Cube Roundtable: DC Rebirth or Hydra Captain America?

What got you more excited for future comics: DC Rebirth #1 or Captain America #1, which ends with a "Cap is Hydra" plot twist?



Matt: Hydra Cap. I am exhausted by DC's reboots. Hydra Cap at least seems like it has the potential for an interesting story or twist or alternate universe. DC's refusal to embrace the absurdity of the comics multiverse makes following what's going on harder and harder. That said, if Booster Gold is truly back, I reserve the right to completely change my mind.

Back Issue Ben: We've seen DC make this "promise" before, that things will be better now. It doesn't change that the same people are still running the show, the same editors are in place, and the creative teams on the Rebirth books aren't exactly knocking my socks off. I have no idea where this Cap story is going to go, and the prospect of an evil Cap being the most dangerous person in the room, only nobody else knows it, is intriguing.

Antonio Nelson Ruiz: DC just seems to be pandering to whatever it thinks the comic community wants. Here's a married Superman with a kid! We can be mature! Here's an Asian Superman! We can be diverse! Maybe that's what they're supposed to do, what they got away from doing. I dunno. Some of it looks interesting, but DC has been drowning for so many years now that I just don't have any faith in them to actually entertain me. Hydra Cap can go a lot of different ways, but I see a lot of fun conflict ahead. Steve versus the Avengers, Steve versus the Thunderbolts and Bucky, and all of it showing just how badass he could be were he villainous. It feels risky, even a little wrong, and just makes me want to tighten my arms around Marvel as they take me for a ride on their bike.

LaMar Forte: Let me say, off the rip, that the most exciting aspect of either is that Geoffrey wrote the biggest F-U to a company's status quo since Grant Morrison's Action Comics run (or going back a little further, George Perez's last panel of Earth 2 Superman's death in Infinite Crisis). When he dipped out to take care of the cinematic universe's issues, he basically left behind a document that actually forces the writers and execs to think about what they're doing, beyond using just gimmicks to sell books. And the fly thing about it is that he used Dr. Manhattan, a guy that's basically lost his humanity and heart, as a metaphor for what's wrong with comic storytelling, while presenting us with the real Wally West as his spiritual and in metaphysical counter. It says a lot that he could basically have done whatever he wanted, but he chose to do it this way. I have no clue where these people are going with either Skeeze Rogers or Rebirth, but I like the way Geoffrey styled on them on his way out the door; what he did was the equivalent of leaving the club and taking the bartender's tip jar on the way out.

Travis Hedge Coke: Hydra Cap has me more interested, but mostly because it is just business as usual and I trust the writer more to give me what I like. Unless Johns promises he won't use the word "hope" more than two more times in Rebirth, I think I'll just take my check and go now, instead of waiting around for the other courses.

Duy: Rebirth, basically for two reasons. (1) I'm a DC fan, and they ARE going back to some things I want. Is that commercially better? No, but that's not the question. And (2) I'm not even done with Brubaker Cap yet. I'll get to Hydra Cap eventually, I'm sure, but my Cap-space in my brain is setting it aside for now. And probably for a long while.