Wednesday, May 29, 2013

On "Age of Ultron" at This Point (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

The idea for this story came from the first arc of the previously relaunched  "Avengers" series, where future Tony Stark and Kang recruit the present-day Avengers to convince Ultron to throw the final battle of the Ultron War, since it's Kang's repeated attempts to win said battle that break the time stream.  (Did you follow all that?  Trust me, just take my word for it.)  However, at this stage, it's unclear the extent to which this original story is actually the same as the present one.  In fact, all signs point to the fact that they're going to wind up having little connection to each other.

First, in the present story, Ultron engaged in a blitzkrieg attack that would essentially preclude this final battle that we saw in "Avengers" #4.  The heroes never actually got a chance to face Ultron, because he took over the world so quickly.  Moreover, even if they had faced him, the splash page their final battle with Ultron depicts a number of heroes in ways that they shouldn't be depicted based on the present story.  For example, Vision is seem as completely assembled and Captain Marvel is still alive.  As such, even if the final battle were to have happened in the present story and Bendis hasn't shown it to us yet, it wouldn't happen in the way that it was present in the original story.

So, the question at this point is whether Bendis is going to change the time stream again in the last two issues of the present story in a way that sets the stage for this final battle or if he's discarding this original story as a timeline that never happened thanks to future Tony and Kang's intervention.  If Bendis is going the first route, he has to change the present story entirely, since the resolution that seems the most likely at this point -- Logan getting Hank Pym to insert some sort of time-released bomb inside Ultron's brain that would activate when he tries to take over the world -- would still result in his blitzkrieg approach and not the final battle.  Whatever happens, for the original story to hold, it has to lead to this moment.

However, one thing bothering me throughout this storyline could actually be the deus ex machina that Bendis needs.  In "Avengers" #6, future Tony hands present Tony some sort of device that he believes will help stop Ultron.  We never really get details about this device, though I'm pretty sure it's mentioned again (possibly in issue #7).  Through the "Age of Ultron," I've wondered why Tony hasn't used it.  Other than Bendis forgetting about it (always a possibility), the only thing that I've been able to suppose is that the blitzkrieg attack made the device useless.  Perhaps it had to be used on Ultron directly and, since he's not in the present, Tony never had a chance to use it.  One way, then, to combine these two stories is for Logan to alter the past in a way that allows Tony to use the device, blocking the blitzkrieg attack and setting up the final battle depicted in issue #4.

(One entry point seems to be "Avengers" #12.1, where the Avengers witness the return of Ultron.  If Logan could travel to that point and explain to Tony what Ultron is going to do, then it seems to set the stage for him to blunt the future attack with the device.)

I know I'm probably the only person who cares about this level of detail, but I can already feel that I'm going to feel betrayed by this mini-series if it doesn't somehow connect to the original story.  It's already starting to feel like "X-Men:  Prelude to Schism," which wound up showing a series of events that had nothing to do with the story that the authors actually told in "X-Men:  Schism."  Connecting the present story to the original story would be a pretty cool feat, rewarding long-time readers for their patience.  Not connecting it to the original story by dismissing the original story as a timeline that never happened would leave you wondering what the point of setting up this story so early was, particularly if it ends with no actual consequences (as it seems like it's going to do).  The latter possibility would just make my event fatigue all the more profound and make me wonder why I even bother forking over the money that I do for these storylines.  The former possibility would at least give me some sense of accomplishment, though I think the likelihood of it happening is remote.  We'll see, I guess.  In the end, after so much build-up, it's hard not to feel disappointed.

No comments:

Post a Comment