Dark Horse is starting a new superhero initiative and ‘Captain Midnight’ is one of their flagship titles. How is a hero from the 40s going to matter in the world of today? Well if you think about it a certain Captain from Marvel was able to pull it off so let’s get another take on the same concept.
The origin of Captain Midnight is shrouded in mystery. His real name is Jim Albright and he was a brilliant genius who was so intelligent, the US Government couldn’t keep his information on record so that the Nazi’s wouldn’t track him down. Not happy to just be a thinker on the sidelines, he created the Captain Midnight persona and has been fighting them head on for the duration of the war.
In this first issue we see him attempting to capture Herr Shark, a Nazi military genius. Things don’t go as planned and instead of captured, Herr Shark ends up as dead. Death by polar boar! (Yes, the Nazi is killed by a polar bear. Now that’s original.) Before being attacked, though, Herr made a point to make sure his daughter Fury Shark was safe. Also it’s hinted that he may have made her immortal.
So what happened to Captain Midnight? We don’t know much but apparently he flew into the Bermuda Triangle and wasn’t seen again. At least, not seen until modern day times. We find out he’s just flown out of the Triangle and is on the run. The government was trying to keep him locked up as a security risk and not let him loose.
A military team tracks him down and is preparing to take him into custody. We quickly flash to Fury taking over as the producer of our military’s technology and it’s quite clear that she’s following somewhat in her father’s footsteps. Nazi or not, she is not going to be good for our country.
Aside from putting a plan into motion to kill the general who just signed her paperwork, she finds out that the team has found Captain Midnight. When that happens, she puts something into motion; half of the team suddenly turns into mutant creatures and attacks everyone else.
Captain Midnight takes them out and immediately tells the government operatives that are still there that now, with the moles flushed out, he’s prepared for his assignment.
Overall, I felt the issue itself was a fun read. It kept me interested all the way through and of course picking Nazi’s as the bad guys is always a sure fire win to root for the hero. I’m looking forward to hearing more of the back stories of these characters and where it’s going to move forward from here.
I don’t think we’ve been given enough details about the characters yet, but you can’t blame that from just the first issue. Character build up takes time and giving it all away at once is never a good payoff. I can’t say this is on my permanent pull list quite yet but at the very least the next few issues will be.
CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT #1
Writer: Joshua Williamson
Artist: Fernando Dagnino
Colorist: Ego
Cover Artist: Felipe Massafera
