Avengers: Twilight gives Steve Rogers the Dark Knight Returns style story we didn't know we needed

Avengers: Twilight #1 interior art — (Image credit: Marvel Comics)

Just as the MCU Avengers are hitting rocky waters thanks to potential changes to the planned Avengers: Kang Dynasty film, in comics, Earth's Mightiest Heroes just kicked off one of their most compelling stories in some time in Avengers: Twilight, a flash-forward future story in which an aging Steve Rogers comes out of retirement, Dark Knight Returns style.

With Avengers: Twilight #1 now on stands, the fate of Steve Rogers and the Avengers in this future dystopia have been revealed, and the title is already setting up a story that reminds us just how much we love the Avengers, and Steve Rogers specifically - and why.

Spoilers ahead for Avengers: Twilight #1

There's a strong similarity between The Dark Knight Returns and the scenario that's been set up in Avengers: Twilight #1 by writer Chip Zdarsky, artist Daniel Acuña, and letterer Cory Petit. Both center on men who were once arguably the greatest heroes of their world struggling to find their place and reclaim their strength as society passes them by in dangerous, dystopian ways.

Like the aging Bruce Wayne of Dark Knight Returns, the Steve Rogers of Avengers: Twilight explores what has become of his home, trading Gotham for a version of New York City that is overrun with the prying eyes of the sinister corporate interests who run the United States and even the Avengers, while Steve and his remaining allies have been relegated to sitting on the sidelines as they age, watching as the city and world they love gets harder and harder to live in.

He meets with an aging Luke Cage, whose bulletproof skin has begun to harden, reducing his mobility, and Matt Murdock, who has given up his life as Daredevil entirely in order to focus on offering legal aid to his community. As for Steve himself, his Super Soldier Serum has been drained from his body, and he feels lost after a failed bid for a seat in the US Senate.

For Steve, life has moved on. But Luke and Matt urge Steve to get back in the fight, telling him his voice matters in the fight against the encroaching corporations who monitor everyone's activity and violently enforce a curfew against the citizens of New York. Steve resists the call to action until he sees an ad on TV for a "docu-series" which promises to expose the "truth" about Steve's old enemy, the Red Skull, which claims the Skull was actually a hero working to defeat the Nazis from within - a blatant lie.

Steve goes on TV to contradict the narrative, where he's met by James Stark, the son of Tony Stark and Janet Van Dyne, who has leveraged his massive corporate assets to engineer the brutal conditions of the country in order to claim wealth and power at the cost of ordinary citizens. James Stark claims that Steve Rogers is a liar, and promises to expose the "truth" about the Red Skull, and about the world's former heroes who he claims were all dangerous enemies of the people following the events of "H-Day," a day in which a massive villain attack caused the deaths of many heroes and civilians.

Taken off guard, Steve bails on the TV show, only to run into a group of teenagers who are quickly beset by police wearing Iron Man style body armor who attempt to violently enforce the city's curfew. Outraged, Steve springs into action for the first time in years to take down the police and save the teenagers. From there, it's just a short journey to meeting Luke Cage's resistance, and ultimately reclaiming the Super Soldier Serum through a new experiment, vowing in the end to reassemble the Avengers.

The parallels to The Dark Knight Returns are obvious, from Steve's dissatisfaction with the world he lives in, to the foreshadowed battle between Steve as Cap and James Stark as a new, villainous Iron Man a la Superman in DKR. But the focus on Steve Rogers first and foremost sets Avengers: Twilight apart in tone and even in its larger themes, which focus on a strongly anti-authoritarian message and a more collective view of justice.

It all makes for one of the most compelling Steve Rogers stories in years - Steve is often at his best when he's struggling to live up to the ideals of what Captain America should be, and making hard choices to prioritize his own values and the idea of the greater good even when it means going against a corrupt authority. Avengers: Twilight puts a totally new twist on Steve's relationship with the identity of Captain America, and also with the Avengers, who have moved on from the glory days of being Earth's Mightiest Heroes to simply acting as a superpowered arm of American imperialism.

This forms one of the most interesting premises for an Avengers story in some time, promising to remind us how much we love the Avengers by first showing us what a Marvel Universe without their kind of heroism might look like. There's still plenty of time to lose that focus in subsequent issues, but for now, Avengers: Twilight is off to a strong start that lives up to the title's prestige status.

Avengers: Twilight #2 goes on sale January 31.

Check out the best Avengers stories of all time.

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I've been Newsarama's resident Marvel Comics expert and general comic book historian since 2011, and now I'm the Entertainment Writer at GamesRadar+. I've also been the on-site reporter at most major comic conventions such as Comic-Con International: San Diego, New York Comic Con, and C2E2. Outside of comic journalism, I am the artist of many weird pictures, and the guitarist of many heavy riffs. (They/Them)