Hawkeye 14, Indestructible Hulk 16, FF 14

Hawkeye 14
Fraction (w) and Wu (a) and Hollingsworth (c)


Kate Bishop is officially moved into LA (as we already know from the Annual) and just about out of money. Realizing that she has skills that are maybe a little harder to market, she starts to try to put herself out there as a hero for hire and gets her first case as she uses her neighbor's printer to print her flyers out. Her neighbors, a gay couple, are getting married and the florist shop set to handle the wedding has been most burned down, burning almost all of the flowers. Kate goes to investigate and the florist points her to Flynt Ward and tells her that Ward burned everything but the orchids he had for the wedding, which Ward took himself and which Kate's neighbors were most insistent about, as one of them saw orchids specifically in a vision of the wedding. Kate tries to get the police involved and then stakes out Ward herself, who immediately recognizes what she's doing and keeps her out of his way. She decides to stalk him and take pictures of his drug dealing ways but is quickly found out and Ward chases her down in his car, knocking her off her bike before driving away. She snaps a few more pictures and goes back to the police, who inform her that marijuana is legal and so he's not really a dealer but that the hit and run will land him in prison, as will illegal possession of a firearm they found in the car. She recovers the last of the orchids and brings them to the wedding, accomplishing her first mission though also getting into a bit of an antagonistic relationship with her police contact. Ward, meanwhile, makes his first call from prison to none other than Madam Masque, enemy of our hero.

Very solid first Kate-in-LA issue (not counting the Annual which was ALSO extremely good) and it sets a nice tone for the book. Fraction clearly has a very strong voice for Kate, one that's maybe a little less grown-up than the Kate we typically see in books like YOUNG AVENGERS where she's kind of forced to be mature one by the immaturity of her teammates. Here, she's a little more free and a little more stream of consciousness than we've seen her. Though the voice might not totally match the voice we've seen somewhat established for her (I would say previous voices for Kate aren't particularly well-established in and of themselves) but they certainly stay consistent and I think you can absolutely see that voice in any iteration of Kate. Annie Wu hops on the book on art and it's phenomenal. Her Kate is outstanding and it's especially emotive. Hollingsworth's colors are great again and incredibly varied from the darker and somewhat grittier colors we've seen throughout HAWKEYE, giving way to lighter and more vibrant colors for Kate. Really fun intro to our Kate issues arc, very excited to see it. Perhaps the best explanation of the art comes from Matt Fraction's Twitter:

@AnnieW gonna get super-esoteric in the scripts just to see how you draw her: "she just remembered something but is about to sneeze" etc
— BUTT STUFF WEREWOLF (@mattfraction) October 31, 2013

Indestructible Hulk 16
Waid (w) and Asrar (a) and Staples (c)

Hulk is back to Hulking and Banner is back to Bannering after the cross-time adventures of the last arc and after the events of INFINITY. Banner is upset at having fallen behind on his promise of a new world-changing invention or discovery each Friday and plans to recoup some time with a couple of pet projects he's been working on, only to find each one invented or discovered just hours before he would have by the other big brains of the Marvel Universe. His frustration forces Hulk out and he hopes to get a mission from Hill but finds out, with the help of team-member Randall Jessup, that Hill doesn't want him on her newest big mission exploring an Aztec ruin for a potential new renewable energy found there. Frustrated more, Banner starts to Hulk but Jessup manages to talk him down and sneak him into the mission anyway. The two of them go down to Mexico and infiltrate the pyramid, where Banner starts to give way to Hulk again. Jessup earns his stripes again as he controls Hulk enough to get him clear from bringing the whole pyramid down and points him at the thing he needs to fight. Jessup also gives Hulk a successful plan of action, which does result in bringing the whole pyramid down but allows the SHIELD team to get out in time and Jessup to smuggle out the source of the renewable energy, which he shows to Banner. The issue ends with a foreshadowing line explaining that Banner knew he could trust Jessup to his death...seven days later.

Really nice issue of this book. I mentioned in my INDESTRUCTIBLE HULK review last week that Banner's team was the only consistent supporting cast created for its book that I really found myself missing over the course of an arc (thinking especially about Wolverine's dumb science cadre in WOLVERINE). Here Waid brings them back in a big way, even though it only really highlights Jessup. It reminded me a little bit of Dennis Hopeless' early run on AVENGERS ARENA, which made sure to give flashbacks of individuals on Murder World juxtaposed with what was happening with the character currently. The same thing happens here as we see a bit of Jessup's past with a tough upbringing that eventually led to him leaving his family behind a bit only to later find that his father had apparently murder-suicided his mother. It's given Jessup a need to stay with the ones he cares about and resolve to never let them down, which comes out strong with Banner in this issue. Though it's not a bad cliffhanger, I'll be a bit disappointed if Jessup does die next issue. I'd also like more issues like this one, which teams Banner up with members of his think-tank to better get to know them as individuals, which was AVENGERS ARENA's true biggest strength and which paid such dividends as the series went on. Still, very good issue, nice solid core to it and it's setting us up to care about a character who will no doubt be in some danger next time out.

FF 14
Fraction and Lee Allred (s) and Lee Allred (w) and M. Allred (a) and Laura Allred (c)

The FF are regrouping after Doom's interference with Alex Power and their subsequent trip through the portal to the moon and Uatu's base. As they regroup, they plan their next attack, hoping to gain more allies in their fight against Doom, Immortus, and Annihilus. They manage to swipe a slew of bots to go up against Doom's army of Doombots, leaving the replacement F4, along with old John Storm and young Ahura and Alex to go after Doom himself. Scott also appeals to Uatu to do more than watch and it seems to get through on some level, but we'll likely have to see about that later. Scott also admits to Darla that he was forced to kill in prison and that he's worried that side of him, the killer who rather enjoyed the act (though it was clear self-defense), will come out against Doom. There's hijinx and tomfoolery and what-have-you as the team prepares to leave the kids on the moon while they strike. Meanwhile, Doom realizes Lang is about to strike but has more on his mind. As we saw in the last FANTASTIC FOUR, he has figured out that the Negative Zone is connected to every universe and he wishes to control that himself, knocking Annihilus out of his plans and eventually causing it to knock Immortus out of his plans, again as we saw in FANTASTIC FOUR.

Plenty happening as the book heads towards it battle royale finale. Some interesting stuff and some nice character moments for a couple of our heroes but overall the book drags a bit in places that I don't think it needs to drag. This series has long wanted to have a different feel to it, one accomplished by charm and wit and fun as much as it is accomplished by Michael Allred's fresh art and Laura Allred's vibrant colors. I think it still has that but it's running into problems here as it wants to have it both ways, trading off fun and carefree with serious and sometimes dark. It's a very tricky line to balance on and I think Lee Allred is having a little more trouble walking it than Fraction, who has had plenty of experience in a lot of his books, had. I think it's because of that that the book turns extra wordy and starts to feel really off-track at certain points as Allred tries to sprinkle enough of everything in and ends up putting in a little too much of each. The funny thing was that I read maybe a little over half the book before needing to attend to other duties, saving the rest for later. When I came back to it and skimmed the first half to remember my place then continued reading the second half, I found it a better read. It felt a little less wordy in the second half and a lot of the fluff and the mixed tone was in the first half, it turned out. Not an awful book, just not one that I'd have as many recommendations for.