out that the words "signal" and "watch" are in boldface in panel 1, which could well be a subtle reference to DC Continuity Jimmy Olsen's signal watch, the device he always used to signal for help. p 10 Lex Luthor characterizes himself as a "tragic, philanthropic recluse." The "tragic" part of this description is never explained here - more backstory for us to wonder about. As for his philanthropy, we know that he is supposed to have designed the "war-ending K-Bombs." In pre-Crisis DC Continuity Lex Luthor was widely known to be a criminal, but the more recent, post-Crisis Lex Luthor, although secretly a villain of the highest order, is popularly believed to be a philanthrop, just like the Amalgam Lex Luthor. p 11 This isn't an annotation, exactly - but panel #3 on this page is about a quintessentially comic-book face-of-evil as we are likely to get. A very nice job by Mr. Gibbons. p 15 Solar radiation was historically the source of Superman's powers - that is, light from a yellow sun. Light from a red sun takes his powers away. Like Luthor says here, "radiation's a bear." Kryptonite - the once substance that can pain or even kill Superman in DC Continuity - is from Superman's home planet, Krypton. The "Green K" that is paining Super-Soldier here is from that alien ship. Moreover, the most painful form of Kryptonite for pre-Crisis Superman was Green Kryptonite, which could kill him if he was exposed to it long enough. A possible explanation for Luthor's green skin is, as he himself says, that he injected some of it into his own bloodstream. It gave him longevity, but also (apparently) turned his skin green. Neat stuff, that Green K. It is also possible that Waid and Gibbons are making a reference to the pre-Crisis Superman villain Braniac, who had Green Skin. Amalgam Lex Luthor, though, has little in common with that Braniac except skin color. p 20 As in DC Continuity, lead halts the harmful effects of kryptonite radiation in Amalgam Universe. Thanks to Trevor Barrie, Mark Coale, Rick Hodge, Sean McDonald and everybody whose names I didn't get for their comments and corrections. jess This file created by Jess Nevins, jjnevins@ix.netcom.com.