The Captain America and the American Dream After September 11

8/13/2019 The Captain America and the American Dream After September 11

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THE CAPTAIN AMERICA AND THE AMERICAN DREAM AFTER

SEPTEMBER 11

Rodrigo Aparecido de Araújo Pedroso

ABSTRACT

This work aims to analyze and discuss how the attacks of September 11, 2001

were represented in the Captain America comics – published between June and

December 2002 – written and drawn, respectively, by John Ney Rieber and John

Cassaday. These authors redesigned and featured the Captain America as a superhero

tasked with a mission that goes beyond defending the American people, because in this

new setting he became a sort of “incarnation” of the values of the American Dream. The

research focused on the analysis of speech and visual elements present in comics, using

as support works of historians who analyze images, and authors of semiotic and analysis

of discourse. Also seek to verify how the fictionality in the comic books contributed to

establish a reflection about the contemporaneity at same time which makes a bridge

with fictional elements of the American past.

INTRODUCTION

The Captain America it’s a comic book character created in 1941 by Joe Simon

and Jack Kirby, his stories were deeply connected with the American propaganda and

war efforts to defeat the Nazi and Fascist threat. After the World War II the Captain

America comics continued to be published, however he passed through the hands of

different creative staffs that sought to make modifications or adjustments to keep him

updated to a consumer market and conjunctures cultural and political in constantchange.

We can say that changes by which the character has passed over the twentieth

century were, to some extent, attempts to adapt it to new historical contexts and

associate it with some important facts related with domestic and foreign policies of the

United States, as the Second War and the Cold War.

This bring us to beginning of the twenty first century, more precisely in

September 11 2001, when occurred the attacks to World Trade Center and Pentagon,

which had his authorship attributed to the Islamic extremist group Al-Qaeda and


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resulted in death of about 3000 citizens. And also threw the country in a new military

intervention, the so-called “War on Terror” that resulted in the invasion of Afghanistan

and afterwards Iraq.

In the middle of all mobilization and the new struggle justified by the attacks,

the Marvel Comics (publishing company who has the rights of Captain America

publication) published, between June and December 2002, a series of six adventures

situated on the historical context post September 11. These comics were a relaunching

of Captain America magazine written by John Ney Rieber and drawn by John Cassaday.

The first three issues of that stories show us, at first, Steve Rogers (the man who

wears the Captain America costume) desperately trying to rescue someone alive from

the rubble of World Trade Center. Later we see the Captain fighting terrorists which had

have invaded and hijacked all citizens from a small town called Centerville. At the last

three issues of the comics, the Captain does a travel by the memories of his past at

World War II, when he goes to Germany to fight the master of the terrorists who created

a complex plan to destroy the USA.

AMERICAN DREAMS AND MYTHS

These new Captain America comics are a mix of real and fictional facts.

Whereas, we can see the representation of real events, the September 11 attacks, by the

point of view of a group of fictional characters. And there is also the creation of

fictitious event – the terrorist attack on Centerville – which serves as justification for the

Captain America actions. The authors sought to build a new version of the Captain

America; they characterized him as an obstinate hero, with a great feeling of “guilt” for

had failing in prevent the attacks that his country suffered. This guilt feelings, is one of

his motivations to action. Other feeling that guides the Captain in the comics it’s his

love to the people of his country.

However, the main motivator for Captain America to fight is the ideal of the

“American Dream”. According with John Ney Rieber:

I believe that Cap's primary loyalty is to the American dream. And I believe that his view of America is based firmly on the constitutionand the bill of rights--tempered by a very accurate perception of the

world around him. I believe that he considers the history of the nationas a struggle between the American dream and the American reality.1

1 Interview available at:< http://www.buzzcomics.net/archive/index.php/t-498.html > Access in:

23/01/2013


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The first mention of the American Dream in the comics occurs between the

pages 32 and 33 of the first edition of that new series – right after the scenes where

Captain saves a young Arab-American from to be assaulted by a group of men confused

and angry because of their loss in the WTC attacks – where the hero evokes, and

characterizes, the American Dream as the “only force” able to join the American people

in this tragic moment.

The Captain America says that American people are “United by a power that no

enemy of freedom could begin to understand. We share...We are... The American

Dream.”2 This excerpt show us the American Dream as more than a element of national

unit, the Dream is a kind of identity element, that differentiates the Americans from his

“enemies”. The American Dream should be faced as an element of differentiation

between “Us” and “Others”. In these differentiation elements we could add the

“freedom”, in the comics this ideal it’s appointed as other important element of

American identity, the “enemies” are against “freedom”. If “they” are against freedom,

then “they” are against the United States and his people.

This distinctions between “We” and “Others” is common in the constitution of

identity for many people, and according to Todorov (1999) its occurs in two dimensions

the “individual” and “collective”, individually when an “I” self -recognize and

distinguished from an “Other” and it could occur internally “you can find yourself in

others” (p.03). In a collective range the “Others could” be:

[…] or else as a specific social group to which we so not belong. Thisgroup in turn could be interior to the society: women for men, the richfor poor, the mad for “normal”; or it can be exterior to society, anothersociety which will be near or far away, depending on the case: beingswhom every thing links to me on the cultural, moral, historical plane;or else unknown quantities, outsiders whose language and customs I

do not understand, so foreign that in extreme instances I am reluctantto admit they belong to the same species as my own. (TODOROV,

1999, p.03)

This last definition given by Todorov fits well into the distinction that the author

made between the American people and their enemies. "They" do not understand, "can

not understand" the meaning of the "American Dream" and the power it has. Only the

American people can understand the true meaning of it, which makes them different.

This opposition between "Us" and "Others" seems essential to creating an American

national identity.

2 Captain America nº1, p.32 e 33, jun. 2002.


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The American Dream it’s related with two other United State’ national myth: the

“Exceptionalism” and the “Manifest Destiny”. Together they provide the key elements

to understand how the American national identity was build. The origins of these myths

remount from colonial past, when most of the America colonizers thought and treated

the new lands discovered as a kind of “Heaven on Earth” where they could find

marvelous and fantastic things could happen (like myth of El Dorado the city made of

gold). This view were common for all the nations that were involved in the America

conquest (Spanish, Portuguese, French and English), in the specific case of the Puritans

(Calvinists) – that came to America trying to be free from religious persecution in

England – the New World was interpreted as the “Promised Land” that God had

assigned to the Hebrews in “Old Testament” of the Bible.

Based in this religious interpretation the first United State’ settlers would

consider themselves as a people “chosen” by God, and they journey to America were a

chance to build a new society “free” from all “evil” and “sins” of the “Old World”, they

were a community of “chosen” in a “Promised Land”. According to historian Arthur

Schlesinger: “The covenant of salvation, it seemed, had passed from Jews to the

Americans colonialists. Like original sin, this proposition underwent secularization in

the eighteenth century.” (1999, p.14)

This “secularization” suggested by Schlesinger became more evident after the

American Revolution, the defeat of British’s troops was a important signal of how

“special” the American people are, they become the first colony to achieved his

independence, this fact was one great indicative of the American Exceptionalism.

Over time, these ideas were developed and shaped the myth of the “Manifest

Destiny”, as a “people chosen by God” the Americans started to believe that they have a

great mission: “lead the regeneration of the world”. This idea, of “Manifest Destiny”,

entered the collective imagination of the U.S., leading them to believe they are a kind of

“super nation” that has a special and continuous mission to save the world, and spread

the freedom and democracy worldwide, as they comic books superheroes, which the

Captain America it’s a great example.

Returning to the American Dream, according to Walter Allen (1972), this myth

has deep roots in United States history, the first manifestation of the Dream is the

Declaration of Independence (1776), which says “all men are created equal, that they

are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life,


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Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”3 The Declaration of Independence, according to

Allen, is a document of great importance to understand the “American Dream”, the

rights presented on Declaration still yet revolutionary than was two hundred years ago.

In addition, “the Declaration is the expression of a dream almost in a classic Freudian

sense, because treats in fulfillment of wishes that may never become full realities.”

(ALLEN, 1972, p.02)

Based on those ideas we can understand a little more about the meanings of the

American Dream, it could be considered as an objective that guides the United States. It

is represented as a search through a free and egalitarian society where all citizens,

through their individual efforts, contribute to the country’s development. In the Captain

America comics one of the meanings of American Dream it’s something close to this.

The dream is represented as an ideal that guides the Captain, and of course should also

guide the American people.

The fourth edition of Captain America, September 2002 on page 25, presents

another interpretation of this dream, a more particular. After leaving a military base –

where he was seeking clarification from their superiors – the Captain goes on your bike

amid the festivities of Fourth of July and reflects on how his life could be if it was not a

hero:

You could have had a home. You could be there now.In a little white house. One quiet sunny street. Nobody firing missles at you.Knowing who your friends are… Listening the neighbors’ kids squeal, running through the sprinklersone more time. While she works on her tan. The one you love.The one who loves you.

4

This part of the comics has an important function within the context of this new

configuration of the character, it refers to a more intimate viewpoint of the Captain

America, and he is showed with dreams about an alternative life, if he was not Captain

America. The personal version of the "American Dream" of Captain America comes

down to a “home” in a “calm” neighborhood, next to “friends” and one “woman to

love’. Although it seems something intimate and with personal character, this dream

makes a clear reference to what we might call “materialistic” side of the American

Dream.

3 Available at:< http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/> Access in: 07/02/2013

4 Captain America nº4, p.25, set. 2002.


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According to Robert Darnton (2005) the American Dream can be related to the

right to “pursuit of happiness”, established by the Declaration of Independence. This

right to pursuit of happiness goes back to the thought of the philosopher John Locke,

who was the first to associate this kind of “pursuit” with the right of property. In the

United States the association between the right of “property” and “happiness” was

developed by George Mason, and was later assimilated by Thomas Jefferson, and

included in the Declaration of Independence. Thus, the idea of "pursuit of happiness"

became a right associated with the materialist right of “property”. Over time this quest

for happiness was acquired contours even more materialistic, summing up the search

endlessly for virtually any type of material possession. This constant search is another

element that characterizes the right to happiness, according to Darnton this right is

“something to be sought, is not something that fell from the sky” (2005, p.119).

This search is now linked with the idea of “hard work ” to be happy you have to

earn it; you have to go through hardships and challenges. This sense was very well

incorporated by many of the immigrants who settled in America, they created their own

versions of the American Dream. And for many of them that dream could be summed

up in having “their own land, in houses with gardens and white picket fences of wood

[...] For those people, America was truly the land of opportunity, even if it was

necessary two generations for free them from the slums [...]” (DARTON, 2005, p.119-

120).

Returning to Captain America comics, we can note one feeling of deprivation

when he says: “You could have had a home. You could be there now. In a little white

house. One quiet sunny street.” The hero, even with their superhuman characteristics,

expresses the desire to own a property, a “white house”, he longs to have friends, peace

and, especially, get a woman to love. But their status as hero and his struggle (or

mission) does not allow him to enjoy this kind of happiness. For Captain America

achieve his version of the American Dream is still far, as for many U.S. residents

(immigrants or born there), the ideal of the Dream and the happiness arising from its

realization is still something to be achieved. The “American Dream offers the promise

that if you work, you - or at least their children - will b e rewarded with a better life.”

(HERTSGAARD, 2003, p.161)

Moreover, this materialistic ambition of Captain America is an indicative of his

humanity, or rather; it conveys the idea that even having superpowers he, like any otherman, also dreams with a better life. So what differentiates the Captain America of


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another American citizen (besides his superhuman powers)? This differentiation

between “Hero” and “Citizen” is one of the main issues debated by the author's.

Concisely, the author states that there are no major differences between Captain

America and a “common” citizen. What differentiates them is the attitude, that is,

anyone can be like him just need to assume the same commitment that hero.

This is evident on page 24 of the fourth edition of the comics, in it we see a

family that is watching the celebrations of Fourth of July, and when a child sees Captain

America happen the following dialogue:

Girl (Cat) – Joel, Joel, look... It’s that super hero guy! From TV, Iswear… Boy (Joel) – He took his mask off, Cat. He’s not a super hero… Dadsays, just a hero. Like, people could do a lot of stuff he does, if

they… Father (completing the boy sentence) – If we cared as much. And

tried as hard.5

It appears that Captain America is no longer seen as a superhero now “he's just a

hero” and this brings his exploits to the level of a “normal” human being. Anyone who

cares and strives, as much as the Captain can do much that “he does”. The difference

between the Captain and an ordinary citizen, again, is the attitude of each. Steve Rogers,

the man behind the mask, is like any “ordinary person”, what makes you different is not

their superpowers, but his determination to fight for his country, he cares and tries to do

more than others.

Thus it can be said that pages 24 and 25 show the choices that Captain America

had to make to become a "hero", to him defend the people of his country is most

important. More important than his personal ambitions, which he sets aside in the name

of his ideal. His determination and altruism are so great that he is willing to sacrifice his

"happiness", his "welfare" and his version of the American Dream. In the following

pages of this adventure, while being surrounded and attacked by terrorists, he wonders

how his life could be. And, even injured, he did not give up fighting. The Captain

America's struggle is to ensure that everyone will have the opportunity to seek and

perhaps enjoy the Dream.

Following, from page 28 to 33, we see a series of images that show Captain

America trying to escape their enemies who cornered him at the top of the dam. In a

desperate attempt to escape he jumps from the dam and throw oneself into toward a

5Captain America nº4, p.24, set. 2002.


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U.S. flag, thinking: “Hold the Dream. If you don’t believe… Who will? It’s enough to

hold it, soldier…Hold the Dream.”6 This sequence ends with an image of the hero

falling in flames grabbed in the U.S. flag and concluded his thoughts about the Dream

with the following sentence: “You do not have to taste it.”

That part of the comics gives us another important data about the Captain

America and whereat he is in a constant struggle. He should not only believe in the

American Dream, he as a national symbol should, more than any other American,

believe and hold the Dream, if the Captain America does not do it nobody will do.

Being a hero, in this moment so complicated for the United States, requires an even

greater effort to keep the people united and confident in the power of the American

Dream.

CONCLUSION

In this new comics version the Captain America was characterized as more than

a soldier who fights to defend his country. It can be regarded as a representation of

values and ideals that are part of the American imagination and, as we saw, they make

references to the Declaration of Independence and one self selection of the American

past, where real facts and mythical interpretations of America are united.

The American Dream has two views; one is the quest for utopian ideals of

freedom and equality that are considered universal values essential to all human beings.

The other view is a search for individual goals, the pursuit of “happiness”, which often

manifests itself as a materialistic search for goods, property, wealth, etc. The “new”

Captain America embodies these two visions of the American Dream.

So we can say these Captain America comics have a function that goes beyond a

mere ideological and patriotic propaganda, they reaffirm old “national myths” and uses

they power to mobilizing of them to generate the fictitious scenario where they, in the

figure of Captain America, becomes a valid alternative to overcome the crisis caused by

the attacks of September 11.

REFERENCES

ALLEN, Walter Ernest. Sonho americano e o homem moderno. Rio de

Janeiro: Lidador, 1972.

6 Captain America nº4, p.29 to 31, set. 2002.


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DARNTON, Robert. Os dentes falsos de George Washington: Um guia não

convencional para o século XVIII. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2005.

HERTSGAARD, Mark. A sombra da águia: por que os Estados Unidos fascinam eenfurecem o mundo. Rio de Janeiro: Record, 2003.

SCHLESINGER Jr., Arthur M. The cycles of American history. New York: Mariner

books, 1999.

TODOROV, Tzvetan. The conquest of America: the question of the other. New York:

Harper & Row, 1999.

The Captain America and the American Dream After September 11

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