Superhero Media: Captain Britain and MI13

Been a long time since I ran my SuperSystem RPG campaign based on this comic (and Alan Moore's run on "Captain Britain"), but if you haven't heard of it, Captain Britain and MI13 may well be one of the best comics you've never read. Written by Paul Cornell, decent Doctor Who novel writer, poor Doctor Who television writer and reasonable comics writer, Captain Britain and MI13 starts in the middle of the Secret Invasion crossover event, as British heroes battle the Skrulls for the control of Earth's magic. Answering the call are Captain Britain, Union Jack, Spitfire, Black Knight and Pete Wisdom, having to battle the Skrulls in their midst as well as the invading forces, before Avalon and the Fae realms fall to the enemy. Through the death of Captain Britain, the freeing for Merlin from the dark realms and Brian Braddock being reborn more powerful than ever before, and wielding Excalibur, Britain is saved from the Skrulls and a new team is born, MI13. 

Union Jack makes his own way with MI5, but pops up in the story here and there, with Dr Faiza Hussein joining the team as the new wielder of Excalibur and Blade, yes, the Daywalker, signing on as well, because he's actually British, believe it or not. In the second volume the team takes on obscure magical foe Doctor Polkta, a Duke of Hell and Master of the Mindless Ones, who has taken over a Birmingham block of flats, before the dial gets turned to eleven and the team battle Dracula himself, with his army of vampires invading England from the Moon. No, I didn't make any of that up. In a smaller title like Captain Britain, Paul Cornell is free to go nuts in a way a writer never could in a more popular book, which is great, but the only thing better than Captain Britain punching Dracula in the face, is that the whole series is actually well-written, with compelling characters and good moments of humour. 

Naturally, this series, sadly canceled early, is way up the top of my list for properties I want adapted into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Yes, there are a lot of great Captain Britain stories, and it would be great to see the Corps and The Fury show up, but Captain Britain and MI13 is almost perfectly set up for a big screen trilogy already. The first adventure need not be tied into the "Secret Invasion" plot, but could piggyback onto any big Avengers moment, then the next two films follow on into "Hell Comes to Birmingham" and "Vampire State". The cast is already reasonably diverse, a little fiddling of the Meggan elements is needed, but even dropping her and bringing Faiza and Black Knight's relationship more into the fore is a reasonable possibility. Sadly, the three volumes of Captain Britain and MI13 aren't all that easy to get your hands on, with the print runs of all but the first volume being pretty small and not in the typical Marvel covers, but if you can find it, it's a great series that I go back to again and again. Hopefully, Cornell will get another run at the team one day, but what is there is great.