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Captain America Joins... The Avengers! Story Detail
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Captain America Lives Again!
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The Avengers
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Marvel Comics Group
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March 1964
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Featuring: Don Blake/Thor, Tony Stark/Iron Man, Henry Pym/Giant-Man, Wasp, Steve Rogers/Captain America, Rick Jones, Sub-Mariner.
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Written by Stan Lee.
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Penciler Jack Kirby.
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Inker George Roussos.
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Letterer Art Simek.
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Editor Stan Lee.
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22 Pages
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Picking up where the previous issue left off, a very agitated Prince Namor The Sub-Mariner is swimming the depths, frantically seeking his lost race of Atlantians. Instead, he finds a large group of Eskimos worshipping a frozen figure of a man, entombed within a cake of ice. (If Namor looked a little more closely, he might recognize his former Invaders teammate. He won't find out the significance of his next actions, until issue #262.) The deposed undersea prince, seeing this as personally insulting to himself, picks up the frozen idol, and chucks it into the ocean, while screaming maniacal threats at the ice-dwelling humans. The block of ice floats away, until it hits the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, where the rock-hard outer sheath begins to melt.
Scouring the Arctic seas for Sub-Mariner, the Avengers come across a partially frozen body floating in the Gulf Stream north of Newfoundland. They don't recognize Steve Rogers, but they do recognize the famous red, white and blue garb of the legendary Captain America showing underneath his tattered RAF uniform. He awakens disoriented, and fights The Avengers, screaming some nonsense about not letting someone kill Bucky. He collapses to the floor, and realizes it's already happened. Iron Man asks the man who he is, and Steve Rogers confirms their suspicions, that he is Captain America. He recounts his last memory; the tragic death of Bucky Barnes:
Flashback: World War II era Europe; Captain America and Bucky, acting as security guards for a British Army base, try to stop an explosive-filled drone plane from taking to the air. Leaping from a high-jumping motorcycle, Bucky grabs on to the plane, while Steve Rogers slides off into the ocean. Before he hits the water, Steve Rogers sees the plane explode, with his teenage partner still hanging onto it. End flashback.
Upon mooring at New York Harbor, The Avengers are met by the Press Corp. One of them is a disguised alien, whose camera is actually a cleverly disguised Petrification Beam. Wasp, Giant-Man, Iron Man and Thor are turned to stone. Captain America emerges from the sub, and wonders where The Avengers have gone. But, he can't help but admire the lifelike statues honoring them, which just happened to be there. After just having slept for twenty years, Captain America decides he should find a place to crash out. He awakens, in a hotel room, and sees someone he momentarily mistakes for his, by now, long dead partner, Bucky. It's Rick Jones. He tells Captain America that The Avengers have disappeared, and they need to solve the mystery. They discover that the culprit is a wild-haired alien, who has been turning people to stone, for centuries. They accredit him as being the likely source for the Medusa legend. Well, there you have it; one mystery solved, one to go: Captain America asks the alien with the unpronounceable name why he petrified The Avengers. Sub-Mariner made him do it. Captain America notes that the name Sub-Mariner seems familiar to him. The alien restores The Avengers, and they go to help free the alien's ship from the Sub-Mariner. During the battle, Giant-Man releases the spaceship from the grip of the ocean floor, then joins his comrades in battling Sub-Mariner and his Atlantian soldiers. The alien's ship's underwater lift-off causes an explosion, which Sub-Mariner presumes is the beginning of a natural oceanic upheaval that will certainly kill The Avengers. So, he and his soldiers leave, thinking they have won. It's just the alien's ship, returning to the stars. When it's all over, The Avengers invite Captain America to join the team.
Elsewhere, lost in thought, is Rick Jones. He's thinking about The Hulk, and wondering if his intuition is right; that Captain America wants him for a partner. Even Captain America, himself, doesn't know the answer to that question. He does and he doesn't. He will struggle with the dilemma, for many issues. Ultimately, he'll decide that he doesn't. But, don't worry, Rick Jones will find many other ways to weave himself into the tapestry of the Marvel Universe. Including, eventually, a couple temporary stints as a Bucky-like side-kick in Captain America’s own magazine. He will also share a dual-identity with Captain Marvel I, and, as ordinary Rick Jones, will single-handedly defeat the Kree and Skrull armadas. Really!!
Throughout this series, there will be many Invaders tie-ins. For the record, and for the purpose of future reference, The Invaders (sometimes called the Liberty Legion or the All Winners Squad) were comprised of; Captain America and Bucky, Prince Namor a.k.a. The Sub-Mariner, the android Jim Hammond a.k.a. The Human Torch, the teenage mutant Thomas Raymond a.k.a. Toro, Brian Falsworth a.k.a. Union Jack, Jacqueline Falsworth Crichton a.k.a. Spitfire, Bob Frank a.k.a. The Whizzer, and Madeline Joyce Frank a.k.a. Miss America.
After the disappearance of Captain America I, in 1945, which was depicted in this issue, President Truman replaced Steve Rogers in The Invaders, with William Nasland a.k.a. Spirit Of ‘76, as Captain America II. Later, Nasland would be replaced, in the All Winners Squad, by Jeffery Mace a.k.a. The Patriot, as Captain America III. Then, a madman named “Steve Rogers” a.k.a. The Grand Director will pretty much proclaim himself Captain America IV (Actually, this guy was Steve Rogers the original Captain America, during the 1950’s, until this Avengers #4 story made it so he couldn’t have been. He was later revised to have been a nutcase imposter. See Young Men #24). Still to come; a poor schlub named Roscoe as Captain America V (See Captain America #181), and John Walker a.k.a. Super-Patriot II, as Captain America VI (Later to become U.S. Agent. See Captain America #333). The lattermost happens, because of some ditsy government proclamation about the persona of Captain America being a govenrment appointed post, and Captain America I can go along, or step down. After something less than a year as “The Captain”, Steve Rogers will finally get his preferred original identity back.
Presented in animated form as To Live Again (Segment 3) of The Marvel Superheroes Show/Captain America.
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