Back in the seventies, Steve Englehart wrote a Captain America And The Falcon comic that retconned the Falcon's origin. Rather than a social worker from New York, lured away for his falconry skills to the jungle, then organising locals against the Red Skull, it was revealed that this was all a ploy by the Skull, that Sam Wilson was actually "Snap" Wilson, a mob-connected hoodlum who was trapped in the jungle on his way to a "big score" in Rio De Janeres, who the Skull has used the Cosmic Cube to rewrite his history to become the perfect partner for Captain America, for his own nefarious schemes.

If the original origin was seen as racially clumsy, the second version wasn't exactly seen as better. More recently writers would try and reconcile the two identities, the two possible timelines, but in today's All-New Captain America, with Sam Wilson now taking on the name and identity, something about this has to be done. First we see the idealised original version…

Then the Snap Wilson version, with Wilson not only a mob thug but a drug runner…

But now we have the current version, the retcon imposed by the Red Skull being retconned away, the fake background now being the true one, the true background now being the fake, and the Red Skull's plan to place doubt and distrust.





Bit of a wasted use of a cosmic cube if you ask me. But a reconciliation of Sam Wilson's various pasts as Skull machinations and for Sam Wilson fans, an uncomfortable retcon retconned away…

Comics courtesy of Orbital Comics, London. Currently holding a large 'outlet store' sale, with massive discounts, in the gallery.