Avengers 3, Uncanny X-Force 1, Winter Soldier 14, Young Avengers 1

Boy, weird that on a day that isn't an X-Men centric day, the majority of my reviewed comics come so far down alphabetically.

Avengers 3
Hickman (w) and Opeña (a)

Much of the things I love about New Avengers so far are among the things I'm having some trouble with in Avengers so far. New Avengers instantly grabbed me because I loved the idea of the Illuminati and who was on the team and the story that had come out of those characters. Avengers is very different. Instead of an established team of people who know each other and have worked together in some form or another through their histories, Avengers has shown a group of core Avengers (the movie Avengers, even) backed up by a bunch of people who may or may not know one another. Yes, there are the old stand-bys in that group (Wolverine, Spider-Man, Captain Marvel, Spider-Woman), but there are also less-known faces like Hyperion, Sunspot, Manifold, Captain Universe, and Smasher. Then there are people I know I'm at least more familiar with (of that last group, I'm probably most familiar with Manifold but even that is from Secret Warriors and boy has it been a while since I read that) like Shang-Chi, Falcon, and Cannonball. And two of THEIR first names are Sam.

Look, what I'm getting at in my roundabout and convoluted way is that this team is hard. Especially early, thrown into a story abruptly, it's hard to kind of get the bearings of the team. It's a little hard to understand how big the team is mid-battle and it's tough to know everyone's powers if you don't already. Presumably this will clear a bit as the story progresses. I really like that Hickman doesn't hold your hand while you're reading. It makes this book, which really SHOULD feel kind of like the most comic-y book Marvel has, feel like a real historic comic. Avengers is so ingrained in the Marvel Universe, so exhaustively woven into the thread of Marvel comics, that it really ought to be, for better or worse, one of the least accessible books on the shelves. I love that this runs with Avengers Assemble for that reason; one is a great jumping-on point without sacrificing characters while the other is just an absolutely horrible jumping-on point that invokes every corner of the Marvel Universe.

So yes. I like this book a lot for what it is. I hope it pushes forward exactly this way, weaving narratives and characters together in the quieter moments without needing to explicitly state who everyone is and what they do while making it clear that they've all been around the Marvel U long enough to know what's up. I'm comparing it to Young Avengers: Children's Crusade in my head because my girlfriend and I just went back and read all of that at once to prep for the new series. In that book, every issue has the same plot re-explained just about each issue. Each issue someone reminds us why Scarlet Witch is seen with such contempt and each issue has her say, with regret, "no more mutants." This Avengers book wouldn't be caught dead doing that. Or alive, because it's a book and not a living thing, but that's beside the point. Was I confused by this arc? Yes. Did it hinder some enjoyment of this book? Maybe a tiny bit. Do I love it anyway? Absolutely.

Uncanny X-Force 1
Humphries (w) and Garney (a)

This was kind of similar to Avengers in the "throw the audience in and see what happens" kind of vein. We get flashes of backstory here and there but by and large we're waiting to see what's happened with Betsy and Fantomex since the last iteration of X-Force tragically ended. There was certainly more backstory than in any of the three first issues of Avengers but I think it's more necessary. Betsy and Storm have both gone through tremendous life events so, even though they're hugely established characters (unlike some of the Avengers), we have to understand why more than we have to understand who each Avenger is right away. And that's the last comparison I'll make between the two.

Betsy's a bit unhinged post-X-Force and, apparently, post-Fantomex. Storm is re-mohawked and ready to hit something post-Black Panther. I appreciate the way both of these characters act in this book. They are two of the stronger women in 616 and so it's definitely more fitting for them to be out and maybe a little more aggressive upon break-ups of some sort than to be moping around or horribly saddened. Wolverine fires Betsy from the school (she'd be an awful teacher anyway) and she and Storm set out to meet Wolverine's contact, Puck, for a new mission that involves Spiral. I know little about Spiral so I won't go into much there. At the end of the issue, we find out how things ended with Fantomex and Betsy. There's a new love in Fantomex's life, or maybe an old one, as the issue ends with him and his lady-clone Cluster making out in Paris.

It was definitely a moment where I went "aw, gross, no, that's not what-" and then I thought about it and said "yeah, nevermind, that's exactly what Fantomex would be doing." No sight of the third Fantomex yet, but I'm sure we'll see him some time soon. I'm excited for him to pop up, mutant hater as he probably is (Sentinel brain will probably do that to you). The series seems to have stories lined up, as Storm and Puck discover Spiral has a child locked up in a vault (reminiscent of the surprise child Apocalypse in Remender's early X-Force days) and as Bishop has returned from the future he was abandoned in. Here's hoping the series knows where it wants to go from here.

Winter Soldier 14
Brubaker (w) and Guice (a)

Brubaker's final Winter Soldier book, and quite possibly his final book ever at Marvel, is sad for a number of reasons. As I've said before, I came into comics in the middle of Brubaker's run on Captain America and he was a big part of what pushed my interest in comics and in Cap and Bucky. Now, years later, he's ending his time there and I'm as in love with Marvel and those two characters particularly as I've ever been. So while the characters will no doubt survive his leaving (I've already talked about how much I'm enjoying Remender's new take on Cap and I'm excited about the new era of Winter Soldier), it still cuts deep. Thank you for everything you've brought to this Universe, Brubaker. And thank you for still writing your several creator-owned series, which are all great and I highly recommend but aren't Marvel so I won't be talking about on a blog called "Marvels" at readmarvel.blogspot.com.

The other major reason it's sad is that it's a very sad issue. One of the more enjoyable romances in the Marvel Universe (of which there are just so, so many) has been Black Widow and Bucky's. Two people with a somewhat shared history (and the only two who can share it with one another) and a similar experience, with similar "powers" (which is to say no powers) and similar roles tied to similar personalities was always going to lead to just a delightful romance. And of course, because Brubaker can never let us just be happy, now it's not. The Black Widow Hunt arc ends with Bucky saving her from former Winter Soldier program assassin Leo Novokov and SHIELD restoring all of her memories except her memories of Bucky. Novokov surely would have preferred these people all died but barring that he had a plan to ruin Bucky as best he could even in the case of his success. Instead of allowing more people to tamper with her head in the hope of restoring those memories, Bucky lets Natasha go so she can be happily ignorant of him while he suffers.

This series under Brubaker was phenomenal. A great little spy/noir book with amazing art and colors throughout (Bettie Breitweiser and Jordie Bellaire colored this one. I tend to love Breitweiser's work all around and she's one of the few I'm usually able to pick out without looking it up and Bellaire has popped up on tons of books I've really enjoyed so clearly she's doing a bang-up job too) and great storytelling at every juncture. Bucky's becoming a big player in this world with nowhere to go but up, especially with Cap 2 coming out next year. This series has done a great job showing his skills and his off-the-charts coolness. I'm eager for Jason Latour's run to start to see where Bucky goes next.

Young Avengers 1
Gillen (w) and McKelvie (a)

After spending the last two days reading the entire Young Avengers back catalogue over again (it is not NEARLY as long as I thought it was. I had it in my head somehow that maybe they had come around in the 90s and had been on and off the radar for a while, but instead they originated in 2009-2010. I've had a huge Avengers poster with them on it throughout almost their entire existence) and reading Kieron Gillen's "Meet the Team" series on Tumblr, I came in with a fair grip on these characters. Unlike Avengers, it's not totally necessary to know much about this team coming in. Gillen lays a lot of it out on the table in a way that's easy to comprehend without feeling like forced exposition. Anything he doesn't lay out on the table is for us to discover along the way. By the end of the first issue, we've seen a bit of Noh-Varr's powers, a bit of Loki's powers, a bit of Ms. America's powers, a bit of Teddy's powers, and a bit of Wiccan's powers. Sharp readers know that's everyone bound for the team aside from Kate, who is the only unpowered member so it seems a good decision she's the one we don't see anything from but from whom we see maybe the most personality in limited space.

McKelvie's art is something I could rave about all day but it's particularly nice here as we see different forms of magic, of shape-shifting, of alien technology, and of whatever else you can think of in comics but none of it ever seems too hectic or unidentifiable. It's useful because, although plenty happens in this comic, nothing seems out of our grasp of understanding. It's a solid first entry from both Gillen and McKelvie. I expect it to only get better going forward, as there are plenty of irons in the fire, both in terms of the team's personalities and the conflict bound to arise. I also always love seeing writers and artists who have worked closely together in the past join up on a book. There's a level of comfort you can kind of feel emanating out of the book, leaving no confusion in terms of book real-estate or plot-holes (though SUDDENLY "Caplan" is spelled with a "C" instead of the usual "K." I hope we hear the exciting tale of why they changed their names. OR MAYBE we'll see why Teddy pronounces their name with a "C" instead of a "K." Maybe it was completely intentional!). This and Winter Soldier both ended with my girlfriend and I saying "wait, that's it? How are there no pages left?" which is always a good place to be. Well, a bad-good place.