Because publishers want you to buy their product every month, comics are typically serial in nature. However, occasionally (and more often nowadays than ever before) publishers launch a comic title that is only meant to last for one issue. While ongoing series often have multiple chances to hook in new readers, the comics highlighted in this ongoing investigations only had One-Shot At Greatness!
Publisher: Amalgam Comics
Cover Date: April 1996
Cover Price: $1.95
Writer: Mark Waid
Artist: Dave Gibbons
When the DC and Marvel Universes merged in Marvel vs DC, a new one was created: the Amalgam Universe. This one-shot combined Superman with Captain America.
After a space rocket landed in 1938, the government scavenged the alien corpses within. They added their findings to the Super Soldier formula, and created America’s top-performing WWII hero: Super Soldier! Fifty years later, the Super Soldier has returned to defeat the one villain he could not defeat: Ultra-Metallo. This time, Lex Luthor has planted a bomb within Ultra-Metallo’s chest and set him on course for the Oval Office. Once he reaches the White House, the bomb will automatically trigger, devastating Washington, D.C. But, how can Super Soldier hope to defeat the mechanical powerhouse, when it’s also equipped with a large portion of Green K (aka Kryptonite)?
Mark Waid’s crafted a morbidly-interesting fuse between the origins of Supes & Cap with this book. Unfortunately, the rest of the story isn’t all that engaging. Sure, Super-Soldier has to stop a seemingly unstoppable villain from reaching the White House but, besides the action, not much room is given to the main hero’s characterization. I think it’d be more interesting to spend some story-time on what it’d be like to wake up in a world that’s 50 years more advanced than you last knew it. Besides that, there’s no real sub-plot that needs a conclusion – so, even if there was an issue #2, I wouldn’t be all that enticed to pick it up.
On Ebay: Amalgam | Mark Waid | Dave Gibbons
On AtomicAvenue: Amalgam Comics