Books

Captain Canuck vol.1

By Patrick Bérubé
September 7, 2009 - 08:57

Terrorists and criminals of all kind beware! Captain Canuck and his acolytes are back in this first volume reprinting issues #4-10 of the original adventures of this Canadian comic book icon. Set in future 90's (it was written in the 1970's), Captain Canuck is pitted against, Neo-Nazis, drug dealers and space pirates. As part of C.I.S.O, he is not only one of earth's peacekeeper but also Canada's public figure.

I have to admit that even if I am Canadian, I had never read Captain Canuck before and I did not really know what to expect. I had assumed that cheesy superhero fights would be the norm and that our captain would be a simple ripoff of our southern neighbor's counterpart . Instead, I found the stories leaning a lot more toward science-fiction and espionage than standard superhero stuff much to my delight. Every issues is more or less connected but this give to opportunity to explore a lot of ground. We are treated from space settings to mysterious Incas cities. As for the plot, if you take into account that they were written more than 30 years ago, you could say that they are relatively well told aside from some rather hard to believe plot twist. The only odd thing is that this first volume starts at #4 of the original series. I don't know why they did not include #1-3 but the opening page is the follow up to the previous issue so I just felt I needed a bit more information to fully understand what was going on. They also never explained what C.I.S.O. was all about which I guess was done in the unprinted issues.

Aside from some cool looking sci-fi design, the art is probably one of the weak point of this collected edition. First, there is some inconsistency as both Richard Comely and George Freeman shared the pencil duty. Even if there is an evolution as the issues progress, it is still not enough. The same could be said about the coloring. The technique used might have been revolutionary in the 1970's but even with the digital cleaning it does not translate very well on today's glossy paper. The best art is probably from the never-before-printed B&W newspaper strip that comes as an extra at the end.

Even with it's minor flaws, Captain Canuck should interest anyone interested in Canuck comics. This collected edition will surely help people who did not want to dig through bargain back issue bin discover this Canadian comic book icon.

Rating: 7 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12