Steve Rogers is a character whose entire existence is predicated on just about everyone he knows being dead. Batman lost his parents, Spider-Man lost his uncle, but the original Captain America has lost an entire generation of friends and family. After being frozen during the Second World War and resurrected decades later, everyone Cap knew before is dead or really, really old. Even worse, for the longest period he was haunted by the untimely death of Bucky, his teenaged sidekick from the good old days who apparently perished in the plane crash Cap miraculously survived. Both losses were a key part of Steve Rogers characterisation over the years, as he adjusted to a lonely and unfamiliar world. Both those losses have changed, one becoming more severe, one less so. The sliding timescale of Marvel Comics means he was originally frozen for just twenty years, whileas now its more like sixty. Bucky eventually returned, as it was revealed he worked for years as covert Soviet assassin The Winter Soldier. Nobody in a costume in comics ever really dies. That goes double for the Star-Spangled Avenger himself. Steve Rogers has shuffled off of his mortal coil more times than its possible to count, only for it to be revealed as a hoax, dream, imaginary tale, or clone. Here are ten times that Captain America died (for a little bit anyway).
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
