Taking stock of the Black superhero universe

Here & Now's Celeste Headlee speaks with journalist Jesse Holland, author of the forthcoming Marvel/Titan Books anthology "Captain America: The Shield of Sam Wilson," about the state of the Black superhero universe.

Edited by Jesse Holland

Uniform

It only took Sam Wilson one bite to fall deeply, madly in love.

The warm flaky crust, the tart yet sweet apples, the faint aftertaste of cinnamon sugar. Closing his eyes and moaning to himself as he reached for a second bite, Captain America had no choice but to admit, dammit, yes, this was the best apple pie he’d ever tasted.

“Damn, Johnny, you were right.” Sam moaned with pleasure as he slumped back onto the red vinyl diner bench while scooping more pie into his mouth. Brushing flakes of pie crust off the red hoodie he wore over his uniform, Sam shifted around in his seat and reached for more pie, his elbows pushing his famous red, white and blue shield—that signified his status as the nation’s new Captain America—further down the seat.

Sam sighed as he scooped the last of the pie into his mouth, using the back of his hand to wipe the light-colored crumbs off his dark black goatee and chocolate skin. He grinned across the diner table at the muscular blond man smirking at him.

“Yeah, yeah, it’s a cliche that Captain America loves apple pie. You did too, I bet, and I know Steve Rogers has a wicked sweet tooth. We just had some strudel from a Queens bakery before I headed down here,” Sam admitted. “I know this can’t be the reason you called me all the way down to Georgia, but it was worth leaving New York and coming down South just for this pie.”

John Walker smirked as he carved off big chunks of the pie on his plate and shoveled them into his mouth, the late afternoon Georgia sun glinting off of his chiseled jaw and blond buzzcut. A former wielder of Captain America’s shield himself for a brief period, Walker still had muscles on top of muscles because of a strength augmentation procedure that made him one of the strongest Captain Americas in history. But after a rocky start, which included the murder of

his parents in Custer’s Grove, Georgia, by some of Captain America’s enemies, Walker abandoned the public persona of Captain America and found his true role as the black-clad U.S. Agent, a shadowy government-sponsored troubleshooter.