The problem is, it takes a great writer to understand the concept and use it well. Children of Billy's age are not necessarily undisciplined or foolish. What they can be is wildly idealistic, and this is the trait that makes Captain stand out from the crowd. That, and being uncomfortable in certain adult social situations.

And this allows us to sympathize for the tragedy inherent in the character and admire Billy for being special in his own right. A homeless boy could never be blamed for lacking idealism, yet Billy has the strength of character to hang onto his in the face of all the ugliness our society can throw at him. Why, if he can turn into a superpowered man, is he still homeless? He could find treasure or do all sorts of stuff to make himself rich and comfortable as Billy.

The reason is, his idealism won't allow him to use his powers for selfish reasons. His powers are a gift supposed to be used to help others, period. That's idealism that puts even Superman to shame.

And speaking of Superman, the very best Captain story ever told was the recent team up, where Superman finds out Billy's secret identity. When Superman asks the boy, in horror, "Who did this to you?" we realize for the first time what a terrible thing it is to place the responsibility of almost limitless power on a child. Yet Billy manages. That's what makes the character interesting.

If that's the case, how come none of the other Marvels change appearance?

And T., I'm not Catholic, but I don't think y'all have a Book of Solomon in your Bibles either.

But why would you want to put Capt. Marvel in their universe?
He had his own one.
It worked.
He joined the DCU, he stopped working.

And they have to be seperate people, that way you get the comedy of Billy being fine and normal when talking to girls, but Cpat. Marvel being scared/nervous when talking to them.

It's not he has access to wise advice, it's supposed to be that he actually has the wisdom himself. Even if we went with your premise, if one has access to wise advice and chooses not to listen to it, then he's unwise plain and simple, regardless of his age. And part of the allure of the wisdom of Solomon is that it's supposed to be so fundamentally common sense, just and logical that even a child can see that it's right. I know this from Catholic school when we had to read the book of Solomon. If a child can still choose an illogical unwise path in the face of wisdom as basic and persuasive as Solomon's, that really makes the hero's judgment questionable.

If Captain Marvel is a being with all the powers of Superman, but with an immature child's inability to listen to reason like you say, then he's just a "mildly retarded Superman" like Jeff Smith says. Like I said, whether you go with the two different people route or the one person route, the only thing I want is that you don't have him act and think like a kid once he transforms because it totally negates the wisdom of Solomon claim. Also, I don't think it fulfills any power-fantasy element of children to be adult and powerful yet still make the same childish mistakes you would when young.

I choose not to listen to good advice all the time. And I did even more when I was Billy's Age.

And why would he turn back? This was explored in by Alan Moore Miracle Man with the Kid Miracle Man character. Kid Miracle Man never changed back to human because why should he?

So, in order to have some semblance of internal logic, I admit that CM and Billy must, in fact, be separate entities.

Seems to me the easiest way to handle the two-seperate-people or tranformed-version-of-the-same-kid paradox is to just ignore it. Shouldn't be too hard to write the character so that Billy/Captain Marvel can be read either way.

Some more things:

(1) Holy shit, Smith is one hell of a cartoonist. He's got this Carl Barksian sense of SCOPE, but he might be even more versatile. There's kind of some Kirby in there, too. Smith conveys size and power really well.

(2) Can't wait for Mary.

(3) And on the negative: Whole thing felt a little rushed, and I wanted more set-up.

Really.

My favorite parts of Bone were right at the beginning where Smith was defining his world, so to speak. The parts that were more "This is how everything works in my fictional creation" than straight out plots. I wouldn't have minded more homeless Billy, even. I completely agree with everything Cronin said about how kid's entertainment shouldn't be TOO warm and fuzzy.

I think the big distinction is whether you're going to use Cap in an ongoing setting or not.

If you're doing a lot of done-in-ones or a series with a beginning, middle, and end, or even something that's ongoing but self contained, it's fine, and possibly preferable to do with them as two people.

If you're doing an ongoing set in a universe with a lot of other heavy hitters like Superman and Captain Atom, you need something to make him stand out a bit more, and Billy being behind the driver's seat, his good nature combined with the problems of youth tempered by the wisdom of Solomon is a whole lot more interesting and prone to ongoing character development through issues. I thought Johns used him BRILLIANTLY in JSA.

Now if you're looking to tell done-in-one superhero stories with a lot of action and adventure, where nothing changes by the end of the issue and you just have a lot of fun, then I figure either can work.

It's just my opinion though.

Also, I thought the preview of the origin was no less powerful for having been seen before. From the preview, I thought it was an incredibly powerful sequence. And did anybody else notice that Billy knew what the magic word was without having to be told?

You guys keep looking at Captain Marvel as an alter-ego power fantasy for a little kid. That isn't how Captain Marvel works. He's not another personality, he's the genie in the bottle!!

He's Billy's ace in the hole when he sees injustice. Billy learns from Cap and in some ways, Cap learns from Billy. He's older... more experienced. He has the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles and the Wisdom of Solomon. He is a totally different personality!!

In the Fawcett comics, they made this arrangement work by making the stories more about Billy Batson with Captain Marvel showing up to sort everything out. In fact, if CC Beck had had his way, Captain Marvel would barely have been in a story. It will be interesting to see how Jeff Smith plays this out.

I think the whole problem for Captain Marvel is that so much of what makes him neat flies in the face of comic-reading sensibilities today. That's why I'm thrilled that Jeff Smith has brought The Big Red Cheese back (and Judd Winick, there is nothing wrong with that expression) in all his glory.