Black Panther/Captain America: Flags of Our Fathers #1-4 (2010): 1st Armless Tiger Man

So apparently we’re still doing the Marvel Knights thing, because this is an MK title. Interesting. In a world where we have a MAX universe and all comics are skewing more adult, I wonder why MK is still a thing. Reggie Hudlin has his fans and detractors, and I fall somewhere in the middle. Specifically, I found his Black Panther run to be extremely uneven. Here, he’s paired with Denys Cowan–so that’s nice. His art tends to elevate everything it illustrates. I’m hopeful. The story starts with a flashback to World War II, with Captain America leading the Howling Commandos on a mission. The narrator is Gabriel Jones–the black member of the team. It’s an interesting entry point. During mission prep, they’re all at mess and Cap finishes the food on Jones’ plate (he was done eating), and Gabriel shares his observation that a white man had never used the same fork as him before. This is the kind of stuff Hudlin does well. The mission takes the team to Wakanda, where they are racing stop Hitler’s contingent–led by Baron Strucker and Red Skull–from getting Vibranium. So this is the first meeting of Black Panther and Captain America, and if course it starts out with Panther treating Cap lik...