-->UPDATE 10:00 am: CNN has filed a report on the issue, recapping the quick version of Civil War, and the issue. In speaking to Marvel Publisher Dan Buckley and Editor in Chief Joe Quesada, a few more details of the behind the scenes story of the issue.

From CNN.com:

Marvel says the comic story line was intentionally written as an allegory to current real-life issues like the Patriot Act, the War on Terror and the September 11 attacks.

"Every child knew about 9/11," says Dan Buckley, president of Marvel Comics. "If [he] could see a TV he knew what 9/11 was. The other similarities [to] things going on are just part of storytelling.

It was a violent and strange end for an American hero.

Captain America first appeared in 1941, just as the United States entered World War II. He was a symbol of American strength and resolve in fighting the Axis powers, and later Communism.

As originally conceived by creators Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, Rogers was a man born before the Great Depression in a very different America. He disappeared after the war and reappeared only recently in the Marvel timeline. For a superhero many thought perfect, it was perhaps a fatal flaw for "Cap," as he became known.

"He hasn't been living in the modern world and the world does move," says Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Queseda.

Queseda said he wanted to readers find their own meaning in Cap's end.

"There is a lot to be read in there. But I'm not one who is going to tell people, this is what you should read into it, because I could look into it and read several different types of messages," he told CNN.

The CNN story also asks how "real" the death is, to which Quesada replied:

"There was period in comics where characters would just die and then be resurrected. And the death had very little meaning and the resurrection had very little meaning," he said. "All I ask of my writers is if you're going to kill a character off, please let that death have some meaning in the overall scope of things."

Besides, he said, there are other important questions left unanswered.

"What happens with the costume? And what happens to the characters that are friends and enemies of Cap?" Queseda said with a smile. "You're going to have to read the books to find out."

Original Story:

As with the major reveal in Civil War #2, the mainstream media has picked up on a story point in a Marvel Comic, this time, Captain America #25.

SPOILER WARNING FOR CAPTAIN AMERICA #25

According to the New York Daily News, Captain America dies in issue #25, after being shot on the steps of the courthouse where he was to be arraigned.

"It's a hell of a time for him to go. We really need him now," co-creator Joe Simon, 93, told the News after being informed of his brainchild's death.

The News outlined Cap's history up to the point of Civil War, quoting current Cap writer Ed Brubaker as saying:

"What I found is that all the really hard-core left-wing fans want Cap to be standing out on and giving speeches on the streetcorner against the Bush administration, and all the really right-wing [fans] all want him to be over in the streets of Baghdad, punching out Saddam," Brubaker said.

From the News:

Comic book deaths, however, are rarely final. Marvel's archrival, DC Comics, provoked a media frenzy when it killed off Superman in 1993, only to reanimate its prize creation a year later.

Joe Quesada, 43, Marvel Entertainment's editor in chief, said he wouldn't rule out the shield-throwing champion's eventual return. But for now, the Captain's fans are in mourning.

Newsarama will endeavor to keep a rolling update of the media's coverage of the story running throughout the day.