Showing posts with label Tony Stark. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tony Stark. Show all posts
Monday, October 13, 2014
Marvel Cinematic Universe preparing for CIVIL WAR
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Captain America 21, Black Widow 7, Iron Man 27
Captain America 21
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c) and Caramagna (l)
The Gungnir has fully deployed, turning into a giant robot over the small country of Nrosvekistan in Iron Nail's attempt to show SHIELD and America tyrannically and devastatingly eliminating an underpowered enemy. With Mindbubble out of play, the SHIELD agents onboard have started to wake up, though they're groggy from their time mindbubbled. Captain America continues to fight Iron Nail and manages to stall him a bit, enough for Maria Hill to tell him that he needs to destroy the Gungnir's power core. Cap races down, pursued by the Iron Nail, and weak and injured, manages to make one last throw to send his shield caroming into the power core and shutting down the Gungnir. Iron Nail manages to get some of his weapons into Cap, draining him of his life force and aging him incredibly before Falcon arrives to save him, though it affords the Nail a chance set the Gungnir to destroy, hoping to take everyone down with him. Falcon pulls Cap out as Ran Shen is engulfed in flames but it may be too late for Steve, who recovers in a hospital bed old and frail.
There's a lot of strong character work in this book as Steve pulls himself together for a final attempt at shutting down the Gungnir. He yells at himself for letting this all happen on his watch, for not seeing that Nuke was clearly a part of a bigger scheme, and for losing himself in thoughts about Dimension Z when it was already past, that he would mourn his past while he lost his present. Poor Steve is just about the only guy whose gone through that sort of thing TWICE and now he's here and upset with himself for being sad about it. He remembers his role as the super soldier, as Captain America, the guy who gets the privilege of wearing the uniform, as he continues to push himself and continues to stand. It's meaningful and hopeful and restorative right up until the moment when Iron Nail ages him up (hard to say if it's aging him up or extracting the super soldier serum from him, all possible, though I don't know that the latter would age him so incredibly). It's a strong finish to the Iron Nail's arc and it's certainly going to leave plenty of story pieces to pick up as we move forward.
Total Score: 5/5
Black Widow 7
Edmondson (w) and Noto (a and c) and Cowles (l)
Black Widow's new target, a group of cyberterrorists, are making a buy in San Francisco, new home to former lover and ally Daredevil. Natasha remembers her days with Daredevil in San Francisco, where she walked the line between contract killer and hero and where he could read her like everyone else. She takes out the seller and poses as him to try to make the drop but she's found out quickly and ends up in a rooftop chase with a sniper who tried to take her out. She catches up with him and holds him at gunpoint, trying to get more information out of him but he doesn't know enough. Before anything else comes of it, Daredevil appears and intercedes, telling Natasha that he'll make sure the authorities take the sniper. He tells her to leave San Francisco as he cannot read her heartbeat any more, meaning he doesn't know if he can trust her and his job is to protect the city.
As Isaiah hopes for Natasha to make some friends, Natasha finds that maybe she's lost one of her oldest. It's a poignant and meaningful story and rather heartbreaking. It's the first time we've seen Natasha as she's viewed in the superhero community and the first time we've seen her in this series outside of her own bubble, where we know what she's doing and we root for her because she's our protagonist. Now Daredevil steps in and tells us that maybe Natasha's role isn't so sacred. There's a flashback to kick this one off as Natasha, years ago in San Francisco, lies to Matt about a job she's just done and he tries to get her to reconsider her jobs. Juxtaposed with this story where Matt can't afford to give her the benefit of the doubt, it's a little painful to watch. It also pretty starkly gives us the contrast between the Natasha of then (someone trying to shelve her killer past) to now (someone trying to atone for sins but unafraid to kill, which puts her at odds with so many heroes, including Daredevil). On top of ALL OF THAT, we get a bit more on Isaiah, a former mob man who somehow got himself and his sister out and believes himself indebted to Natasha, despite his sister's protests. Really excellent writing in this one and some of the best character work I've seen a single issue do. Oh, and Phil Noto is still on this book so it continues to be outstanding art.
Total Score: 5/5
Iron Man 27
Gillen (w) and C. Richards and J. Bennett (p) and Hanna (i) and Guru eFX (c) and Caramagna (l)
The Stark brothers have made their own ring and know at least some of the plans of the current Mandarins. All they need is someone who has interfaced with these rings to put their plan of taking down the Mandarins in action. That, of course, leads them to Abigail Burns, the Red Peril (I want everyone to know, right here and now, that I almost called her "Abigail Brand, the Red Fury" but DIDN'T EVEN STUMBLE because I knew how wrong that was and instantly course corrected both words. I wish I could also say I didn't look it up afterwards to be sure but I'm not that self-secure), who needs convincing but agrees when she learns that Nazi Alec Eiffel is one of the ring-bearers and she wants to stomp a Nazi. With her help, the Starks manage to find and take down the Mandarins pretty handily, except for the so-far-unrevealed Liar, who reveals himself to be Marc Kumar, PR person for Stark and fiancee to Pepper Potts (who can't have anything nice). Oh, and speaking of Pepper Potts, Marc has her hostage and forces Tony to a standstill.
There's a lot happening here to explain the rings and the Starks' methods for bringing them down and Iron Metropolitan (which is a full battlesuit and which is activated to stop Mole Man and his pals) which rather slows this issue down. It's a lot of exposition and a lot of soft science from all angles (we have to talk about the rings, about the plans that each known Mandarin has, about the way to stop them, about tech vs. magic, etc.) but I don't know that there's a better way to do this. I think if you stretch this issue out into two it doesn't work and I think if you sprinkle this sort of exposition across books, you forget the relevant parts by the time we reach the showdown. Gillen has sprinkled in some of this information already but it really is a bit of an information dump here (which is rare from Gillen) and it's a little hard to get through at times. Not a bad book by any stretch but certainly not as impressive as I'd like from this typically top-notch book.
Total Score: 3/5
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c) and Caramagna (l)
There's a lot of strong character work in this book as Steve pulls himself together for a final attempt at shutting down the Gungnir. He yells at himself for letting this all happen on his watch, for not seeing that Nuke was clearly a part of a bigger scheme, and for losing himself in thoughts about Dimension Z when it was already past, that he would mourn his past while he lost his present. Poor Steve is just about the only guy whose gone through that sort of thing TWICE and now he's here and upset with himself for being sad about it. He remembers his role as the super soldier, as Captain America, the guy who gets the privilege of wearing the uniform, as he continues to push himself and continues to stand. It's meaningful and hopeful and restorative right up until the moment when Iron Nail ages him up (hard to say if it's aging him up or extracting the super soldier serum from him, all possible, though I don't know that the latter would age him so incredibly). It's a strong finish to the Iron Nail's arc and it's certainly going to leave plenty of story pieces to pick up as we move forward.
Total Score: 5/5
Black Widow 7
Edmondson (w) and Noto (a and c) and Cowles (l)
As Isaiah hopes for Natasha to make some friends, Natasha finds that maybe she's lost one of her oldest. It's a poignant and meaningful story and rather heartbreaking. It's the first time we've seen Natasha as she's viewed in the superhero community and the first time we've seen her in this series outside of her own bubble, where we know what she's doing and we root for her because she's our protagonist. Now Daredevil steps in and tells us that maybe Natasha's role isn't so sacred. There's a flashback to kick this one off as Natasha, years ago in San Francisco, lies to Matt about a job she's just done and he tries to get her to reconsider her jobs. Juxtaposed with this story where Matt can't afford to give her the benefit of the doubt, it's a little painful to watch. It also pretty starkly gives us the contrast between the Natasha of then (someone trying to shelve her killer past) to now (someone trying to atone for sins but unafraid to kill, which puts her at odds with so many heroes, including Daredevil). On top of ALL OF THAT, we get a bit more on Isaiah, a former mob man who somehow got himself and his sister out and believes himself indebted to Natasha, despite his sister's protests. Really excellent writing in this one and some of the best character work I've seen a single issue do. Oh, and Phil Noto is still on this book so it continues to be outstanding art.
Total Score: 5/5
Iron Man 27
Gillen (w) and C. Richards and J. Bennett (p) and Hanna (i) and Guru eFX (c) and Caramagna (l)
There's a lot happening here to explain the rings and the Starks' methods for bringing them down and Iron Metropolitan (which is a full battlesuit and which is activated to stop Mole Man and his pals) which rather slows this issue down. It's a lot of exposition and a lot of soft science from all angles (we have to talk about the rings, about the plans that each known Mandarin has, about the way to stop them, about tech vs. magic, etc.) but I don't know that there's a better way to do this. I think if you stretch this issue out into two it doesn't work and I think if you sprinkle this sort of exposition across books, you forget the relevant parts by the time we reach the showdown. Gillen has sprinkled in some of this information already but it really is a bit of an information dump here (which is rare from Gillen) and it's a little hard to get through at times. Not a bad book by any stretch but certainly not as impressive as I'd like from this typically top-notch book.
Total Score: 3/5
Thursday, May 29, 2014
Iron Man 26, Iron Patriot 3
Iron Man 26
Gillen (w) and Bennett and Ross (p) and Hanna and Ross (i) and Guru eFX (c) and Caramagna (l)
Malekith, unable to defend himself from the other six rings and their wearers, makes a deal with Tony: he'll give the ring up if Tony will get him out of the area safely. Tony is wary but agrees, preferring, as Malekith puts it, to win than to take revenge. Tony returns to Earth with the rings intact and hides them away in his encasement. something is happening with the Bride (from way back in the Extremis storyline) and it may just be tied to the fact that Tony has discovered that Arno is trying to perfect Extremis. It's a problem Tony will have to deal with later, though, as four rings has brought them closer to their own goals, which seem to be constructing a ring of their own.
The book is appropriately dark, both in tone and in art/color, for the sorts of shady goings-on that are happening here. Between Iron Man making a deal with Malekith to protect him from the ring-bearers and Iron Man discovering who some of the other ring-bearers are and Arno trying to work the kinks out of the extremely dangerous Extremis and the two of them concocting something to do with the rings, there are a lot of threads here and exactly none of them guarantee any sort of a happy ending. There are outcomes, potentially, that may be less terrible than others available, but many of the possible outcomes are very worrying for Iron Man and it's impossible not to recognize that to some extent in this story. Well done overall.
Total Score: 4/5
Iron Patriot 3
Kot (w) and G. Brown (a) and Charalampidis (c) and Cowles (l)
Rhodes nearly dies from his time underwater but his mysterious savior/possible attacker revives him with a jolt of electricity as a homemade defibrillator. Rhodes attacks him but is forced to stop when the armored man threatens James' father and Lila. Meanwhile, James' father throws himself at the kidnappers, who seem to have some personal issue with him, allowing Lila a chance to run. Back with the masked man, a former agent of SHIELD, James learns that the man has kidnapped him in the hopes that he'll assassinate the former president for him, throwing the country into a civil war over how soldiers are used.
It's a compelling enough story and, I'd say, the most compelling aspect of it is how fast each issue reads. I try not to compare a writer's work to his other work (I do this unsuccessfully OFTEN) but it's hard to separate that I haven't really liked Kot's work with Marvel to this point, mostly because I think it's trying too hard to hit too many points and it ends up slowing an issue down or needlessly complicating things. Here, Kot has an interesting story and seemingly complicated moral decision for our protagonist to make and he's keeping the exposition and the dialogue to a minimum, letting both the art breathe and the story to stand on its own. Each of these issues has read quickly but not because they're uninteresting or poorly written or anything along those lines. They're gripping and compelling and Garry Brown's art and Jim Charalampidis' colors work extremely well with the tone and the content.
Total Score: 5/5
Saturday, May 24, 2014
SUPER QUICK REVIEWS: Ultimate FF 2, Miracleman 6
Ultimate FF 2
Fialkov (w) and Guevara (p) and Vlasco, Hanna, Pennington, and Leisten (i) and Rosenberg (c) and Sabino (l)
The FF, complete with new member Victor Van Damme, are tasked with finding out what happened to group of disappeared rich people living in an underwater luxury destination built near the ruins of Lemuria. Falcon and Stark speculate that the abrupt disappearance has to do with dimensional shifts but they have to put their theories aside when suddenly Namor, the thought-dead emperor of Atlantis, appears, as does apparently the entire population of Atlantis, all of whom have super strength because everyone seems to be from a different dimension.
It's a little hard to follow some of the different dimension talk because the theories start to ask if just about everyone they stumble upon isn't from a different dimension but nothing is ever really confirmed. Some of the bickering between the team is fun (a good Doom is typically a welcome addition to any sort of team book or, you know, any book) but some of it feels a little out of place and forced. Still, the book has an energy and a sense of fun to it that's certainly welcome. I should mention that Tom Grummett is credited with layout work on the art in this book but I didn't want to double use the letter "L" above.
Total Score: 4/5
Miracleman 6
Moore (w) and A. Davis and Ridgway (a) and Oliff (c) and Caramagna (l)
Miracleman and Evelyn Cream head to Paraguay to find Gargunza, who Miracleman suspects has his wife. While Cream wrestles with his motivations for all of his actions, Miracleman stays decidedly quiet, seemingly scared. Gargunza, meanwhile, runs some tests on Liz thinking about how neat it's going to be to be immortal. We also get a flash to the past of Gargunza and MM as, back in the testing days of the '60s, Gargunza observed and experimented on Miracleman. One particular set of tests, though, started to see Miracleman's subconscious begin to try to rouse him from his sleep, to set him to the task of stopping Gargunza. Gargunza manages to set his mind at ease at the last moment but the fear he raised is palpable.
Another strong issue, though this one feels almost like a rest issue, giving us a chance to kind of catch up with the story and prep for the upcoming encounter between Miracleman and Gargunza. There are interesting things happening with Cream that we're only kind of privy to but dishing it out slowly is an effective way to keep us interested. Plenty of cool things still happening in this book and it continues to be a worthwhile read even for those not so interested in the re-release.
Total Score: 5/5
Fialkov (w) and Guevara (p) and Vlasco, Hanna, Pennington, and Leisten (i) and Rosenberg (c) and Sabino (l)
It's a little hard to follow some of the different dimension talk because the theories start to ask if just about everyone they stumble upon isn't from a different dimension but nothing is ever really confirmed. Some of the bickering between the team is fun (a good Doom is typically a welcome addition to any sort of team book or, you know, any book) but some of it feels a little out of place and forced. Still, the book has an energy and a sense of fun to it that's certainly welcome. I should mention that Tom Grummett is credited with layout work on the art in this book but I didn't want to double use the letter "L" above.
Total Score: 4/5
Miracleman 6
Moore (w) and A. Davis and Ridgway (a) and Oliff (c) and Caramagna (l)
Miracleman and Evelyn Cream head to Paraguay to find Gargunza, who Miracleman suspects has his wife. While Cream wrestles with his motivations for all of his actions, Miracleman stays decidedly quiet, seemingly scared. Gargunza, meanwhile, runs some tests on Liz thinking about how neat it's going to be to be immortal. We also get a flash to the past of Gargunza and MM as, back in the testing days of the '60s, Gargunza observed and experimented on Miracleman. One particular set of tests, though, started to see Miracleman's subconscious begin to try to rouse him from his sleep, to set him to the task of stopping Gargunza. Gargunza manages to set his mind at ease at the last moment but the fear he raised is palpable.Another strong issue, though this one feels almost like a rest issue, giving us a chance to kind of catch up with the story and prep for the upcoming encounter between Miracleman and Gargunza. There are interesting things happening with Cream that we're only kind of privy to but dishing it out slowly is an effective way to keep us interested. Plenty of cool things still happening in this book and it continues to be a worthwhile read even for those not so interested in the re-release.
Total Score: 5/5
Sunday, May 18, 2014
This week's picks
Hey all my buddies! Sorry for all of those SUPER QUICK REVIEWS this week. GUYS, why did I say "sorry?" It was probably better for EVERYONE. I'm still planning to do full reviews for a number of books but, as I intimated earlier this week, I may do these more often (unless, and this is a pretty big unless potential investors, someone starts paying me for this blog). But THAT'S not what the Sunday post is for. The Sunday post is for BEST OF. So what was the best of this week? Well I'd certainly recommend the following.
Avengers 29
Am I still a little sore that this book was $4.99? And that this extra dollar came from an extra ten pages plenty of readers have already read or that could have been covered in maybe an extra page-long recap? Yes. Duh. I just mentioned it all, clearly I've been thinking about it. THAT SAID, I do really love this issue. Jonathan Hickman has two AVENGERS books in a row that feature key Avengers members (one of the original Avengers and one of the "IT ONLY TOOK ME FOUR ISSUES TO GET HERE TOO" Avengers) discovering something about other key member Tony Stark and wanting rip him apart for it. Unlike the last one, which sort of disperses as Banner agrees reluctantly to join up with the world-saving and not kill the Illuminati (yet), Cap won't be so easily swayed. It's wonderful and incredibly tense, somehow managing to be tense despite being a different version of AVENGERS 28. Lots of fun if you find remarkably tense moments between dudes who were friends but also have been pretty bitter enemies PERHAPS a bit more recently "fun." I do. Check it out.
Captain America 20
This one was a tough choice (and probably my Cap bias is out in full here) between, particularly, this one, CAPTAIN MARVEL, NEW AVENGERS, and AVENGERS UNDERCOVER. This one ultimately wins out because Rick Remender has made it his mission this whole series to break Steve Rogers in every way possible and BOY does it come out in force here. If you're looking around going "geez, I think superheroes at Marvel don't get beat up enough," you will love this book. I'm...I'm not sure anyone should be looking for that? But if the idea doesn't turn you off, you should check this book out. You should probably check it out anyway. Remender's doing astonishing stuff breaking down the most unbreakable character in this modern day Job-like story. But also with punching and superheroes and world-level threats.
X-Force 5
Si Spurrier is regularly putting out really thought-provoking, human books even as he puts people up against incredibly powerful or even ridiculous villains (Spurrier recognizes in the book that Volga is crazily over-the-top but he's not really who we care about). X-FORCE is just another in a line of phenomenal releases from Spurrier (even outside of his Marvel work) that make you really care about the characters and that keep you aware of who everyone is and what everyone's going through at all times. This is very heavily a Marrow-centric issue but it's impossible to not acknowledge what's happening with Cable and with Psylocke and with Fantomex. It's excellently done and it's, to this point, everything I want this series to be.
Avengers 29
Captain America 20
X-Force 5
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Iron Man 25, Captain America 20, Captain Marvel 3
Iron Man 25
Gillen (w) and Ross (a) and Guru eFX (c) and Caramagna (l)
Tony Stark is not happy. However, he's now not happy and also armed in actual iron, ready to tear through some dark elves. Though the elves put on quite a tough front, Tony slaughters them pretty ably. He manages to take back the Lightning ring (he's already taken Incandescence) and then gets to Malekith himself, eventually besting him and taking back the Remaker ring. Malekith flees but Tony isn't satisfied, following him back to his throne. However, there are surprises for everyone when the other Mandarins are revealed, all united to teach Mandarin a thing or two (they are Alec Eiffel, Thomas Wilkins, Colin Anderson Sixty, Unknown [he wields the liar ring], Victor Kohl, and, of course, Mole Man).
Story
Tony wastes no time in taking it to Malekith in a book that really shows off the sort of power that an enraged Tony Stark can have. Of course, Gillen's setting us up for the bigger fight, wherein Tony fights a more organized and more dangerous and less weak-to-iron force, so it's great to see him so strong in this issue, beating up pretty much every dark elf in the realm and taking back three of the four rings Mandarin has (Mandarin reclaims the Spectral ring when he returns to his throne but it needs full recharge time, don't think that we've seen the last of it). And now, perhaps most impressively, all the rings are in the same place for what promises to be an impressive final fight. 5/5
Character
The biggest character stuff comes out of Tony's anger and out of Shevaun's frustration with him as she tries to advise him at every turn to find his way back home and he declines at every turn. There's character in all of that and character in the way Tony fights and the fight intelligence he has even when he's been driven to anger (typically when strong characters are prone to mistakes). It's also a bit of a strange character issue for Malekith, who gets thoroughly beaten but turns to fear a little faster than I'd've expected (unless, of course, this is some weird situation where Malekith wanted to lure the other rings here in which case his plan is tenuous). 4/5
Writing
Gillen clearly relishes writing the dark elves, with their menacing and old-timey threats and their disregard for human emotion. The tone of the book works pretty well as it never really feels, once the fighting starts, like Tony's not in control. He very much dominates the fight, which is, I think, exactly what Gillen needs right now. Still, some of the writing feels a little cut down, which I think is partly done for humor (the abruptness of cutting down some of the Svatalfheimian dialogue) but some of it still comes off as choppy. 4/5
Art
Luke Ross continues to do impressive work with the art here and Guru's colors continue to really shape the tone and the feel of the book. Ross draws excellent people and elves and still manages to make a menacing Iron Man, which is always an impressive thing. 5/5
Miscellaneous
Another Del Mundo cover as Marvel clearly understands what they have in him.
Total Score: 4/5
Captain America 20
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c) and Caramagna (l)
Cap's been mindbubbled and BOY is it depressing. He "wakes up" (guys, I could put quotation marks throughout this whole section and frankly, I'm not above doing that, but I WON'T) in a SHIELD hospital wondering whether or not his ongoing fight is worth it only to find his "family" all around him. This includes Fury and Hill but also Bucky, Falcon, and Jet. Banner and Pym also enter the room to say they went to Dimension Z to make sure there was nothing else that could trigger the virus in Cap and found instead that Ian alive and well and brought him out and that the Sharon who died had been an LMD while the real one went deep undercover. As a parade for Cap rages outside, Cap realizes what's happening and throws himself off the balcony, waking him from the Mindbubble (this was the suicide Jet told him he needed to break out) and putting him directly up against Iron Nail and Mindbubble himself. As Jet arrives and begins to fight Iron Nail, bounces his shield into Mindbubble's dumb, jerk face and makes him freak out, sprinting off the helicarrier and presumably to his death. However, Steve soon learns he may be too late as Nail reveals that he's pinned the attack on SHIELD on Nrosvekistan and that now the world will watch in horror as SHIELD retaliates with the transformer-like Gungnir, a huge overreaction to any perceived attacks. The world will see SHIELD as the overstepping, incredibly dangerous and unregulated army it is.
Story
Guys, I'm not sure I can do this justice. Poor Steve has the absolute worst life. It's super depressing and you know it's happening the whole time and you can only watch as poor Steve slowly figures it out. Iron Nail's plan is an intriguing one as it involves just doing what SHIELD is already so good at doing: overreacting. Iron Nail continues to be an interesting villain as he more or less raises a lot of questions that Steve himself has had over the years but does it in such a way that obviously Steve can't help but fight him. It's a really compelling story and one that perfectly works to Captain America. 5/5
Character
Poor Steve. 5/5
Writing
I'm not sure why Remender enjoys being so mean to Captain America but it's pretty effective. As I said, everyone reading should know that Cap's in his mindbubble but that doesn't make it any less heartbreaking. I got a little nervous that maybe Remender would spend the whole time in the mindbubble and nothing else would happen in the issue until the last second reveal that he was there but Remender gave the audience the benefit of the doubt and let us get right back into the story after what seemed like the perfect amount of time. 5/5
Art
Really strong art from Nic Klein here and Dean White's colors are perfect, really relaxing in the mindbubble and then jarringly dark back on the Gungnir. Klein's art really highlights just how sad Steve is. 5/5
Miscellaneous
I DON'T LIKE SEEING STEVE SO SAD, OKAY? That sentiment, though, may perhaps be interpreted differently considering the overall score of this one.
Total Score: 5/5
Captain Marvel 3
DeConnick (w) and D. Lopez (a) and Loughridge (c) and Caramagna (l)
Tic has stolen Captain Marvel's ship (and her cat along with it) and Carol is now worried about where she'll go with it, concerned both for Tic's safety and for her ship's (and her cat's, inexplicably). Fortunately for her, Tic is really concerned with attacking the son of J-Son, so she comes right on back, dropping in and out of hyperdrive (which shows pretty good strategy) and attacking quickly. Carol's pretty sick of it though and stops her as she attacks one of the times. She gets back into the ship, using her helmet to override the ship's commands and let her back in. She and Star-Lord convince Tic that J-Son wouldn't care about the capture of his son and that, likely, the Spartax didn't try to poison her new home planet. Carol returns her to her people and offers her assistance, though quickly realizes that maybe she's out of her depth a bit.
Story
Carol's out in space and, though I worried last issue about her involvement with the Guardians of the Galaxy because I feared it would take the focus too much off of the amazing work DeConnick has done to establish Carol as a great character (particularly now that she's lost her memories), it's shaping up to be a fairly personal story. Obviously we'll get more of Tic and her people but there's a lot happening to let us see more about Carol. She's offered herself to Tic's people in the hopes that she'll be able to assist them but has quickly learned that she's a bit out of her element which will help to establish who she is and how she deals with the sorts of problems she can't punch away. 5/5
Character
Carol's concern for Tic, the girl she hadn't even spoken to until she stole her ship, says a lot about her character, as does her willingness to throw herself into a ship that keeps going in and out of hyperdrive to get her ship back and to help the girl. She also very quickly realizes that the leader of Tic's people sees her as more a hindrance than a help but she's determined to prove her worth and save these people, no matter what it takes. It's about proving worth but it's also very clearly just about wanting to help and that speaks volumes. 5/5
Writing
I think the move to get Carol away from the Guardians, despite the good fit for the team and for her, is a strong move for DeConnick and one she knew she had to make, just as Gillen knew he had to separate Tony from the Guardians in IRON MAN when they teamed up. There's a lot happening in this book and we're getting a sense of some interstellar politics and alien cultures but it never feels overwhelming, which is definitely to the book's credit. 5/5
Art
I still really like David Lopez's art on the interiors of this book and I think that it's particularly well-suited to the kind of calm in this issue after the initial action (the action was pretty strong too but he does emotions and stillness really well too, which is impressive for a comic book artist who knows he'll have to draw so much action. 5/5
Miscellaneous
After really disliking the last cover, I really love this one. What a turnaround!
Total Score: 5/5
Gillen (w) and Ross (a) and Guru eFX (c) and Caramagna (l)
Story
Tony wastes no time in taking it to Malekith in a book that really shows off the sort of power that an enraged Tony Stark can have. Of course, Gillen's setting us up for the bigger fight, wherein Tony fights a more organized and more dangerous and less weak-to-iron force, so it's great to see him so strong in this issue, beating up pretty much every dark elf in the realm and taking back three of the four rings Mandarin has (Mandarin reclaims the Spectral ring when he returns to his throne but it needs full recharge time, don't think that we've seen the last of it). And now, perhaps most impressively, all the rings are in the same place for what promises to be an impressive final fight. 5/5
Character
The biggest character stuff comes out of Tony's anger and out of Shevaun's frustration with him as she tries to advise him at every turn to find his way back home and he declines at every turn. There's character in all of that and character in the way Tony fights and the fight intelligence he has even when he's been driven to anger (typically when strong characters are prone to mistakes). It's also a bit of a strange character issue for Malekith, who gets thoroughly beaten but turns to fear a little faster than I'd've expected (unless, of course, this is some weird situation where Malekith wanted to lure the other rings here in which case his plan is tenuous). 4/5
Writing
Gillen clearly relishes writing the dark elves, with their menacing and old-timey threats and their disregard for human emotion. The tone of the book works pretty well as it never really feels, once the fighting starts, like Tony's not in control. He very much dominates the fight, which is, I think, exactly what Gillen needs right now. Still, some of the writing feels a little cut down, which I think is partly done for humor (the abruptness of cutting down some of the Svatalfheimian dialogue) but some of it still comes off as choppy. 4/5
Art
Luke Ross continues to do impressive work with the art here and Guru's colors continue to really shape the tone and the feel of the book. Ross draws excellent people and elves and still manages to make a menacing Iron Man, which is always an impressive thing. 5/5
Miscellaneous
Another Del Mundo cover as Marvel clearly understands what they have in him.
Total Score: 4/5
Captain America 20
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c) and Caramagna (l)
Story
Guys, I'm not sure I can do this justice. Poor Steve has the absolute worst life. It's super depressing and you know it's happening the whole time and you can only watch as poor Steve slowly figures it out. Iron Nail's plan is an intriguing one as it involves just doing what SHIELD is already so good at doing: overreacting. Iron Nail continues to be an interesting villain as he more or less raises a lot of questions that Steve himself has had over the years but does it in such a way that obviously Steve can't help but fight him. It's a really compelling story and one that perfectly works to Captain America. 5/5
Character
Poor Steve. 5/5
Writing
I'm not sure why Remender enjoys being so mean to Captain America but it's pretty effective. As I said, everyone reading should know that Cap's in his mindbubble but that doesn't make it any less heartbreaking. I got a little nervous that maybe Remender would spend the whole time in the mindbubble and nothing else would happen in the issue until the last second reveal that he was there but Remender gave the audience the benefit of the doubt and let us get right back into the story after what seemed like the perfect amount of time. 5/5
Art
Really strong art from Nic Klein here and Dean White's colors are perfect, really relaxing in the mindbubble and then jarringly dark back on the Gungnir. Klein's art really highlights just how sad Steve is. 5/5
Miscellaneous
I DON'T LIKE SEEING STEVE SO SAD, OKAY? That sentiment, though, may perhaps be interpreted differently considering the overall score of this one.
Total Score: 5/5
Captain Marvel 3
DeConnick (w) and D. Lopez (a) and Loughridge (c) and Caramagna (l)
Story
Carol's out in space and, though I worried last issue about her involvement with the Guardians of the Galaxy because I feared it would take the focus too much off of the amazing work DeConnick has done to establish Carol as a great character (particularly now that she's lost her memories), it's shaping up to be a fairly personal story. Obviously we'll get more of Tic and her people but there's a lot happening to let us see more about Carol. She's offered herself to Tic's people in the hopes that she'll be able to assist them but has quickly learned that she's a bit out of her element which will help to establish who she is and how she deals with the sorts of problems she can't punch away. 5/5
Character
Carol's concern for Tic, the girl she hadn't even spoken to until she stole her ship, says a lot about her character, as does her willingness to throw herself into a ship that keeps going in and out of hyperdrive to get her ship back and to help the girl. She also very quickly realizes that the leader of Tic's people sees her as more a hindrance than a help but she's determined to prove her worth and save these people, no matter what it takes. It's about proving worth but it's also very clearly just about wanting to help and that speaks volumes. 5/5
Writing
I think the move to get Carol away from the Guardians, despite the good fit for the team and for her, is a strong move for DeConnick and one she knew she had to make, just as Gillen knew he had to separate Tony from the Guardians in IRON MAN when they teamed up. There's a lot happening in this book and we're getting a sense of some interstellar politics and alien cultures but it never feels overwhelming, which is definitely to the book's credit. 5/5
Art
I still really like David Lopez's art on the interiors of this book and I think that it's particularly well-suited to the kind of calm in this issue after the initial action (the action was pretty strong too but he does emotions and stillness really well too, which is impressive for a comic book artist who knows he'll have to draw so much action. 5/5
Miscellaneous
After really disliking the last cover, I really love this one. What a turnaround!
Total Score: 5/5
Wednesday, May 14, 2014
Avengers 29, New Avengers 18, Secret Avengers 3
Avengers 29
Hickman (w) and Yu (p) and Alanguilan (i) and Gho (c) and Petit (l)
Steve Rogers has been having bad dreams but they've gotten clearer. Suddenly he remembers his time with the Illuminati and the way in which they parted. Furious, he grabs Hawkeye, Black Widow, and Thor, who subsequently grabs Starbrand and Hyperion, and the team of core Avengers and muscle confront Tony in his lab. Steve accuses him of all of his sins and it pretty quickly comes to blows as Tony regrets nothing about fighting to save the world through whatever means necessary and has a whole ton of suits with him. It's a bitter and brutal fight but it's ended abruptly (for now) when the time gem, the only one of the Infinity gems that didn't shatter right away (BECAUSE IT'S TIME, GUYS), appears and shatters in Cap's hand, sending the story to 48 years in the future.
Story
This is the one we've been waiting for since Tony ordered Steve's memories wiped way back in NEW AVENGERS 3 and everything's fallen nicely into place for Hickman and company. The story is appropriately dark and tense and it's impossible not to be impressed by how well Hickman has crafted his Tony Stark. Stark has never been above doing whatever it takes to do what he thinks is right but it's all come into focus here as the last two issues of AVENGERS (coming nearly thirty issues into a book that started by casting Steve as life and Tony as death) have found longtime associates of Tony accusing him of unthinkable crimes only to discover that they're entirely correct. Tony manages to convince one but not the other and, unfortunately for him, the other rather commands respect from just about everyone, including Thor, Hyperion, and Starbrand. Not really the best guy to go up against. 5/5
Character
This is very much meant to be a turning point moment for AVENGERS as it will fundamentally shake the two real leaders of Hickman's team. As such, it rather has to be a big moment for character and it certainly works out that way as we see the rage building in Steve and his swift decisiveness, immediately calling on Black Widow and Hawkeye as well as Thor. It's also worth noting that character is often built just as much on how other characters perceive someone and the fact that he can turn to this set of core Avengers and immediately have them trust him enough to storm their friend and fellow hero's home speaks volumes about both Cap and Tony. It's really brilliantly executed and enormously important. 5/5
Writing
I've pretty much covered this already, though I'll add that the tone of this book, as with the tone of the last issue, is that perfect blend of darkness and increasing hostility that this story absolutely needs. This will also tie to Yu and Gho's art and colors in the book but it comes first and foremost from the writing. 5/5
Art
Pretty much already said it all above but Yu, Alanguilan, and Gho capture the dark tone and the anger as well as anything Hickman wrote. Really strong work to tie everything nicely here. 5/5
Miscellaneous
The first ten pages of this issue or so are taken directly from NEW AVENGERS and serve as a really good point to get into this issue. On top of that, the book is an extra ten pages long to make up for the summary. Still, I continue to question Marvel's pricing as this one jumps up a dollar to $4.99, a disturbing trend recently. I understand that a bigger book means more cost to Marvel but I steadfastly maintain that keeping the price $3.99 does far more to gain readers/keep readers and to keep readers from getting skeptical and cynical about your prices while still not, I would think, bankrupting your company. Also, you're now forcing people who already know what's going on to pay an extra dollar to get recap they already have. This book itself is really good (and will get the score it merits on that alone) but it's another example in a worrying trend from Marvel.
Total score: 5/5
New Avengers 18
Hickman (w) and Schiti (a) and F. Martin (c) and Caramagna (l)
With a very short time before the Illuminati know they'll have to face another world, this one populated with innocents and heroes alike, it's time for some serious soul-searching. T'Challa seeks and receives counsel from the dead kings of Wakanda who allow him his moment of sadness and heavy-heartedness before reminding him that the very act of keeping Wakanda so secluded has cost many innocents in the outside world their lives, that the kings of Wakanda (or any place) have always been beyond these sorts of decisions, and that he needs to do what is best for Wakanda. Meanwhile, Beast shows Banner around their antimatter bombs, a powered-up and soulless Stephen Strange returns to the Illuminati, and Stark and Reed confront Black Swan in the hopes she has more information for them. By issue's end, though, it's time for the Illuminati to square off against heroes.
Story
It's fitting that this issue and this arc comes out alongside the current AVENGERS storyline (certainly, you guys, that's not by mistake) as it's the first time that the Illuminati are tested in exactly the sort of way Cap feared they would be when he "left" the team. Now, as Cap returns to dole out some justice on Tony over in AVENGERS, the Illuminati has to deal with a world populated by real people and real heroes alike in order to keep their own world alive. Will the most heroic among these men falter? The question is asked here and, though it puts off seeing the actual fight we're waiting for until next time, it's given the room linger for an issue, allowing the audience to understand just what everyone's going through. As this is a book driven by these consequences, it's important to give this fight the space it needs to really breathe. 5/5
Character
The characters are al highlighted by how troubled they are to enter into this fight. For T'Challa, that means his ongoing struggle to do what's right by his own moral code while also protecting and upholding Wakanda. Panther has always been a great character for seeing that sort of struggle and it's at a fever pitch right now. Tony Stark is the same way, though his feelings come out through anger and frustration where T'Challa's really border on abject sadness. Also worth seeing the characters who aren't seemingly struggling with this, including a somewhat-repowered Black Bolt, Namor, and Stephen Strange. Next issue should show us a lot. 5/5
Writing
Hickman's writing continues to be very strong and, as with AVENGERS, you can see the strengths of his long game all through these issues (long con). He has spent over a year building these stories and now it's all coming together wonderfully. He's also doing a solid job developing the tone really switching back and forth between all of the various emotions that the team is feeling. 5/5
Art
The talented Valerio Schiti steps in to provide the art for this issue and, while I quite like Schiti's art, I'm not sure it totally works here. It's at its strongest in this issue on the various emotions, particularly when we see Black Panther with his council, but it occasionally feels too clean for the dark things that are happening. Schiti is helped tremendously by Frank Martin's colors, which set up the tone really well, but it's hard not to feel like Schiti might have been a bit of a strange choice on this one. 4/5
Miscellaneous
Extra points here to Christian Ward's unbelievable variant cover (at right).
Total score: 5/5
Secret Avengers 3
Kot (w) and Walsh (a) and Wilson (c) and Cowles (l)
A deranged poet has built a superbomb and is planning to sell it on the island nation of Sokotra, possibly to Latverians. Hill sends Coulson, Black Widow, and Spider-Woman to the scene to try to capture the bomb and dispose of the poet while Fury and Hawkeye go on a different mission. Things start to break down in Sokotra as Coulson experiences a bit of PTSD from his recent mission and as Black Widow has to learn to trust her colleagues to do what they do. She covers Coulson while he snaps out of it and Spider-Woman attacks the poet, managing to subdue him and talk the superbomb out of committing suicide (yes, the superbomb talks and thinks). While Black Widow wonders if this isn't all a weird set-up (there appears to be no buyer for the bomb present after all), Lady Bullseye turns up and attacks before Coulson drives her off a cliff after hitting her with a jeep. They begin to return home as we learn that Fury and Hawkeye's mission is to go out and find and capture the Fury, who Fury and Coulson managed to dispatch in the last issue.
Story
Pretty standard story here as part of the team is sent to stop an arms deal that could put a devastating weapon in the hands of enemies (or of anyone, really) and part of the team, separated from the others, is sent to do something shady for SHIELD. Coulson's PTSD seems a bit forced as, although he only first appeared a few years ago in BATTLE SCARS, he's touted to be this big super agent who has had his hands in plenty of soups up to this point. Not to say his PTSD isn't warranted, it just kind of feels like it's here to develop Natasha more, who is forced to figure out what to do in this situation. Also, though the story is pretty standard, that doesn't mean it also doesn't feel a bit forced, particularly the criminal mastermind poet bit. 3/5
Character
The two biggest complaints I have about this issue's characters are that Kot is set on doing the somewhat standard Black Widow-team-writer thing of making her a cold and relentless killing machine, someone who revels in murder as much as any supervillain. I've always felt the best Natashas are the ones who don't get hung up on the killing but also aren't exactly licking their lips while they think of how best to kill someone. Here, she's absolutely flippant about murder and I think it weakens who she is. Kot is also set on making Hawkeye something of a twelve-year-old, which I think is a cue taken from Fraction's Hawkeye. The difference is that Fraction shows us all sides of Hawkeye; he's immature, sure, but he's also a guy with a dark past just trying to do what's right in whatever way seems best. Here, he's little more than comic relief and something of an audience stand-in, apparently needing explanation of what the team does because he's too dumb to understand it any other way, despite the fact that he recently ran his own Secret Avengers team so probably he's not too unfamiliar with it. It feels very much like it's trying way too hard on a lot of fronts, more of which we'll get into in the next section. 2/5
Writing
It's trying way too hard on a lot of fronts. I talked in the review of the first issue (and the second issue) about how Kot himself has called the tone of this book something akin to Breaking Bad, a Michael Bay movie, and Arrested Development. I think that all of those tones are coming at the expense of the overall quality of the book which feels like it's trying just so very hard to be different or to challenge common comic book conceptions. There's a poet screaming about Mailer and Plath as he prepares to detonate a reality ending bomb, there's a mention of Scarlett Johansson playing Black Widow in one of the inane introductory captions, and there's a page of the book dedicated to Natasha playing a weird text adventure sort of game in her mind as she decides how best to proceed, meaning that Natasha's mind is working in precisely the last way anyone would expect it to. I'm going to stop harping on this book trying too hard now because, in finding those links above, I looked at my last two reviews and saw that I'm just repeating myself OVER AND OVER AGAIN so I'm going to let you all assume what I'm saying. 1/5
Art
In case you missed it, I don't like the tone of this book and I don't like how hard this book is trying but I will say that the art is doing its job to keep up with whatever tone Kot wants to put forward. Though I'm not onboard with the book so far, I think the art is doing everything it can to make it palatable. Credit to Michael Walsh and Matt Wilson for doing some strong work to keep this book moving. 5/5
Miscellaneous
As with everything, this is all just based on my personal opinion as well as whatever technical knowledge I've gained throughout my life (that's why I tend to focus so much more on writing aspects than art aspects; I'm far more experienced with writing than with art). Maybe this book is working for you. For me, though, I tend to get super skeptical and cynical when you can smell a book trying too hard and this is nailing that (I thought FEARLESS DEFENDERS was doing it too but I was more willing to forgive that on some levels because it was at least doing it with C-list characters).
Total score: 2/5
Hickman (w) and Yu (p) and Alanguilan (i) and Gho (c) and Petit (l)
Story
This is the one we've been waiting for since Tony ordered Steve's memories wiped way back in NEW AVENGERS 3 and everything's fallen nicely into place for Hickman and company. The story is appropriately dark and tense and it's impossible not to be impressed by how well Hickman has crafted his Tony Stark. Stark has never been above doing whatever it takes to do what he thinks is right but it's all come into focus here as the last two issues of AVENGERS (coming nearly thirty issues into a book that started by casting Steve as life and Tony as death) have found longtime associates of Tony accusing him of unthinkable crimes only to discover that they're entirely correct. Tony manages to convince one but not the other and, unfortunately for him, the other rather commands respect from just about everyone, including Thor, Hyperion, and Starbrand. Not really the best guy to go up against. 5/5
Character
This is very much meant to be a turning point moment for AVENGERS as it will fundamentally shake the two real leaders of Hickman's team. As such, it rather has to be a big moment for character and it certainly works out that way as we see the rage building in Steve and his swift decisiveness, immediately calling on Black Widow and Hawkeye as well as Thor. It's also worth noting that character is often built just as much on how other characters perceive someone and the fact that he can turn to this set of core Avengers and immediately have them trust him enough to storm their friend and fellow hero's home speaks volumes about both Cap and Tony. It's really brilliantly executed and enormously important. 5/5
Writing
I've pretty much covered this already, though I'll add that the tone of this book, as with the tone of the last issue, is that perfect blend of darkness and increasing hostility that this story absolutely needs. This will also tie to Yu and Gho's art and colors in the book but it comes first and foremost from the writing. 5/5
Art
Pretty much already said it all above but Yu, Alanguilan, and Gho capture the dark tone and the anger as well as anything Hickman wrote. Really strong work to tie everything nicely here. 5/5
Miscellaneous
The first ten pages of this issue or so are taken directly from NEW AVENGERS and serve as a really good point to get into this issue. On top of that, the book is an extra ten pages long to make up for the summary. Still, I continue to question Marvel's pricing as this one jumps up a dollar to $4.99, a disturbing trend recently. I understand that a bigger book means more cost to Marvel but I steadfastly maintain that keeping the price $3.99 does far more to gain readers/keep readers and to keep readers from getting skeptical and cynical about your prices while still not, I would think, bankrupting your company. Also, you're now forcing people who already know what's going on to pay an extra dollar to get recap they already have. This book itself is really good (and will get the score it merits on that alone) but it's another example in a worrying trend from Marvel.
Total score: 5/5
New Avengers 18
Hickman (w) and Schiti (a) and F. Martin (c) and Caramagna (l)
Story
It's fitting that this issue and this arc comes out alongside the current AVENGERS storyline (certainly, you guys, that's not by mistake) as it's the first time that the Illuminati are tested in exactly the sort of way Cap feared they would be when he "left" the team. Now, as Cap returns to dole out some justice on Tony over in AVENGERS, the Illuminati has to deal with a world populated by real people and real heroes alike in order to keep their own world alive. Will the most heroic among these men falter? The question is asked here and, though it puts off seeing the actual fight we're waiting for until next time, it's given the room linger for an issue, allowing the audience to understand just what everyone's going through. As this is a book driven by these consequences, it's important to give this fight the space it needs to really breathe. 5/5
Character
The characters are al highlighted by how troubled they are to enter into this fight. For T'Challa, that means his ongoing struggle to do what's right by his own moral code while also protecting and upholding Wakanda. Panther has always been a great character for seeing that sort of struggle and it's at a fever pitch right now. Tony Stark is the same way, though his feelings come out through anger and frustration where T'Challa's really border on abject sadness. Also worth seeing the characters who aren't seemingly struggling with this, including a somewhat-repowered Black Bolt, Namor, and Stephen Strange. Next issue should show us a lot. 5/5
Writing
Hickman's writing continues to be very strong and, as with AVENGERS, you can see the strengths of his long game all through these issues (long con). He has spent over a year building these stories and now it's all coming together wonderfully. He's also doing a solid job developing the tone really switching back and forth between all of the various emotions that the team is feeling. 5/5Art
The talented Valerio Schiti steps in to provide the art for this issue and, while I quite like Schiti's art, I'm not sure it totally works here. It's at its strongest in this issue on the various emotions, particularly when we see Black Panther with his council, but it occasionally feels too clean for the dark things that are happening. Schiti is helped tremendously by Frank Martin's colors, which set up the tone really well, but it's hard not to feel like Schiti might have been a bit of a strange choice on this one. 4/5
Miscellaneous
Extra points here to Christian Ward's unbelievable variant cover (at right).
Total score: 5/5
Secret Avengers 3
Kot (w) and Walsh (a) and Wilson (c) and Cowles (l)
Story
Pretty standard story here as part of the team is sent to stop an arms deal that could put a devastating weapon in the hands of enemies (or of anyone, really) and part of the team, separated from the others, is sent to do something shady for SHIELD. Coulson's PTSD seems a bit forced as, although he only first appeared a few years ago in BATTLE SCARS, he's touted to be this big super agent who has had his hands in plenty of soups up to this point. Not to say his PTSD isn't warranted, it just kind of feels like it's here to develop Natasha more, who is forced to figure out what to do in this situation. Also, though the story is pretty standard, that doesn't mean it also doesn't feel a bit forced, particularly the criminal mastermind poet bit. 3/5
Character
The two biggest complaints I have about this issue's characters are that Kot is set on doing the somewhat standard Black Widow-team-writer thing of making her a cold and relentless killing machine, someone who revels in murder as much as any supervillain. I've always felt the best Natashas are the ones who don't get hung up on the killing but also aren't exactly licking their lips while they think of how best to kill someone. Here, she's absolutely flippant about murder and I think it weakens who she is. Kot is also set on making Hawkeye something of a twelve-year-old, which I think is a cue taken from Fraction's Hawkeye. The difference is that Fraction shows us all sides of Hawkeye; he's immature, sure, but he's also a guy with a dark past just trying to do what's right in whatever way seems best. Here, he's little more than comic relief and something of an audience stand-in, apparently needing explanation of what the team does because he's too dumb to understand it any other way, despite the fact that he recently ran his own Secret Avengers team so probably he's not too unfamiliar with it. It feels very much like it's trying way too hard on a lot of fronts, more of which we'll get into in the next section. 2/5
Writing
It's trying way too hard on a lot of fronts. I talked in the review of the first issue (and the second issue) about how Kot himself has called the tone of this book something akin to Breaking Bad, a Michael Bay movie, and Arrested Development. I think that all of those tones are coming at the expense of the overall quality of the book which feels like it's trying just so very hard to be different or to challenge common comic book conceptions. There's a poet screaming about Mailer and Plath as he prepares to detonate a reality ending bomb, there's a mention of Scarlett Johansson playing Black Widow in one of the inane introductory captions, and there's a page of the book dedicated to Natasha playing a weird text adventure sort of game in her mind as she decides how best to proceed, meaning that Natasha's mind is working in precisely the last way anyone would expect it to. I'm going to stop harping on this book trying too hard now because, in finding those links above, I looked at my last two reviews and saw that I'm just repeating myself OVER AND OVER AGAIN so I'm going to let you all assume what I'm saying. 1/5
Art
In case you missed it, I don't like the tone of this book and I don't like how hard this book is trying but I will say that the art is doing its job to keep up with whatever tone Kot wants to put forward. Though I'm not onboard with the book so far, I think the art is doing everything it can to make it palatable. Credit to Michael Walsh and Matt Wilson for doing some strong work to keep this book moving. 5/5
Miscellaneous
As with everything, this is all just based on my personal opinion as well as whatever technical knowledge I've gained throughout my life (that's why I tend to focus so much more on writing aspects than art aspects; I'm far more experienced with writing than with art). Maybe this book is working for you. For me, though, I tend to get super skeptical and cynical when you can smell a book trying too hard and this is nailing that (I thought FEARLESS DEFENDERS was doing it too but I was more willing to forgive that on some levels because it was at least doing it with C-list characters).
Total score: 2/5
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Avengers 28, New Avengers 17
Avengers 28
Hickman (w) and Larroca (a) and F. Martin w/Mossa (c) and Petit (l)
AIM has taken back the Avengers from another world, hoping to send them away because they seriously do not need two Avengers teams out there. However, the Banner that seemed to be the other world's Banner asks the Scientist Supreme why worlds are dying. With nothing to lose from this conversation, Forson admits that they believe the multiverse is dying and that Earth is the center point. It turns out that this Banner is actually our Banner, though, and he escapes AIM, doing a bunch of damage on the way out, before making his way to Avengers Tower. He interrogates Tony and, with a smart line of questioning, realizes what's been happening and realizes that Tony has re-formed the Illuminati, the same Illuminati that launched Hulk into space so long ago. Banner pumps himself full of tranquilizers to keep from hulking out while Tony explains and while Tony invites him to join the team, which he reluctantly does, understanding how big the threat is. Tony hands off the other universe's Banner to SHIELD and the Avengers, who are looking to dole out punishment for attacking the Avengers and Avengers Tower, and the Illuminati meets its newest member. OH, and also the Adapoids that went out to explore the multiverse meet up with the Mapmakers and it turns out that they're all one and the same.
Story
Really great story here as Hickman preps for ORIGINAL SIN and props up his amazing NEW AVENGERS work with a new and crucial addition to the team. It's a wonderful idea, putting the worldbreaker Hulk and the genius scientist Banner into this situation wherein worlds may need to be broken if science can't answer these questions. On top of that, it's executed perfectly; there's plenty of time at the beginning where you don't know if Banner is our Banner or the other universe's and we figure out definitively that it's ours just as the other drama of the plot, the idea that Banner has figured everything out, is coming to the head of the story. It's extremely well done and it's a huge step for this series and for NEW AVENGERS. Plus, as if Cap wasn't going to be mad ENOUGH at Tony and crew for wiping his memories when he finds out in ORIGINAL SIN, he's now had an innocent(ish) Bruce Banner handed to him in lieu of the real deal. 5/5
Character
AVENGERS hasn't had a ton of room for character because the plots have been so sweeping and the team has been so big. It's nice to have an issue that pulls back to just two major characters to give us a better look at those two guys and BOY what a great look it is. It's Banner at his most tense, a perfect portrait of someone right on the brink of hulking out with one false step, and it's Tony at his most duplicitous and covert, the weapons maker returned. It's incredibly tense and it's incredibly well-crafted, two could-be/have-been allies in a conversation that could turn them into quick enemies, another thing they have been. It's a dynamic built on decades of discontent and it's perfect. 5/5
Writing
This is one of those issues whose writing score is based on the perfect execution of story and character more than any one thing in the dialogue. That's not to say the dialogue isn't sharp. In fact, the dialogue is extremely well-balanced as the audience knows Tony is hiding something and Banner is pretty sure Tony is hiding something all while we're not sure if Banner is Banner and as we and Tony try to figure out what's in the case. There's so much happening here and it's all done in service to the tone, which, in turn, builds our story and our character. It's all a circle and it all feeds itself. 5/5
Art
I often have issues with Salvador Larroca's art but he does solid work here. Larroca uses a mix of close-ups and wide shots to help establish the tone as two people snipe back and forth trying to outwit one another. I don't know that it's the best possible art for this book but that way madness lies so we're not going to worry about that. In this case, it works perfectly well. 5/5
Miscellaneous
I've been back and forth on this AVENGERS series for a while. It's largely good but sometimes the long con style game Hickman and company tend to play makes it a little harder to get into as a whole series. When it's said and done, though, I think this series will read extremely well as one long volume. Solid work here and BOY was this issue good.
Total score: 5/5
New Avengers 17
Hickman (w) and Morales (a) and F. Martin (c) and Caramagna (l)
Namor and T'Challa continue to watch Earth-4290001 to learn how they deal with their incursion. With the help of the Norn, they've defeated the incurring world but not before four Mapmakers land on their planet. Their hero Boundless manages to destroy the AI of one but is stopped before she can damage the rest but their leader Sun God, warning everyone to take cover under Dr. Spectrum's shielding, unleashes his full power and destroys the others. T'Challa and Namor watch as the heroes, all surviving the fight recover a bit until they realize that another incursion is already underway. Namor steps away from the screen to have a drink, complaining that it seems an unwinnable scenario; they're up against not just incurring planets but the Mapmakers, the Black Priests, and the Ivory Kings. He jokes darkly about their chances and he and T'Challa have some real talk about hope and honor and nobility and share a laugh about their survival before T'Challa is pulled back to the screen to find that, in two hours time (thanks to the window's strange effect on time), the world incurring on Earth-4290001 is their own Earth.
Story
Hickman's created an interesting batch of characters from this alternate Earth and, though we can't care about them in the same way we care about characters we've known for decades, it's hard not to root for them. They're pointedly the opposite of our heroes; they're still fighting the incursions and they still hope to see their Earth win but they refuse to give up hope that this is unwinnable. Sun God himself kicked off their mission by saying "Everything lives" in the same way that Reed Richards continues to say "Everything dies." So it's hope against despair as the theme here, even as T'Challa and Namor discuss it as two kings with no kingdoms. Solid story and quite a cliffhanger. 5/5
Character
The Namor-Black Panther dynamic has been one of the more interesting stories in this book all the way around. From the time this series kicked off, Atlantis and Wakanda have been at war with one another, putting their champions at odds even as they're forced to work together for the survival of the world. It's also worth pointing out that we are rather rooting for Earth-4290001's champions despite their relative obscurity, to the credit of Hickman. 5/5
Writing
The hope/despair theme prevails and plays well as Hickman particularly focuses us on Namor, a character for whom the difference between himself and everyone else is hope. It's a great tool and it's explored really well here as Namor keeps up his personality even against T'Challa, his equal in power but someone who fights because he has hope, among other reasons. It's smart writing. 5/5
Art
Rags Morales has some really incredible art and the expressiveness and the emotion of these characters really stands out in these particularly emotional times. An artist who wasn't as capable of showing the minute emotional turns of these two pretty calculated characters, even if they did better action or something (which is just an example, by the way, I think Morales' action has been pretty cool so far), wouldn't be nearly as successful. 5/5
Miscellaneous
I should have seen the twist at the end coming and I didn't and it still made me go "ohhhhhhhhhhhh wowwwwwwwww."
Total score: 5/5
Hickman (w) and Larroca (a) and F. Martin w/Mossa (c) and Petit (l)
Story
Really great story here as Hickman preps for ORIGINAL SIN and props up his amazing NEW AVENGERS work with a new and crucial addition to the team. It's a wonderful idea, putting the worldbreaker Hulk and the genius scientist Banner into this situation wherein worlds may need to be broken if science can't answer these questions. On top of that, it's executed perfectly; there's plenty of time at the beginning where you don't know if Banner is our Banner or the other universe's and we figure out definitively that it's ours just as the other drama of the plot, the idea that Banner has figured everything out, is coming to the head of the story. It's extremely well done and it's a huge step for this series and for NEW AVENGERS. Plus, as if Cap wasn't going to be mad ENOUGH at Tony and crew for wiping his memories when he finds out in ORIGINAL SIN, he's now had an innocent(ish) Bruce Banner handed to him in lieu of the real deal. 5/5
Character
AVENGERS hasn't had a ton of room for character because the plots have been so sweeping and the team has been so big. It's nice to have an issue that pulls back to just two major characters to give us a better look at those two guys and BOY what a great look it is. It's Banner at his most tense, a perfect portrait of someone right on the brink of hulking out with one false step, and it's Tony at his most duplicitous and covert, the weapons maker returned. It's incredibly tense and it's incredibly well-crafted, two could-be/have-been allies in a conversation that could turn them into quick enemies, another thing they have been. It's a dynamic built on decades of discontent and it's perfect. 5/5
Writing
This is one of those issues whose writing score is based on the perfect execution of story and character more than any one thing in the dialogue. That's not to say the dialogue isn't sharp. In fact, the dialogue is extremely well-balanced as the audience knows Tony is hiding something and Banner is pretty sure Tony is hiding something all while we're not sure if Banner is Banner and as we and Tony try to figure out what's in the case. There's so much happening here and it's all done in service to the tone, which, in turn, builds our story and our character. It's all a circle and it all feeds itself. 5/5
Art
I often have issues with Salvador Larroca's art but he does solid work here. Larroca uses a mix of close-ups and wide shots to help establish the tone as two people snipe back and forth trying to outwit one another. I don't know that it's the best possible art for this book but that way madness lies so we're not going to worry about that. In this case, it works perfectly well. 5/5
Miscellaneous
I've been back and forth on this AVENGERS series for a while. It's largely good but sometimes the long con style game Hickman and company tend to play makes it a little harder to get into as a whole series. When it's said and done, though, I think this series will read extremely well as one long volume. Solid work here and BOY was this issue good.
Total score: 5/5
New Avengers 17
Hickman (w) and Morales (a) and F. Martin (c) and Caramagna (l)
Story
Hickman's created an interesting batch of characters from this alternate Earth and, though we can't care about them in the same way we care about characters we've known for decades, it's hard not to root for them. They're pointedly the opposite of our heroes; they're still fighting the incursions and they still hope to see their Earth win but they refuse to give up hope that this is unwinnable. Sun God himself kicked off their mission by saying "Everything lives" in the same way that Reed Richards continues to say "Everything dies." So it's hope against despair as the theme here, even as T'Challa and Namor discuss it as two kings with no kingdoms. Solid story and quite a cliffhanger. 5/5
Character
The Namor-Black Panther dynamic has been one of the more interesting stories in this book all the way around. From the time this series kicked off, Atlantis and Wakanda have been at war with one another, putting their champions at odds even as they're forced to work together for the survival of the world. It's also worth pointing out that we are rather rooting for Earth-4290001's champions despite their relative obscurity, to the credit of Hickman. 5/5
Writing
The hope/despair theme prevails and plays well as Hickman particularly focuses us on Namor, a character for whom the difference between himself and everyone else is hope. It's a great tool and it's explored really well here as Namor keeps up his personality even against T'Challa, his equal in power but someone who fights because he has hope, among other reasons. It's smart writing. 5/5
Art
Rags Morales has some really incredible art and the expressiveness and the emotion of these characters really stands out in these particularly emotional times. An artist who wasn't as capable of showing the minute emotional turns of these two pretty calculated characters, even if they did better action or something (which is just an example, by the way, I think Morales' action has been pretty cool so far), wouldn't be nearly as successful. 5/5
Miscellaneous
I should have seen the twist at the end coming and I didn't and it still made me go "ohhhhhhhhhhhh wowwwwwwwww."
Total score: 5/5
Thursday, April 10, 2014
Iron Man 24, Captain Marvel 2
Iron Man 24
Gillen (w) and Ross (a) and Guru eFX (c)
Tony's trip into Svartalfheim is not off to a great start as he has been quickly spotted. He's able to fight off the first wave of Dark Elves but his stealth suit isn't really made for combat and so he's forced to flee when Malekith attacks and before Shevaun can send the weapon he needs. He escapes into the woods and hides out, hoping that he left enough of a trail for his pursuers to track him. Malekith, who holds four rings (Spectral, Incandescence, Remaker, and Lightning), divvies up his rings among the search parties, giving the leader of each a different ring and keeping the Remaker for himself. Shevaun sends the gun, tailor made to defeat elves and rings alike, to Tony's new location and he's able to use it to put down the holder of the Incandescence ring, taking it back, but he's forced to cloak again when the others arrive. Malekith taunts him, knowing that he's around, and really cuts to the core of Tony. When he and the rest of the elves leave, preferring to wait for Tony's eventual emergence rather than searching him out. Shevaun suggests that Tony use the third and final available portal to come home with a partial mission success but he refuses, furious with Malekith. Instead, he has Shevaun send his big, dwarf-killing armor to him.
It's a real culture clash over here as Tony learns that the Dark Elves are maybe a little bit more than he bargained for and that maybe he's not entirely prepared to wage war against them. Just when those thoughts are settling though, Malekith, who used Tony's flesh to see into his heart, starts talking about Tony being an unwanted child and how the Dark Elves are no strangers to unwanted children; they just tend to eat them because, as Malekith puts it, what else are they good for? It calls back on some of the thoughts that Tony has had to put aside in order to deal with his city and the Mandarin rings but that are clearly still pretty powerful in his mind. That alone would make for an interesting story but putting Tony in Svartalfheim up against a vicious enemy powerful already wielding three rings that make him much more powerful seems like the recipe for success. We'll see next how the Dark Elves, with a notable hatred for iron, deal with one of Tony's offensive suits instead of his defensive one. Plenty of good stuff happening here and I think the adrenaline is really about to start pumping.
Captain Marvel 2
DeConnick (w) and D. Lopez (a) and Loughridge (c)
Captain Marvel is transporting the Nowlian girl Tic to the planet Torfa, where supposedly the rest of her people have been moved after the Builders destroyed their home planet. She and her ship, with an AI named Harrison, and her cat Chewie who, apparently every single person on Earth refused to watch (not that unbelievable), are intercepted by two smuggler ships guarded by a mercenary ship. She explains her mission but the mercenaries, on the order of their client, fire on her anyway. The ship takes damage quickly and Carol is forced into the fight herself, directing Harrison to protect the medical bay and get the thrusters up while she deals with and/or distracts the ships. Out in space she begins to tear apart the smuggler ships. The mercenary ship flees as the Guardians of the Galaxy show up to dispatch the ship on her tail. Carol's ship and the Guardians' ship link so that Rocket can help with the repairs but he pretty quickly starts attacking Chewie, swearing that it's a Flerken and not a cat. Carol and Star-Lord separate them and she finds out that Torfa seems to be a poisonous planet so perhaps bringing the girl there isn't the best plan. Meanwhile, the gunfire as Rocket attacked Chewie woke up Tic and she emerges as Star-Lord reveals to Carol that he's the son of J-Son, which isn't what Tic wanted to hear. She flees into Carol's ship, locking them all on the Guardians' ship in the hopes that she'll be able to steal it. Captain Marvel sets out after her by herself in the depths of space, anxious to get her ship back and to rescue her cat.
Good introduction of the Guardians here, with whom Carol is primed to spend a good amount of time. She's immediately accepted and the DeConnick does a pretty good job writing all of the Guardians, though we really only get extended dialogue and looks at Star-Lord and Rocket. In addition, any thought that the book might suffer unduly from the loss of Carol's supporting cast (Wendy, Spider-Woman, Tracy, Kit, Frank, etc) should be more or less assuaged here. We're only an issue removed from her leaving them all behind and going into space but it's clear that DeConnick's take on Carol and her character alone are certainly capable of carrying a book. Obviously the introduction of the Guardians and the hint from the first issue that Captain Marvel will form a team of her own don't hurt things but regardless, Carol has returned to this book as the same strong and confident character, totally able to drive a book, that she left the last series as. David Lopez's art is remarkably good and he draws a mean Carol as well as a mean suited-up Captain Marvel, all of which I was happy about and, admittedly, a little relieved about because I did not particularly care for Lopez's cover. Fans of the last series should absolutely be picking this one up. It has the same heart and the same enthusiasm as the first series, not to mention that there are already a couple of irons in the fire for story ideas and new characters. Even if you didn't read the first series, check this one out, see if the tone is for you. I find it hard to think it isn't.
Gillen (w) and Ross (a) and Guru eFX (c)
It's a real culture clash over here as Tony learns that the Dark Elves are maybe a little bit more than he bargained for and that maybe he's not entirely prepared to wage war against them. Just when those thoughts are settling though, Malekith, who used Tony's flesh to see into his heart, starts talking about Tony being an unwanted child and how the Dark Elves are no strangers to unwanted children; they just tend to eat them because, as Malekith puts it, what else are they good for? It calls back on some of the thoughts that Tony has had to put aside in order to deal with his city and the Mandarin rings but that are clearly still pretty powerful in his mind. That alone would make for an interesting story but putting Tony in Svartalfheim up against a vicious enemy powerful already wielding three rings that make him much more powerful seems like the recipe for success. We'll see next how the Dark Elves, with a notable hatred for iron, deal with one of Tony's offensive suits instead of his defensive one. Plenty of good stuff happening here and I think the adrenaline is really about to start pumping.
Captain Marvel 2
DeConnick (w) and D. Lopez (a) and Loughridge (c)
Good introduction of the Guardians here, with whom Carol is primed to spend a good amount of time. She's immediately accepted and the DeConnick does a pretty good job writing all of the Guardians, though we really only get extended dialogue and looks at Star-Lord and Rocket. In addition, any thought that the book might suffer unduly from the loss of Carol's supporting cast (Wendy, Spider-Woman, Tracy, Kit, Frank, etc) should be more or less assuaged here. We're only an issue removed from her leaving them all behind and going into space but it's clear that DeConnick's take on Carol and her character alone are certainly capable of carrying a book. Obviously the introduction of the Guardians and the hint from the first issue that Captain Marvel will form a team of her own don't hurt things but regardless, Carol has returned to this book as the same strong and confident character, totally able to drive a book, that she left the last series as. David Lopez's art is remarkably good and he draws a mean Carol as well as a mean suited-up Captain Marvel, all of which I was happy about and, admittedly, a little relieved about because I did not particularly care for Lopez's cover. Fans of the last series should absolutely be picking this one up. It has the same heart and the same enthusiasm as the first series, not to mention that there are already a couple of irons in the fire for story ideas and new characters. Even if you didn't read the first series, check this one out, see if the tone is for you. I find it hard to think it isn't.
Thursday, March 20, 2014
Iron Man 23, Thor: God of Thunder 20
Iron Man 23
Gillen (w) and L. Ross (a) and Guru eFX (c)
Iron Man is on the hunt for the Mandarins out there and happens to find that one of them is the fired director behind a musical based on Iron Man that created Tony to be a pervert. Of course, Tony's people fired him and now a ring has made its way to the disgruntled artist. Tony tries to put him down softly but, before he's able to, Malekith appears and straight up murders the guy, taking the ring and disappearing before Tony gets his bearings. Tony now knows who's behind the capture of the rings and so he turns to his new specialist on magical affairs, Shevaun Haldane, Dark Angel. He explains to her that he doesn't want to go to Malekith expert Thor because then his attack on Malekith ends up being political between Asgard and Svartalfheim as opposed to being simply about the rings and he doesn't want to put that on Thor. Shevaun builds him a weapon that she thinks should render the rings inert temporarily and creates three magical one-use doors that will, if all goes according to plan, drop him in Svartalfheim, drop the weapon next to him, and return him home from Svartalfheim when it's finished. Wearing the stealth suit with the hopes that he can sneak through Svartalfheim without alerting too many people to his presence, Tony is sent through the first door only to find that he's been dropped right into the center of Malekith's hall.
Plenty going on right now and the book moves really quickly as a result, even despite the amount of explaining and backstory they have to give. On top of the A plot summarized above, there's a B plot involving a relationship developing between Arno and Abigail Burns, the Red Peril who just lost her hands to Malekith's attack. There's a good chance that none of this is ideal news for Tony but you can't help but feel good that Arno's making friends. Anyway, there's always the chance that a story like this, one that crosses a couple of different mythologies, can come off feeling really forced and leaving the audience feeling cynical about the motives behind the crossover, as it were. Here though, Gillen nicely threads the needle between the science vs. magic and the Iron Man vs. Malekith so that the story feels like a really solid one developing instead of some kind of weird opportunistic cash grab. Pretty neat, you guys.
Thor: God of Thunder 20
Aaron (w) and Ribic (a) and Svorcina (c)
Thor and Rosalind Solomon are out to stop Roxxon, whatever it takes, as Rosalind hates them and what they're doing to the environment and Thor is pretty sure that Earth hates them and also he likes Rosalind. Thor has taken several books out from the godly library he's visited in recent days about the death of many different worlds and he's prepared to do what it takes to bring Roxxon down. In this case, it means blowing up a few of their plants in an "Act of God" manner that means insurance won't pay for it. Of course, increasingly evil Dario Agger knows who is behind it and insists that his men find a way to hurt Thor, to strike back in this new war. Their suggestion to the evil man who is both nicknamed and physically, on occasion, "minotaur" is that they strike at Broxton, Oklahoma. MEANWHILE, in the far-off future, King Thor tries to talk with Galactus about maybe not eating Earth and then, when words don't work, prepares to fight.
There are parts of this story I like and am intrigued by and there are parts that I can't help kind of rolling my eyes at. For example, I like the idea that Thor wants to get into the conservationist mindset because he just straight up loves Earth and anything that harms it, whether it's Dr. Doom trying to take it over, Ultron attempting to kill everyone on it, or Roxxon actually killing it, is in for a fight. The idea that he'd be behind the "hey, let's make nature be great!" kind of fight is one that I both get and that I like for his character. On the other hand, Dario Agger is eye-rolling villainous. He admits that he's caused chemical spills just to kill wildlife, that he's introduced predators who don't belong in certain places to be in those certain places, and that he's altered several bears to completely deplete the salmon population in certain rivers, all so that Roxxon can provide the solutions eventually. While I don't doubt that there are evil people out there, this is so frustratingly comic book evil that I can't help but be a little disappointed by it. I tend to prefer my villains either untouchable and evil or even a little more complicated. It does seem as if they're ready to build up a sad backstory for him but I think it may already be too late. Anyway, King Thor calls Galactus rude so I GUESS I'm saying you should check out this issue?
Gillen (w) and L. Ross (a) and Guru eFX (c)
Plenty going on right now and the book moves really quickly as a result, even despite the amount of explaining and backstory they have to give. On top of the A plot summarized above, there's a B plot involving a relationship developing between Arno and Abigail Burns, the Red Peril who just lost her hands to Malekith's attack. There's a good chance that none of this is ideal news for Tony but you can't help but feel good that Arno's making friends. Anyway, there's always the chance that a story like this, one that crosses a couple of different mythologies, can come off feeling really forced and leaving the audience feeling cynical about the motives behind the crossover, as it were. Here though, Gillen nicely threads the needle between the science vs. magic and the Iron Man vs. Malekith so that the story feels like a really solid one developing instead of some kind of weird opportunistic cash grab. Pretty neat, you guys.
Thor: God of Thunder 20
Aaron (w) and Ribic (a) and Svorcina (c)
There are parts of this story I like and am intrigued by and there are parts that I can't help kind of rolling my eyes at. For example, I like the idea that Thor wants to get into the conservationist mindset because he just straight up loves Earth and anything that harms it, whether it's Dr. Doom trying to take it over, Ultron attempting to kill everyone on it, or Roxxon actually killing it, is in for a fight. The idea that he'd be behind the "hey, let's make nature be great!" kind of fight is one that I both get and that I like for his character. On the other hand, Dario Agger is eye-rolling villainous. He admits that he's caused chemical spills just to kill wildlife, that he's introduced predators who don't belong in certain places to be in those certain places, and that he's altered several bears to completely deplete the salmon population in certain rivers, all so that Roxxon can provide the solutions eventually. While I don't doubt that there are evil people out there, this is so frustratingly comic book evil that I can't help but be a little disappointed by it. I tend to prefer my villains either untouchable and evil or even a little more complicated. It does seem as if they're ready to build up a sad backstory for him but I think it may already be too late. Anyway, King Thor calls Galactus rude so I GUESS I'm saying you should check out this issue?
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
New Avengers 15, Avengers World 4
New Avengers 15
Hickman (w) and Bianchi w/ Pieruccini (a) and Dall'Alpi (c)
The team has been using the bridge that Black Swan advised them to create in order to look into other worlds and see how they've combatted the incursions or, in many more cases, who they failed to combat incursions. However, that's not all they've been able to do with the bridge. They've realized that they can actually use the bridge to see through time, like looking at a star in the sky that's millennia old. It doesn't work great on the future but it's pretty good at looking at the past so they've decided to try to learn a few things about the threats they face, including looking into Black Swan's past, which reveals a glimpse at some of the people she's misled and betrayed (including alternate versions of Reed and Tony) to get where she is. They promptly go and fight her, managing to get her caged again in what they believe to be an unbreakable cage, though it still leaves her a chance to speak with Terrax, who tells her that he believes there are no constants and that these men will fall.
Friends, I'm going to level with you here. I haven't been sleeping particularly well lately and last night was no exception. I woke up several hours before I intended this morning after falling asleep several hours after I intended. And now, here I am reviewing this comic just about as quickly as I can. after its release. Any person reading this book can probably tell you that it is not best read when weary and sleep-deprived. I had to read the various parts of this one a few times over and, were I closer to my copies of the rest of the series (and were I not afraid that retrieving them would just land me in my bed from which I would not move again the rest of the day), I'd likely be referring back to them to try to straighten some things out. I really like this book and I think it's doing a lot of really interesting things. I will say that at this point I think that reading this by trades isn't a bad idea. It's a lot to keep in your head from moment to moment and week to week. That said, I'm still enjoying the way that the characters interact with one another and I'm looking forward to seeing where this whole story goes, particularly as it's been revealed of late that Captain America will have his memories of the Illuminati and the incursions restored in the upcoming ORIGINAL SIN event. Should be a good time. Well, not really good, per se, but certainly interesting. Should be a time, anyway.
Avengers World 4
Hickman and Spencer (w) and Caselli (a) and Mossa (c)
The team of Hawkeye, Spider-Woman, Nightmask, and Starbrand have accidentally found their way into the City of the Dead under Velletri, Italy. Well, one of the cities of the dead, as Sebastian Druid explains to Captain America and Bruce Banner back at the Iliad. Under Velletri, Starbrand is called away from the rest of the team by voices only he can hear beckoning to him while his team fights some spirits emerging from the rivers. Kevin finds that the voices are all the souls of the people he killed back when he first got his powers in AVENGERS and that they're not particularly thrilled with him. He's overcome with fear and guilt and the spirits take him to their leader, who Sebastian explains would have to be someone pretty powerful to hold sway in the city of the dead. "Powerful" doesn't seem to be an issue for the ruler of this city of the dead, as Morgan Le Fay returns to the Marvel Universe.
Another pretty interesting turn as Hickman and Spencer continue to break in this new title that is living up to its promise of shining a light on the Avengers in smaller groups and as individuals. It's also another nice little reunion for Hickman as former Secret Warrior Druid returns to shed some light on the City of the Dead and to get involved with the Avengers right as Banner points out to Cap that, with all of their new hires, they're sorely lacking people who represent the magical element of the Marvel Universe. His concerns, it seems are totally warranted and it's nice to see another Secret Warrior back in the fold, raising the total up from Manifold in Hickman's AVENGERS and Quake in Spencer's SECRET AVENGERS. Also can't help but like Stefano Caselli's work with one of the old Secret Warriors and his work in general on this issue. It's a very compelling idea and one that had to come to a head at some point; regardless of how little Kevin may have interacted with the students at his school, regardless of how ignored he may have been, he still killed hundreds, if not thousands, of people when he got his powers. As one of the souls he recognizes points out, it's not the kind of superhero origin that makes you Captain America. Should be interesting when this one picks up again, likely after we've revisited the other AVENGERS WORLD stories.
Hickman (w) and Bianchi w/ Pieruccini (a) and Dall'Alpi (c)
Friends, I'm going to level with you here. I haven't been sleeping particularly well lately and last night was no exception. I woke up several hours before I intended this morning after falling asleep several hours after I intended. And now, here I am reviewing this comic just about as quickly as I can. after its release. Any person reading this book can probably tell you that it is not best read when weary and sleep-deprived. I had to read the various parts of this one a few times over and, were I closer to my copies of the rest of the series (and were I not afraid that retrieving them would just land me in my bed from which I would not move again the rest of the day), I'd likely be referring back to them to try to straighten some things out. I really like this book and I think it's doing a lot of really interesting things. I will say that at this point I think that reading this by trades isn't a bad idea. It's a lot to keep in your head from moment to moment and week to week. That said, I'm still enjoying the way that the characters interact with one another and I'm looking forward to seeing where this whole story goes, particularly as it's been revealed of late that Captain America will have his memories of the Illuminati and the incursions restored in the upcoming ORIGINAL SIN event. Should be a good time. Well, not really good, per se, but certainly interesting. Should be a time, anyway.
Avengers World 4
Hickman and Spencer (w) and Caselli (a) and Mossa (c)
Another pretty interesting turn as Hickman and Spencer continue to break in this new title that is living up to its promise of shining a light on the Avengers in smaller groups and as individuals. It's also another nice little reunion for Hickman as former Secret Warrior Druid returns to shed some light on the City of the Dead and to get involved with the Avengers right as Banner points out to Cap that, with all of their new hires, they're sorely lacking people who represent the magical element of the Marvel Universe. His concerns, it seems are totally warranted and it's nice to see another Secret Warrior back in the fold, raising the total up from Manifold in Hickman's AVENGERS and Quake in Spencer's SECRET AVENGERS. Also can't help but like Stefano Caselli's work with one of the old Secret Warriors and his work in general on this issue. It's a very compelling idea and one that had to come to a head at some point; regardless of how little Kevin may have interacted with the students at his school, regardless of how ignored he may have been, he still killed hundreds, if not thousands, of people when he got his powers. As one of the souls he recognizes points out, it's not the kind of superhero origin that makes you Captain America. Should be interesting when this one picks up again, likely after we've revisited the other AVENGERS WORLD stories.
Thursday, March 13, 2014
Captain Marvel 1, Fantastic Four 2
Captain Marvel 1
DeConnick (w) and D. Lopez (a) and Loughridge (c)
Six weeks from now, Captain Marvel is in outer space with some new and alien crew-mates, on the run from the Spartax Secret Police and on the search for certain materials at an outpost. They pretty quickly get into it with a couple of roaming Spartax Secret Policemen and are forced to separate. Cut back to six weeks ago, when our story begins, as Carol and Iron Patriot attempt to stop what seems to be a missile from hitting New York. She grabs it and tosses it, giving the two a chance to examine it in the air. It's not a bomb, as it would happen, but instead some sort of containment for an alien creature. The alien is delivered to SWORD while Captain Marvel returns to her home in the Statue of Liberty, where she's recently welcomed Kit and her mother to stay after Kit's mother lost her job. As Carol puts Kit back to bed (she got up when Carol returned home), Iron Man beckons her to come with him. He tells her that he thinks the Avengers should have someone out in space monitoring any potential threats to Earth or even just things Earth should be aware of. His time with the Guardians of the Galaxy made him aware of how dangerous space may be for Earth and he wants to be prepared. She volunteers to take the first shift, which would be about a year or so in space. She breaks the news to her disappointed but understanding boyfriend Rhodey and she sets off, hoping to find where she belongs.
I think this is a tricky issue to write and it kind of shows. This is a book being rebooted not because it was doing poorly or because it needed a fresh start but because Marvel wanted the boost of a new release in the midst of new release season instead of just before a wave of new releases. This is, anyway, the company line. That said, there are pros and cons to sending Carol to space just as there are pros and cons to having to reboot a series so soon after the last one "concluded." Some of the pros and cons of the latter include needing to try to reach a new audience while similarly retaining one fresh off a great and well loved volume while some of the pros and cons of the former are that Marvel cosmic is ALWAYS a risky move. It's, of course, currently rather in vogue as Guardians of the Galaxy and the comic by the same name have paved the way for introducing more mainstream audiences to the space side of Marvel comics. Of course, that doesn't make it entirely less risky, just means it's got a bigger sandbox to play in. I guess what I'd say, then, is that this isn't a bad issue, just an issue that has found itself in the precarious position of trying to set up a new world without completely dismantling the old one. With that said, I think that the next few issues have the ability to get progressively stronger as the new order falls a little more into place.
Fantastic Four 2
J. Robinson (w) and Kirk and Kesel (a) and Aburtov (c)
The strange monsters that burst from the Baxter Building are revealed, by Franklin Richards, to have come from his secret pocket universe which is currently, as Franklin puts it, sick. They are extremely resilient creatures and it takes Reed a while to concoct something that will neutralize them. By the time he does, they've wreaked havoc all over New York and drawn the attention of plenty of Avengers and other heroes alike. Like his solution with Fin Fang Foom in issue one, Reed's solution this time requires Johnny to act as a catalyst for the cytotoxin he's developed and which will need to be dispersed in the atmosphere. He warns Johnny that it may have negative effects on anyone close to it while it disperses but Johnny decides they can't wait any longer and flies off with it. The cytotoxin works, rendering all the beasts unconscious, but it also knocks Johnny out of the sky. When the F4 catch him, he reveals that he can't feel his powers any more.
The pocket universe Franklin refers to in this issue is the controversial HEROES REBORN universe that it was revealed he had created back in the late '90s when Marvel attempted to reboot some of their major franchises with more modern takes on some of their key heroes after their apparent deaths at the hands of Onslaught. Interestingly, series writer James Robinson also wrote the final issue of all of the HEROES REBORN rebooted titles back in the '90s so he has some first hand familiarity with the universe he's reintroducing here. Despite all of the fighting and the race-against-the-clock mentality of Reed developing the cytotoxin (which happens kind of anticlimactically), it's hard to say this was a particularly exciting issue. It's also hard to be TOO interested in Johnny losing his powers as this is something of a frequent trope of superhero comics and, more importantly, is something that happened in just the last volume of FANTASTIC FOUR, albeit in a slightly different way. Of course, before Fraction's run (and part of Hickman's run, I suppose), I could never find myself interested in the Fantastic Four for some reason so being kind of bored by this one just fits the mold.
DeConnick (w) and D. Lopez (a) and Loughridge (c)
I think this is a tricky issue to write and it kind of shows. This is a book being rebooted not because it was doing poorly or because it needed a fresh start but because Marvel wanted the boost of a new release in the midst of new release season instead of just before a wave of new releases. This is, anyway, the company line. That said, there are pros and cons to sending Carol to space just as there are pros and cons to having to reboot a series so soon after the last one "concluded." Some of the pros and cons of the latter include needing to try to reach a new audience while similarly retaining one fresh off a great and well loved volume while some of the pros and cons of the former are that Marvel cosmic is ALWAYS a risky move. It's, of course, currently rather in vogue as Guardians of the Galaxy and the comic by the same name have paved the way for introducing more mainstream audiences to the space side of Marvel comics. Of course, that doesn't make it entirely less risky, just means it's got a bigger sandbox to play in. I guess what I'd say, then, is that this isn't a bad issue, just an issue that has found itself in the precarious position of trying to set up a new world without completely dismantling the old one. With that said, I think that the next few issues have the ability to get progressively stronger as the new order falls a little more into place.
Fantastic Four 2
J. Robinson (w) and Kirk and Kesel (a) and Aburtov (c)
The pocket universe Franklin refers to in this issue is the controversial HEROES REBORN universe that it was revealed he had created back in the late '90s when Marvel attempted to reboot some of their major franchises with more modern takes on some of their key heroes after their apparent deaths at the hands of Onslaught. Interestingly, series writer James Robinson also wrote the final issue of all of the HEROES REBORN rebooted titles back in the '90s so he has some first hand familiarity with the universe he's reintroducing here. Despite all of the fighting and the race-against-the-clock mentality of Reed developing the cytotoxin (which happens kind of anticlimactically), it's hard to say this was a particularly exciting issue. It's also hard to be TOO interested in Johnny losing his powers as this is something of a frequent trope of superhero comics and, more importantly, is something that happened in just the last volume of FANTASTIC FOUR, albeit in a slightly different way. Of course, before Fraction's run (and part of Hickman's run, I suppose), I could never find myself interested in the Fantastic Four for some reason so being kind of bored by this one just fits the mold.
Wednesday, March 5, 2014
Captain America 18, Iron Man 22
Captain America 18
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c)
Mindbubble has control of Fury and, in turn, control of the Gungnir, a new helicarrier the size of a city and probably with the firepower to level more than just that. Maria Hill calls for all the backup she can get to try to stop Mindbubble. Fortunately for her, Cap and Falcon were nearby trying to spy on the goings-on, suspicious of SHIELD for having weaponry and villains that even Steve isn't allowed to know about. As they approach, they find themselves set upon by SHIELD agents thinking that the two heroes are Hydra. They take them down non-lethally and Cap steals one of their bikes to go after the helicarrier. On the way, Steve calls Jet, who had been interrogating a cyborg tasked with guarding Weapon Minus, and learns from her about Mindbubble, an ex-SHIELD scientist who had wanted to create a less violent alternative to warfare. SHIELD, of course, wanted an alternative to Weapon Plus, in case their experiments ever turned on them. Mindbubble used the super soldier serum and LSD to create a new concoction he hoped would be more peaceful. With no willing test subjects, Mindbubble used the serum on himself and quickly went crazy, turning on SHIELD and taking down a number of SHIELD agents before he could be restrained. Jet also informs Steve that Mindbubble's mindbubbles create a sort of dream map for the victim, placing him in the fantasy world his own heart desired. When Mindbubble is done with them, the fantasy turns dark and kills the victim. She advises Steve to kill himself rather than let the fantasy do it if he's mindbubbled. Steve arrives on the helicarrier with an entire SHIELD fleet on his tail as the issue ends.
Still a lot going on here though this issue does feel a little redundant. The Mindbubble origin isn't exactly foreign to us at this point so retelling it isn't too effective only a couple issues later. Also, much of this issue is fighting and a chase scene between SHIELD and Steve and Falcon. Despite all that, though, the issue is still entertaining and it moves really quickly for how much information is dispensed. Hill somehow remains the only one un-mindbubbled of the agents sent to take down Mindbubble and Fury and she sets the Gungnir to self-destruct though she's surprised and stopped by the Iron Nail amidst everything else that's happening. It's a solid issue and there are some nice moments between Steve and Sam. The narration continues to be fairly strong and sets up plenty of feelings for Steve, letting us know that he's got a lot to fantasize about when he eventually has to go up against Mindbubble and letting us know that he has just about exactly the right amount of trust in SHIELD. The colors on this issue were a nice departure from the grim and dark metal colors we've seen lately in this book, setting up the chase over plenty of orange desert making it seem a little more light than it had lately, even if it's only as an interlude between tense moments. I don't think you'll miss a lot if you miss this issue but it's still one worth reading. Can't complain.
Iron Man 22
Gillen (w) and Bennett and Hanna (a) and Guru-eFX (c)
It's Red Threat and Iron Man up against Lord Remaker and the Exile in a battle of Mandarin Rings and Stark Tech for the new city Troy. Abigail Burns has changed her mind about the city and fights alongside her hated foe Tony Stark to defend it but Tony's mind is on the Troy Core, the heart of the city and the last known whereabouts of Arno Stark, that Lord Remaker just destroyed. Tony continues fighting but is soon surprised when Arno emerges from the wreckage in his new battle suit, a giant Iron Man suit of his own design. The reinforcements force the Exile and Lord Remaker to flee. Red Threat tracks Lord Remaker in the city with her own ring and finds him dead at the hands of someone else, the ring gone. Just as quickly, her hands are sliced off and the attacker again disappears with the ring. Tony finds her and brings her to a hospital where he and Marc question her about the rings. She tells them that the rings just want to destabilize and cause chaos and that they seem to really hate Tony Stark. Therefore, their mission is two-fold: wreak havoc and wreck Tony. According to Abigail, this means Stark has painted a bullseye on Troy with his very presence. He acquiesces and holds a press conference to announce his decision to leave the city in the hands of the capable and mysterious new designer Arno. Meanwhile, new series villain Malekith counts the three rings on his fingers and vows to complete the set.
This is one of those situations where I hate hate hate solicits. I understand, to a point, the purpose of them. In this, the information age, no one wants to wait three months to find out what to expect from a new series or, for retailers, to know what's going to be on the shelves. Sometimes, books are able to guard their secrets in solicits but that's usually just for big events and deaths and things. This would have been a crazy reveal, one that really shakes up what's happening in IRON MAN and leaves a lot of questions to the reader. I try not to read solicits as often as I can but it's impossible at this point not to see some things, given the websites I frequent and the twitterers I follow. Even though many in the comics industry tend not to like solicits, they're forced to lean into them and advertise storylines in advance. I can't blame them for that; the news is out there, best to control it and answer questions the way you want them answered. In this case, I knew about Malekith joining the book a couple months ago so when a hand appeared and snagged Lord Remaker's ring, I wasn't at all surprised. It's too bad too. I kept thinking about this as I was reading, how curious I'd be if I wasn't aware of what was coming. GUYS, I think it'd be PRETTY CURIOUS. Still a good book and one that's well-written and exciting. Still a fun and exciting book as IRON MAN presses on.
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c)
Still a lot going on here though this issue does feel a little redundant. The Mindbubble origin isn't exactly foreign to us at this point so retelling it isn't too effective only a couple issues later. Also, much of this issue is fighting and a chase scene between SHIELD and Steve and Falcon. Despite all that, though, the issue is still entertaining and it moves really quickly for how much information is dispensed. Hill somehow remains the only one un-mindbubbled of the agents sent to take down Mindbubble and Fury and she sets the Gungnir to self-destruct though she's surprised and stopped by the Iron Nail amidst everything else that's happening. It's a solid issue and there are some nice moments between Steve and Sam. The narration continues to be fairly strong and sets up plenty of feelings for Steve, letting us know that he's got a lot to fantasize about when he eventually has to go up against Mindbubble and letting us know that he has just about exactly the right amount of trust in SHIELD. The colors on this issue were a nice departure from the grim and dark metal colors we've seen lately in this book, setting up the chase over plenty of orange desert making it seem a little more light than it had lately, even if it's only as an interlude between tense moments. I don't think you'll miss a lot if you miss this issue but it's still one worth reading. Can't complain.
Iron Man 22
Gillen (w) and Bennett and Hanna (a) and Guru-eFX (c)
This is one of those situations where I hate hate hate solicits. I understand, to a point, the purpose of them. In this, the information age, no one wants to wait three months to find out what to expect from a new series or, for retailers, to know what's going to be on the shelves. Sometimes, books are able to guard their secrets in solicits but that's usually just for big events and deaths and things. This would have been a crazy reveal, one that really shakes up what's happening in IRON MAN and leaves a lot of questions to the reader. I try not to read solicits as often as I can but it's impossible at this point not to see some things, given the websites I frequent and the twitterers I follow. Even though many in the comics industry tend not to like solicits, they're forced to lean into them and advertise storylines in advance. I can't blame them for that; the news is out there, best to control it and answer questions the way you want them answered. In this case, I knew about Malekith joining the book a couple months ago so when a hand appeared and snagged Lord Remaker's ring, I wasn't at all surprised. It's too bad too. I kept thinking about this as I was reading, how curious I'd be if I wasn't aware of what was coming. GUYS, I think it'd be PRETTY CURIOUS. Still a good book and one that's well-written and exciting. Still a fun and exciting book as IRON MAN presses on.
Thursday, February 20, 2014
Captain America 17, Iron Man Annual 1
Captain America 17
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c)
Dr. Mindbubble, the product of the mysterious Weapon Minus program, is loose and his old friend Ran Shen, the Iron Nail, is the first to contact him. They talk about how SHIELD has lost sight of any boundaries and how its power is too great before Mindbubble agrees to do his part to slow its growth. He finds Nick Fury, having lost Falcon, at the bottom of the cliff and quickly mindbubbles him (GET READY, I'm using this as a verb whenever I see fit). Back in New York, Cap and Jet talk about Cap's idealism and how, in Jet's opinion, he could maybe stand to have a little less. Cap does seem to recognize that occasionally his desire to capture and not kill allows greater crimes to happen later but it's not something he's willing to strike right away. He's pulled into a situation wherein a dirty bank manager is attacked by Shen's people, ready to bring him to Shen's dirty bank manager mine. Cap stops them but looks with disgust at the man he saved. He's called back to the Hub by Maria Hill, who informs him of Nuke's explosion and the deaths it caused, including the presumed deaths of Fury and Falcon. Cap blames himself but gets the slightest reprieve when Jet reveals that she can sense Falcon two miles downstream from the site, not dead. MEANWHILE, Dr. Mindbubble has so mindbubbled Fury that Fury attacks a SHIELD base, thinking it's a Hydra base, and "steals" the plans for a new and seemingly indestructible helicarrier.
There are a lot of things to really like about what's happening in this book right now. Among those things is the idea of Dr. Mindbubble. I'm not going to say yet that I think Mindbubble is a great character (though, I can't stress this enough, mindbubble is a great verb) because it's just too soon. However, the idea that Weapon Minus was a SHIELD project meant to counter Weapon Plus is very intriguing and rather goes to Iron Nail's point that SHIELD maybe does have too much power (anyone who's ever read anything with SHIELD in it, except maybe Hickman's work or Steranko's work, could have told you that). Where everything that came out of Weapon Plus (Cap before it was officially Weapon Plus, Wolverine, Deadpool, Fantomex, the Skinless Man, etc) was created for his strength and fighting prowess, Mindbubble was created for his power over the mind, where everyone of them (aside from Fantomex, who takes his own precautions) is susceptible. Actually, you know what, tangent time. In a world where like, EVERYBODY wears costumes that entail some sort of headgear, why does only Magneto, of the major characters, have the sort that blocks out telepathic communication. Sure in SOME cases it makes sense, it may be more likely that Wolverine will WANT to communicate telepathically with, say, Psylocke than that he'll be controlled telepathically but shouldn't there be like, some sort of switch or something that blocks telepathic communication? Like, your head is ALREADY covered, dude, just throw in some lead or something. ANYWAY, pretty good issue, glad Falcon's not dead (though I wouldn't have supposed he was), really like the idea of Weapon Minus to counter Weapon Plus.
Iron Man Annual 1
Two Cities: Gillen (w) and A. Martinez and R. Fernandez (a) and Sotomayor (c)
Orbital: Gillen (w) and Padilla and Hanna (a) and Staples (c)
By Moonlight: Gillen (w) and Marz (a) and Sanz (c)
Three stories in this IRON MAN ANNUAL, or IRON MANNUAL, that all focus around recent events in the IRON MAN universe. The first ties to the recent Iron Man infinite comic FATAL FRONTIER wherein, on the moon, abandoned Soviet probe Udarnik the Shockworker used a new fuel source, called Phlogistone, to build a wonderful city for anyone who would join him and Tony, to prevent the free flow of Phlogistone getting out of hand, tried to keep the peace by pitting prospective Phlogistone manipulators against one another. It ended badly and Tony realized that Phlogistone poisoned humans, driving them mad. Everyone abandoned the city and Tony neutralized the metal. "Two Cities" picks up after that as Tony pleads with Udarnik to remove the remaining Phlogistone from his system. Udarnik isn't exactly on good terms with Tony, though, after the shutdown of his own city left him alone in space again. Tony convinces him by telling him of Troy and the impact it will have in space and reaching to the moon. Udarnik doesn't like it and hates the cruel irony that Tony, who destroyed his city, wants Udarnik to save him so he can finish building his own great city but Udarnik also can't help believing that Tony is the world's greatest hope to building a city like he claims and reaching to space and so saves him, telling him to leave and bring back other people. "Orbital" finds Arno Stark reaching out to Warren Ellis Eli Warren and his New Modernist Army (from that first arc with Extremis, the guys who were in space) to man Troy's geostationary orbital platform. Warren is skeptical and doesn't want to help anything Stark-related (though he doesn't know that Arno is Stark-related, just that Troy is) but Arno makes a compelling case and they agree, though not before informing Arno that Tony had destroyed every piece of Extremis which likely would have had the power to fix Arno's physical maladies, rebuilding him from the ground up. Finally, "By Moonlight" shows us a series of double-page spreads that start nine months ago, with Pepper and Marc's first meeting, followed by one a month later with the two of them on a date, and culminate with a date in Scotland three months ago when Marc proposed marriage and Pepper proposed a business relationship between Marc and Stark Resilient.
Geez, long summary, but remember I'm summarizing three different stories in one issue and (very briefly) one four-part (maybe?) infinite comic so let's cut me some slack, okay? The best thing about this issue, hands down, is how into Tony it gets without even really placing Tony front and center for the three different stories. In fact, he's only arguably the star of one of the three stories and even then Gillen has to cover some backstory that he can't be sure the reader of this comic has actually gotten around to reading yet, even if he's promised to do it and has it somewhere. In that first story, though, Tony is hallucinating about Yinsen, his friend from the day he became Iron Man, and Yinsen pretty explicitly offers up the theme of this issue and it's a powerful one. Yinsen says, as Tony believes himself to be dying (before Udarnik reluctantly helps him), "you're always willing to ask others to sacrifice for your greater good" and it's perhaps the most compellingly true thing about Iron Man. It's hard to argue that Iron Man has done good for this world, that his genius and his, after the Iron Man-creating incident, ethics have made the world a better place. In some ways, that's a part of what can make Iron Man boring if he's not well-handled; we know he's a good guy at this point and we know how nearly unbeatable he can be given some tools. But this, the idea that his egomania and arrogance make him exactly who he is, someone willing to make people give up their dreams to further his own because he knows them to be good, is certainly a compelling take on Iron Man and it's one that I certainly can't find fault with. As if his asking Udarnik to sacrifice his city and pride to help Tony build his own isn't enough, we get the second story where Arno learns that Tony destroyed Extremis despite the good it could have brought into the world. Very neat stuff, worth checking out to get a good sense of who Iron Man is.
Remender (w) and Klein (a) and White (c)
There are a lot of things to really like about what's happening in this book right now. Among those things is the idea of Dr. Mindbubble. I'm not going to say yet that I think Mindbubble is a great character (though, I can't stress this enough, mindbubble is a great verb) because it's just too soon. However, the idea that Weapon Minus was a SHIELD project meant to counter Weapon Plus is very intriguing and rather goes to Iron Nail's point that SHIELD maybe does have too much power (anyone who's ever read anything with SHIELD in it, except maybe Hickman's work or Steranko's work, could have told you that). Where everything that came out of Weapon Plus (Cap before it was officially Weapon Plus, Wolverine, Deadpool, Fantomex, the Skinless Man, etc) was created for his strength and fighting prowess, Mindbubble was created for his power over the mind, where everyone of them (aside from Fantomex, who takes his own precautions) is susceptible. Actually, you know what, tangent time. In a world where like, EVERYBODY wears costumes that entail some sort of headgear, why does only Magneto, of the major characters, have the sort that blocks out telepathic communication. Sure in SOME cases it makes sense, it may be more likely that Wolverine will WANT to communicate telepathically with, say, Psylocke than that he'll be controlled telepathically but shouldn't there be like, some sort of switch or something that blocks telepathic communication? Like, your head is ALREADY covered, dude, just throw in some lead or something. ANYWAY, pretty good issue, glad Falcon's not dead (though I wouldn't have supposed he was), really like the idea of Weapon Minus to counter Weapon Plus.
Iron Man Annual 1
Two Cities: Gillen (w) and A. Martinez and R. Fernandez (a) and Sotomayor (c)
Orbital: Gillen (w) and Padilla and Hanna (a) and Staples (c)
By Moonlight: Gillen (w) and Marz (a) and Sanz (c)
Geez, long summary, but remember I'm summarizing three different stories in one issue and (very briefly) one four-part (maybe?) infinite comic so let's cut me some slack, okay? The best thing about this issue, hands down, is how into Tony it gets without even really placing Tony front and center for the three different stories. In fact, he's only arguably the star of one of the three stories and even then Gillen has to cover some backstory that he can't be sure the reader of this comic has actually gotten around to reading yet, even if he's promised to do it and has it somewhere. In that first story, though, Tony is hallucinating about Yinsen, his friend from the day he became Iron Man, and Yinsen pretty explicitly offers up the theme of this issue and it's a powerful one. Yinsen says, as Tony believes himself to be dying (before Udarnik reluctantly helps him), "you're always willing to ask others to sacrifice for your greater good" and it's perhaps the most compellingly true thing about Iron Man. It's hard to argue that Iron Man has done good for this world, that his genius and his, after the Iron Man-creating incident, ethics have made the world a better place. In some ways, that's a part of what can make Iron Man boring if he's not well-handled; we know he's a good guy at this point and we know how nearly unbeatable he can be given some tools. But this, the idea that his egomania and arrogance make him exactly who he is, someone willing to make people give up their dreams to further his own because he knows them to be good, is certainly a compelling take on Iron Man and it's one that I certainly can't find fault with. As if his asking Udarnik to sacrifice his city and pride to help Tony build his own isn't enough, we get the second story where Arno learns that Tony destroyed Extremis despite the good it could have brought into the world. Very neat stuff, worth checking out to get a good sense of who Iron Man is.
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