LET'S RAP WITH CAP

As superhero names go, Captain America kind of comes out of left field. Is he actually a captain of something? Like a ship's captain? It's like his surname is America.

I think it's meant to be a military rank, because he started out as a soldier granted super powers. So, it's like he's the captain of America. But I guess "Captain (of) America" made for a lousy logo on the front of his magazine so they shortened it to simply Captain America.

But, while "Captain America" has a nice feel to it - it flows off the tongue, it sits nicely on the page - it's not really a very impressive title for a superhero. In the American military you have quite a lot of people who outrank the captain. Major, Colonel, Brigadier and General all outrank him, and there are plenty of gradations within those ranks, I can assure you. I could be here all day listing all the Lieutenant Colonels, Brigadier Generals and Major Fractions that outrank a captain.

Yet, as a superhero, you don't really want to be outranked. Ideally, you'd choose General America, chief of the army, but it kind of sounds a bit vague, I guess. "Freeze evildoer - or face the wrath of General America!" You'd find yourself fighting a lot of bad guys called stuff like the Vague Menace and Nasty Something.