Astonishing X-Men #11: I like Soule a lot, but I’m not sure what the story is here exactly. If I had to guess, it sounds like the Shadow King created the X persona to win back his access to the psychic network Psylocke accessed at the start of the series (and accesses again here). But, it's unclear to me at this point if resurrecting Proteus was an accidental by-product of this decision or a needed distraction. Either way, we’re essentially where we started this series, with Shadow King in control of Psylocke once more. It’s...anticlimactic.
Avengers #1: To no one’s surprise, Aaron and McGuinness do an outstanding job here: it really does feel like the band has gotten back together again. They convey a certain excitement and scale that the Avengers have been missing for a long time. In retrospect, even "No Surrender," for all its effort, failed to hit the marks that these guys do here in just one issue. In a way, Aaron and McGuinness don’t have to use words to convince us how important Cap, Iron Man, and Thor are to the Avengers. You can just feel the difference. But, Aaron does actually use words to great effect. The conversation that opens the issue reminds me of Bendis’ “Avengers Prime” mini-series. In that series, they sat around a campfire and talked; here, they're at a bar. (Don't worry, Tony has a Shirley Temple.)
Avengers #1: To no one’s surprise, Aaron and McGuinness do an outstanding job here: it really does feel like the band has gotten back together again. They convey a certain excitement and scale that the Avengers have been missing for a long time. In retrospect, even "No Surrender," for all its effort, failed to hit the marks that these guys do here in just one issue. In a way, Aaron and McGuinness don’t have to use words to convince us how important Cap, Iron Man, and Thor are to the Avengers. You can just feel the difference. But, Aaron does actually use words to great effect. The conversation that opens the issue reminds me of Bendis’ “Avengers Prime” mini-series. In that series, they sat around a campfire and talked; here, they're at a bar. (Don't worry, Tony has a Shirley Temple.)
In this conversation, Tony makes it clear he's not sure the Avengers need them. He convincingly talks about how he could think of two dozen people that could take the Avengers to places they couldn’t. Cap and Thor don’t disagree. Instead, they argue the opposite: they need the Avengers. Aaron and McGuinness really sell that idea, with Tony using their recent nicknames: Nazi Cap, Coma Tony, and Unworthy Thor. It’s time to get back their mojo. The authors also give them a suitable threat: dead Celestials start falling to Earth. Carol Danvers manages to prevent one from falling onto Manhattan, but it’s obviously a problem. Then, the Final Host arrives. I figured they were just going to show up one day, but dead Celestials serving as their heralds is pretty awesome, to be honest.
Meanwhile, the Black Panther has called in Dr. Strange after a group of archaeologists died on a research mission. The pair discovers a cavern buried deep in the Earth filled with green glowing pods. The pods suddenly self-animate, attacking the pair; the new Ghost Rider has the same problem. I’ve never been a Ghost Rider fan, but Aaron and McGuinness do a good job with the new kid; he's shades of the overwhelmed teenage hero Peter Parker once was. When you add in there a Jennifer Walters trying to control her powers on the margins of the story, it’s a pretty great group.
Aaron is at his strongest when it comes to dialogue, and I’m really paying him a compliment there because, as I've made clear, the plot is great. But, really, the scripting is even better. The conversation between the guys at the bar really sets the stage, but other players, from Tony’s hilariously understated AI to Dr. Strange’s wonderful snarkiness, add to the fun. Of course, I’m anxious for an entire issue dedicated to Carol and Tony having at each other over “Civil War 2,” but I’ll try to be patient. In the meantime, it’s a great start to this series. It’s one of the few times I believe restarting at #1 is warranted. The Avengers are back, baby.
Captain America #701: I can’t say I dislike this issue. In fact, if it were the first issue of a mini-series like “Batman: White Knight,” I’d be pretty stoked, to be honest. I love the idea of Steve’s great-great-etc.-grandson Jackson discovering Steve's legacy has been tarnished and finding himself in a moral quandary: does he stop the President’s military advisor from using the Super-Solider Serum — now administered to every American as a matter of course — to turn America’s population into sleeper agents for the Kree, even if it costs him his son's life? It’s the sort of dilemma even Captain America would struggle to resolve. Waid implies the answer is going to come from Jackson’s son himself, whose inability to absorb the Serum now seems like a good thing. But, I have to say, I really just want a Steve Rogers story. I get what Waid’s been doing during his run, telling stories that highlight the philosophy Steve embraces. You don’t have to read the ongoing discussion in the letters page about what Captain America means to the readers to know that. But, Waid started his run in the midst of a much larger assault on the Captain America mythos: Steve has to find a way to wind back America’s trust after the Captain Nazi business. Waid has weirdly ignored that almost entirely, and I wonder when — if ever — it’s actually going to be addressed. As much as I’m used to events being quickly forgotten, it seems unbelievable Marvel wouldn’t address the fallout of “Secret Empire” in “Captain America” beyond the brief fight with Rampart at the start of Waid's run. Again, I'm not saying this story is bad, but I think we really should've addressed the Captain Nazi business -- even if it wasn't Mark Waid's mess to fix -- before getting into these sorts of hypothetical stories.
Infinity Countdown #3: This issue is sort of silly, but a bunch of important things happen in it. First, Rich’s brother Robbie tells him the Fraternity of Raptors put him in some sort of simulator and he subsequently realized the entire Universe is essentially a larger simulation. (I don't think we ever learn why the Fraternity put Robbie in the simulation in the first place, but whatever.) Robbie seems to be the only one to realize this Universe is different and, ipso facto, the Power Stone is different. For reasons that aren’t entirely clear to me, he tells Nova how to control the Power Stone: as the chart at the start of the issue says, it’s mind over matter. The Guardians and Nova manage to control the Power Stone just in time to fend off the Chitauri, which delivers the pretty great moment of Drax playing a Power Stone-powered sax. (This issue wasn’t all bad, obviously.) Meanwhile, Adam Warlock heals the Surfer from whatever it was Ultron did to him. Surprisingly, the Surfer immediately flees, and Adam fails to prevent Ultron from launching his surrogates to take over the galaxy. Meanwhile, Norrin tracks down Galactus (now the Lifebringer) to ask for him to return to his old ways to destroy the planet Ultron controls.
Rogue and Gambit #5: Man, this series was awesome. Thompson had done a great job of explaining how we got to this point, so it was really just a matter of Rogue and Gambit landing their final punches before the kiss (which, honestly, didn't feel inevitable, to Thompson's credit). Rogue realizes their therapist was one of Lavish's golems, and she destroys her to take on Lavish's powers to return people's memories and powers. She then destroys all the other golems, absorbing everyone's memories and powers (as she can now later return them, given Lavish's powers). She then discovers Lavish herself was just a golem, making Gambit wonder if they ever really faced Lavish. Rogue then returns everyone's memories and powers, including Remy's, after giving everyone a chance to refuse them. She also tells Remy the experience made her admit she's always been running from him because it was never perfect; she realizes it will never be perfect. They kiss, and fandom cheers. As the editor says, this series was clearly a passion project for Kelly Thompson, and I really hope Marvel just hands her the keys to the kingdom. This mini-series and "Hawkeye" were two of Marvel's brightest spots of the last few months, and she deserves whatever she wants.
Spider-Man #240: I really wasn’t sure how Bendis was going wrap up this issue, but it’s a testament to his brilliant understanding of Miles that he did so in the best way possible. He manages to wrap up everything in a bow, from Ganke’s girlfriend confessing she loved him too much to sell Miles’ identity to a blog to Uncle Aaron sneaking into the hospital to tell him he was right that he could do better. (I'm not sure the latter is necessarily a good thing.) Bendis explains his thinking in the letters page better than I ever could in the letters page, so just read that. I only joined Miles after “Secret Wars,” and I have to say I really felt privileged to get to jump on this bandwagon. It's been a great journey.
Also: Transformers vs. the Visionaries #1-#5; Star Wars #47; X-Men: Gold #27
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