Captain America: Gulag (or how to make me love Bucky more then kill him)

‘Gulag’
By Ed Brubaker, Chris Samnee, Butch Guice, Mike Deodato Jr. and Stefano Gaudiano
Issues 616-619

After an extensive trial, James Buchanan ‘Bucky’ Barnes is found guilty of murder and shipped off to a Russian gulag. Any attempt to escape or to rescue Bucky would result in an international incident. Steve Rogers, newly returned to life, cannot lift a finger to help his friend. Inside the prison walls Bucky discovers that he has many enemies from his past to keep him company. Due to the nature of his revivals and submersions as the Winter Soldier, he cannot remember much of his past, but that will hardly keep him safe when his enemies come calling and the KGB decide to unravel the complicated memory barriers protecting a cherished secret through violence.

From the outside, Brubaker’s run on Captain America must look pretty strange. They bring back the Red Skull, then kill him. They bring back Bucky then kill Steve Rogers only to bring Rogers back and then kill Bucky. However, summarizing these issues thusly would be a great disservice to the monthly comic book and the many talented creators behind it. As a teenager, I had never liked Captain America and instead gravitated toward the anti-heroes such as Wolverine. It wasn’t until I read Jim Krueger’s Earth X that I became aware of how fantastic Captain America is as a character and how indefatigable he is as an icon of hope and defiance.

When Rogers died, Bucky reluctantly took up the mantle of his mentor. He had only just been brought back into existence himself thanks to the cosmic cube. It was the cube’s influence (through Steve Rogers’ wish) that twisted reality and allowed Bucky to survive the explosion that took his life. However, Barnes was found by the Russians and transformed into the perfect killing machine. Barnes was the ideal assassin, able to perform his duty then return to suspended animation until he was needed again. However, his programming deteriorated over time and he began to remember his old life. It hardly helped matters to realize that he had been perverted into an assassin, but eventually he returned to a semblance of his old self.

In recent years he has made an attempt to fill the sizable shoes of Rogers as Captain America, aware that one day his past would come back to haunt him. That moment arrived sooner than anyone anticipated and Barnes begins this story doing penance in a gulag where he is expected to live out the rest of his life or die in the arena against brutal opposing forces. How brutal? His first sparring partner is the aptly named Ursa Major, a giant Russian bear.

Gulag is another stroke in Brubaker’s masterpiece. It combines heart-wrenching drama following Bucky’s struggle in prison with espionage and intrigue as the Black Widow and Sharon Carter attempt to unravel the truth behind his murder conviction. The art chores are split between several incredibly talented teams, making each chapter distinctively gorgeous in its own right. Deodato’s scenes involving the slinky lady spies is juxtaposed by Guice’s stylish and grim prison scenes while Samnee’s portions starring Steve Rogers
give the reader a taste of what’s to come when the monthly title is reborn with him as regular artist.

Bucky survives the bout with Ursa Major only to face still more formidable foes while in between old enemies make attempts on his life. The penance kick is soon forgotten as Barnes realizes he has no choice but to break out. He can’t understand what is being done to him, if the warden is expecting to kill him or make money off of the matches, but it hardly matters. If he wants to live, he has to escape. It soon transpires that within Bucky’s head is some incredibly valuable information concerning a Soviet Super Soldier program. By placing Barnes in such violent situations, the KGB hopes to break down his memory blocks to access the information.

It’s somewhat tragic that ‘Gulag’ is the finest story starring Barnes as it is also his last. It’s also unfortunate as the events jar noticeably with the hero’s final appearance in Fear Itself. I have read online that this may be explained later, but as it stands, the story is marred by this inexplicable detail. The artwork and layout is simply breathtaking and evokes the fine artistry of Jim Steranko back in the day. It’s a shame that the character of Bucky Barnes had to be killed off to make way for a rebirth of Steve Rogers as Captain America, but if it had to happen I cannot imagine a better send off than ‘Gulag.’ Stylish and professional in artistry and story, it is a modern classic.