>"I was always a big fan of stories like Man in the High Castle, or even in the Marvel universe we had done stories like Age of Apocalypse or Age of Ultron that had shown villainous take-overs of various kinds, but they were usually alternate realities or alternate time lines, things like that," Spencer told us. "So a big part of my pitch was 'what if we really do it this time?' What if the bad guys win, and there's a jump in time, and then we see what the country and what the world looks like after they've won?"
>Spencer said the whole issue is built around the fact people still want to believe Captain America is good. "When they see him, and when people within the Marvel Universe see him, they still see Captain America."
>"So even with the Hydra High Council there's a sort of instinct that he's not going far enough, that's he's being too nice," Spencer explained. "That whole issue is really building to showing you 'no, he really is that bad.'"
>"Every time you start to think 'maybe he's OK, maybe this is a good version of bad,' no, he's actually a villain. He does villainous things."
>"It was nice to break everyone out of their status quo and put them in a new place," he said. And part of that breaking of the status quo comes with the death by firing squad of Rick Jones. We asked Spencer about the fate of Rick Jones, and he didn't mince words at all.
>"He's actually dead. As far as I'm concerned, he's really dead," he said in no uncertain terms, but said it wasn't something he didn't arrive at easily. "I think that it was a tough decision. I really like Rick as a character, I've had a lot of fun writing him."
>"He's been big part of my run and I didn't know that I was going to do that when the run started," Spencer told us. "It was heartbreaking to do that to Rick."
>Spencer pointed out "death isn't always permanent in the Marvel Universe, but I will say it's a lot more permanent for the non-super powered characters a lot of the times."
>Spencer said the whole issue is built around the fact people still want to believe Captain America is good. "When they see him, and when people within the Marvel Universe see him, they still see Captain America."
>"So even with the Hydra High Council there's a sort of instinct that he's not going far enough, that's he's being too nice," Spencer explained. "That whole issue is really building to showing you 'no, he really is that bad.'"
>"Every time you start to think 'maybe he's OK, maybe this is a good version of bad,' no, he's actually a villain. He does villainous things."
>"It was nice to break everyone out of their status quo and put them in a new place," he said. And part of that breaking of the status quo comes with the death by firing squad of Rick Jones. We asked Spencer about the fate of Rick Jones, and he didn't mince words at all.
>"He's actually dead. As far as I'm concerned, he's really dead," he said in no uncertain terms, but said it wasn't something he didn't arrive at easily. "I think that it was a tough decision. I really like Rick as a character, I've had a lot of fun writing him."
>"He's been big part of my run and I didn't know that I was going to do that when the run started," Spencer told us. "It was heartbreaking to do that to Rick."
>Spencer pointed out "death isn't always permanent in the Marvel Universe, but I will say it's a lot more permanent for the non-super powered characters a lot of the times."
