Avengers Power Review

Avengers

By Grey Scherl ⋅ September 1, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment | Email the author

Are you ready for the Mighty New Initiative? I know I am. I considered reviewing all three of these books separately, but when I realized that two of them were flashback tie-ins to Secret Invasion, and the other was simply a great read, I decided to throw them all into one post to cut back on the work load a bit. It also doesn’t hurt that I’m writing two Gold Standards and two advance reviews

So which first….which first…..let’s pick it out of a hat and….New Avengers! Come on down!

Finally, the long awaited issue that shows how the Illuminati caused the Invasion. Back in Illuminati #1 we saw them journey to the Skrull Throneworld to lay down an ultimatum that wound them up captured and tortured, information gathered on them. The Skrulls were given the opportunity to educate themselves on the most powerful of their enemies, and as fans we’ve suspected that they did something there that helped the invasion along. It doesn’t appear to take very long for them to single out Reed Richards as the most intelligent man in the group, and as their biggest threat. In him they see the potential to find the method to invade, to disguise themselves so completely that they wont be detected. They don’t use the real Reed though, rather a clone of him that believes himself to truly be Reed, which means that this can take place at anytime after the Illuminati showed up on the Skrull Throneworld.

They try out several methods of getting him to come up with the information that they need, but the problem with using the mind of Reed Richards is a simple one. He’s the smartest man on the planet Earth, one of the smartest men in existence, and you don’t get to be that smart without having some sort of guard up. Even as a clone, the mind works in a way that has him guarding his thoughts, doing anything he can to keep this sort of knowledge from the Skrulls. In fact, it eventually takes them finding the one weakness in the man himself to get the information that they needed, preying on one of his most redeeming qualities….which I wont spoil for you here.

The writing is amazingly well done and the characters are all spot on. The pacing is incredibly solid, which has been a consistent high point for the Avengers tie in issues. Bendis is a master at weaving together continuity on a large scale to craft together a story, both his own continuity as well as that which has been in place for decades. While some writers will make their plots seem contrived and forced, with events shoehorned into the tapestry of history to make things work out, Bendis has found his gift in his ability to work thinks subtly into what’s come before. When Secret Invasion was announced I was afraid of all the plot holes that would be coming from it, all the issues with past stories, and yet I’ve had no real problems with that. Every thing I think is going to cause an issue winds up being explained, in fact, the only thing still irking me is that lack of a reference to a late nineties X-Men story where time travel and space travel landed on the team on the Skrull Throneworld as they prepared copies to replace the heroes of Earth only for Galactus to show up and eat the planet. Anybody else remember that story?

And how about Billy Tan’s pencils? Just amazing. The man has been a breakout talent the past few years, and I’d love to see him get a regular penciling job for longer then a few issues. Hopefully when he takes over as the full time artist for New Avengers his run will last a few years, and not just a single story arc as it’s been the habit of the book. Every artist has an arc and….I really hate when they do that. Lenil Francis Yu had a decent run under his belt but…..I like Billy Tan more.

Now what’s second? Let’s coin flip this one! Mighty Avengers! It favors the Mighty! Kinda like Action Girls.

Another Hank Pym spotlight, this time showing the problems arising for the Skrull impersonator. It seems that when a Skrull becomes somebody in the current manner it does more then just hide them in the skin of another, it gives them their victims mind. So while there is most definitely a Skrull in Pym clothes, it suffers from a “problem”. It’s sharing a brain with a man smarter then he is, a man more heroic then he is, and a man who believes that he’s smarter and more heroic then he actually is. Such is Hank Pym.

The book opens with Skrull Pym and Skrull Dugan having a talk, where Pym is trying to point out that their plans are falling apart and that the Invasion is flawed. That they should reconsider it, that they should take more time. Dugan hears nothing of it, and it winds up being that Pym is running from an entire squad of Super Skrulls out to bring him down. The threat that Hank Pym creates to their mission, even when he’s one of their own, is shown to be a great one. Enough so that at the first mention of him second guessing their mission, he’s to be shut down. You don’t do that with a random pawn, you do that with a threat.

It’s a nice touch to show Hank Pym as a hero, even when he’s supposed to be a villain. Enough of the true character bleeds through the bumpy chin to bring a smile to the face of fans, and enough to grant hope for future issues of the Invasion itself. After this issue I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see Skrully Pym turn just like Captain Marvel did.

How many indeed?
Khoi Pham on art is…..his style reminds me a lot of Lenil Yu, but the thing is, I don’t like Yu’s art normally so that isn’t doing him any favors in this review. That isn’t to say that I don’t like it, but after just reviewing something by Billy Tan….yeah. The art is crisp, though a little sketchy. For some reason teeth keep standing out to me in his faces, and while sometimes they look good, other times I see characters that need braces like crazy. Though I’m probably just being anal.

And now onto the best thing to come out of Civil War….The Initiative!

Few times in my life I’ve been happy that a mini-series was turned into an ongoing, and this is one of them. Dan Slott has turned what promised to be a fill in mini into one of the strongest titles that Marvel produces. A home for new characters to grow and develop, as well as a place for old forgotten characters to find new life. It’s also the home of the Irredeemable Ant-Man, which just makes the book even sweeter.

As the home for forgotten characters, I wasn’t shocked at all to here that the Skrull Kill Krew would be making a come back. I mean, I’d never read the initial mini-series, but I’d heard about it and knew the gist. Guys eat Skrull burgers, gain the ability to see through the shape shifting, start killing them. It’s a classic premise in that it’s incredibly simple. The best things are simple. Well, simple or old school, old school like the 3-D Man’s Skrull seeing goggles.

The issue moves along covering the various plots and subplots in a manner that shows that Slott can cover the big tie-in arc without forgetting what makes this book so special. Even with the Kill Krew taking up pages, we still get to see how War Machine gets back on his feet after the Starktech around the world gets shut down, as well as another glimpse into Crusaders personal struggle with his heritage.

There is nothing more inspiring then Nick Fury giving you the thumbs up.

The new Krew makes their journey across the country with the knowledge that there’s a Skrull in every state, and that means a Skrull to kill in every state. We find out that the two old members of the team still eat Skrulls just for the taste, which is a little disturbing, but still worth a laugh. We also get to see the return of Komodo! Yes, Komodo returns as the new Krew fights the Skrull on her team, who near as I can tell is the Omega Flight Super Skrull. A quick battle takes place and the Skrull gets killed as the Krew picks up a new member as they prepare to make their way from Arizona to Nevada.

The Initiative maintains it’s usual greatness, taking full advantage of the crossover to help boost up the story rather then try to cash in on sales, something that I will always commend Slott for. And as you can tell by the looks of it, Caselli’s art is his usual consistent goodness. No other artist should be allowed to touch this book, as can be seen clearly in how awful the fill in artists always seem to look on this book. Caselli has carved out quite the little niche here, and these characters do truly seem to belong to him artistically.

Ant-Man says it best
The verdict?