Avengers Arena 13, Secret Avengers 7

Avengers Arena 13
Gage (w) and Moline and Pennington (a) and Beaulieu (c)

Someone outside of the Arena suspects that something's wrong. Unfortunately for the people in the Arena, the person who suspects something is wrong is 12 year-old Molly Hayes (is she 12? I'm pretty sure that's the last age I remember her being but it's entirely possible I made that up, you guys. Don't tell anyone). Molly doesn't believe that her fellow Runaways Nico and Chase have, as they reported it, simply disappeared to try to work some things out away from home. Molly doesn't believe the texts they keep getting or even the phone calls they occasionally receive. She brings her problem to Avengers Academy head Hank Pym who promises to look into it. He works out a few pieces of the problem, realizing that he lost kids (Juston, who went back home allegedly, and Hazmat and Mettle, who ran away so they could stay in a relationship Hazmat's parents didn't approve of) the same time the Runaways ran away. With a little investigating, he finds out that X-23 and some of the Braddock Academy kids disappeared at the same time. All of it bothers Pym tremendously but he can't seem to convince anyone else something is wrong and, more than that, he can't find any substantial evidence. Arcade has done a truly phenomenal job (or, in truth, Miss Coriander has) covering his bases and only pulling kids likely to disappear for one reason or another and maintaining a presence for them within their communities. Eventually Pym has to give up the fight when he's met by Mettle (Arcade's trump card, cybernetics hidden under what appears to be, disgustingly, Mettle's real skin) and assured that everything is okay but that they still have to lay low because Hazmat's parents are trying to call it a kidnapping. Is there anyone else out there looking for the young heroes?

Solid explanation of why no one has become suspicious in the world and, given everything else that Miss Coriander has arranged for Arcade, it fits well within the scope of the story. It's also rather nice to see Christos Gage writing another story that ties so nicely to Avengers Academy, which was a deceptively good book, surprising in the same way this book is but probably a little less action heavy. Minor complaint to start (and it's incredibly minor and petty but it's been bugging me so WHATEVER): Tigra appears in this book (she's number two at Avengers Academy and romantically linked to Hank right now) and her caption calls her a were-woman, which is entirely wrong on a couple fronts. First off, "were-," as in "werewolf" translates to "man," hence why it's werewolf and not wereman or manwere. So calling her a were-woman is saying she's a man-woman which complicates PLENTY and she's already complicated, okay? Secondly, it implies that she transforms back and forth and I'm pretty sure she doesn't, she's just all Tigra all the time. That's PRETTY MUCH my only complaint though so I guess it evens out. Nice explanation, slows down the series a little bit from all the high-action we've seen lately but certainly a necessary addition to the book.

Secret Avengers 7
Spencer (w) and Guice and Magyar with Epting and Theis (a) and M. Wilson (c)

Maria Hill continues her unbeaten streak of being my least favorite Marvel character in existence. There are plenty of contenders in that race, including Wonder Man and Milla Murdock (okay, some are more relevant than others), but no one ever holds a candle to Maria Hill. Maybe its my own biases here but I have real trouble believing, as the recap page says, that Hill had to make a terrible decision. I don't think she ever thought it was terrible, having Daisy removed from SHIELD. Just like I have my doubts that she had problems making this call. Sure, give her a look like it was a really hard decision and soften her up later but I'll never buy it. Man. Maria Hill, am I right? Anyway, we flash over to Barbuda to find that the strike team needs a way out and that Mockingbird has a shot at the real Scientist Supreme (AIM had warning of the attack and got their man out of the way). Hill shuts her down, wipes the memory of her being on this mission from the team, and gets them out of there. So Mockingbird is stuck on AIM Island with no idea what she's doing or why she's there. Maria Hill, ladies and gentlemen.

This was, admittedly, the first issue in a while for Secret Avengers where I was surprised and intrigued by the ending. I'm still not totally onboard with this Avengers team that has chosen to work for SHIELD (SHIELD and Avengers notoriously don't get along and many could say it's because of issues like this and YES, "issues" there is a double meaning because I'm a great writer and I want you all to know it) and chosen to have their memories played with by SHIELD. It just doesn't feel entirely right, largely, I think, because all of these heroes (and that is an all-encompassing "all") are broken and they all (all) have trust issues and frankly they probably could have figured out that AIM Island was bad news without SHIELD's help. On top of that, I have trouble viewing SHIELD with any real constructive eye; they're always sort of backups to the Avengers or blocking the Avengers in some way  (because their literary function isn't to be the heroes, that the hero's job, it's to throw up more roadblocks or, best case, to assist the hero in some minor capacity) so it's hard to view them as doing anything competently. Despite them being the focus of the book in a way, it's hard still to say they're doing anything competently, which makes it far harder to like them which, in turn, makes it harder to like a book driven by their actions. Tricky scenario Nick Spencer has worked himself into. Let's see if he can get out of it (maybe throw Winter Soldier on the team, hm?).