New Avengers 9, Uncanny Avengers 11, Secret Avengers 8

New Avengers 9
Hickman (w) and Deodato (a) and F. Martin (c)

Thanos' army, led by his Black Order, is attacking Earth and, more specifically, attacking the Illuminati. After the events of Infinity 1, Thanos has learned that most of the Infinity Gems have been destroyed, shattered by the effort it took for Cap to blow up a planet. However, one simply disappeared. It's Thanos' prerogative, then, to hunt for that last gem by interrogating the Illuminati. Reed and Tony, together in New York City, use Stark Tower defenses to take down parts of the invading fleet while members of the Black Order lead squads to the other Earthbound Illuminati members. Dr. Strange is taken captive by the Ebony Maw, Beast and the X-Men are besieged by Corvius Glaive and Supergiant, Wakanda is attacked by Black Dwarf, and Atlantis, struggling after Wakanda's recent attack, is set upon by Proxima Midnight. The battles are fierce and our team wins some and loses some but the most important bits to take from it all is Proxima Midnight offering lenience to the already defeated Atlantis in exchange for information and the way Black Bolt reacts to it all from above New York in Attilan. Namor bows to Proxima, telling her that the Infinity Gem she seeks (and where she should point all of Thanos' troops) is in Wakanda, which managed to stave off Black Dwarf's attack but will have more trouble fighting off the rest of the army. Black Bolt, meanwhile, is ready to put his secret plans in motion.

Plenty happening here to coincide with Infinity 1 (this book, like Avengers 18 though only tangentially related, falls between Infinity 1 and 2, as evidenced by the pretty nifty and useful flowchart at the back of each book) and to push our story forward. We've been introduced to Thanos and his desires (which didn't take much introducing, as this is pretty much what Thanos does whenever Thanos shows up) as well as his Black Order, who will certainly have more to do with the coming story. It's still an interesting story and, as I've said plenty already, there's enough going on here to justify the event. It's really smart to have these two major event-scale things happening in one event because it will, over time, likely make us feel better about the length of the event (in this way, it will almost feel more like two separate events at half the size as opposed to an overly long single event that loses momentum halfway through). As for this issue, it continues the New Avengers tradition of being a solid series with, perhaps, a little less personality than you'd like. The story is still good enough and there are enough character-driven moments to keep things going (like Namor faux-bowing to point Thanos' troops at Wakanda) but the writing for the characters feels a little weaker. On the one hand, I think that the big plot removes some of the insider-feeling this and Avengers had both given, where you'd figure out what was going on maybe halfway through the issue and be left to deduce things yourself. Here, there isn't a ton of subtext; there are characters saying things that advance the plot left and right or that simply summarize bits here and there. It's still a good book but I think the actual writing takes a hit while it opens itself for more plot. Still not bad and it still makes the event feel pretty giant.

Uncanny Avengers 11
Remender (w) and Acuña (a and c)

Eimin and Uriel, with the help of their four horsemen, are moving forward with their plans to save mutants. This plan, unlike the two big plans mutants tend to adopt (cohabitation vs. war with humans), involves separation. Not in the style of concentration camps or anything of that ilk; more in the vein of Utopia or Asteroid X but in a bigger scale. A new planet fully inhabited by mutants, where mutants can be free to use their powers and do what they will while keeping humans on Earth and allowing them to do what they do (which is mostly hate mutants but, you see, fixing that now!). It's an interesting idea for peace though it obviously has its flaws, what with taking mutants by force to this new planet to live and forcing humans and mutants to separate. Also there's the matter of scale of the actual plan, though the twins believe they can combine the sheer power of Wonder Man (trapped by Grim Reaper in a machine of Uriel and Eimin's design) and the abilities of Scarlet Witch to up and move everyone all at once. It's hard to imagine that wouldn't work; Wanda deactivated nearly every mutant's powers with just words. Combined with Wonder Man, she could go greater. Meanwhile, Sentry's gone even crazier but is still strong as ever, if not stronger (certainly stronger in his crazy convictions), and is keeping Thor pretty well occupied off-planet while Daken has, with great ease and relish, killed Wolverine. Yes. That's a thing that happened. Granted, he's Wolverine, he was also killed in New Avengers this week (whoops!) so these things tend to work themselves out.

One of the impressive things about this book is that it seems to continually lose me a little in the middle as so many plot points converge on one another or as we get a little lost in speeches but they always manage to pull me back in, getting me invested even more by the end. This one certainly had a lot going on and needed to keep cutting back and forth a fair amount but started to bog down a little, particularly as Sentry lectured Thor, before leaping back up with the impressive cliffhanger of Eimin and Uriel addressing the world's population and Wanda seemingly consenting to aid them in their plan. Like I said above, the solution they've come up with isn't ideal but it's hard to argue that it's not practical and that, if everything happens the way it's been promised, it's not less bloody. It could still have major ramifications as the superhero community will be suddenly fairly weakened by the loss of so many heroes but it's an interesting idea and certainly an interesting story all the same. One last thing to mention: Sentry said that the Void has been left in the White Hot Room, which is either a weird expression being used nowadays that I'm not aware of or is the same White Hot Room that Fantomex mentioned in Uncanny X-Force.

Secret Avengers 8
Spencer (w) L. Ross (a) and M. Wilson (c)

Mockingbird has been left behind by SHIELD as part of the new Maria Hill-led takeover. It's left Bobbi in a precarious position, though, as she's left on AIM Island in her disguise as biologist Harold Bainbridge. She has no memory of the mission or any sort of briefing on the life that Bainbridge led, certainly not enough knowledge to get out or to call for SHIELD's help or anything. In fact, she's not even convinced she's who she thinks she is. She remembers being Mockingbird and has some inkling that the recent attack on AIM Island by Hawkeye, Nick Fury Jr., and Black Widow has something to do with her but the whole situation is throwing her through a variety of emotions. As the issue ends, she's lasted a couple days on the island by keeping her head down but now she's being dragged into giving a presentation that apparently Harold was supposed to give to the Council. We also get a look at the Council in slightly greater detail so we have a better sense of how AIM Island runs.

This is the first time since Hawkeye was taken captive in the first couple issues that we've seen the ramifications of the memory based espionage. There are several good moments within that and you can understand the choice for making Mockingbird the first significant test of this plot. She's had plenty of issues in her past and her most recent set of issues had to do with being taken and replaced by a Skrull, which is now weighing on her as she begins to consider that maybe she is a Skrull, placed here by Skrull higher-ups to infiltrate. It's not the best explanation and to someone on the outside of this it seems pretty obvious what the real case is, but she's not on the outside of this so her alternate explanation is "I started my day in the gym and then I was here on AIM Island in the body of a 40 year-old man named Harold Bainbridge AND THAT IS NORMAL," which is not great either. The look into AIM Island is kind of interesting but also a little slow. The series as a whole continues to be, for my money, the weakest Avenger book coming out right now but I still have high hopes for it as the ideas aren't bad and this is the first time we've really explored what those ideas are. Still, basing your book around SHIELD isn't really a recipe for success. Not a bad issue, though.