To their credit, Marvel didn’t force Ed Brubaker to start back at #1 when Captain America entered the Heroic Age.  That’s good, because his run is best read as a single end-to-end story.  (And yes, I know he started with #1 and then reverted to old numbering so now he’s at #606).

Ghost, who was a Thunderbolt under Norman Osborn, meets Baron Zemo, the founder of the original Thunderbolts.  Baron Zemo has something very interesting (and very “meta”) to say:

Zemo laments that Osborn wasted an opportunity to capitalize on a “grey” world that was missing Captain America, and because Osborn insisted on being super-bad he’s now forced the world to create a new Cap and to get into a more black-and-white morality.  This is deep for so many reasons.  The United States (and indeed much of the world) is going through a similar extreme polarization as I write this in 2026.  Plus, Marvel had an opportunity to have a much more textured Earth 616 but instead has launched a “Heroic Age” that reverts back to good/bad norms.  We could probably ponder this for pages and pages, but I doubt you, the readers, would care.  

So, back to the story.

As Zemo and Ghost share stories, Bucky Cap is haunted by recent events (because he’s always haunted, frankly). 

It’s distracting him. In a fight against the Wrecking Crew we see that Bucky is getting sloppy in combat–and his buddies call him out on it. Then, they all go out drinking (because that’s what you do when you’re all emotional) with Steve Rogers and Falcon.

When they leave, Bucky realizes he’s been drugged and his motorcycle explodes, injuring Falcon.

Zemo was behind it.  It is the start of a campaign whereby Zemo is trying to pull Bucky back to the dark side–to make Captain America grey again, basically.  While Steve Rogers and Black Widow help Bucky try to figure out what’s going on, they meet a new version of Beetle–Janice Lincoln (the bartender who drugged Bucky).

Beetle is captured, but the distraction lasted long enough for Zemo to release some stolen “Winter Soldier” footage to the world–showing that the new Captain America was actually a Russian agent.

Zemo is able to capture Bucky Cap, and in the final issue of this arc we get a very nice tribute to Jim Steranko…

Zemo tries to reprogram Bucky, having him relive being strapped to a bomb back during World War II–the incident that led to him becoming Winter Soldier.  But Bucky is able to shake it off and fight Zemo, who escapes.

Steve Rogers, Black Widow and Falcon ultimately track him down and, together, the return to the U.S., knowing Bucky will now have to face the recent exposure of his past to the media.

I like this arc, even if the release of Bucky’s past is not new information.  It’s already been done.  But I guess with him being the new Cap it will have newfound importance. It’s nice seeing Zemo kinda-sorta start up a new Thunderbolts, but it would have been better if the opening sequence with Ghost had actually gone somewhere.

There are Nomad backups starring Rikki Barnes and Arana.  Do you care?  You shouldn’t.  They’re completely disposable.  They pull the overall rating for these issues down to C.  The main story would have gotten a C+.

I will add, though, that the Nomad/Arana stories might have been better as standalones.  They read like all-ages books. Tonally, they are completely different from Brubaker’s work and the art, too, stands out as cartoony.  If they’d been their own book, that contrast would be missing and they might have been easier to appreciate.