At the Virtues of Captain America, friend of the Gutter Mark. D. White looks at Avengers #32-3 (Sept. / Oct. 1966). “These two issues are not heavy on ethical content related to Captain America specifically, but it is a particularly timely story… unfortunately. It deals with a white nationalist movement that, under the cartoonish guise of the Sons of the Serpent, rallies populist fervor and gains some mainstream respectability until the Avengers reveal them for the anti-American frauds they are. This is just one of many times that Stan Lee’s social conscience took center stage and Marvel Comics became meaningful as well as entertaining, several years before this approach became more common in the early 1970s with the anti-drug issues of Amazing Spider-Man and the Hard Travelin’ Heroes’ trek through America in Green Lantern/Green Arrow. (It’s also clear evidence that comics have not “only recently” addressed political themes.)”
Categories: Notes