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Captain Britain Reading Order, Marvel UK’s Superhero

Captain Britain Reading Order

At the beginning of the 1970s, Marvel Comics expanded its business by opening a new branch in Great Britain: Marvel UK. At first, and for a few years, it was just a way to reprint American comics in a magazine format in order to establish the brand. It didn’t really work. It was then decided that a real line of British comics was needed. This led to writer Chris Claremont being asked to come up with a British character. With artist Herb Trimpe, they created Captain Britain who made his debut in Captain Britain Weekly #1 in 1976.

Brian Braddock was chosen by the sorcerer Merlyn himself to become a hero. Between the sword of might and the amulet of right, Captain Britain emerged as the United Kingdom’s greatest champion from the streets of London to the mystic realm of Otherworld.

In the beginning, the Captain Britain series was written by tourists, Americans who only visited the UK. This didn’t help the book speak to British readers. The first issues are nevertheless important for the introduction of memorable characters like psychic Elizabeth “Betsy” Braddock, Brian’s twin sister, and their older brother Jamie Braddock—The Queen also appeared! The sales didn’t go up so Captain Britain was buried in a Spider-Man reprint title after 39 issues. The two heroes “really” met though, as Brian Braddock made his debut on the American market in a issue of Marvel Team Up.

In 1977, the adventures of Captain Britain ended discreetly. But in 1979, in the newly launched anthology magazine Hulk Comic, a new Fantasy series starring the Black Knight written by Steve Parkhouse, with art by John Stokes, was used to reintroduce Captain Britain. He was then a secondary player but gradually gain momentum to the point of making him the new star of the anthology Marvel Superheroes.

Editor Dave Thorpe and artist Alan Davis had little experience but a lot of ideas. They redesigned Captain Britain’s uniform and sent him to a parallel Earth (it was them who came up with the idea to call Marvel Universe’s main dimension “Earth-616”). Thorpe’s work was not conventional, but he wrote a story about the Troubles in Northern Ireland that offended Alan Davis so much that the two of them stopped collaborating. A young writer named Alan Moore was recruited to replace Thorpe. The rest is history!

Moore worked his magic, killed some characters, resurrected some, and introduced new ones as well as new darker concepts. Captain Britain’s success was cemented, but some conflicts (editorial and/or financial) with Marvel led Moore to quit. As a replacement, he recommended another young writer named Jamie Delano (who later wrote Hellblazer based on a creation of Moore). In 1986, the title was not as popular as before and, with the creative team finding new endeavors, it was canceled.

Chris Claremont found a lot of success with The X-Men and, impressed by what he read, he decided to bring back Captain Britain and his friends to the X-Universe. Betsy first appeared in the New Mutants but quickly joined the X-Men. And, with Alan Davis interested in working again with the character after a stint at DC Comics, he worked with Claremont on the creation of Excalibur. After the success of the one-shot Excalibur Special Edition in 1987, an ongoing series with the same creative team was launched. At some point, Claremont and Davis left, but the artist came back once more and got the opportunity to write his own stories.

At that time, Captain Britain also made a comeback in England, becoming a supporting character in Marvel UK’s Knights of Pendragon series. In Excalibur, Brian Braddock was lost, but eventually came back in a minor position, until Warren Ellis gave him back his place in Excalibur #100—that didn’t last as the next writer, Ben Raab, got rid of Captain Britain again, but that didn’t last either…

In 2001, Brian was King of Otherworld, but Excalibur was no more. The title was revamped without a connection to the previous series. Four years later, however, as an after-effect of “House of M” event, Marvel launched New Excalibur featuring Captain Britain as the leader of a London-based team of mutants. The series concluded after two years with the X-Men: Die by the Sword event.

After that, Brian Braddock didn’t come back in a new Excalibur series but in the 2008 series Captain Britain and MI: 13. MI-13 being a (fictional) British intelligence agency dealing with “weird happenings” within the United Kingdom. It was decided by the Prime Minister that all British superheroes had to be members of the agency and, together, they faced the Skrull, protected Earth’s magic, and fought demonic forces.

Once that chapter was closed, Captain Britain joined the Secret Avengers and fought alongside the Avengers, taking part in storylines like “Time Runs Out” and “Secret Empire.” And recently, after the events of Dawn of X, Betsy Braddock had to become the new Captain Britain, but Brian and also Jaimie quickly found a place in the latest series of Excalibur…

Captain Britain Reading Order

The British years are collected in one omnibus. It includes stories from anthologies like Hulk Comic, Incredible Hulk Weekly, Super Spider-Man & Captain Britain, Marvel Super-Heroes, the Daredevils, Mighty World Of Marvel, and Marvel Tales, as well as the ongoing series.

  • Captain Britain Omnibus
    Collects Captain Britain (1976) #1-39, Super Spider-Man & Captain Britain #231-247, Hulk Comic #1 And #3-46, Incredible Hulk Weekly #47-55 And #57-63, Marvel Super-Heroes (1972) #377-388, Daredevils #1-11, Mighty World Of Marvel (1983) #7-16, Captain Britain (1985) #1-14 And Marvel Tales (1964) #131-133 – Plus Marvel Team-Up (1972) #65-66, New Mutants Annual #2 And X-Men Annual (1970) #11.

Next came the Excalibur series in the US. We already have an Excalibur Reading Order detailing the different collections.

  • Excalibur Omnibus vol. 1
    Collects Excalibur Special Edition (1988) #1, Excalibur (1988) #1-34, Excalibur: Mojo Mayhem (1989) #1, Quasar (1989) #11, Thor (1966) #427-429, Material From Marvel Comics Presents (1988) #31-38.

    • The Knights of Pendragon Omnibus (back in the UK, Captain Britain joined the Knights)
      Collects Knights Of Pendragon (1990) #1-18, Knights Of Pendragon (1992) #1-15, Mys-Tech Wars #1-4 and Dark Guard #1-4.
  • Excalibur Omnibus vol. 2
    Collects Excalibur (1988) #35-67; Excalibur: Weird War Iii, The Possession, Air Apparent and Xx Crossing; Sensational She-Hulk #26, and Material From Marvel Comics Presents (1988) #75 and #110.
  • Excalibur Omnibus vol. 3 is coming in 2024

After Davis left again with issue #67, writer Scott Lobdell (Uncanny X-Men) filled in for over a year (issues #68-82). Those issues are hard to find. They are not properly collected for now. You can find #71 in X-Men Milestones: Fatal Attractions and #78-80 & #82 in X-Men Milestones: Phalanx Covenant.

After Lobdell, Warren Ellis assumed writing duties (issues #83-103), then Ben Raab took over until the cancellation of the series in 1998 with issue #125.

In 2006, Captain Britain came back, but the team was not the same. This New Excalibur also came from Chris Claremont, at first. Frank Tieri took over after #8.

Excalibur Reading Order - Team Logo

With the Secret Invasion, Captain Britain joined MI:13 to fight the Skrull in Captain Britain and MI:13!

After that, Captain Britain jumped from one series to another.

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