Thursday, December 6, 2012

Avengers #1

Of all the "Marvel NOW" titles, this is the one I've probably been looking forward to the most.

That's because writer Jonathan Hickman has been doing such impressive work on books like Fantastic Four, SHIELD and the sadly-underrated Secret Warriors.

Now he's tackling The Avengers, following a long and successful run by Brian Bendis on the title, and he wastes no time in carving out his own spot.

This issue starts with an Avengers line-up that's taken right from the film, as Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, the Hulk, Hawkeye and the Black Widow investigate a strange attack - and an ever stranger menace - that has set up shop on Mars.

You'd expect this powerhouse team to have no problem dealing with any menace - but that's just part of the surprise waiting in this story (which we won't spoil here, of course).

The story sets the stage for a sea change with the team - and as that final page indicates, it's going to be very interesting to see what happens next!

The art for this issue is by Jerome Opena, and I have to admit it took me a while to get used to it. His style is very organic and unique, with some echoes of the great Mobius. By about halfway through the issue, I was sold.

Hickman specializes in big, sprawling stories, and that's exactly what we're getting here. I love it!

Grade: A

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This was a fun issue. I am a little bugged by all the big type title/other pages that Hickman is famous for. But they don't seem to cut into the art pages. The art is terrific! I love this guy. Looks like fun.
Pete

Chuck said...

Pete, I agree that the title page shtick is a bit well-worn (I've never counted the pages to see if those count as story pages). But it was a solid first issue.