Iron Fisting: The New Avengers #27 Review

Editor’s Note: With great spoilers, comes great douchebaggery. I learned that lesson from my Uncle James. Yup. Good old Uncle James Beam. Died sticking up some old fart at gunpoint.

The final four pages of New Avengers #27 are amongst the most affecting and most emotional of the entirety of the Avengers Vs. X-Men event to date. It humanizes Hope in a way that has been missing in the event in favor of showing her alternate between a willful little whining brat and a cocky willful little whining brat, and it gives Spider-Man not only a logical and effective (if small) role in a cosmic apocalypse that should be completely out of his league, but it distills, in just a few short panels, the essence of the character and what he’s about better than six hours of Sam Raimi Spider-Man movies did. And it is Goddamned gorgeous to look at, besides.

Unfortunately, this is a 20-page story. Which further unfortunately means that what we got here is sixteen pages of decompressed life support for those spectacular closing four pages, that spins out a story conceit based purely on what was probably a simple lack of costume and coloring design communication between John Byrne and Gil Kane back in the mid-70s. On the fortunate end of the equation, those are sixteen pages of decompressed life support written by Brian Michael Bendis, meaning that they are filled with entertaining dialogue and some decent character beats… even while the best part of the book could have been presented as an interlude in the main event’s title.

Innocence By Association: New Avengers #22 Review

UPDATE, 3/3/2012, 9 a.m.: Via Twitter exchange with Mike Deodato on the division of art labor between him and Will Conrad:

@mikedeodato – FYI: @willconrad didn’t ink me on NA#22. He drew these awesome pages: 5,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17 and I did the rest. Thanks, buddy!:)

@InfiniteMidlife – Thanks, @mikedeodato. I’m curious: did @willconrad pencil those pages with a common inker for the book? I couldn’t see a difference in style

@mikedeodato –@InfiniteMidlife We ink our own stuff.

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Here’s the ugly and sad truth that DC Comics will not want to hear and will ignore even if they do: when it comes to superhero team books, The New Avengers is, bar none, the most consistently good one you can currently put your hands on. From the plot to the characters to the dialogue to the art, this book blows Justice League out of the water… and I say this despite the fact that New Avengers #22 continues the Dark Avengers 2 storyline, which just by existing makes me so crazy with rage that I want to catch a flight so I can chloroform writer Brian Michael Bendis and draw a misshapen Norman Osborn wavy haircut on his lumpy bald noggin.

This issue continues the aftermath of Osborn’s and his Dark Avengers’ public relations assault on our heroes, which has led to a bunch of very expensive power-armored New York SWAT cops (Hey, it’s New York in the 616; let’s assume Mayor Jameson’s reduction of the Moustache Tax hit the sweet spot on the Laffer Curve) waiting outside Avengers Mansion to arrest the crew. Luke Cage, however, has some obvious and understandable issues with police authority, so fisticuffs ensue. Meanwhile, various members of the Dark Avengers are engaged in a race to see who can sneakfuck Osborn the fastest, and some members of the New Avengers have realized that S.H.I.E.L.D. liason Victoria Hand – former right-hand woman for Osborn in the Dark Reign days – might have been giving the team a Victoria Job. Wait, that’s not right…

SSDDR: New Avengers #19 Review

I had a moment reading The New Avengers #19 where I just about completely and totally checked out. I just suddenly had had enough of Norman Osborn and the Dark Avengers and different made up villains in Avengers costumes and doing the mental clean and jerk required to buy into a story where a man who is known to have killed a woman in cold blood in broad daylight follows a master plan of winning over public opinion to prove he leadership material when in reality we demonize leaders for taking pictures of their junk.

That moment was at the end of the book, when Norman and his Dark Avengers are standing in front of a crowd and announcing that they were here to make the world a better place, and I realized it was the same Goddamned moment as when he introduced the Dark Avengers back in Dark Reign. And my enthusiasm for this story, as precarious as it was to begin with, just vanished.

Seriously, I know what I said last month, but I don’t think I have it in me to climb back on board the Norman Osborn PR gladhanding and the Dick Avengers train again. I stuck with it for what felt like forever in Dark Reign and I just don’t care anymore. This doesn’t feel like anything interesting or new or that I didn’t read a dozen times over in the earlier story, which I didn’t like the first time around. The whole thing was like watching your uncle use his AA chip to crack open a Bud before Thanksgiving dinner: you know what’s coming, you’ve seen it before, and you know it’s not gonna be fun.

Assuming you don’t have an innate and visceral weariness and mistrust of Dark Reign and it’s ilk, on an individual issue level, there’s nothing wrong with this comic book. Bendis continues to write excellent dialogue and character moments. Seeing Daredevil wandering by Avengers Mansion and being hit on by Squirrel Girl – while being overwhelmed by the stench of baby shit and squirrel funk – is a nice little moment showing that sometimes superpowers aren’t all they’re all cracked up to be… while knowing all the while that yeah: he’s gonna hit that. Daredevil’s already fucked every woman that’s walked, moved or crawled; why wouldn’t he add “skittered up a tree?”

Avenge Me: Marvel’s February Solicitations

Last week, DC Comics announced their solicitations for their upcoming releases for February, and there was a… disturbing trend of books with covers that made the heroes’ thighs look like something that would make Johnny Wadd Holmes weep with bitter, envious frustration.

But surely the repeating nature of DC’s offerings was just a coincidence. One would think that Marvel, who just released their own February solicitations, would never fall into the trap of repeating themselves in the space of a single month!

So let’s take a look at what is sure to be the widely varied and diverse offerings that Marvel has for us in February! (Rob: Tone down the pissy sarcasm and show the nice people the books. -Amanda)

Recidivism: New Avengers #18 Review

Albert Einstein supposedly said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Norman Osborn is insane. Brian Michael Bendis might be too.

Let’s start with the most important thing to keep in mind when reading this review: I didn’t particularly like Marvel’s 2008 – 2009 Dark Reign crossover event all that much. The foundation behind it – that Norman Osborn was made head of S.H.I.E.L.D. (Renamed H.A.M.M.E.R. to sound all badassed during the event) – meant that reading a Marvel comic during that time required a suspension of disbelief that would make Hercules say, “Ah, fuck it.”

Yes, I know Osborn killed that invading Skrull Queen in Secret Invasion. He also killed Gwen Stacy. In cold blood. In the middle of New York City. On camera. Making Osborn the Top Cop was roughly akin to setting Bernie Madoff up as Secretary of the Treasury, or hiring Ted Bundy as the Headmaster of The Finishing School for Aspiring Victoria’s Secret Models.

The biggest thing Osborn did during Dark Reign was create his own “official” version of The Avengers, packed with supervillains dressed as their superhero counterparts. With Daken as Wolverine, Venom as Spider-Man, Bullseye as Hawkeye, et cetera, et cetera. Which is a brilliant and interesting concept… for say, a two or three issue story arc. As a fiendish plot by some master criminal to fool street cops. “I know… while we are robbing the New York Bank of New York, we will dress in the costumes of our enemies! That will make the police mistrust and harass The Avengers, and we will have our revenge! Mwu-hah-hah-ha!”

Instead, the Dark Avengers went on for almost a year and a half, all based on a concept that also only worked if you never stopped and thought about it for even a second: “Hi, Mr. President? Meet Bullseye. Hired assassin. Done years and years in prison. Once had a brain tumor back that made him hallucinate and kill strangers. Also killed Karen Page in cold blood. In a church. And there’s garage surveillance footage of him stabbing Elektra to death floating around on the Internet. Can we get this man a badge and a security clearance? And while you’re working on that, I’d like you to meet Venom…”

Don’t You Forget About Me: New Avengers #16 Review

EDITOR’S NOTE: This review contains spoilers. How many spoilers? Well, I’m going to include a scan of 9/10th of the last page of the fucking story. The only way to more effectively ruin a climax involves a Donkey Punch. You are warned.

I would like to start by saying, clearly and unambiguously, that I liked New Avengers #16. The story is excellent, the art is spectacular, and the action is almost unrelenting. This is a good comic book. Are we clear?

Good.

Because now I am going to rank it out for a little while.