Captain America 13, Captain Marvel 17, Iron Man 18

Captain America 13
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c)

Back in the late '60s, Nick Fury calls in undercover operative Ran Shen, meant to be infiltrating the Communist party in China to question him on why he hasn't reported back in two years. Of course, Fury doesn't really ask questions he doesn't already know the answers to and the interrogation pretty quickly turns south as he accuses Shen of creating his own party to rival Mao's, a claim Shen doesn't back down from. He then reveals his own enhancements and attacks Fury and Dum Dum Dugan, breaking out of his containment and rushing, with a scan of Fury's eye, to a high security location at the SHIELD hub. He's not the only one, though, as the Russian spy/assassin the Winter Soldier has watched the whole thing go down and attacks Shen once Shen gets inside the secure location. After a quick fight, both are attacked by a Dum Dum and Fury-led SHIELD team and both escape, though we see what Shen was after: a giant wing labeled "Weapon Minus." Lot of information here for the first ten pages of the book. Back in the present, Maria Hill calls Steve and a protesting Falcon (protesting on Steve's behalf) to take down Nuke in Nrosvekistan, claiming that it has to be Steve who does that, it has to be the icon of America to show that America doesn't support Nuke's actions. The two arrive and pretty quickly have some trouble taking the broken super-soldier down. It's a fight that will continue into the next issue.

Geez but there was a lot happening in those first ten pages. Sometimes you'll read a book and it will flow or, perhaps, even slow down (I think this book had a little of both) to such an extent that it covers the fact that we've just gotten so much information. I'm fortunate because I write a comics blog and so I end up delving in to help clarify some things but, if I didn't, I imagine I would forget a lot of key plot points (I still kind of do but that's more poor-memory related than anything else). The beginning of the book, with Ran Shen's interrogation and the Winter Soldier's involvement, are particularly interesting, though it starts to slow a little bit when we get into Shen's point of view, which almost entirely consists of a page or so of Shen hating America. I think it serves a purpose here, really giving us a depth of vitriol and catching readers up with the Iron Nail's beliefs, but it does feel a bit like it drags the story out. Winter Soldier's involvement is neat and it's cool to know that there's a deeper story there (perhaps one set to be explored more in WINTER SOLDIER: BITTER MARCH), expressed as Shen recognizes Winter Soldier and Winter Soldier reveals that Shen's target isn't his target; his target is Shen. Plenty happening here and that's BEFORE we get to Captain America himself, my thoughts on whom have been pretty regular of late. I find it really interesting to see Cap this despondent and Remender does a great job to, despite that, still show Cap as the force he was from the start of this book, someone fighting through anything and everything in his way (physical, internal and external, and mental) though there is an added sense of desperation and hopelessness there that didn't feel as present at the onset of this series. Stellar writing for Cap again. Great book. It would take something pretty impressive to follow this one up in a review. SEGUE.

Captain Marvel 17
DeConnick (w) and Andrade (a) and Bellaire (c)

Carol Danvers has returned to New York for the first time since the Enemy Within storyline's conclusion and it's a bit of a different world now. She's very open with her friends (hard not to be with this) about the state of her memories, though it doesn't impact her personality. Ultimately it means that she has no memories of people in her life like self-proclaimed sidekick Kit, personal assistant Wendy, and friends Tracy and Frank. On the flip-side, a ceremony is being held in her honor by the city of New York, appreciative of her efforts in Enemy Within. One individual, though, is not happy with her (really not happy with the world, but taking it out on her), new villain Grace Valentine, a self-made business success and genius computer engineer who wants more and finds herself overshadowed by the superhero events of recent days. She attacks the award ceremony (where Carol is given a key to the city and, perhaps more importantly, a new apartment in the CROWN OF THE STATUE OF LIBERTY whaaaaat) and Carol springs into action. Valentine has hijacked several drones and uses them swoop down on Carol, stunning her momentarily. As Carol recovers, Valentine sends a message to the world about who she is and who Carol is and why people should overlook Carol's perceived "achievements" for her own before revealing that she's targeting Carol by her star insignia. The crowd then jumps into the action, revealing their own insignias and shouting "I am Captain Marvel" and confusing the drones while inspiring Carol back into the fight. Valentine decides that she has no problem attacking Carol's supporters and sets her drones to the task when Carol leaps back in and saves the day. The day ends with Kit settling in to the CROWN OF THE STATUE OF LIBERTY apartment and showing Carol a comic book she wrote and drew to help re-educate Carol on who Captain Marvel is and what she's done, including inspiring (unbeknownst to even Kit) a young New Jersey teen with superpowers of her own.

A truly phenomenal issue and one that someone with less emotional restraint than I may have even teared up at a bit. Not me, that's not the point, you guys. It's just...it's not the point, okay? Anyway, it's a great issue that pulls on everything DeConnick has built for Carol through the course of this series. I talked about it at length during Enemy Within, which built a nightmare around Carol and enveloped all of her friends, a weight that doesn't feeling weighty if DeConnick doesn't put in the time to create a world around Carol. She did create that world, though, and so the involvement of Carol's friends continued to have resonance throughout the story and it's coming around again here, as Carol suddenly doesn't even remember who her friends are. The characters, though, are so real and so fleshed out that you can feel the love and care from them as they try to work around Carol's recent losses and find a way to get her involved again. What's more is that you're actively rooting for them and for Carol on their behalf. I can't think of another superhero comic populated by non-superheroes where this is more true. Even in Spider-Man, which has one of the most expansive casts of non-superhero characters (though that tends to change pretty frequently as different writers power up different characters in his life, geez), there are a few duds I can point to at anyone time that I can honestly say "yeah, I don't care about that guy/lady." Here, I actively care about everyone in Carol's life and this book doesn't work if you, as a reader, don't. Phenomenal job and a truly wonderful issue.

Iron Man 18
Gillen (w) and Bennett and Hanna (a) and Guru eFX (c)

We get a simulated look at the world of 30 years from now as Tony and Arno Stark immediately get to work on trying to better the world, trying to help the people and protect them. After that simulated 30 years, Tony and Arno have created a self-sufficient and self-protecting city that they can manage from above. As wonderful and idyllic as it is and despite how much it matches their dreams, it's inevitably immediately destroyed as the AI they've had around and based on 451's designs has covertly worked to undermine them, even when it was unaware of doing it. The two are wrenched out of the simulation and Arno emphasizes to Tony, back in the present day, that they cannot trust AI, a fact that Tony keeps glazing over because, as much as he knows he can't trust anything to do with 451, he can't help but be fascinated at the technology. Arno suspects that he's actually just avoiding talking about the adoption. Tony is saved by the bell on that one as an Avengers distress call comes in and he dispatches his Iron Man suit, complete with PEPPER, to handle it. Arno frowns on it but understands Tony's decision to be more proactive in building this new way of life than reactive in trying to stop supervillains as they pop up. Meanwhile, they seem to have a doozy of a supervillain primed to pop up as some sort of possible AI or enchanted ring-dispenser is targeting individuals around the world and making them Mandarins, presumably 1-10 (we see the creation of Mandarin Seven here).

Still a lot happening in this book, though plenty of this issue is dedicated to a simulation of a possible future. That feels like it should slow the book but I didn't even notice how much of the book it had taken up until I flipped through again to look something up for my summary. It moves well and it serves a distinct purpose, showing us what Arno and Tony are set to do. Tony has always been the engineer of the Marvel Universe; it's on his back that the technology and wonders (and sometimes also threats) of the Marvel Universe appear so it's important that we see what his aims are moving forward, as well as what his concerns are. In this case, his aims are perhaps greater than they've ever been, a self-sufficient city that can protect its inhabitants from both natural and alien threats in a particularly threatening new world. We also see some of the newest concerns as Arno warns Tony repeatedly that he can't trust AI, which Tony has more and more begun to trust with time. The addition of a new Mandarin-based threat at the end of the issue is just icing on the cake as we already have more than enough here to talk about and think about moving forward. It would have been relatively easy to take this issue as a sort of break issue, to reorient and keep away from supervillains and the like while Gillen establishes Tony's new life with Arno but, instead, we get plenty of new threats and new promises for Tony. Pretty neat stuff.