Captain America: Prisoner Of War (Captain America

Captain America (2004) (Collected Editions) #15

by Ed Brubaker, Mike Benson, Howard Chaykin

Bucky Barnes is the prisoner of a private war. Fighting for good against consummate evil during WWII, he learned the deadly skills of warfare--only to have these tools exploited by the Soviets' Cold War machine. Memories of his time as a brainwashed assassin haunt him still, never more so than when he dons the star-spangled uniform once worn by Steve Rogers. And just when he thougt he could break free of the chains of his history, he is thrust into a new nightmare: a Russian prison camp housing a handful of his most vicious and revenge-minded Cold War peers. For Bucky, each ponderous minute that ticks by in the gulag brings another new threat to his life. But for his friends--Steve Rogers, Sharon Carter and Black Widow--it is a race against time to undo the wicked conspiracy that has used Bucky's past as the Winter Soldier to trap him in a life of cruelty worse than any he's ever experienced.

COLLECTING: CAPTAIN AMERICA 617-619; and material from 616

Genres: Comics, Marvel, Graphic Novels, Superheroes, Graphic Novels Comics, Comic Book, Fiction

200 pages, Paperback

First published September 7, 2011

About the author

Ed Brubaker (born November 17, 1966) is an Eisner Award-winning American cartoonist and writer. He was born at the National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland.

Brubaker is best known for his work as a comic book writer on such titles as Batman, Daredevil, Captain America, Iron Fist, Catwoman, Gotham Central and Uncanny X-Men. In more recent years, he has focused solely on creator-owned titles for Image Comics, such as Fatale, Criminal, Velvet and Kill or Be Killed.

In 2016, Brubaker ventured into television, joining the writing staff of the HBO series Westworld.

Reviews

[Kemper · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is why I never want to be in charge of anything. The second you become the boss, you can no longer go break your former sidekick/reformed brainwashed Soviet hitman/replacement superhero out of a Russian gulag when you want to.

Current Captain America James ‘Bucky’ Barnes has been arrested and sent to Russia for his alleged crimes while he was operating as the Winter Soldier. Barnes is trying to atone for past sins by accepting his punishment, but when he gets to the Siberian prison he learns that it’s filled with former enemies who want him dead. Meanwhile, Steve Rogers wants to help his old partner but finds that his official role as the head of US superhero business prevents him from doing anything that might cause a massive international incident.

As James tries to survive prison and Steve butts head with government bureaucracy, one point become very clear: James’ reputation is far too tarnished to continue as Captain America. Who will pick up the shield? Oh, come on. Who do you think?

The first half of this was yet another solid story from Ed Brubaker, and while we all know Steve is eventually going to put the red, white and blue tights back on, there’s some nice drama built up with Steve’s admission that he never wanted to be special. He just wanted to serve, and he was supposed to be one of many. Instead fate singled him out, and there’s a nice bit of regret and even a touch of self-pity that he missed out on the victory parade he deserved and instead got called on to continue being a symbol.

Unfortunately, the good stuff only makes up half the book, and then there’s a note to check out more of Steve and James in the Fear Itself crossover. Don’t you just love it when you’ve been reading one comic title for the story for several years only to learn that it’s being continued in a giant crossover that will force you to read about three thousand books to figure out what the hell happened? Thanks for nothing, Marvel.

Plus to fill out this volume, the second half is a hodge podge of stories by other writers that aren’t up to the Brubaker standard. It made this collection seem like a bait-and-switch and seriously irked me.

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s usually a given that if someone dies in the comics, they’ll somehow not stay dead (except Uncle Ben). Characters are bought back into continuity in the most bizarre ways: Either Superboy will punch a hole in a “wall”, the character thought dead was just abducted by Skrulls, the character was in Europe for two decades of continuity, or the character who died was a duplicate/imposter/clone. Whatever! For the longest time, the character that fan boys did not want revived was James “Bucky” Barnes, Captain America’s annoying teen side-kick during World War II.

Well, Marvel, did effectively revive him as the Winter Soldier. In this story, he’s trapped in the Gulag with what seems to be every other Russian super-villain in Marvel continuity, including the guy who was the fifth (?) Red Dynamo (does Marvel pay someone to keep track of these things?). Also, if this is what the Gulag is like, I am going to put Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago on my Good Reads “To Read” list.

Without getting into spoilers, the story was adequate and given the amount of back stabbing villains involved, sometimes confusing. As far as the art goes, is it me or are some panels in modern comics (the art was dark and shadowy to fit the mood) incomprehensible? What was Mike Deodato trying to show? Is Uncle Ben somewhere in the shadows?

[Subham · Rating 3 out of 5]

I just read till like 150th page because after that the stories were becoming unbearable to read like the art was just becoming bad and thats why I hate anthologies. God dont collect them in trade ever marvel else it just ruins the reading experience.

SO it starts with Bucky being in Gulag and there we see him fighting different people in order to survive encountering the former Crimson dynamo and people he might have done wrong but not remembering, and then fighting wolf spiders (think male version of red room) and some others foe until finally the big fight in the end where he might make his escape with widows help and we see her adventures and missions and what they cost and finally Steve's dilemma with will he be captain america again? So yeah a fun story which does well to continue the big story and also give character moments for both Steve and Bucky and builds towards something exciting.

I read two other stories like one with a woman named Jenny and how Steve sort of rescued her and it was alright and then something with Ghost-towns and fighting AIM Robots which bring into question some things about small towns and the desperation which leads them to do bad things, so not bad overall but not needed in this volume but then again anniversary celebrations are like that and some might enjoy that more so yeah upto you to decide whether to read this or not.

[Shannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's more about the Winter Soldier and the fallout but then it shoves another story in the back which isn't as interesting. Some good info otherwise for people who follow the WS tales.

OVERALL GRADE: B

[Drew Canole · Rating 3 out of 5]

After Bucky is set free by a US judge the Russians come in and take Bucky back to Russia to serve time in a gulag. Not really sure how that all works, I can't see the US allowing Russia to just take away a superhero... especially one that was mind controlled by the previous government!

Ignoring those issues, it is pretty cool to see Bucky in jail having to battle for his life like he's in a Van Damme movie.

[James DeSantis · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was okay.

I guess Brubaker was running out of steam a bit. I don't blame him. At this point he's written over 50+ issues. This is the fallou of the trials of captain america and Bucky in prison. They have some sort of fight club thing going on (does every prison story do this?). Then the 2nd half is Steve trying to deal with his friend gone and also trying to figure out if he should put back on the shield.

Overall, it's not bad, but kind of the run of the mil stories without much else. The jarring art change is a bit weird too. The stuff with Steve was interesting to see him debate where he knows he has to go. I thought the ending was a little meh though and the Bucky stuff just okay. A 2.5 out of 5. I'll round it up to a 3.

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well.
There had to be at least one of Brubaker's stories that wasn't great.
sigh
Not bad, but I expected better.

Not sure of the backstory, but Bucky has been extradited to a Russian prison, and Steve can't break him out without possibly making things worse.
It was the funky art that really killed this one for me.
It sort of flashed back and forth?
The parts with Bucky in the Gulag were basically the same as normal, but it seemed like whenever the story switched back to what Steve & Co. were doing to get him back...it turned all wonky.
Not horrible, just distracting.

Ehhhh. It's ok, and at least I'm finally working my way through some new (to me) Captain America stuff.

[Chelsea 🏳️‍🌈 · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of Marvel books keep a consistent artist until the end of the run nears. This series stayed the course up until this volume, for some reason. I'm used to the anniversary issues using different artists but this entire volume shifted between artists several times.

As with the past issues, the stuff with Bucky in the Gulag was wonderful. I enjoyed the last bit of Natasha's solo mission. However, the rest of this book did nothing for me. It was rather annoying to see them drag out Steve deciding to take up the shield again because we saw him struggle with that in the past 2 volumes. It just didn't seem well paced to keep it interesting.

Anyway, it's a recommend for the stuff with Bucky and Natasha (Sam was barely here for some reason? :() but, other than that... I don't think this was necessary.

[Mike · Rating 2 out of 5]

Seriously Ed? You really think we need another Origin issue? What a complete filler job, waste of time. C'mon Brubaker, you can do a lot better than this.

And boy do I dislike the jarring erratic effect on my reading when the artist's pen becomes a revolving door every month. I'm sure it's a blast for the writer to get to work with changing talent, and I'll bet it helps keep the book on schedule - but boy does it make it hard to get into a mood and sustain it over any multi-issue story arc. At least the story is OK.

I can at least understand how Marvel needs this as another setup for another "event" (this time it's Fear Itself), but boy does it cheapen the impact of the story when its plot was likely predestined and jerry-rigged from the start.

Once the Gulag story is over about 2/3 the way through, I could care less about the non-Brubaker filler issues. However, I dove into them anyway to see if Cap has any life left in him after Brubaker has milked him dry.

Unfortunately, for me a bunch of single-issue stories each are too neat and tidy (save one) to really feel satisfying. If this was The Goon vol 6 I'd forgive it for having a lot of funny fan-fic style stories. These are serious and mostly repetitive of every trope we've ever heard about Cap. And only the final issue has decent art.

[Sesana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of this volume is dedicated to the Gulag storyline. Bucky is in Russian prison, which is every bit as terrible as you might expect. And Steve can't break him out, because his new position is so important, so high profile that he can't just storm a Russian prison. But Natasha can. This is written every bit as well as I've come to expect from Brubaker. Action, intrigue, and espionage, everything that I've come to expect from his version of Captain America. And then the story ends on a bit of a cliffhanger. If I want to see what happens next, I need to read the Fear Itself tie-in, and I'm really not sure if I want to. There's also a handful of short stories, thrown in at the end. It was Cap's 70th anniversary, you see, and that deserves celebration. I wish they'd just celebrated with giving more room to Brubaker's story, though. While the stories were ok, none of them were better than that. And I think that the copy I got was a misprint, because at least one page is missing from the end. Oh well.

[Hannah Call · Rating 4 out of 5]

*3.5/5

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bucky is imprisoned in Russia, framed for crimes of the Winter Soldier. Steve Rogers, Black Widow and Sharon Carter are all working to free him. The story focuses on both Steve Rogers and Bucky, with different art teams handling each.

Not as good as some of the previous volumes, but still a good "prison break" type tale.

[˙⋆✮ Anny ✮⋆˙ · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know how I feel about this. Not too bad but I don't think it was needed and the story felt a bit drawn out. Also my boy Bucky was in pain and I'm gonna come after the people who did this. (Don't hurt him!!)
I loved Natasha though, and it was nice to see Steve's struggles, they were really in character. I don't get why the art changed so often though.

[Clyo (Las Páginas de Clyo) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything is worth it for the Winter Widow.

[Martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

After writing "Captain America" for years and [generally] churning out exciting storylines, this book, the last one by Ed Brubaker before yet another re-launch of the franchise, feels like the weakest of his entire run (possibly ex aequo with the Captain America: Two Americas storyline - at least that one had only ONE artist, so there was some consistency).

"Gulag", the main attraction of the "Prisoner Of War" collection, only accounts for just over half the page count of the book. We get no less than 3 artists sharing the art duties, all with different styles. We've got the gritty Guice art, the dark, shadowy Deodato art, and the more cartoony Samnee art. The story directly follows the events of Captain America: The Trial of Captain America, and Bucky finds himself prisoner in - you guessed it - a Gulag. He's thrown into pseudo-cage fights with other fearsome inmates, in order to "break him mentally".

(Eye roll)

Meanwhile and elsewhere, Steve Rogers, Agent 13 and the Black Widow are trying to find a way to get him out of there. Also, the seeds are planted for Steve Rogers' re-taking of the Captain America identity, since the recent events surrounding Bucky have made it clear he can no longer play that role. This is the last storyline for these characters before Marvel's Fear Itself event of summer 2011.

The rest are short stories written and/or illustrated by people other than Brubaker and the series' regular artists, and most of them are to celebrate Captain America's 70th anniversary. Absolutely none of them are essential reading in the grand scheme of things as they don't tie-in or enrich any of the previous storylines.

By no means a bad collection, it is however not up to the usual standard established by Brubaker & co. over the last few years. 3 stars.

[J · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bucky has been transported to a gulag in Russia, and someone wants him killed. The Avengers act like they're unable to do anything about it, until they do. There's no conclusion here, but a blurb to continue the story in "Fear Itself," which I don't want to do. Therefore, this story is incomplete, and the book sucks because of it.

It is nice seeing Agent Gyrich in the mix. When I was a wee lad, Gyrich showed up in Avengers #181 with a government mandate not only to limit the number of Avengers, but which ones were on the team. When Falcon was chosen for the sake of diversity, a visibly angered Hawkeye really wanted to use the N word, but he didn't. Odd the comics one remembers from one's youth.

The last issue in the collection, #616, is the 70th anniversary of Captain America (and a nice nod to the 616 universe), and is a collection of one off stories by different creators. Art wise, they're all great. Story wise, we get yet another WW2 story, another story about how Cap is this great American icon, a story about a mysterious art collector that was kinda cool, and, oh yeah, another WW2 story guest starring Union Jack.

From reading all these Ed Brubaker Captain America volumes, I get that Marvel is trying to make Cap their version of Superman. Meaning, he's the all-American red, white, and blue icon that America can't do without. It gets very heavy handed, though, and it's as monotonous as the frequent WW2 flashbacks and the continuous retelling of Cap's and Bucky's origin stories. When Bucky, in particular, is allowed to shine, it's great. Same with the pre-death Steve Rogers stories. But I think Brubaker was just on this book a bit too long and was running out of ideas, because it all seems like filler by the end of this volume (which was six years into the Brubaker era, I believe). Add in the Marvel tendency not to tell the reader what is going on in the MU at large, or in other books, and it's kind of a mess.

One added bonus was a couple of sketches of Cap by long-time DC artists Jim Aparo and Curt Swan. Now that was cool.

[Zoli · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unfortunately, this volume couldn't keep up with the quality of the previous one, neither when it comes to the artwork nor as far as the story is concerned. The artwork in this volume seems to be thrown together, changing styles every few pages, resulting in a wild mix that seems somewhat disturbing at best. As for the story, I understand that Captain America is a somewhat limited character, limited by his own past. Maybe I've been lucky to start reading Cap's comics at a rather unusual angle, or the past few issues have all just desperately tried to work all the angles into the Cap's WWII history. The result are some weird and cliche-loaded stories where all Germans still seem to be Nazis and every second German is called Schmidt (while the other half is blessed with names noone's ever heard of in Germany before), while the Russians all seem still to be Communists fighting against the United States and every codename in Russia is "Red Something". Maybe I've missinterpreted too much potential into Captain America in the 21st century, maybe the character and the stories are too limited and can't shake off some angles from the past and some ridiculous "us vs. them" mentality. I'll see what the next volume will be like, but I don't know if I'll continue with Brubaker's Cap run if every other volume is purely to keep the story alive and get you to the next one that's going to turn out great again, in all fairness. Oh, and those anniversary runs are useless at best. I didn't really like those "let's have everyone write and draw some mini story" things with previous anniversary editions, but the ones in this volume are beyond ridiculous. Cap bitten by a vampire, turning into one himself just to cure himself at the last moment by biting the vampire? Please...

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This would have gotten a higher rating if the TPB had contained only the Ed Brubaker stories, and not a selection of shorts tagged on at the end. Brubaker tells a taunt tale of Bucky's incarceration at a Russian camp in Siberia for crimes he allegedly committed while a Soviet spy/killer (frame anyone?). Of course it's a frame, but Brubaker takes us inside Bucky's head as Bucky tries to remain the better person he has become and avoid reverting to the killing beast he was while a mind-controlled agent for Soviet Intelligence. The scenes between the Black Widow and Sharon Carter and later Bucky and the Widow are reminders of the type of writing once found in Hollywood screwball comedies/mysteries.

[Suvi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've been following the Winter Soldier/Bucky storyline, and I've come to the conclusion that his whole purpose in the series is to suffer. (He's also a part-time damsel in distress.) I know how to pick my favourites, right?

"This is the trajectory of my life. Every time things are finally stable... finally good... something sudden happens to wreck it all. And then I learn to live with that. And after a while, worse-off becomes the new normal... And then it starts all over again."

It does. I've lost count of the times he's been captured/brainwashed/tortured/thrown into a dungeon. In this heartwarming volume, he's extradited from the US and finds himself in a Russian prison camp. Fun times in Siberia! Unsurprisingly, it's one of my favourite stories this far.

[Gavin · Rating 3 out of 5]

In terms of the Brubaker run on Cap, this is a rather disappointing effort (that being said, still better than a lot of other books). The main problem here is that the art is all over the place. For the most part, Brubaker has had great art to accompany his work, but here the art starts off well and then just goes all over the place, with too many different styles etc, which just take away from some of the content.
The storyline itself is good, but leaves us as ever, standing at a 'now-what?' moment. Bucky is in a Russian Gulag and Cap can't do a thing about it...but maybe someone else can? Appearances by Nick Fury, Sharon Carter and Black Widow.

[Lynda · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am afraid 2 stars was kind of pushing it. Every good author has a dud or two.

[Mely · Rating 4 out of 5]

Superhero comics really haven't gotten over the Cold War yet, huh.

[Brandt · Rating 3 out of 5]

So the obvious is finally about to happen.

I've complained about it before--In his first four years on Captain America, Ed Brubaker crafted a brilliant narrative that had Captain America's nemesis, the Red Skull, using the events of Civil War to his advantage to "kill" Steve Rogers. When it is revealed later that Steve isn't dead, it was obvious, even with Brubaker leaving Bucky in the role of Captain America that at some point Steve was going to reclaim the role of Captain America.

While Steve doesn't take back the shield in this volume, it has to happen soon. This is likely the last of the story arcs that are going to focus on Bucky as Captain America, although to be fair, Captain America doesn't really seem to appear in these pages. Bucky has been sent back to Russia, having escaped being jailed for actions taken when he was the Winter Soldier, only to end up in a gulag where he fights for his life against varied and sundry "super-villains" who also reside in the gulag. Steve, Sharon Carter and the Black Widow attempt to find out what is really going on here, which leads to most of the action of the collection. It is when all of that is over that it's obvious that Captain America is soon to be headlined by Steve Rogers again (this should be a spoiler to no one who has gotten this far--it's been telegraphed since Reborn. We can just stop asking "are we there yet?" now.)

Most of this collection is padded with a number of 70th anniversary stories that apparently appeared in Captain America #616, which is the first story in this volume. They are okay stories (they are described as "love letters" from various creators to the character, and surprise!, they all feature Steve Rogers in the lead role) but when they fill out about half of a trade paperback, they come off as padding for Marvel to justify a $20 (at least) price on a trade paperback. It just feels a little disappointing. In the end, I'm sure that Brubaker's focus on Bucky in the two years since he had "killed" Cap is because he likely felt that Bucky was the more interesting character to focus on (to be fair, Steve Rogers could be a potential "Mary Sue" type character who can do no wrong [thanks to Esther from my book club for teaching me that term], but fortunately he's always had the self doubt of being a person out of his own time, Rip Van Winkle style to prevent this), but I wonder if he would have been better off having Steve just be Captain America when he was "reborn." But maybe that wouldn't have been as much fun to write.

[Ian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Extradited to Siberia, Bucky Barnes finds himself in a gulag filled with old enemies of the Winter Soldier, all intent on being the one to kill him. Meanwhile, Steve Rogers, Sharon Carter and Black Widow work to uncover the conspiracy which set Bucky up in the first place.
Also included are a series of short adventures for Cap from both the modern era and his time in WWII.

Despite me really wanting to be engaged with Bucky's plight in the gulag, I have to say that it all felt fairly derivative. The 'hero locked-in with his worst enemies' thing has been done before (perhaps most viscerally in 'Watchmen') and this doesn't add anything new to the pot. Similarly, Steve's role of 'hero who's been promoted so high he has to play politics now' is also not a new idea.

That said, I did enjoy seeing Steve's internal battle over being pushed towards taking up the shield again versus his reluctance to have ever been Captain America in the first place.

The short additional stories are fine but, with one exception, aren't really anything special. The one that did stand out, however, was Frank Tieri's 'The Exhibit', in which Steve investigates a clone of a monstrous enemy, living free in America.

* More reviews here: https://fsfh-book-review2.webnode.page *

[Jaye Berry · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first issue was such a long boy with so many different stories omg.

So Bucky has been arrested and is now stuck in a Russian prison with a bunch of random D list villains. Steve Rogers doesn't know what to do about Bucky or about being Captain America. He doesn't want his buddy stuck in jail for something he didn't actually do so he tries to get to the bottom of it.

Kinda confused on why there were multiple artists in the same issues?? Like I get the story would switch to following someone else but the art changing was wild. I think maybe because I really liked the art for Steve then Black Widow's side (Chris Samnee ily) but Bucky's was so ugly and I could barely make out anything. Not to mention every single one of them white dudes looked exactly the same like I deadass forgot what Bucky even looked like. 💀

But I really enjoyed this !! I love Bucky so much and his trauma & story is just so fascinating and heartbreaking to me. Plus we have more Winter Widow content of her coming to save him and I was screaming crying throwing up.

The way he gotta go through all this when he didn't even want to be Captain America in the first place lmao rip.

[Jesse · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fucking fantastic. The main story here is told with alternating artists. Butch guice tells of Bucky trapped in a Russian gulag, and it's essentially a preview of his later winter soldier series. It's amazingly dark and gritty, with inventive panel layouts and fantastic colors by bettie breitweiser among others. The other side is Steve and Natasha working on freeing him, illustrated by Chris samnee. Pretty similar to his recent black widow run. Basically, it was my dream team. The final issue was an anthology issue, and some of the stories were ok, but it hit me at first with my arch nemesis howard chaykin. None are written by brubaker, so I might leave most of these out of my bind.

[Linnea · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars pushed up to a 4.5 because oh my god THE ILLUSTRATION !! I was absolutely obsessed with how gorgeous the art was -- both the more naturalistic beautifully textured illustration of Bucky in the gritty gulag and the more classic two-dimensional illustration of Steve/Nat/Sharon's adventures in jail-breaking. I am still loving this storyline and definitely looking forward to seeing what comes next.

[Brad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finally finished the whole Captain America run and was really good. Enjoyed the series far more than I thought I would and I thought I would enjoy it.

I thought I would just read the first 14 issues of the series to read the winter soldier stuff but ended up reading 70+ issues because of how well and intriguing the storytelling is

[Katlyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

As someone usually distracted by shifting art styles, I will admit that I think it worked well in this volume as a way to distinguish between the different point of views: Bucky, Steve, then Natasha / Sharon. Plus, I’m never going to complain about pages from Chris Samnee any way I can get them.

[Shane Perry · Rating 3 out of 5]

This volume was certainly a step up from the last few. I liked the splintered narrative with different artists. It’s a shame Bucky’s time as Captain America is cut so short. Really my only major complaint about Brubaker’s run.