Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Slaymaster, Arcade and the Black Knight, 26 Jun 2009
The original Captain Britain comics were intended to be a Marvel hero based in the UK. It was mostly worked on by Americans so worked in the same tropes as American comics, Cap would go up against a supervillain. As such the stories that begin this collection, the final black and white issues of Captain Britain Weekly, are fairly average. Not hideously bad, but not fantastically inspiring.
They are followed by a team-up with Spider-man, as Brian travels to America as an exchange student to be shown how to be a real hero by Peter. (This rather patronising undercurrent, that Brian doesn't know how to be a hero despite all his acts of heroism, would carry over into most of Chris Claremont's work with the character.) The art is by John Byrne at the height of his powers so it looks great and the bad guy Arcade is quite fun and the story is muy enjoyable and reminds me that I wish someone would collect the Claremont and Byrne Marvel Team-ups as they were generally high quality stuff.
But the real evolution of Captain Britain begins as we move into the Black Knight strip, which again is black and white but with strongly rendered art by John Stokes and a semi-Tolkien script by Steve Parkhouse that blends an idiosyncratic take on Britain's local mythologies, such as trolls in armour, Mordred as a black wizard, mystic pathways and dog-faced elves, with two Marvel superheroes, Dane Whitman of the Avengers (though his civilian identity is not parsed, subsumed by his role as Merlin's champion) and a certain amnesiac whose identity is the reason for the story's inclusion in the TPB. In a way, it's the first time Captain Britain is truly British and paves the way for the Alan Moore makeover of the character due in the next volume. The volume ends on a dire note, with the Black Knight's quest half over and reminds us how verdant Marvel UK was.
If you all read this, maybe we can get some of the superlative Night Raven strips collected by Panini, or collections of the Nick Fury and Hulk strips by Steve Dillon from the Hulk comic! I'd pay for those!
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Captain Britain Vol 3, 23 May 2009
Captain Britain Vol 3
Completing the British "Super Spider-Man & Captain Britain" Weekly stories with the classic Marvel Team Up tale by fan favourites John Byrne & Chris Claremont.
However - the real reason you need to buy this Tpb - is the Black Knight saga from Hulk comics Weekly. A tolkeinseque fantasy set within the Marvel Universe explores the true origins of the Captain. Never reprinted before!
With a foreword by former Marvel UK editor Dez Skinn, (& a little letter by Neil,(Pet Shop Boys), Tennant), rounds off this must have collection!
Steve O
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4.0 out of 5 stars
The End Before Rebirth, 25 April 2009
This book follows on from the previous two, continuing to reprint Captain Britain's adventures in the order they appeared.
They Series picks up with the reprints of Super Spider-Man and Captain Britain Weekly #239-247, of the original B&W series, before moving to his first US appearance in Marvel Team-Up #65 & 66, which is featured in color, although it did appear in B&W in Super-Spiderman and finally the story that everyone has been wanting to see for nearly 30 year "The Black Knight" written by Steve Parkhouse and Drawn by John Stokes that appeared in Hulk Comic Weekly # 1,3-30.
If we see a Vol four continuing the Black Knight story is not known as I rememeber that from #31 of Hulk Comic Weekly, Captain Britain's origin was reprinted in B&W and went for a few weeks before continuing with the original story.
It was after this appearance that CB would be revamped by Alan Moore & Alan Davis into the character we have today.
I would had given this book 5 Stars if it wasn't for the special splash pages that appeared during the Spider-Man & Captain Britain team up, which were in B&W, as this is how the printing appeared here in the UK, but it does break the flow of the color comic. There is also two nice single page images in color that I haven't seen before by Ron Wilson.
All in All, a good by and well reprinted.
Heres hoping that the Black Knight story will be concluded.
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