Captain America and Bucky is the best looking superhero comic on the shelf.

Dc New 52 blah blah blahs aside, the one comic I think EVERYONE should be talking about (and it is a Marvel book) is Captain America and Bucky, with Ed Brubaker and Marc Andreyko on writing, Chris Samnee on art, Bettie Breitweiser on colors and Joe Caramagna on letters. Most of the buzz I have been reading on a Marvel book has been for Daredevil, by Mark Waid, Marcos Martin and Paolo Rivera, and don't get me wrong, that praise is extremely well deserved. The new Daredevil is one of the best comics out there now, and certainly a cut above most superhero books being released.


...But hot DAMN Chris Samnee is on fire, as is colorist Bettie Breitweiser. I'm not sure whose work on this book I like more, Samnee's or Breitweiser's. Samnee's art is the PERFECT combination of superhero style comics illustration, mixed with pure cartooning and a splash of Norman Rockwell. His inks are milky pools of black, they are like dessert, so satisfying and thick.
It's obvious he uses a lot of reference, but he draws every last bit of it, he doesn't just scan a photo and use posteredges to make it look like a drawing. Almost every panel has a background, and if it doesn't, there is a visual reason or excellent coloring choices that make it ok. Everything looks right, nothing is confusing, and it all looks damn good. If there are characters in the background, they are all individuals, and they are interesting to look at. Every panel tells a story. Some specific examples of what I'm talking about below...look at those clowns! Look at that train!


The action is exciting, and it's pure WWII pulp style storytelling, played a little less over the top than the Simon and Kirby Cap stuff, but the art is just spot on. I enjoy the story so far, which mainly focuses on the exploits of Cap and Bucky from Bucky's perspective, but the artwork is just so astounding that it is all I want to talk about. To be honest, the two mesh together perfectly, I can't really separate one from the other, which is PERFECT AND WHAT ALL COMICS SHOULD DO. Sometimes you might read a comic, and go "Hey, that was a great story, but the art just wasn't doing it for me" or vice-versa (I think a perfect example of the vice versa would be Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale's Catwoman: When in Rome story, fan-freaking-tastic visuals, but definitely one of the worst written comics I own).


It is interesting to see the transformation of Bucky from a troubled but well meaning kid into a killer. It is also a little bizarre that the younger Bucky seems almost more bloodthirsty than the older Captain America, but he is still a kid, the three panels below show ways that the artists convey those sides of Bucky... the cold blooded killer and the young soldier looking to impress, still unsure of himself.


The colors are digital, but they don't advertise it. The textures almost make the colors look painted, and they don't just serve the inked artwork, they enhance them, they make them look even better. I'm convinced that if this book was colored by someone else it would not look nearly as good. This book is a feast of comics storytelling, I feel like I get my $2.99 value with each and every issue. My only real qualm with this book is why Samnee isn't doing the covers. This is a perfect example of "don't judge a book by it's cover" because I think as cover images these issues have pretty unremarkable ones.

I would expect this book to be all over the web, pages and panels being tumbled, 5 star reviews on comics websites...maybe I'm just not looking in the right spots, but if you see this book BUY IT NOW. Let's not have another Thor The Mighty Avenger here people.

-Eamon