Truth: Red, White & Black [Paperback]

Robert Morales (Author), Kyle Baker (Illustrator)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In 1940, Joe Simon and Jack Kirby created Captain America, a frail patriot who was transformed by a "super-soldier serum" into a physically perfect specimen to champion freedom, an American alternative to the Nazi uebermensch. Now, writer Morales pursues this idea and also draws inspiration from U.S. government experiments in the 1930s that left unwitting African-Americans infected with syphilis, leading to many deaths. Beginning his story in 1940, Morales incisively depicts the racism his various African-American characters confront both in civilian life and in the military. These black soldiers are compelled to act as test subjects for the super-soldier serum; some die, while others become deformed. Ultimately only one survives, Isaiah Bradley. Substituting for Captain America on a mission, Bradley discovers Jewish concentration camp inmates subjected to experiments. Ranging from heroic figures to pointed caricatures, artist Baker makes his varied styles gel. Drawing on copious research, Morales dramatizes how racism corrupted American history, yet verges close to asserting moral equivalency between America and Nazi Germany. Roosevelt was ultimately in charge of the super-soldier program: would he have approved these human experiments? Besides, how can one talk about "truth" regarding a fictional creation? Simon and Kirby devised a fable about an American everyman tapping his inner strength to combat genocidal fascism; Kirby helped pioneer positive depictions of blacks in comics. By adding Morales's backstory to Captain America's origin, Marvel has turned the character into a white superman who owes his powers to the deaths and exploitation of African-Americans.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Product Details

• Paperback: 168 pages
• Publisher: Marvel Comics (February 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0785110720
• ISBN-13: 978-0785110729
• Product Dimensions: 10.4 x 6.5 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #976,745 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A startling and original graphic novel, April 7, 2004

By 

Rosa Lina - See all my reviews

This review is from: Truth: Red, White & Black (Paperback)

I didn't read comic books as a kid and so have no fond memories of how comics ought to be. When I saw the stark cover of Truth -- and from across the room, the intended effect of seeing a flag in red, white, and black really works -- I was compelled into a world outside my comfort zone. The cover says it all: Truth/ Red, White, & Black, confirming what I already knew, because even when we won't admit it, the truth is evident.

I can see why some readers would find the story unsatisfying -- for a time I wished I'd picked up something lighthearted, like Scrooge McDuck. But when I finished reading this tense, compact, and nuanced story about a group of disparate soldiers, whose only common denominator is the color of the skin (the first section develops a cast of characters you can't imagine would ever occupy the same space willingly, and indeed, it takes the military to unite them) I was amazed and grateful for the read.

"Truth" is not for everyone. There's no sugar-coatings about race relations; the enemies are not always the folks you want to root against; the ideas are deep. It's Fiction with a capital F, and like all great works, that kind of original and difficult thinking inspires controversy. Well done, Marvel Comics and Robert Morales and Kyle Baker.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars LOVE THIS FREAKING BOOK!!, April 21, 2009

By 

Joe Ruck "The Movie Nut" - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Truth: Red, White & Black (Paperback)

As far as Captain America stories go this is one of the better ones i've read in years. "Truth" spins some realistic tones about the treatment of colored soldiers during world war 2 into the captain america mythos. Just the book addressing the fact that in those days the government injecting a white/blonde/blue eyed man with an experimental drug that was not tested on humans,would have been ridiculous. Then showing the many failed black super soldiers that died or were horribly disfigured due to the testing of earlier prototypes of the serum was shocking. Steve Rogers reaction after unearthing this hidden and horrible information that preceded in him becoming Captain America and his actions after the fact, shows why he's one of the most enduring and respected characters in the Marvel U. This book is hard to find cheap, but well worth it.

11 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Empowering, May 20, 2005

By 

Melvin G. Brennan III "jihi no kokoro" (Scotland UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Truth: Red, White & Black (Paperback)

Many folks here just don't get it: the TRUTH about TRUTH is that its an allegory for the TRUTH that diasporan Africans in America have been both the innovators and the guinea pigs for and in America for some time now.

Given the extension of the COnstitutional franchise by things like Abolitionism and civil rights, not to mention the Tuskeegee experiements, it makes eminent sense that both the first test subjects were black, and that the first, best Captain America sprung from that heritage.

This work of storytelling is great, in every sense of the word; it rightly throws an art form sorely lacking in compelling stories of non-whites (even BLACK PANTHER - under Priest - is told from the perspective of the white male observer, however humourously!) that make sense.