Captain America – the more things change…

One of my favorite writers is Mark Gruenwald, who wrote “Squadron Supreme” for Marvel and handled the adventures of Captain America for over 100 issues.   I’m sure part of why he’s my favorite stems from his being the writer of my favorite character when I was a youngster, but I think a lot of his writing holds up, and, sadly, is for the most part not available in trade paperback format. 

Gruenwald died in 1996 at age 43 from a heart attack.  Marvel has a page about Gruenwald’s accomplishments at Marvel.com.

My favorite storyline by Gruenwald — and one of my favorite storylines of all time — is the “President Fires Cap” storyline from “Captain America” 332-350 (with seeds to the storyline going back as far, perhaps, as issue No. 321.)

Gruenwald talked about this storyline with “Amazing Heroes” in 1988, in issue No. 146.  (This is one of the issues I was most excited to get from my fanzine find at Planet Comicon.)   He talks about the only surefire “gimmicks” to revive interest in an ongoing superhero comic.