The White Wolf Strikes: Reviewing ‘Captain America: Symbol Of Truth’ #6

Any villain worth their salt always has backup plans and contingencies for that moment when the heroes ultimately (even if only haphazardly) throw a wrench in their first plans. The White Wolf is clearly worth his salt because he’s got even more deadly terrible plans up his sleeves for Captain America and Falcon.

At first, the sixth issue of Sam Wilson’s new series feels like a lighter affair, as Captain America is at the United Nations protecting the new Prime Minister of Mohannda and the two have some frank discussions. Tochi Onyebuchi takes things up a notch though, as this protection moment turns chaotic and eventually very deadly. One of the things I really like so far about this run, besides just how well Onyebuchi gets Sam and Joaquin and the world, is the fact that the hero and villain haven’t even crossed paths yet. I love those types of stories where they are at odds and the hero is running into the machinations of the villain but not actually crossing paths with each other quite yet.

We have a full change of artists for this issue as Ig Guara comes on board to bring this issue to life, with Jesus Aburtov still handling the color side. In previous issues, the work of R.B. Silva has slickness, is smooth, and is very detailed in many places with a certain type of depth to it. Guara is very different yet very similar in some respects. There is a weight and depth still but there is a rough quality to Guara’s work with sharper edges and senses which fits the roughness of this particular issue. Background characters or elements are more out of focus or not fully rendered, which gives the foreground elements more focus, they are the elements that are important to our current moment/story.

There are a number of pages where we’re just getting character close-ups and dialogue, and no background at all and it works. It centers things on them, cutting out the rest of the world, and keeps us intent on their emotional state and their words.

I’ve noted in the past that Aburtov has a bright sharpness to his color work that fits well with the rough sharpness of Guara’s work. There is still a lot of the slickness that came with the colors in previous issues when paired with Silva or others’ work, but there is a bit of a lighter effect to the colors that keep them from being too heavy or too outlandish. They are superhero quality but of a caliber that is more toned down befitting the political thriller sort of aspects that come with a Captain America book.

Also still on board is Joe Caramagna, still making all the lettering magic happen across the pages. As usual, the dialogue and other lettering just flow through the pages never overwhelming or tripping things up, hitting all the right emotional and personality notes at the same time. As things ramp up, we get plenty of the big in-your-face SFX that really sell the events that are going down, bringing that amazing comic book energy that I just love. Alongside the little changes here or there that allow us to feel the tone or volume in a moment, elongating a moan or scream to fill a bubble or more.

Captain America: Symbol of Truth #6 is now available from Marvel Comics.