Norbert Ebersol’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day – Review Of Thunderbolts #173

I have this theory that if I, now firmly knocking on the door of my 40s, met myself anytime before I turned at least 30…I would hate myself. Not the “damn, I shouldn’t have gone back and messed with the past” kind of hate myself, but the “wow, I can’t believe I was ever like that. How did people ever stand to be around me?” hate myself. I call the period right after I got out of college the “terrible 22s”; I had big plans and no experience, but that’s ok, because I was convinced I knew everything. I’m convinced my mom started to charge me rent when I moved home after college less because she needed the money and more because she was trying to get me to move out. I don’t blame her.

What does this have to do with Thunderbolts #173, written by Jeff Parker with art from Declan Shalvey? Well, the Thunderbolts team has been bouncing around through time for the past several issues. As they get closer and closer to the present, it was inevitable that they’d run into a younger version of themselves eventually. I mean, they’re a super team comprised of super villains; they get around.

So, what do you do when you are a narcissistic megalomaniac and you’ve run into a much younger you? And, enough about me, what do the Thunderbolts do?

Failed dreams, shattered ambitions and spoilers, after the jump.

Parker is mining a well-trodden path that we’ve all considered at one point or another in our lives: what would you do if you met yourself in the past? What advice, if any, do you give yourself? And, even if you did meet yourself, would it change the future all that much?

A lot of fantasy universes have specific rules for what to do or not do when traveling through time. Some are more hard core than others. The Thunderbolts have bounced around so much through time that it’s hard to tell if they’ve already disrupted their original timeline. They’ve even managed to pass the sniff test with heavy hitters like Captain America while engaged in battle during World War II. One thing they’ve tried to be pretty clear on though is that contact with themselves in the past is a no-no. Until now.

However, for reasons I’m not really going to get into, they find themselves in battle with a younger version of the Thunderbolts, helmed by Baron Zemo. Identities get outed. Questions are asked. Accords are reached. Someone breaks out the booze. Let’s get drunk and invade Latveria! Dr. Doom has a time machine! Yay!

Dr. Doom turns out to be the least of the Thunderbolts problems. Norbert Ebersol, aka “The Fixer”, has 99 problems and a time machine ain’t one. We always think about the “what would it be like to meet yourself in the past” scenario from our present day self’s point of view. When young Fixer meets old Fixer, he really doesn’t like what he’s turned into. I guess he had dreams or something:

And where the fuck is my hair? God, you suck so much.

Let’s just say Fixer’s younger self has difficulty listening to reason and it goes sideways from there. Don’t drink and time travel, kids! That’s your PSA for the day.

Parker’s story is fun. I’m curious if the time travel is going to have any major repercussions to the 616 universe; so far it doesn’t seem like it has and we’re facing down the impending arrival of the Phoenix Force elsewhere in the Marvelverse. This particular story is still set a few years before what is going on with Avengers Vs. X-Men. It’s possible that any lasting damage from this story line could be blotted out in cosmic fire wielded by a hormonal teenager, anyway. Shalvey’s art is pretty straightforward, with simple line work in the long shots and nice use of detail in facial expressions up close. It works for the story.

Will The Fixer be able to fix the mess he’s in as we head into the next issue? Probably. You don’t drop a mention about a functioning time machine in your plot without following up on it later. However, I wonder if Parker will find a way to avoid what seems like a fairly obvious temporal deus ex machina going forward.