Avengers AI 11, Avengers Undercover 2

Avengers AI 11
Humphries (w) and Araújo (a) and D'Armata (c)

Alexis, transported to the year 12,000 AD, has been told that she needs to save Jessie Clatterbuck from deactivation by SHIELD. She's caught a glimpse of the future, one where Dimitrios has destroyed mankind and many other species and is only really challenged by the Avengers Empire, a traveling Avengers team composed entirely of AI. Her older self sends her back in time with explicit directions and she returns and delivers them. Dimitrios has created a Trojan Horse around Clatterbuck; if SHIELD deactivates her, a virus will run through their systems granting him access to all of their weaponry. The future Alexis saw had Dimitrios controlling all of that hardware and even a secret nanobot weapon that would devastate mankind before Dimitrios, in the form of a new start-up company, would offer everyone nanobot-repelling rings that would sterilize humanity. It's a dark future and one that can only be prevented by stopping SHIELD from taking Clatterbuck. Unfortunately, Jocasta has just pressed the button to deactivate the LMD.

As this book heads towards its conclusion next issue, the plot has really ramped forward. Alexis sees the future and learns how to stop it. It's an interesting idea and puts SHIELD in the place that SHIELD so often finds itself: the cause of the entire world's problems. Despite the rapid dissemination of plot here, Humphries still manages to get a couple of character moments thrown in, although he has no time for subtlety here. Victor returns to a body and he and Doombot bond the tiniest bit as he accuses Doombot of staying because he wants to and not because he feels like he's stuck. Hank continues to worry that he has been more of a harm to society than a help and is allayed by Vision, who assures him that he's done far more good than bad. Future Alexis demands that Alexis save the world then go see Steve Rogers because, apparently, she's in love with Steve Rogers, etc. If this issue is any indication, the finale should be pretty solid with a lot of plot and only a little time to get through it all.

Avengers Undercover 2
Hopeless (w) and K. Walker (a) Beaulieu (c)

The Murder World survivors head down into the pit entrance of a giant villainous underground city in Bagalia in the hopes of finding Cullen Bloodstone. They're spotted almost immediately and are forced to fight their way through a few minor bad guys on their way to Cullen on Cammi's tracker. When they're through the bad guys, they push into a bar owned by Arcade where Cullen supposedly is. As they arrive, they're shocked to find that Cullen has accepted the way of life proffered by the villains below. They try to talk him into leaving with them but he refuses. He's not evil, he says, just happy to be in a place where people aren't afraid of him all the time. The kids get comfortable for a bit while they see if Cullen's okay (Cullen explains who they are to everyone and everyone is excited to meet them). Hazmat and Anachronism dance for a bit, Death Locket is examined by mad scientists before Excavator (who she had wailed on outside) comes to buy her a taco, Chase makes out with a villainess, and Cullen introduces Nico to Daimon Hellstrom, who helped him control his powers and has some experience in controlling black magic and distancing himself from his parents. Cammi gets sick of it and attempts to finally pull them out of there but Cullen insists they go elsewhere. Daimon magics them away and puts them in nicer clothes, sending them to a fancy dinner party where Arcade is introduced as the guest of honor.

Really neat turn here for this series. AVENGERS UNDERCOVER was advertised as as a book where the survivors from AVENGERS ARENA go undercover in the new Masters of Evil. I think that's probably still coming but I didn't expect it to go this way. I really like this interpretation, one where these survivors go what seems to be the natural way. They're all good kids (with maybe varying levels of good); that's why Arcade stole them away and that's why there's a conflict here. However, it's not unreasonable to believe that this would be the next logical step. Hopeless throwing in Daimon Hellstrom as one of their first contacts in this seedy underworld is another great "writes itself" sort of move. Hellstrom isn't all bad for sure. He constantly finds himself assisting heroes or working at odds against villains and the ties to black magic and bad influences makes him a natural fit to hang out with these kids. There's so much that this book can do and I think it's off to a good start, taking things in a new and interesting direction. Pretty great second issue, helps to confirm that things are moving the right way.

Avengers Undercover 1, Deadpool 25

Avengers Undercover 1
Hopeless (w) and K. Walker (a) and Beaulieu (c)

The survivors of AVENGERS ARENA are dealing with their new lives in their own ways, with Hazmat trying to keep her head down (though she can't help punishing some jerks commenting on the videos), Chase making a new living on the interview circuit, Nico trying to keep to their shared promise of NOT making a new living on the interview circuit, Death Locket trying to get her Deathlok soft and hardware removed, Cammi returning home, and Cullen hunting Arcade wherever he may be, to the chagrin of Anachronism. They're each trying to return to civilization but it's made infinitely more difficult by the release of the videos by Arcade, which has played into the world's love of reality television and the like. After one of Cullen's most recent online videos in a line of videos he's posted where he searches and torches a number of Arcade's hideout, it's become clear that he's bitten off a bit more than he can chew when he attacked Baron Zemo's new Masters of Evil and been captured. The other survivors (minus X-23 who is out galavanting with the O5 X-Men) agree to go try and help Cullen.

Really strong first entry into this new series as Hopeless and Walker move directly from AVENGERS ARENA to AVENGERS UNDERCOVER. The personalities are still fresh in their minds just as the events of AVENGERS ARENA are fresh in ours. It's a really interesting and compelling idea to have the entirety of AVENGERS ARENA available to view in this universe, giving regular people a chance to watch it all and ignore the horror, instead focusing on the competition and the strategies where there were strategies. Suddenly, people like Hazmat who weren't even on the radar of normal people find themselves endlessly talked about and discussed and critiqued when all they want to do is forget that part of their past. It's huge and inescapable and really fascinating to see already. Excited to see how this one progresses, particularly given how strong this opener was.

Deadpool 25
Posehn and Duggan (w) and Hawthorne (a) and Bellaire (c)

Deadpool chats with Crossbones for a while over a few beers before they eventually take to the streets to battle. Crossbones, of course, is furious with Deadpool for leaving him up in a hot air balloon and Deadpool is sick of everything in his life right now and goaded into even more violence by the Preston voice in his head, though the Preston voice seems to actually just be another voice in his head as the real Preston, alongside Coulson and Adsit, shows up just in time to keep Deadpool from completely murdering Crossbones. The SHIELD agents have also brought Deadpool's money with them, giving him a chance to take off on vacation out to Europe to get away for a little while.

For a fight issue, this one definitely moves a little slower than the average. It's not a bad issue, per se, but typically when you have an issue that's almost entirely made up of fighting it moves a little quicker than this. If a fight comic does move this slowly, it's usually saying a little bit more. There's some weight here as we start to see just how much the recent events have impacted Deadpool's already fragile state of mind and how much it may mean to him going forward. Still, it's maybe a little heavy-handed in its presentation of a depressed Deadpool, though it doesn't cross the line to boring at any point. On top of it, posehn and Duggan wrap up, if a little anti-climactically and abruptly, the Gorman storyline as he drops into the fight randomly and gets thrown into a trash compactor for his efforts. Bit of a weird way to wrap it up there. Still, certainly the way has been paved for Deadpool's next adventure.

Avengers Arena 15, Infinity the Hunt 1

Avengers Arena 15
Hopeless (w) and K. Walker and Gorder (a) and Beaulieu (c)

Cullen's monster, released when Cullen took off his Bloodstone ring to protect Aiden, is putting up a solid fight against the thought-unkillable X-23. She seems to snap out of her bloodlust and admits she doesn't know how to stop the monster. She's saved as Reptil, Darkhawk, and Nico come out of the woods to protect her and to engage the new and unknown monster. Cammi, Nara, and Aiden start looking desperately around for the Bloodstone ring, which is eventually found by Cammi but inevitably knocked away and into the ocean by a flung Reptil. Nara dives after it while Cammi and Aiden talk about whether or not Aiden will have to kill Cullen to stop the monster. Both are morally against it but Cullen had told Aiden how to do it if he needed to and had made him promise to do it if he lost himself. As Aiden is about to strike, Nara bursts out of the water with the ring, managing to get the monsters attention and eventually touching the ring to its skin, pulling Cullen out and making the monster disappear, but not before the struggle with the monster kills Nara.

There's a ton happening in this issue and even more on the horizon because of this issue. It's easy to forget, given how many contenders are still alive and the depth of personality each of these characters has demonstrated, that issue 18 is the final issue, putting us officially at three remaining issues following this one. There's so much to resolve and so much fear that it won't be resolved. That's been the best thing about this book, in truth. I'm not following it to see who survives or who "wins," though I'm certainly interested in that. There's so much more here and it's more that I want to know about. Where does/do the survivor/s go after this? What of the relationships formed here or that were brought in from various other books here? What of the mental scarring? I think every character in this book has been, at one point or another, a risk for turning evil. Avengers Academy was built so that kids Norman Osborn "created" didn't follow in his footsteps. Apex kind of is evil, very conniving and mastermind-y. Kid Briton was an arrogant bully. Anachronism has rage issues. Cullen was left in a horrible monster dimension for years and years. X-23 was created to be an assassin. The Runaways are the children of supervillains. Death Locket is a female Deathlok. Cammi was abandoned by the her favorite person and father figure, the assassin Drax the Destroyer. In this issue (narrated by Nara), we learn that Nara was the daughter of two Atlantean traitors, who followed Attuma and rebelled against Namor, leading to their death at his hands. Red Raven believed Namor killed her father. Darkhawk was the son of a dirty cop. Juston's only friend was a mutant-hating Sentinel (reprogrammed somewhat successfully). Have I made a point? Plenty of superheroes have these tragic backstories but these ones are all young enough to still potentially be turned with the right scarring. In fact, I'd even hazard that the least damaged ones, the ones most likely to err on the hero's side, are the ones who died first (Mettle, Red Raven, Darkhawk, Juston), just as Arcade predicted in issue one (telling them that, in essence, being the villain would be the only thing to save them here). It's all really fascinating, and all of that doesn't even get into Nara's complex emotions and backstory or the change we'll see in Aiden with his new girlfriend dead saving him and his best friend. Really stellar book, as ever.

Infinity the Hunt 1
Kindt (w) and Sanders (a) and Campbell (c)

A new mini-series spawned out of Infinity and also a multitude of other books. This book focuses on the heads of various superhero schools across the globe deciding to band together to create an intramural competition between all of their students. The games themselves, called the Contest of Champions, haven't been established yet as this issue chooses instead to focus more on introducing the schools and the key students we'll likely see. The schools represent places all over Marvel, with the Jean Grey School, Avengers Academy (where this takes place), the Future Foundation, the Braddock Academy, a Pan-Asian school, a Wakandan school, a Latverian school, and an Atlantean school (not participating, given the tensions between Wakanda and Atlantis right now). We get a brief overview of each school and an introduction to a couple characters from each as well as a thought bubble from each character giving a small window into their personalities and motivations. It's perhaps a bit heavy-handed but it gets the point across. The opening ceremonies are interrupted, though, when an emergency broadcast from the Atlantean school shows the destruction in Atlantis and an attack starts on LA from Thanos' army.

As I said, the introductions are a little ham-fisted as they prefer text over subtext ("you know how I'm your brother?") but it gets the job done. The real story here, presumably, will be the way these adults running the school and these kid heroes band together to push back Thanos. It's all hands on deck right now on Earth as the Avengers are off-planet so it makes sense that we'd see the young heroes and their guardians getting in on the fight, I guess I just didn't expect them to all be banded together while they do it. There are an impressive amount of new heroes introduced with new powers pretty laid out for us though, again, I think it's a little heavy-handed. Not to keep coming back to Avengers Arena, but Avengers Arena created all-new characters without me even realizing they were all-new. The first few issues, I just nodded and assumed they were already established and that the Braddock Academy was already a thing, not all stuff that Hopeless created for the series. Granted, Kindt has far less time here to establish the sort of things Hopeless (who just won a Harvey Award, I believe) has been able to do over in Arena. Fairly ambitious book, we'll see if it leads to anything.