Next time you are at the library or at the comics shop, pick up a collected volume of Essentials or Visionaries - it doesn't matter if it is the Hulk, Wolverine, Spidey or Iron Man. Walter Simonson's Thor probably is the best example of how good superhero comics can be: tight, weird, powerful tales that just entertain per issue rather than just set up the next damn crossover or mega-event. And none of them have cheap tricks like what Amazing Spider-Man #543 tried with its cover. Writing back then delivered what it promised, and wasn't a long tease to an overhyped storyline that overzealous marketing violated and left for dead.

But I do have a problem with this whole Captain America angle. Obviously, since Cap and Frank's altercation in Civil War, and Frank's reaction to Cap's death in issue #5, this story arc was a long time coming. By the way, does anyone believe that Cap is going to stay dead for long? Quesada and Brubaker pretty much acknowledge that his return is inevitable: Cap's ongoing title has been plotted for the next couple of years, even though he is supposedly at the bottom of the Arctic. In the meantime, they choose to embroil Frank Castle in a weird storyline where he takes up Cap's costume and mission and label the arc as part of "The Initiative." I can understand the Initiative in the current Iron Man comic, but involving the Punisher in this just seems... forced. It's a cheap way to get more mileage out of the Civil War aftermath even though yet another "summer event" has started. And I can't believe that Fraction would be the genesis for the nonsense; it must have come from editoria