Avengers Academy #31

So the lesson learned in these last two issues is that Christos Gage needs to be writing Hercules more regularly. Herc simply steals the show in these two issues. I think I prefer him in this issue over last month, simply because I’m not reminded of his temporary loss of powers. I’m not sure Herc really belongs as an instructor for the Academy, but man, he’s a great guest lecturer, and I would be thrilled to see Gage write him again.

There’s a fun scene where Tigra takes on the mind-wiped Sebastian Shaw, and he comments about how tough she is. I appreciate that Gage is repeatedly having his villains comment on Tigra’s coolness, but eventually she’s got to show it on the page. I’m not saying she needs to beat up Dr. Doom, but maybe a win over Kraven the Hunter or some other B-tier villain would be better than having B-level guys say “yeah, she’s pretty good.”

Sebastian Shaw is another problem for me. I’m simply not interested in him as a mind-wiped, confused man. He’s a great, classic villain, and giving this blank dude two whole issues seems like too much. Especially since his actions this month make last month’s fighting meaningless.

Tom Grummett’s art cracks me up. I’ve always enjoyed his art, but there is a splash page in the open of the book with a teenage girl with a bare bottom. I mean, I don’t know who that blue girl is (Transonic, maybe?) but I swear she is not wearing any clothes. I can’t believe Marvel is OK with a naked teenage girl on the X-Men!

Plot-wise, this is about as thing a crossover as they come. There are some nice character moments (as always). Gage really knows the Marvel U, past and present. He’s got a great handle on his characters. But these constant ancillary tie-ins have got to stop!

Fair

Avengers Academy #30

Even more than usual, this book seems sidetracked by a greater story. Christos Gage does his best to make lemonade, but unlike his X-Men Legacy book, this tie-in feels like it belongs in the periphery of the greater AvX conflict.

Sebastian Shaw had his mind wiped in a forgettable trade that I know I’ve read, but didn’t love. I guess that’s still going on, cause the guy is wandering around with vague motivations. He’s possibly a threat to the Academy students (and the younger X-Men under guard there), but I bet he ends up with better motivations than we’re supposed to think. I was shocked to see how easily he took out all the powered folks who went after him. I like Tigra getting another nod of respect, but man, Hercules went down easy.

Herc still doesn’t have his powers? I’m waiting on the Herc trade. This is similar to my Jugger-Colossus complaint. You know this isn’t going to stick. It’s too bad this transient power level is being recorded in such a big crossover.

Tom Grummett gets to draw an awful lot of heroes in this one. Whiz Kid, Ricochet, and BOX II! I haven’t seen BOX in years, I was wondering if Madison Jeffries even did that any more! I guess he does, it’s too bad he wasn’t rocking the maroon and silver color scheme he was using in those old Jim Lee Alpha Flights. I hope BOX sticks around; the X-Men need an Iron Man!

Fair

Chaos War: Dead Avengers TPB

Now this is more what I had in mind! Fred Van Lente's look at a team of dead Avengers is a lot more what I had in mind for book featuring undead super-heroes. The problem with reading all these tie-ins at once is that the Chaos King isn't a very good bad guy. I mean, his goals are so huge that I'm not really that interested in him. Van Lente dodges that bullet by giving two of his "servants" more powers to make things interesting for the core cast. Grim Reaper and Nekra are classic Avengers villains, and Nekra even has some ties to team-member Dr. Druid. So there is a lot more riding on this series on a character level.

The main plot is pretty weak, the Dead Avengers are protecting the unconscious bodies of the Avengers from Reaper and Nekra. The baddies have some slaves/underlings, but they're pretty ineffective. The big bads' powers are ramped up to make it interesting, and at the end of the series, only a couple Dead Avengers are still in action (and it is not who you'd think!)

I'm most impressed with Swordsman. He hasn't been in a ton of books, but I would actually like to see more of the character if written this way.

Tom Grummett's artwork is as solid as ever. He's a reliable penciller and I always enjoy his work.

Good

Chaos War TPB

I hate to say it, but as much as I LOVED most of the Incredible Hercules saga, the conclusion didn’t do much for me. The Chaos King is too abstract a villain, and his design is too generic. Having him speak in haiku is a genius move from writers Fred Van Lente and Greg Pak, but I just never got worked up over the guy. There’s lots of good pseudo-science and cosmic yammering, but giant-Hercules fighting a giant Chaos King over the Earth just doesn’t do anything for me.

It’s all worth it for the return of Alpha Flight, but I wonder what happened to Yellowjacket II and Swordsman. I didn’t see them die again, so is there a chance they made it?

In the end, I’m afraid the big conflict didn’t live up to my expectations. The story is suitably huge, and all the heroes on Earth get to give Hercules some props, but the story is just too far away from that Hercules-style story I’ve come to love. (And the resolution is a tad too easy too. I saw it coming back in issue 1, and I’m not as smart as Amadeus Cho!)

Khoi Pham’s sketchy art works better on the alien gods and Chaos King than on the heroes of Earth. Again, I feel he might be better suited to Hercules “solo” stories rather than Marvel U-spanning crossovers.

Average

Chaos War: X-Men TPB

It does my heart good to know I can recognize good writing.

I picked up the Chaos War books thinking that just about all of them were written by Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente. Imagine my surprise when the X-Men tie-in was chock full of characters talking about how brave each other are, along with everyone calling each other "dear heart." That's right, this was written by Chris Claremont.

Don't get me wrong, I LOVED old school X-Men, but seeing the dialogue so disconnected from the pencils; the repeated arrivals of a villain who did very little; the immediate domination of a female telepath; this thing checked all the boxes.

It's fun seeing James Proudstar again, Thunderbird is awesome. I never figured he'd be channeling the power of some ancient god and showing off what a pure guy he was, though. Thunderbird was cool because he was angry and tough!

The next chapter of the trade holds up a hell of a lot better, with Jim McCann bringing back Alpha Flight. Clearly McCann read the same comics as a kid I did, because he uses the Canadian Great Beasts to nice effect in facing down the Chaos King. Even if it was bad, I'd forgive it because McCann brings back Alpha Flight, but fortunately, there is nothing to forgive.

The final two chapters are Chaos War: God Squad and Chaos War: Chaos King. They are both filler-type stories and pretty unnecessary to the overall plot. I sort of wish I had skipped this trade.

The Alpha story brings it up to

Average

Prince of Power TPB

Hoo boy. The Incredible Hercules & Amadeus Cho roller coaster ride has been a great one. I love how seamlessly Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente have integrated mythology and super-heroics. Honestly, these old mythological heroes are basically super-heroes anyway, but I'm thrilled at how well they mix. The coolest part may be how so many of their weaknesses are public knowledge to anyone with a library card. Check out how Hathor acts when Amadeus Cho slips her a roofie! I can only hope that after Chaos War wraps up that some of these characters might hang around for awhile.

Hercules is absent for this entire trade, as his "Prince of Power" moniker gets picked up by Cho (against Cho's wishes). But he looms large through the story as his closest friends talk about him and deal with his personal effects. I loved the funeral scene, with some of Herc's most famous paramours talking about his prowess. Having Northstar zip away is hilarious. I'm sure tons of people are going to be furious about that one. Even better, there is a short story with Namora and Venus from the Agents of Atlas traveling the country telling Hercules' many, many ladies about his passing. It seems Herc maintained apartments and homes all over the world, each with its own lady of the house. Herc takes pimping to a new level; I can't help but be impressed.

I'm thrilled that Vali Halfling and the Pantheon came up again too, although I would have loved to see more of their members taking on Herc's extended cast. I don't even remember them all, but I know that era of Hulk is my all-time favorite. Vali Halfling is a great villain too; the Marvel U can always use more super-genius villains. He makes a great arch-foe for Amadeus Cho too, we can only hope. I will admit to being surprised at how well Thor fits into this title. He sort of steps into Herc's role, and it works very well.

Reilly Brown's art is just tremendous. He's got a weird mix of classic comic and manga in his style, but it works perfectly. His sense of comedic timing works perfectly, but what I love is how well he executes action sequences. his take on Venus and Namora are tremendous.

Good

Incredible Hercules: The Mighty Thorcules TPB

What a fun, fun comic. I've been loving Hercules more and more as the months have gone by, and this might be the best story so far.

Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente split up the dream team, with Hercules and Kid Zeus heading off one way and Amadeus Cho in another. Hercules and Zeus are quickly misled into backing the wrong horse when they throw in with the Dark Elves of Asgardian myth. The best part is that in order to make it work, Hercules allows himself to be disguised as the Mighty Thor. This leads to some awesome moments where Herc gets to act like his normal doofy self, but he can blame it on Thor. Naturally, Thor hears about this and disguises himself as Herc. There are some fantastic moments in this story. Herc's skill in the sack actually gets him a big win; he does it without fighting. In fact, I'm not sure he effectively fights anyone in this whole trade.

Meanwhile, Amadeus is searching out the man who killed his family. More importantly, he believes his sister is still alive and he wants to find her too. His story is lead by a book about the heroic journey and with a role-playing game. The thinly-veiled D&D references are great, I love hearing how Cho wasted his youth playing Excello role-playing games. The story wraps up nicely too, and again, Cho wins not through his skill or his brains, but with a pretty neat way to deal with his foe.

The art throughout is fun. I'm glad Reilly Brown has hit on a new regular gig, he's too good to be out of Marvel's regular stable. His Thor, Herc, and dark elves all looked tremendous.

Good

Marvel Graphic Novel #37: Hercules

Clearly, I should have re-read Bob Layton's first Hercules stories before I just plowed into this one. I really don't remember most of the characters involved, but there are a ton of callbacks to the previous limited series.

I love the idea that an an immortal demi-god, Hercules is going to keep on having crazy adventures way into the future. He's the same guy he's always been, regardless of the time period. I dig the red and black costume, although those 80's style curls are sort of hard to get used to. Herc travels around the galaxy with a Skrull sidekick and the Recorder robot, who is not quite C-3PO, but they share some traits.

This graphic novel has Herc discovering that the egotistical warlord conquering the galaxy happens to be his son. There are some neat moments as Herc figures out how to handle someone who has been trained to hate him. I'm not sure this story deserves a big, fancy "graphic novel" treatment, but that was true of the She-Hulk GN I read recently too. Maybe I'm wrong about the whole idea behind these things. Was this just another format for regular, non-event stories? This is the last in the series, but not I want to go back and check out the others I have on my bookshelf (Emperor Doom, Cloak & Dagger, and God Loves, Man Kills for certain).

Layton's art looks fantastic on the big pages. Layton's Iron Man always impresses me with those little glints that always show up on the armor. Iron Man doesn't appear in this, but there is enough smooth metal on the ships and soldiers' armor to make sure I have a lot of that little detail. Hercules' hair looks silly, as I said, but heck; this guy has been around long enough to get to pick and choose what era of haircut he's going to sport.

This is hardly essential reading, but it is pretty fun. I grabbed this for 3 bucks, and it is totally worth that price. I'd even say that fans of Layton's art should seek this out, it does have all the things he does best (ships, armor, and smashing!)

Fair

Incredible Hercules TPB

I never would have guessed that I could love the Marvel version of Greek mythology this much. Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente have created something wonderful with this Incredible Hercules series. It's a buddy book. It's a super-hero comic. It's a mythological book. It's all of those things, but most importantly, it's good.

The trade opens with a flashback story where Hercules learns he is the son of Zeus. It's a great little origin story, made better by Herc exhibiting all those smug (yet heroic) traits that was love so much. We also see the origin of his "uniform." There is a short little Amadeus Cho story, but it is pretty much a fluff piece about Kirby, Cho's coyote pup. There is a lot of Dark Reign action early on, establishing Herc squarely in the Marvel U as he goes up against the Dark Avengers and his mother's Olympus Group. The Olympus Group is an evil company run by the Greed deities on Earth. It's a great idea and the back and forth with the Dark Avengers is quite entertaining. I get the impression that Norman Osborn is never quite certain what or who he is dealing with here.

The rest of the story deals with Hercules and Cho traveling to Hades to try and defend the life of Zeus. New Warrior Aegis features prominently in the story, since he's one of Athena's chosen champions, but he doesn't make out too well. He's killed off pretty quickly, but at least with a story set in Hades, he still has a pretty big role after he dies! His best sequence is the tour of the afterlife casino populated by heroes and villains of the Marvel U. It seems they wait around and play the slots, gambling that soon one of them will be called back up to the land of the living. "Although, to be honest, more of them win than you might ever expect." We see Jack of Hearts come up a winner, is his return imminent? Hercules is unable to absolve Zeus of the crimes he committed as the head of the gods, and so Zeus is banished back to the land of mortals with his mind wiped. He has to learn his ways again, now as Kid Zeus. Look at that idea! Classic superhero and classic mythology at the same time. The fit is perfect.

There are a bunch of artists on this collection and I'm not too familiar with any of them. They all do a nice job keeping things classic looking. I especially liked Rodney Buchemi's pencils on the flashback story. The facial expressions are top notch.

Good

Mighty Avengers #31

Dan Slott does a nice job wrapping up the Unspoken story. What impressed me the most was how well the story eventually intersected with the personal journeys of a few of the cast members. It was never clear to me before now, but this was a Quicksilver story. Pietro came in at the start of the story, and each time his supporting buds got taken out, he made it through. In fact, I found it fascinating that the last few heroes to make a stand against the Unspoken were Vision, Quicksilver, Radioactive Man, Hulkling and Scientific Beast. Only those few were able to shake off or resist the Terrigen mists and avoid being mutated into Alpha Primitives. There are some great moments in this finale; when Hawkeye and Bucky team up to get Stature aboard the Unspoken's ship while sacrificing themselves, Hercules describing his seduction of the ship itself, and even the last stand of Radioactive Man and Quicksilver. I didn't see it coming until the moment arrived, but having the Unspoken ramble on and on about his past to Hank Pym was genius. That moment where Pym realizes how annoying it is hear that kind of self-pity was great, and was a great lead-in to Pym's "owning" of his personal history in the closing pages. That taking of responsibility plays perfectly against Quicksilver's integration back into the Inhuman society. While Pym owns his own past and wants to move on, Quicksilver refuses to take any blame and tries to pass it off on skrulls. I love that while the Inhuman society as a whole buys it, Quicksilver's daughter does not. The most important person in Quicksilver's life (aside from his sister) knows what a fraud he is, and the dismay on his face at the issues end is great drama.

Sean Chen is a better fit for this title than Koi Pham. The action is much less sketchy and everything looks more classic. Chen has been around long enough that his Hercules, Tigra, and Pym are all spot on, and he quickly makes the other Avengers his own too. I do think the Unspoken's design ended up kind of boring. I don't think he has much staying power due to his lack of a memorable look.

Good

Mighty Avengers #28

This one doesn't have much forward movement. Last month we found out about the secret king of the Inhumans who was banished by Black Bolt and his cadre of royalty. After living in exile for so long, this lost King finally returned and was rampaging across China. After defeating China's super-heroes, US Agent and Quicksilver realize they are outmatched. This issue picks up with Quicksilver and the Agent calling for help, only to have the signal cut off by Loki in her Scarlet Witch disguise. Stature complicates things by witnessing this, setting up a big confrontation with Stature at the close of the issue. Making it a bit more interesting, Stature seeks out her Young Avengers teammates and brings them back to the Avengers mansion to confront who she thinks is the Scarlet Witch. She brings along a tag-along too. Ronin shows up at the end of the issue wanting some answers too. I wish Ronin was in his Hawkeye duds, of course, but I am pleased to see him showing up in a book I'm already enjoying.

As I said, there is not a lot of plot movement with the Inhuman King, and right now we're only getting teases about the Scarlet Witch reveal. I'm hoping next issue kicks it up a bit and we get more payoffs, this title has been a tad slow lately.

Khoi Pham's art is looking sketchier and sketchier. I think the book would benefit from a tighter inker coming in and finishing up some of the characters. This book has a large cast, so I'm sure it is a lot of work, but too many times background character's faces end up being lumpy or unfinished looking.

Fair

Chicago Comic-con News and Announcements!

Comic Book Resources has some great articles recapping Chicago's announcements. As always, I'm just posting these in the order of my interest.

• Dan Slott supposedly dropped hints that Thor would be entering Dark Reign through Mighty Avengers. We couldn't be lucky enough to have him join that team, could we?
  
• Realm of Kings - DnA's new status quo for Marvel Cosmic. It kicks off with a one-shot starring Quasar and will continue in two new limiteds; Imperial Guard by DnA and Kev Walker and Inhumans by DnA and Pablo Ramiondi. I love cosmic Marvel!
• It sounds like Darkhawk will be a featured character in the Nova ongoing too! Combined with Guardians and we're getting like 4 DnA books a month for the forseeable future.
  
• Jeff Parker is taking over the Thunderbolts, and he's promising to keep focusing on both teams of T-bolts. Excellent news!
• Assault on New Olympus is the next arc of Incredible Hercules. The New and Mighty Avengers will be guest-starring, so I'm psyched.
• Paul Cornell & Leonard Kirk are writing Dark X-Men, a new mini starting this fall. As you know, Cornell's work on Captain Britain guarantees I will purchase this.
  
• DC's co-features will be getting their own trades, which is good to hear (so I can get the Captain Atom stuff after all).
• Spider-Man & the Secret Wars tells the old series' story from Spidey's point of view. Sounds like another Marvel Adventures-style treat I can read with my daughter. (ALthough this is not an "Adventures" title, it sure looks that way.)
  
• S.W.O.R.D. - a new ongoing starring Agent Brand, Beast, and Lockheed written by Kieron Gillen and Steven Sanders. I'm not sold yet, but I'm intrigued...
  

Mighty Avengers #27

I'm surprised to see Christos Gage credited with scripting over Dan Slott's plot here. I've heard the stories that Slott has a hard time meeting deadlines due to some perfectionist tendencies, so I wonder if Gage is going to be a regular part of the creative team to help move things along and meet deadlines. EDITED TO ADD: Slott actually explains why Gage is coming on in a recent Newsarama interview. I'm happy to see it! I'm be fine with that, since I like both writers and they worked well together back on Avengers: The Initiative.

Most of the story here is a flashback to the fall of CENSORED, a mysterious former king of the Inhumans who removed something called a Slave Engine from Attilan. It seems this reduced Attilan's standing in the world and changed it to the well-known status as a "great refuge." I never got a full-on villain vibe from our mystery king, even though he was facing off against youthful heroes Black Bolt, Medusa, Gorgon, and Karnak. We do see the king again in the present when US Agent, Quicksilver, and the GRAMPA agent see him take on a new Chinese super-team (including Radioactive Man!). USAgent has the best line of the book when he yells out that they just got "Alpha Flight'ed" when the king takes them out in one hit. What a great new verb, even if I'm still annoyed that Alpha was taken out so easily in New Avengers.

Pym's new HQ is revealed too, Avengers Infinity Mansion, a huge HQ with teleportation doors leading all over the world. I get the impression each Avengers member has quarters there, which is a neat idea. Jocasta maintains the place and now can bounce control amongst multiple robot bodies.

Koi Pham's art is looking more refined than he did in his last issue. I think the break between issues allowed Pham to spend time tightening his pencils making this look pretty strong. I will say I think the book would benefit from a regular penciller.

Good

Incredible Hercules: Love & War

Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente are crafting a modern Marvel classic. These stories don't change your life or make you re-imagine your thoughts about comics, but they are darn fun.

Hercules and Namora are off frolicking on an island when a group of Amazons kidnap Amadeus Cho and make off with him back to a Lemurion museum they've taken over. This brings Namor into the story, and there is a wonderful sequence where he and Hercules start battling until Namora stops them. It turns out Hercules knew they didn't need to fight, but he didn't think it was worth stopping the fight over a little detail. That's just awesome. Hercules' casual attitude about his protege's time with the Amazons is hilarious from start to finish, as he's just hoping Cho can get some action.

Meanwhile, Cho doesn't hit it off with the leader of the Amazons as he figured, but with an interesting gorgon-lady who is quite taken with him. I really dug the star-crossed infatuation the two shared, especially with the sad resolution that we all knew was coming. Cho couldn't really be happy, could he? As always, there is the required rib on Cho's "Fifth-smartest person" status too, as he's forced to admit he got the label from a soup company.

Namora was great in this, she's a fantastic character and I can't wait for the new Agents of Atlas trade. Namora is pretty much a lady-Hercules. She's out to smash people and have a good time. If she keeps appearing in books like this, she may quickly make it into my list of favorite characters. The other revelation in this trade was the first appearance of the Olympus Group, Hera's corporate posse of evil gods out to get Hercules. I'm excited to see what comes of that in upcoming trades.


Clayton Henry does a great job here. His core cast look good, of course, but I was really impressed that he succeeded in making a snake-headed Gorgon cute. Plus, he provided us with what might be the best Hercules panel ever.

Good

Incredible Hercules: Secret Invasion TPB

By switching to the trade on so many of my favorite comics, I'm always worried that I'm going to accidentally spoil thinks for myself. I've been really worried about that happening with Hercules, since I loved the first storyline so much. I did accidentally hear about Snowbird's involvement with the God Squad (Herc's team of anti-Skrull deities in this story) and I had also found out which member of the Squad was secretly a Skrull. But I actually had avoided finding out the full lineup of the squad, specifically that it included my favorite Eternal Ajak. The God Squad idea is a tremendous one, and Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente do a fantastic job developing the rival Skrull gods. I actually think the evil deities in this would have been a better reveal for Secret Invasion than the silly God statement that Queen Veranke dropped in the core series. The God Squad was neat too, I love Snowbird's look, so having her show up anywhere is fine with me. I'm not sure I entirely understand why the Demogorge made himself look like an Egyptian god though, I was never exactly clear on that. Amadeus Cho is growing on me too, he's seeming a lot more like a hero with flaws than a super-villain, in the first trade he was basically a bad guy. I like seeing him kind of deal with that in this trade. The use of the Eternals as guest stars was a neat idea and I'm really quite taken with Athena in this manipulator/ally role. She seems like a character that could get a lot more development and has quite a bit of potential.

This comic is trucking along nicely. I hope the sales hold up so we keep getting this fix of Herc for a good long while.

The JRJR covers were fantastic, and Rafa Sandoval does nice work throughout. He's not fantastic, and his use of the Ajak re-design is a little tame, but overall the book looks good.

Good

Mighty Avengers #23

I see where you're going, Dan Slott. Nicely played. It is almost hard to talk about most of the issue after the big reveal at the end, but I'm not going to spoil it here. I will say I like the idea, and the parallel to the formation of the Avengers is a very clever. As to the bulk of the issue, wow, Iron Man is a read dick, isn't he? I love Iron Man, he's one of my favorites, but it is hard to like him when he comes off like such a jerk in this issue. Now sure, when he comes in and takes over from Pym, Pym immediately launches into a tirade that would probably hurt IM's feelings, but still. IM is so darn harsh to Pym, if Pym was as weak as Iron Man seems to believe, this would send him right down the drain. Fortunately, the purpose for Mighty these days is to make Pym a kick ass leader, and he steals the show again here. I loved how quickly US Agent and Herc left for Iron Man's leadership, but then how quickly they realized they made the wrong call. The actual method Pym and Cho used to take out Cthon was a lot of fun, since it follows the rules and lets the team defeat an immensely powerful foe. How great was Iron Man calmly noting that when you take out a reality shaper, the world goes back to normal. He wasn't even worried! I'm really enjoying the sparring between Cho and Pym in this book. They obviously are starting to respect each other, but they seem to be having fun trying to one-up each other too. It is a neat relationship I'm looking forward to seeing more from.

The actual line-up is starting to take form too. Hulk is out (as expected) and I'm not sure about Stature and Vision. At a guess, I'd say they're gone. It also looks like Iron Man will not be sticking around to follow Pym as leader. The team right now looks like Pym, Herc, Cho, US Agent, Jocasta, and Jarvis. Not a bad start, but I'd love one or two more members like Wonder Man or Falcon. Songbird would be a great fit too if she wasn't still in play in Thunderbolts.

Khoi Pham's art still fluctuates between nice tight pencils and more sketchy pages. I can't really tell why he switches around, but overall he's fine. I really liked the panel at the end with Pym surrounded by his friends, the variety of expressions on their faces was fantastic. Cho's grudging respect, Herc's open friendship, Jarvis looking pleased, and Jocasta's now-standard worried look. Overall, this is my Avengers title.

Good