What, so you say I barely review any marvel comics?
Here's a very fun rendition of the Avengers team that sadly didn't last long enough...
For more Hank Pym's adventures, check out these other reviews!
There's been dozens incarnations of the Avengers over the years, many even in publication at the same time. There's been New Avengers, Secret Avengers, Dark Avengers, Dead Avengers... you name it !(and that's not even counting the main Earth Mightiest Heroes book and other all-ages out of continuity comics)
The Mighty Avengers was a much simpler funnier light hearted title, yet very much part of the main mainstream Marvel Universe.
Mighty Avengers was originally launched by Brian Michael Bendis and Frank Cho after the Civil War crossover event. The book started as a parallel Avengers team book running by the side of the main one. Giving another perspective on the current stories. Originally it was about a team of "registered superheroes" compared to the other unlicensed teams. The team was lead by Iron Man, Ms Marvel and the Wasp.
After the death of the Wasp at the end of the Skrull invasion, writer Dan Sloot took over and retooled the book under a better cleaner direction.
The book had lost itself in countless crossovers and grittier tone.
The Mighty Avengers were reimagined with Dr. Henry "Hank" Pym leading an unlikely team of new Avengers (no, not that other Avengers team!).
I''ve always been a big fan of Ant-man. Well, I dunno why but I tend to like these sort of shrinking/growing super heroes. Be it Antman or DC Comics' answer to it, The Atom.
With Norman Osborn creating his own Avengers team under the HAMMER (think evil SHIELD), Hank answered to this with a team of his own acting outside the US. For this occasion Hank took the mantle of the new Wasp. With some help from Scarlet Witch (or is it..?), the Earth Mightiest Heroes were back better than ever!
This is Hank Pym's time to shine... They are the MIGHTY AVENGERS!
Comic title: The Mighty Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Written by Dan Slott
Art by Khoi Pham, Rafa Sandoval, Paco Diaz & Stephen Segovia
Format: Trade Paperback collecting Secret Invasion: Requiem & issues #21-26 of The Mighty Avengers.
Janet Van Dyne is dead. The robotic Avengers Hank Pym built years, Jocasta, is going through some old memories. Hank Pym has been through a LOT of
Chaos is running all around the world. And by chaos I mean really unnatural disasters.
The Scarlet Witch starts recruiting a team of Avengers. Meanwhile Hercules is doing the exact same thing.
Hank finally takes responsibilities into his own hands. He's joined by Iron Man fighting the Hulk. He is then joined by the new Vision and Stature of the Young Avengers and Hercules brings in the boy genius Amadeus Cho as well.
But soon both Iron Man and the Hulk end up walking off this new rag-tag team. US Agent later joins our little gang.
Scarlet Witch sends them off to free Quicksilver.
Turns out the Witch is secretly Loki in disguise! Quicksilver follows our heroes around the world to get back to his supposedly sister. To start anew with a fresh new slate he passes himself as another prisoner of the Skrulls.
Hank Pym's interdimensional headquarters are having a problem. His PymPocket doorways are getting dangerously instable. After asking politely Reed Richards for a particular machine, the team decides to break into the Fantastic Four's Baxter Building to get their hands on that tech.
It's heroes vs. heroes! Our Mighty Avengers succeed. But Jocasta is now forced to hold the gateways into that dimension.
Overall: What a fantastic beginning!
It's a book very much versed in the Marvel lore, but also pretty simple to get into and get introduced to all these (new) characters.
The tone of the book is very much in line with the recent live action Avengers motion picture.
Dan Slott is a very good writer. He can both handle pretty epic-scale adventures one minute and the next focus on some more minimalist character scenes. The videochat back-and-forth between Hank and Reed is worth the price of the entire book!
The art is top notch from cover to bottom. Altough Stephen Segovia artwork on the last storyarc is very.. how to put it? "Very different" from Pham and Sandoval. Unusually sexy pin-up-ysh poses for the few female members of the team.. Just...
Iron Man's Jarvis gets a little spotlight. He gets lots of great lines and sarcastic comments in this book.
Here's a funny bit of trivia for you. With this first trade paperback of Dan Slott's Mighty Avengers, Marvel left out the volume number from the title. As to better make this a new start apart from Bendis' original series.
It's fun, perfect for new readers and newcomers alike. This is a great start into everything Marvel comics.
"It's on, bitch!"
I give this one a: 3 / 3 Score!
Comic title: The Mighty Avengers: The Unspoken Written by Dan Slott
Art by Khoi Pham & Sean Chen
Format: Trade Paperback collecting issues #27-31 of The Mighty Avengers.
The team gets some time to settle in their new HQ, The Infinite Avengers Mansion!
Meanwhile US Agent and Quicksilver go to China. Their own special superteam has disappeared after facing "the Unspoken", whoever that is.
Tuns out the Unspoken actually is the former king of the Inhumans (the cousin of Black Bolt).
Back at the Mansion, Stature wants her revenger for what Scarlet Witch did to her family. She gets the help from her old teammates at the Young Avengers. As well as Ronin's (ex-Hawkeye Clint Barton now going by that title). Loki, currently hijacking Sif's body and hiding in plain sight as Scarlet Witch (you still following?) is almost find out. But he escapes away, barely.
All the Avengers team are brought in to help face the Unspoken and his Alpha Primitives.
During this entire story Hank's exploring other planes of existence through his size-changing powers. He finds outside our world Eternity. Eternity thanks Hank for his recent help, dubs him Earth's Scientist Supreme.
Once Pym back, he help dispose of the threat quickly. The man is a genius!
Overall: Another fairly enjoyable adventure!
This volume collects a longer storyarc compared to the three smaller ones in the opening first book.
Still very much of the same, a great epic adventure with dialogues and characterisation. And fun.
I really enjoyed Khoi Pham's art on this volume. He really gets these characters, and is the perfect fit for this adventurous/fun tale.
I give this one a: 2.5 / 3 Score!
Comic title: The Mighty Avengers: Siege Written by Dan Slott
Art by Khoi Pham & Neil Edwards
Format: Trade Paperback collecting issues #32-36 of The Mighty Avengers.
This last volume collects three story arcs.
In "Mighty/Dark", Loki manipulates our heroes to end up facing down Norman Osborn's Dark Avengers in the middle of a conference Normie's having. But Osborn can't fight such a popular team like the Mighty Avengers in front of an audience.
So here comes the bigger gun! A wild powered-up Absorbing Man with the powers of the cosmic cube romps through the scene. Wait, THE cosmic cube? The thingie than can reshape the universe according to one's wish? Both Norman and Hank race for it!
It was that same cube that allowed Osborn to put in place his Dark Reign to begin with.
In the second arc, Hank Pym is now well aware that the Scarlet Witch is actually a disguised Loki!
He tells Quicksilver and the team then tries to capture Loki to get some answers. Loki has cowardly as always calls for help. Thor always end up helping Loki stupidly enough...
But at the end of the day, Wanda is still nowhere to be found... Meanwhile Jocasta is having some trouble with her duplicate bodies all over Infinity Mansion...
The final arc "Salvation" avoids entirely to tie-in with the Siege crossover event. Hank Pym's other famous robotic creation Ultron is back!
Ultron dubs himself "Ultron Pym" and inflitrates the Infinity Mansion with the help of his "Army of brides" possessed Jocastas.
Ultron wants to kill his "father" now.
Meanwhile the rest of the team is facing Osborn in the outside world.
Since all this is really about oedipal complexes, Pym gets Ultron to leave peacefully through a forced arranged marriage with the main last Jocasta unit. (Pym's "robot-son" married to his "robot-daughter" with brain patterns of his ex-dead wife? sheesh...)
Finally Pym is free to join Amadeus Cho and help his team in one last final fight.
But WAIT! There's a final twist! The original Wasp Janet van Dyne appears to still ive on... outside our plane of existence!?!
Overall: ...Aaaaand that's a wrap!
Despite what the title implies, the Mighty Avengers series didn't tie-in with that annoying new event either. But it certainly killed the series. Since a new crossover implies a big change of status quo at Marvel...
The book was sadly canceled with issue #36.
This last volume was certainly packed with action, adventure and twists at every curve.
I'll miss this incarnation of the Avengers for sure.
Hank Pym/Wasp II was a great leader. One of the original founders of the team. It was great to see him lead a bunch of C-listers for a change. (It's always either Tony Stark or Steve Rogers leading big name characters...)
Dan Slott's Mighty Avengers were able to switch between big epic on-going plots and more episodic episodes. The characters had some great interaction between them. It was fun while it lasted.
I give this one a: 2.5 / 3 Score!
Mighty Avengers was pure entertainment.
This series can be best described as: loud, epic and funny. Dan Slott's series was really fun and quite eventful.
And I'm not even usually a fan of "team" books or Avengers series. (they tend to delve around either non-stop crossovers, gritty action, slow paced storytelling stretched thin or cheap drama...)
Marvel has a history of ruining simple fun on-going series with tiresome crossovers...
This book was a perfect blend of comedy and adventure, light hearted with great characters. It got a sort of spiritual successor in the form of Avengers Academy, but that will be for another time...
That's all for this time's Quickies!
Sounds awesome. I think I saw it on sale in my comic-shop.
ReplyDeleteGo for it!
DeleteOn the same genre, if you're familiar with Wolverine & The X-Men or want something like Avengers Academy afterwards, both series are pretty similar in tone~