Avengers 8 and 9

[badficwriter]

What happened after the Red Hulk crashed into Avengers Tower?

Avengers 8 (4 pages)
The Red Hulk relates how he's been living in Death Valley in secret, doing ops for Steve Rogers. (I found it unbelievable that some of the Avengers didn't know him. The guy appeared on live television announcing his takeover of the Unites States, for heaven's sake.) He describes how he was attacked by the guy with the red and yellow jewels.



That's a coloring mistake. Steve Rogers is standing next to Maria Hill.

Tony puts out the Illuminati signal. Everyone but Black Bolt shows up, and everyone is angry. They weren't supposed to meet anymore after the Hulk thing.



There is some exposition about the Infinity Gems and their thefts. Lockjaw teleports them to Inhumans old home in the Himalayas. They follow the trail of bodies into the underground. Medusa recognizes the broken shell the gem was kept in as the work of a dead Inhuman. They realize they have company up top.



Avengers 9 (4 pages)

The scenes with the Avengers are interspersed with the scenes of the Hood. He was moved to non-powered prison, got bodyguard protection, made friends with the only nonhuman he could find..who is an Inhuman who makes shells...and bribing a guard to get out of prison. (In the most recent Avengers Initiative, it's revealed that Hood was replaced by a lookalike.)







The 'preview', for some reason, shows the private conversation that came after these pages here.

The Red Hulk suggests splitting into teams to go after all the gems at once, and use their power against the mystery man. Because the gems are drawn together, the situation is already past the 'necessary sacrifice' stage.

Steve says after it's over, Tony is out. No more excuses. Thor encourages Tony to prove Steve wrong.

Meanwhile, the Hood visits Madame Masque, whose lawyer kept her out of prison. He heals her face.

Someone tell me what "And you decided to be Captain America!" means. I just don't get what Tony is trying to say.

Comments

[sherkahn]

Someone tell me what "And you decided to be Captain America!" means. I just don't get what Tony is trying to say.


Tony is saying he did what he believed to be the right thing to do, just like Steve did what he thought was the right thing to do when he volunteered for Project Rebirth.

[freezer]

And with every different "I did what I thought was right" justification, Tony just sinks deeper into the mire of Self-Righteous Dickery.

[okkult3000]

"Some time ago, the four of us decided to get together and do what we could to proactively prevent catastrophes from happening. It didn't work AT ALL."

[silverzeo]

... when, how, and why is Beast growing a beard and mustache?

[thelazyreader]

Will Tony Stark ever stop scheming?

PS: If he does get kicked out, he'll be back by the next story arc. In fact I'm pretty sure this kind of plotline's already been done twice or thrice in the Avengers publishing history.

[badficwriter]

Since Tony is a founding member, he has special powers according to the Avengers charter. I'm not sure Steve CAN kick him out permanently, though deciding he doesn't want him on his team is surely the team leader's prerogative.

I'd love to see Tony lose that special status, even if he is allowed to remain an Avenger.

[starwolf_oakley]

I thought everyone knew about the Illuminati. The Hulk broadcasted the "Sorry about this, Bruce" message at the start of WORLD WAR HULK. He even went to Westchester to see how Xavier would have voted if he was with the Illuminati at the time. As a result, presumably everyone knows about the Illuminati .

I know Bendis usually goes "Continuity is what I say it is," and he didn't write anything to do with WORLD WAR HULK. Still, everyone acting all shocked and surprised is a little annoying. Like Bendis just wanted to do a funny "You were seeing Namor behind Sue's back" joke.

[badficwriter]

Is there anything to state that it wasn't a one-time thing?

[shadur]

Tony really, REALLY needs to shut the fuck up instead of still trying to claim moral high ground when yet /more/ of his "I know what's best for everyone, trust me" chickens come home to roost.

[tzipwich]

He will never, ever learn.

[schala_kid]

Reed: I am sorry
Medusa: He loved you

Woah that got me by surprise! Were Reed and Blackbolt close?

Also Tony and Steve fighting makes me sad.

[avantre]

Reed: I am sorry
Medusa: He loved you
Reed: Really? He... he never told me.

bdum tish.

[avantre]

Not a big fan of the artist, but I will say it's nice to see them acknowledging the environment they're in by having all but the invulnerable ones wearing winter gear (even if it's just mostly hoods), rather than having them standing around in their normal costumes. Although, apparently Ben's only weak spot is his ears according to what he's wearing...

[tzipwich]

Ohhhh...I thought they were all on their way to rob a bank or something. I forgot about weather.

[polarisnorth]

The kids don't like it when mom and dad fight...

Goddamn I want Tony to stop being the worst fuck up in the Marvel universe. He's always been a bit of an ass, but usually that was outweighed by the good he did and the fact that he is a good person in the end. Now things just keep piling on, and it feels like no one's ever going to get back to a position where they can trust him. (Though I do like that Thor is more willing to give him a chance now.)

[keeva]

I'm bummed that they got Lockjaw's group affiliation wrong.

Since the end of Avengers vs. the Pet Avengers, he really should have reserve Avenger status!

[badficwriter]

He's like Wolverine. He can be a member of the Inhumans, Fantastic Four and Pet Avengers at the same time.

[righthondude]

I'm not a huge fan of the art but I LOVE Lockjaw here!

[bradhanon]

I know it's because I'm a Captain America fanboy, but I truly do want to see Tony momentarily revert to the delusion that he can take Steve in a straight fight. You have no idea how badly my anti-authoritarian soul wants to see Tony Stark get the living shit kicked out of him.

[badficwriter]

I want Tony to revert to being an anti-authoritarian businessman, not constantly being his own government, whereever he is.

[wizardru]

Dear Brian Michael Bendis:

FUCK. YOU.

Thanks.


P.S. Could you ask SOMEONE at Marvel to actually work as an EDITOR? kthxbye

[blackruzsa]

Heroic age is, for every comic you see Steve and Tony together, post-breakup where they have sweet and happy times at one point and start going at each other's throats (without the slash) the next.

It stopped being subtext years ago.

But I'm glad Steve's calling Tony out on these things. Just hope they keep resolving these issues between them.

[greenmask]

Junior's doing amazing work on this. I'm not usually that much of a fan, but it really gels with the events for me.

Also Lackjaw looks ADORABLLLLE.

I thought Moon Knight(..right?) was Faiza for a sec there, boo.

[protogarrett]

"Steals her face?"

???????????????

[badficwriter]

'Heals'. Madame Masque covered her face because it was scarred. He healed her scars.

[mullon]

Dammit Tony. And damn the rest of them for going along with this.

[starwolf_oakley]

Black Panther was the one who said it was a bad idea. But no one ever listens to the Black Panther.

[his_spiffynesss]

When did Xavier start walking again?

[starwolf_oakley]

After House of M. Wanda *somehow* had the wherewithall (meaning "not that crazy") to fix his legs *and* take away his powers. He somehow got his powers back from the M'Krann Crystal.

[valtyr]

Hey, the art doesn't suck! It's not fantastic, but doesn't suck.

Steve strangely adorable in winter gear. Love his hair sticking up like that. At least people OTHER than Tony are finally getting called out for this stuff, a bit. Although having Steve Rogers feeling personally betrayed right in your face is rather more punishment than any of the others are getting.

Poor Steve. He must feel so hurt. Oh, Tony, you couldn't just tell him? :(

[badficwriter]

If Cyclops finds out (and he should), Xavier's gonna get smacked. Namor might get a pass, on this and that "Let me exterminate these ancient races" thing in Fantastic Four.

[q99]

-
Steve says after it's over, Tony is out. No more excuses. Thor encourages Tony to prove Steve wrong.-

Good! He deserves it.

[recognitions]

I may be late on this, but I love that the Inhumans' teleporter is a giant pug.

[icon_uk]

A little late yes, Lockjaw has been around since 1965.

[fajrdrako]

I love the scene in the Preview where you can see Steve's face reflected in Iron Man's face-plate.

[julian]

I'm sorry, I'm so so distracted by Ben's earmuffs.

[wizardru]

[RANT]
The thing that most annoys me about this isn't the fact that they keep playing these scenes out OVER AND OVER (why even HAVE Avengers Prime if you're just going to do THIS SHIT?). No, what annoys me is how first Millar (who hates heroes in general, afaik) and then Bendis proceed on this line-wide assassination of characters in the MU.

And I just don't know WHY. I can understand not liking a character...but this just reads like CRAP. And these continual massive retcons are just really tiring.

I liked when Professor X was just a dude with a mission. Maybe he was impersonal. Maybe he wasn't always nice. But he was a Stern Father...not a zealot who spent the lives of his surrogate children, every bit as much a monster as Magneto. Remember? He used to the ANSWER to Magneto. But not now.

Remember when Iron Man was just a dude trying to make up for a life of debauchery and improve the world? When he was just a dude who was a bit of a player who'd beaten a drinking problem? Who folks turned to for help all the time?

A whole generation has come into comics without ever knowing that every member of the Illuminati hasn't always been a bunch of raving assholes. For that matter, how is it that the smartest guys in the room picked a name like that? I mean, am I supposed to think that these incredibly smart, classically educated men have no idea what the connotations of that title hold? And don't tell me ''Oh, it was a bit of wit" or some such nonsense, given their described mission.

Never mind the fact that IF they actually were intending to do all this pro-active stuff (rather than just an excuse for shooting the Hulk into space)...where the fuck where they for the dozens of crises that supposedly NOW happened while they were together?

Also: A FUNCTIONAL ALCOHOLIC AND CHRONIC LADIES MAN WHO SPENT YEARS PRETENDING HE WASN'T A SUPERHERO BUT WHO DID COVER UP HIS HABIT SUCCESSFULLY IS NOT THIS BAD OF A LIAR. Seriously, WTF? "Let Me...Go check my files...."? Is that the best you can manage, Bendis?


ARRGHH!

[/RANT]

[LATE RANT]

[quroiui.livejournal.com]

Actually, I just wanted to say thank you for posting this. I'm fairly new to comics, and I've been out for a few years, but I picked up Iron Man again recently an I had NO IDEA who I was reading! I couldn't put my finger on what bugged me, so thank you for articulating it.

Has Bendis actually READ about the formation of the Illuminati? Tony Stark calls together a bunch of really smart guys who represent as many groups of Metas as they can, and lays down some fucking facts.

They knew the Kree and Skrulls had set up shop on Earth. They knew that the only reason Earth hadn't fallen was luck. There's no army prepared to take on these threats, when this happens again, the superpowered people will be the ones to face them.

Then he proposes that ALL of the superpeople organize themselves to prevent this from happening. He identified a serious problem, he proposed a solution. He never suggested secrecy, and his solution was shot down. When the idea of a sort of secret information society comes up, STRANGE proposes it, backed by Reed, and then Namor makes it a requirement for his participation.

This is the point where it spirals into stupidity, but MY point is that it ISN'T JUST TONY'S FAULT. It's not even MOSTLY Tony's fault, but tell that to the Marvel writers. That entire argument is just stupid. From both characters. There's a legitimate conflict to be worked out there, and instead they substituted that garbage.

Civil War turned me off comics, and now that it's really, really over Marvel CONTINUES with this asshatery. I don't know what they thought was wrong with the characters before, I really don't. I was pretty fond of some of them.