Captain America vol 5, AvX Versus

Captain America vol 5 1-7

Ed Brubaker’s extended run on Captain America starts here.  And for a story that calls itself Winter Soldier, there’s precious little of him in these issues.  Brubaker’s playing the long game here, letting the plot slowly unfold.  Just how slowly?  Let’s find out, because after a trade paperback’s worth of issues, I’m asking myself what I spent those last 45 minutes learning.

Issue 1: A flashback teases General Lukin’s possession of the Winter Soldier.  Sharon worries that Steve is in a bad mental space and fighting angrier than he normally does.  Red Skull monologues about how he’s going to make Captain America suffer with his newly constructed Cosmic Cube.  Winter Soldier snipes the Skull dead and steals the Cube for Lukin.

Issue 2:  Cap investigates the Skull’s death, refusing to believe that he’s dead.  Cap flashes back to false memories.  Cap and Sharon foil one of Skull’s schemes to blow up Manhattan.

Issue 3: Cap flashes back to more false memories.  More Skull schemes are foiled.  Jack Monroe, formerly Nomad, is murdered by Winter Soldier.

Issue 4: Sharon looks for Jack Monroe, whose prints are found on the rifle that killed Red Skull.  She gets captured by Winter Soldier for her troubles.  Cap flashes back to more false memories, get his distracted ass kicked by Crossbones.

Issue 5: Cap flashes back to General Karpov, Lukin’s mentor.  

Issue 6: Cap returns to the castle where Bucky died.  Flashes back to that day.  Remembers a few more details.  Rescues Sharon.  Is in Winter Soldier’s crosshairs, but doesn’t get the green light from Lukin.  An explosion charges up the Cosmic Cube.

Issue 7: We learn that Nomad was dying from the flawed super soldier serum in his blood and was losing his mind when he was killed.

A ton of flashbacks, and what have we got?  Lukin killed Skull for the Cosmic Cube and is charging it up.  He’s got the Winter Soldier working for him.  He’s probably messing w/ Cap’s memories with the Cube.  Doesn’t feel like we needed seven issues to tell that story.  I’m all for deconstruction when the details are interesting, but a lot of this reads like plain filler material.  Like those episodes of Dragonball Z where they spend an entire half hour charging up their chi.

30 minutes of this.  I'm not kidding.

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? No

Would read again? Yes

Rating: Fine

Versus 3-6

I got the trade of Avengers vs X-Men Versus, since the first two were so fun.  The last four didn’t disappoint either, with a bunch of standout moments:

Sweet Brandon Peterson art…

...He’s come a long way from his early X-Men days

The rare Arthur Adams interior art.  Does it count if it’s only one page?

Once again in this series, excellent use of captions.  And perfect reaction shots in the final panel by Jim Cheung.

It's funny because it's true.

Bravo to all the writers for embracing the silly.

And to those who embraced the epic.

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? Yes

Would read again? Yes

Rating: Pretty good

Avengers vs X-Men, America

Finishing off the rest of the AvX-related issues.  Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays to everyone!

Versus 1-2

A series that does a deep dive on the 1-on-1 battles taking place throughout the mini-series.  It makes no effort to be anything but extended fight scenes, starting with the wonderfully tongue-in-cheek FAQs at the beginning of each issue.

Own it!

I’m impressed by the talent that Marvel recruited for a throwaway money grab.  The first two issues alone include Jason Aaron and Kieron Gillen among the writers, and there isn’t a weak artist between Adam Kubert, Stuart Immonen, Steve McNiven, and Salvador Larroca.  Beautifully illustrated, fun fights peppered with AvX Fun Facts?  Even if I don’t get the rest of AvX main story, I’ve got the trade queued up for purchase on Amazon right now.  

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? Yes

Would read again? Yes

Rating: Pretty Good

Uncanny X-Men 12

Ugh.  A whole issue that revolves around Namor’s sexual prowess.  Couple that with Greg Land’s photo-referenced models awkwardly shoehorned into their comic panels, and you end up with an issue that leaves me feeling icky.  A story that could have been better told in a Versus segment, and without an alien asking if Namor and Thing are going to mate.  

Less said about this the better.

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? No

Would read again? No

Rating: Didn’t suck

AvX 3-4

After the initial massive free for all between the two teams, the writers find a way to split the X-Men and Avengers up into 5 smaller groups so that they can fight each other in various tie-in issues. Meanwhile, Cap and Wolverine have an entertaining fight after Steve Rogers is somehow surprised that Logan’s solution to the Phoenix problem is to kill Hope.  Did he really not see that coming?  

JRJR's not bad at the 1-on-1 action scenes.

I stopped reading AvX after these issues.  I wasn’t in the mood to watch a Phoenix-powered Cyclops tell everyone he knows best when it comes to fixing the world (and kill Professor X in the process.)  

Other notes:

JRJR's not so good at the group scenes.  Everything's a lot less dynamic.  George Perez he ain't.

Gotta respect the sentiment.

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? Yes

Would read again? Yes

Rating: Nice

New Avengers 27-30

On the other hand, I kept buying New Avengers.  Because Bendis rules all.  Why didn’t I regularly collect his Avengers run?  Totally buying it after I write this.  Highlights:

• Spider-Man gives Hope his “great power/great responsibility” speech.  It should be corny and it’s overused, but in Bendis’ hands, it doesn’t matter.  It inspires Hope and it inspires me.
• Hawkeye breaks out of prison, and it’s awesome.

When did Hawkeye start ripping off Bulleye’s gimmick?  I thought he was only good at bows.

• How many people can spend an entire issue on a conversation between people sitting around a table?  I’ll have to remember to keep an eye out, see who can challenge Bendis for that championship title.  

Doctor.  Doctor.  Captain.  Captain.

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? Yes

Would read again? Yes

Rating: Good

America 1-2

I’m a fan of Marvel’s recent push for more female solo titles - Ms. Marvel, America, Wasp, Squirrel-Girl, etc.  And I loved America Chavez in Young Avengers, so I gave her solo title a spin.  To my disappointment, the writing was a little too out there for my taste, and I’m cutting the two issues that I bought.  It reeked of Hickman’s Complex - Words that make sense individually, but not after they’re strung together into a sentence.  Though now I’m tempted to read the Moon Girl title.  A nine year old as the Marvel U’s smartest person?  I’ll give that concept a go.  

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? No

Would read again? No

Rating: Didn’t suck

Avengers vs X-Men

Nozawa Bar

Raindancer and I had dinner here tonight (We’re in LA for the Christmas weekend).  The sushi was pretty darn amazing, but not 4x as good as the regular omakase at Sugarfish.  More than happy that we did it, would do again, but we’ll generally be satisfied with Sugarfish in the future.  The taste/value ratio is off the charts there.

AvX 0-2

Avengers 25

Uncanny X-Men 11

New Avengers 24-26

I know that I didn’t finish buying this series.  I’m not sure why, but I suspect it has something to do with my main takeaway from the first 3 issues of the main storyline:

Cyclops is a mega-douche.  

He may have some valid points as the Avengers and X-Men fight over Hope Summers with the impending arrival of the Phoenix Force, but I just don’t care.  He’s a self-righteous, sanctimonious dick with a massive persecution complex, and I can’t wait for him to get smacked upside the head.  Multiple times.  

Bendis, who writes the mini-series plus the Avengers and New Avengers tie-ins, does a fine job with the initial battle between the two teams.  In a surprising move, he succeeds primarily through the use of captions, neatly summarizing why each of the individual moments are awesome.  I’ve rarely (if ever) seen this technique used to such good effect.

Avengers is drawn by Walt Simonson, and its main source of awesome comes from seeing Simonson draw Thor again, this time in his new costume:

Like coming home.

There’s also a satisfying moment between Thor and Cap, aided by some nice colors by Jason Keith:

Nothing like an old friend to cheer you up.

Regret buying? No

Would buy again? No

Would read again? No

Rating: Fine

Uncanny X-Men recaps the events of AvX 1 and 2.  I wonder if this is because as not-Bendis, Kieron Gillen felt that he owed a more straightforward retelling to his readers.  (As opposed to Bendis, who veered more sharply from the mini-series with his other titles)

After all these years, I’m still undecided in my verdict on Greg Land.  I know most of his work is tracing model references, but it’s still very nice to look at.  More on this as I get to his main work, I’m sure.

I’m having a ton of fun with the New Avengers side of things.  Aside from Ultimate Spider-Man and Miles Morales, the Jessica Jones/Luke Cage relationship may be the best thing that Bendis has brought to the Marvel Universe.  It reads as such a true relationship between two loving people with both powers and major issues.  (Though for people with huge problems communicating with each other, they have some of the best talks.)  

By the time you get to this point in the issue, you know everything that's going on in his head.  It adds so much weight to this moment.  

I’m also loving the Iron Fist flashback.  It reads like a hidden chapter from Ed Brubaker’s Iron Fist run, and I want to see Mike Deodato on a martial arts title.  An Iron Fist/Shang Chi comic from him would be heavenly.

Part of me wants to know how many of these trainees were drawn individually and how many were copies.  The other part can't be bothered to do the Where's Waldo.

Iron Phoenix?  I'm all in.

I’ll grade everything that’s not Avengers 25 tomorrow, when I read the last parts of those storylines.

Other notes:

I've asked this same question myself.

Be. Successful!  B.  E.  Successful!