Issue(s): Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty #5, Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty #6
Cover Date: Jan-Feb 99
Title: "The great pretender" / "Double danger"
Credits:
Mark Waid - Plot
Brian Vaughan / Mark Waid - Script
Doug Braithwaite - Penciler
Mark Farmer / Robin Riggs - Inker
Natt Idelson - Editor
Bob Harras - EIC

Review/plot:
Captain America goes undercover at a mental hospital in order to investigate a patient who has been rattling off U.S. top secrets. It turns out that he is a telepath that got caught in SHIELD's ESPer network. The Chameleon is also after the telepath, and he and Captain America fight it out in the hospital.

In the end Cap defeats the Chameleon and brings the telepath to SHIELD, where he can learn to control his powers and possibly join the ESPers.

At one point the Chameleon leads Cap into the Violent Ward, where apparently psychotic mental patients roam the halls looking for people to attack.

Aside from its poor depiction of mental hospitals (or maybe they were that bad in the 70s?), there's nothing particularly wrong with this issue, but there isn't any real reason to do this story as a continuity insert, either.

Quality Rating: C

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: Two separate stories run across issues five and six (kind of like a tribute to the split stories in Tales Of Suspense, maybe): one with Cap and Iron Man, and this one where Cap fights the Chameleon. The two stories don't take place at the same time, so i've had to split them up. This story has to take place after Captain America has met Nick Fury and has a relationship with SHIELD. The Marvel Chronology Project places this between Captain America #134 and #135, which were published Feb-Mar 71. Cap says that he's never locked horns with the Chameleon before, which isn't entirely accurate since the Chameleon tricked Iron Man into fighting Cap in Tales Of Suspense #58 (Oct 64). However, Cap didn't actually fight the Chameleon that issue so it's technically accurate, and placing this prior to that issue doesn't work because SHIELD's ESPer unit wasn't introduced until Strange Tales #141 (Feb 66). I'm not sure how the MCP determined this placement but it seems to work.

References: N/A

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? Y

My Reprint: N/A