Doing the work means taking inventory. Stare every decision you’ve made in the face and own each one. You are powerful enough to evolve. That’s where the magic is, and that’s where you find your light. It will be bright and endless. It cannot be destroyed. It is infinite. It is you.
Welcome to a new feature I’m trying, called Reading Topical Comics. The idea is that I will choose a comic related to a recent Marvel multimedia property, and read through it. Blogging as I read.
For example, we all watched and loved the Dr. Strange movie last night. And it’s possible some people want to learn more about his newfound ally, America Chavez.
A delicate issue with this feature will be spoilers. I hate spoilers, and recognize someone may have been sick yesterday and unable to see the film. Sometimes the very existence of a character in a film is a spoiler. America is featured heavily in the trailers. I’ll keep this post nearly spoiler-free. If you are the one person who hasn’t seen Doctor Strange yet, this post shouldn’t reveal any more about the film than the trailers. We’re mostly just going to read a comic about America.
Bit of personal background is that this is taking me away from familiar territory. I read Marvel religiously from 1989 to 2007, and worked hard to collect all the back issues or appropriate collections to get everything from 1961 forward into my home. But the last 15 years, I’ve only picked up the odd Marvel collection here or there. America Chavez was introduced in 2011, so after my time. I’ve met her before because she was a member of the second iteration of the Young Avengers, and I did pick up the first trade of that. But I don’t know her well.
She was introduced in a series called Vengeance, 2011, as a member of the Teen Brigade. The Teen Brigade we recall had been introduced in Incredible Hulk #6 as a group of ham radio enthusiasts using their network to get information to superheroes. The Vengeance miniseries revealed the group was more complex than we knew, and even included some young superhumans like America Chavez, AKA Miss America.
Her namesake is likely not the beauty pageant winner, but the 1940s superhero, Miss America.
She would drop the “Miss” from her name pretty soon and just go by America Chavez, or simply America.
Circumstances brought America into contact with former members of the Young Avengers, leading them to form a new version of the team, including Hawkeye (Kate Bishop, of course), Noh-Varr (the former Marvel Boy), Hulkling, Wiccan (Billy Maximoff, son of Wanda), and Loki (who was now a child and a good guy).
Due to her power levels, she joined an Avengers offshoot called the Ultimates that proactively dealt with cosmic-level threats before they threatened the Earth.
After flipping through her history, I’ve decided to focus this post on the first issue of her solo ongoing series.
So, in the immortal words of Sacha Baron Cohen, Who is America?
Pa’ Fuera, Pa’ La Calle
We get answers from an assortment of Marvel regulars as well-wishers, including Hawkeye, Spider-Man, Black Cat, Loki, and Storm.
After spending time reading 1960s Marvel, scenes like the girls posing for a selfie stand out and create a firm reminder we are back in the present.
We get a recap of her history so far on the title page. (Whew. I was afraid I was going to have to look it up elsewhere to recount it for you.) Anyways, her background is that she’s from something called the Utopian Parallel, but she left after her mothers died heroically saving the Multiverse. Powers, you ask? Well, she’s a super-strong queer brown girl who can apparently punch star-shaped holes between dimensions.
Between her name, outfit, and this “star” nature to her powers, I’m definitely seeing a motif.
Those are also way more detailed credits than the 60s comics give us. Probably more accurate about the breakdown of work as well.
This is Gabby Rivera’s first comics work. She was previously best known as a writer of graphicless novels in the “Young Adult” category. To the best of my knowledge, Joe and Paolo Rivera are not related to her, but they are father and son. It’s probably not an accident that the creative team all seem to boast a Latino heritage.
Issue 4 gives us a nice retelling of the origin. Let’s take a peek at it before we begin this story. We see her moms about to make their great sacrifice.
This is obviously a little different than the glimpse of her past we get in the film. But the look for her world and her mothers is pretty similar in the film. What happens to them is a bit different, and somewhat ambiguous in the film. In the comics, they seem to be plainly dead (as dead as anybody ever is in these comics). In the film, we’re not so certain.
OK. This issue begins as America’s leading the Ultimates on a mission. Overseeing the mission from home base are Black Panther and Blue Marvel. She’s teamed with Spectrum and Captain Marvel, AKA Monica Rambeau and Carol Danvers.
But when I started reading Marvel, Monica Rambeau was Captain Marvel. She wasn’t Marvel’s first Captain Marvel, and certainly not comicdom’s. But she’ll always be my Captain Marvel.
Carol Danvers was originally just Carol Danvers, ally and love interest to Marvel’s first Captain Marvel. Over the course of events, she gained powers and became Ms. Marvel. She then lost those powers to Rogue, but gained new star-based fire powers and became Binary, which is how I was introduced to her, and who I still think of her as. Brian Cronin calls this chronological privilege, a subconscious unwillingness to accept either that these characters have changed since we’ve met them, or that they had changed before we met them, and instinctively locking into our minds a “true” version of the character which is really just a moment in time.
We see an emotional moment, where watching a girl she saved reunite with her mom reminds her of her own lost parents.
Similar to the selfie, we learn America has a handle for a cosmic version of Twitter, again reminding us this is the modern era.
Back on earth, America had missed a date with her girlfriend, Lisa Halloran. Lisa reveals she won’t be moving with America to near her new university. America doesn’t take this well.
America wants a break from superheroing and will be attending Sotomayor University.
Professor Douglas teaches a course on “Intergalactic Revolutionaries and You”, with the first lesson on Rojelia Amante of Earth-10009.
One of America’s classmates is Prodigy, a former mutant and onetime superhero ally.
Prodigy has an invention called the Wayback which America can power, perhaps a form of time machine.
America tries to go see her parents, but instead ends up in World War II fighting alongside Captain America, Marvel’s premier superhero with the “America” name.
The ending is an homage to the famous cover of Captain America Comics #1, except this time it’s America Chavez who gets to punch Hitler in the face.
Now, when you go to watch Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness a second time, you’ll be able to say you know all about America Chavez.
Here’s a variant cover for the issue, in the vein of Hamilton.
A 21st century hero, indeed.
Now I know. Hadn’t picked this up before because $3.99 – thought I’d wait for price to go down. And maybe the language clean up. But your discussion is cheaper and no waiting.
Kinda hearkens back to the then innovative premise of great power combined with inexperienced and immature kid wanting to grow up fast and frequently thinking they’re already grown up. Lots of possibilities of making mistakes, which means good stories. I’ll be keeping an eye on this kid. Because if an immature kid with spider powers can knock over dominoes enough to kill a father figure, an immature or impatient kid with cosmic powers can make cosmic mistakes.
And like Peter Parker, Ms Chavez seems linked to Steven Strange.
Oh, man, I’m like 70% sure I read that. Some comics just don’t leave much of an impression.