Avengers – Page 14 – Now Read This!

January 28, 2015January 27, 2015

Captain America & the Korvac Saga

By Ben McCool, Craig Rousseau, Rachelle Rosenberg, with Jim Shooter, George PÃ©rez, Pablo Marcos & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-5160-9

Over the decades since its founding, Marvel has published a number of popular and/or critically successful mega-epics which fans always talk about with great fondness. In relatively recent years the company began to reconfigure some of them – such as Avengers & the Infinity Gauntlet and Spider-Man & the Secret Wars for younger readers in the manner of the company’s all-ages Marvel Adventures format: notionally â€œin-continuityâ€ tales offering cosmic thrills, chills and light drama as a (possibly misdirected) way to bring kids in on the House of Ideas’ biggest successes.

This yarn is one of the most intriguing, greatly diverging from its source material as writer Ben McCool, illustrator Craig Rousseau and colourist Rachelle Rosenberg wittily wove an alternate interpretation adding a contemporary tone to the twice time-displaced Sentinel of Liberty.

This highly entertaining digest-sized collection collects the 4-issue miniseries Captain America & the Korvac Saga from February-May 2011 and also re-presents the opening shot in the original epic from Avengers #167 (January 1978) as crafted by Jim Shooter, George PÃ©rez & Pablo Marcos.

The new yarn retells the saga, giving the Star-Spangled Avenger the leading role in an engaging and appealing way, adding contemporary sensibilities and a lighter take to a classic but rather dark and gritty Fights ‘n’ Tights yarn.

I would strongly suggest, however, that if you’ve never seen the original epic, you track it down either in Essential Avengers volume 8, Avengers: the Korvac Saga or elsewhere: it’s not strictly necessary but you will get to read an extremely classy piece of fantasy fiction as it was originally intendedâ€¦

The action here opens in ‘Strange Days’ as Cap leads his avenging comrades Spider-Man, Scarlet Witch, Vision, The Beast and Iron Man against a quartet of super-villains inexplicably amped up and retooled into major menaces.

Maelstrom, Quasimodo, Living Laser and Super-Adaptoid are putting up far more resistance than expected and when the android Vision detects unusual emanations he and the Sentinel of Liberty track the signals to a sinister technologist who oddly presents no real threat and is easily subdued.

With his defeat the fearsome foursome also fold, but as Cap hauls him off to jail the mystery man exhibits an unnerving understanding of the Super Soldier’s sense of being a man cut off from his own timeâ€¦

Disturbed without knowing why, the Star-Spangled Avenger later visits the stranger in jail and is on hand when a strange team of super-beings try to break the enigmatic prisoner outâ€¦

‘Souljacker’ finds the aggressive newcomers demanding custody of the stranger, a thing they call â€œKorvacâ€. They also claim it is a cyborg from a thousand years in the futureâ€¦

The smug captive delights in all the commotion; turning to energy and freeing his villainous quartet to attack the newcomers. A time portal is opened but in the melee only the acrobatic alien named Nikki and tempestuous star-warrior Firelord follow Korvac through it. Before it finally snaps shut though, Captain America also hurtles into the stellar unknownâ€¦

On the other side is the year 3003 and a scene of fantastic future warfare where Nikki and Firelord reveal how they and her now-stranded companions Starhawk, Vance Astro and Charlie-27 – AKA The Guardians of the Galaxy – had been hunting Korvac before it could use the â€œPower Cosmicâ€ it stole from space god Galactus to destroy humanityâ€¦

No sooner have the explanations finished than the energy entity attacks them. After valiantly driving the killer off Cap is determined to make things right and enquiring how to stop it learns that the long-gone star deity had a special weapon known as the â€œUltimate Nullifierâ€ which could negate Korvac’s purloined powerâ€¦

As the trio set off for Taa-II, Galactus’ solar-system-sized ship, ‘The Traveler’ takes us back to the year 3001 when the battered fugitive cyborg first encountered the seemingly abandoned starship and tapped into incomprehensible energies which allowed it to became a transcendent new form of lifeâ€¦

Two years later as the determined trio vector in on the incredible vessel, Korvac materialises and ambushes them. With cosmic-powered Firelord taking the brunt of the assault, Cap and Nikki painfully crash into the system-ship and begin a terrifying safari through astounding beasts and terrors in search of the Ultimate Nullifier. They are within sight of their goal when their beaten companion crashes at their feet and the triumphant Korvac comes for themâ€¦

With doom inescapable ‘The Star Lord’ brings the cosmic odyssey to a tremendous conclusion as Captain America’s final indomitable battle against the cyborg God from Tomorrow brings the long vanished Galactus into the fray to set all things arightâ€¦

This star-spanning, time-busting blockbusting little box of delights includes a cover gallery by Rousseau & Chris Sotomayor, as well as one by PÃ©rez & Terry Austin which precedes one final treat as the fresh adventure is capped off by a re-presentation of the original 1970s saga.

In the 1960s Jim Shooter was a child-prodigy of comics scripting writing the Legion of Superheroes and Superman before he’d even finished High School. After college, when he returned to the industry and gravitated to Marvel Comics it seemed natural to find him working on a comic with just as many characters as that fabled future super-team.

His connection to The World’s Mightiest Superheroes, although episodic, was long-lived and produced some of that series’ best tales, and none more so than the cosmic epic begun here: a sprawling tale of time-travel and universal conquest which originally ran in The Avengers issues #167-168 and 170-177.

In previous issues a difference of opinion between Captain America and Iron Man over leadership styles had begun to polarise the team and those submerged tensions started to show in ‘Tomorrow Dies Today!’

In the Gods-&-Monsters filled Marvel Universe there are entrenched and jealous Hierarchies of Power, so when a new player mysteriously materialises in the 20^th century the very Fabric of Reality is threatenedâ€¦

It all kicks off when star-spanning 31^st century Guardians of the Galaxy materialise in Earth orbit, hotly pursuing a cyborg despot named Korvac.

Inadvertently setting off planetary incursion alarms, their minor-moon sized ship is swiftly penetrated by an Avengers squad, where, after the customary introductory squabble, the future men – Charlie-27, Yondu, Martinex, Nikki, Vance Astro and enigmatic space God Starhawk – explain the purpose of their missionâ€¦

Cap had previously fought beside them to liberate their home era from Badoon rule and Thor had faced Korvac before so peace soon breaks out, but even with the resources of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes the time travellers are unable to locate their quarryâ€¦

Meanwhile on Earth a new and mysterious being named Michael is lurking in the background. At a fashion show staged by Janet Van Dyne he achieves a psychic communion with model Carina Walters and they both vanish, oblivious to a pitched superhero battle that breaks out involving not only the Wasp and her husband Yellowjacket, but also Nighthawk against the perfidious Porcupineâ€¦

To Be Continued – Elsewhereâ€¦

In 2012 the Marvel Adventures line was superseded by specific comicbook titles tied to Disney XD TV shows designated as â€œMarvel Universe cartoonsâ€, but these collected stories are still an intriguing and perhaps more culturally accessible means of introducing character and concepts to kids born often two generations or more away from those far-distant 1960s originating events.

However even though these stories are extremely enjoyable yarns, parents should note that some of the themes and certainly the violence might not be what everybody considers â€œAll-Ages Super Hero Actionâ€ and might perhaps better suit older kidsâ€¦
Â© 2010, 2011 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

January 16, 2015January 14, 2015

Avengers World: Ascension

By Nick Spencer, Al Ewing, Marco Checchetto, Stefano Caselli, Dale Keown & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-629-8

Post-Infinity, the reshaping of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes into an unbeatable legion of justice continued in new title Avengers World which became the core title from which all other associated series would derive direction. Of course, that’s pretty much irrelevant if all you want is high stakes, high octane Fights ‘n’ Tights fun in the traditional Summer Blockbuster mannerâ€¦

During the Origin Bomb bombardment by planetary sculptor-turned-probationary Avenger Ex Nihilo (see Avengers: Avengers World and The Last White Event), large parts of the planet were subjected to forced, random and rapid evolution. It was just the start of a season of extraordinary and escalating crisesâ€¦

The most recent outbreaks brought an Avengers stealth team consisting of Shang-Chi, The Falcon, Black Widow and Wolverine to the Pacific island of Madripoor to investigate a hyperfast civil war. On arrival they discovered the entire place had been stolen.

Mystic ninja clan The Hand, at the behest of new chief The Gorgon, had enacted a ritual whose collateral effects enflamed the populace but whose true purpose was to awaken the unbelievably vast dragon the island rested upon. The heroes were too late to stop it taking flight wearing Madripoor as a hat and were trapped upon it as the Wyrm flew towards mainland China.

High over Southeast Asia, Shang-Chi challenged The Gorgon to single combat only to be cruelly beaten and tossed over the edge into the voidâ€¦

Simultaneously Nightmask, Hawkeye, Spider-Woman and Starbrand were dispatched to Velletai in Italy. When the town’s entire population vanished a Continental super-team was deployed, but soon after arrival contact was lost. Exactly the same thing happened with the Avengers team, too.

Under Velletai, the American squad found a City of the Dead where the restless departed all screamed inside Starbrand’s headâ€¦

At S.H.I.E.L.D. HQ Bruce Banner had deduced that the newly autonomous nation A.I.M. Island was the crux of the cluster of contemporary crises. He also realised the rogue state’s landmass was changing shape and size so Captain America sent in relative neophytes Bobby â€œSunspotâ€ Da Costa, Sam â€œCannonballâ€ Guthrie and alien hybrid Izzy â€œSmasherâ€ Kane (latest Superguardian of the Shi’ar Empire and granddaughter of Golden Age Earth hero Captain Terror) to investigate.

They were quickly captured and Smasher suborned to A.I.M.’s causeâ€¦

Scripted by Nick Spencer, Ascension collects issues #6-9 of Avengers World and Avengers #34.1 (spanning July to November 2014) and opens as a back-up team consisting of powerhouses Thor, Captain Marvel and Hyperion are teleported into A.I.M.’s capital city Barbuda by freshly recuperated new recruit Manifold. Illustrated by Marco Checchetto and colourist Andres Mossa, the action commences as a wave of A.I.M. warriors attackâ€¦

It is a bitter moment for Hyperion who was plucked from inter-dimensional limbo by the secret society’s Scientist Supreme Andrew Forson to spend an immeasurable time as an agonised guinea pig in the futuristic citadel. However it’s not his torment there that troubles him but the memory of having survived the death of two worlds and his new role as father-figure to a new race which developed in the distant Savage Land as the result of the recent Origin Bomb bombardmentâ€¦

As the battle intensifies distracted Hyperion blasts his way into the heart of Forson’s lab to find the Scientist Supreme again ripping open doors between dimensions and is astounded by the incredible offer the maniac has the sheer audacity to makeâ€¦

Before he can respond, however, the mind-warped Messenger (nee Smasher) intercepts and physically throws him off the island, with Thor and Marvel unceremoniously ejected in similar manner soon afterâ€¦

Stefano Caselli illustrates the next chapter as attention switches to Madripoor where Falcon, Wolverine and Black Widow are helpless to save the rioting population from their own destructive panic. The Airborne Avenger soars off to find the missing Shang-Chi but is lured off the steadily progressing dragon-island and meets a most unlikely band of alliesâ€¦

Smooth operator Xian Zheng rescued the defeated Shang after The Gorgon threw him off Madripoor with an astounding flying fortress dubbed The Circle but he is only the point man for a new direction in crisis-management by the Chinese Governmentâ€¦

The People’s Republic has formed its own covert peacekeeping force – S.P.E.A.R. – in response to S.H.I.E.L.D., but now employs a team of super-champions to deal with strictly Chinese problemsâ€¦

As an army of mystic warriors riding small dragons attacks The Circle, the spy chief activates The Ascendants – Weather Witch, Saber, Vector, Devastator and Sun Wukong, the Monkey King: demonstrating to Falcon and the watching world that the new China will take a back seat to no oneâ€¦

Checchetto returns to limn the third chapter set far below Velletai. When the mission went dark, S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Maria Hill circumvented the Avengers’ lack of mystic resource by seconding neophyte wizard Sebastian Druid to find out what was going on.

He divined that the site was a â€œspirit trapâ€ built by Entropy-worshipping Cult of Yagzan but now being used by a being of malign power, and as the tale resumes the kidnapped Starbrand meets it head onâ€¦

Control of the Dead City has been usurped by infernal Avengers’ arch-foe Morgan Le Fay and, as she crows over her immensely powerful juvenile captive, elsewhere Hawkeye, Spider-Woman and Nightmask battle revenant legions until fortuitously rescued by the team they came to saveâ€¦

Despite being cut off from the surface Euroforce was able to stay alive and gather intel for a counter attack and, although Swordswoman, Tumult, Sliver, Tiger and Mikhail Zamorska, the Baby Killer are strangers to the Avengers, their leader is not.

Black Knight Dane Whitman is an honoured past member of the World’s Mightiest Heroes who combines high tech weaponry with ancient magic. His take on the situation is crucial to the counterattack but despite the combined teams’ best efforts Le Fay makes her move and opens the doorway to doom in Zagreb, Munich, Madrid, Athens and Parisâ€¦

The ongoing series of extinction events reaches critical mass in #9 as Caselli illustrates ‘Operation Bar Fight’ which initially returns to Barbuda where Avengers Sunspot and Cannonball are being cosseted and feted by the A.I.M. in a vain – and expensive – attempt to â€œturnâ€ the mutants into willing adherents.

Everything changes when, aboard the S.H.I.E.L.D. helicarrier, Agent Phil Coulson finds a captured robotic Jocasta unit has spontaneously reactivated and begun dictating a message from the futureâ€¦

Forson’s incredible technological breakthroughs are the result of collaboration with a faction of A.I.M. based decades ahead of now and Tomorrow’s Tech Terrorists are funnelling future advancements to today for reasons S.H.I.E.L.D. can only guess.

Hill risks destroying Sunspot and Cannonball’s cover, contacting and ordering them to find Forson’s time machine and use it to glean useful data from the future.

Hill has always been worried by the young mutants’ cavalier attitudes and frat boy silliness, but never more so than now when the fate of humanity is in the hands of two hormonal idiots with no sense of self-preservationâ€¦

Luckily she has no idea just how serious the mission is as the lads materialise in a fantastic alien-populated metropolis where master assassin Taskmaster is waiting for themâ€¦

The killer might not need to do anything as the two goons hit a bar for a quick drink and manage to start a riot. Thankfully the time-linked Jocasta unit is there to save them and amidst a fusillade of blaster bursts she drags them to meet the real reason for their temporal jaunt.

Now all the danger-loving buffoons have to do is rescue five extremely dangerous and rebellious kids: the children of today’s greatest heroes collectively known as The Next Avengersâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

The chronal chronicles take a pause here, but the Fights ‘n’ Tights furore doesn’t end as this titanic tome closes with ‘The World in His Hands’ from Avengers #34.1 by Al Ewing, Dale Keown, Norman Lee & Jason Keith; taking a long hard look at extra-dimensional superman Hyperionâ€¦

Wrapped up in the tense search for a young boy abducted by a minor-league super-villain, the twice tragic history unfolds of a hero who is the last survivor of not only his ultra-advanced birthworld but also the alternate Earth which subsequently fostered and reared himâ€¦

More a collection of tantalising set-ups, introductions and prologues than an actual narrative adventure, this light confection of action and spectacle will nonetheless intrigue and astonish lovers of cosmic Costumed Dramas, and the tome also offers a potent covers-and-variants gallery by Neal Adams & Paul Mounts, Mark Brooks, Gabrielle Dell’Otto, Ryan Stegman & Edgar Delgado, Keown& Keith and Chris Bachalo.

Promising a stupendous clash and climactic conclusion (sometime, somewhere else) this is a book best appreciated by dedicated fans rather than occasional or casual readers, but if you’re a consumer with a little patience the eventual payoff that follows this collection will certainly be worth the waitâ€¦
Â© 2014 Marvel. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

January 14, 2015January 13, 2015

Avengers: Infinite Avengers

By Jonathan Hickman, Leinil Francis Yu, Gerardo Alanguilan & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-637-3

Following an unending string of universe-shattering crises, Iron Man Tony Stark and Steve â€œCaptain Americaâ€ Rogers swallowed old animosities and reunited to reshape The Avengers into a planetary defence-force more formal militia than voluntary association. Their new model army soon had more than twenty active members – human or alien and even some things less clear cut – whose specialities ranged from stealth and counter-intelligence to sheer, blockbusting stopping-power.

The posture and attitude also changed as the new group actively sought out potential disaster points rather than waiting for trouble to startâ€¦

Collecting Avengers volume 5 #29-34 (covering April to October 2014), the ongoing Big Picture series, as scripted by Jonathan Hickman with art by Leinil Francis Yu & Gerardo Alanguilan and additional colour work by Sonny Gho & Matt Milla, picks up a long-unfolding plot-thread and concludes an epic time-bending story-arc which also serves as an integral component of the vast Original Sin crossover eventâ€¦

As previously established, Reality is composed of discrete entire universes – from the near-identical to the radically different – all held apart by an infinite crimson underspace dubbed the Superflow. In recent times that immemorial barrier somehow began fragmenting, with the timeless celestial engineers who maintained it helpless to curtail the carnage. Now whenever an Earth drifts into contact with one of its doppelgangers the result is the destruction of at least one and usually bothâ€¦

On our Earth (Reality 616, if you’re counting) the world’s greatest minds – Stark, Reed Richards, Stephen Strange, Black Panther T’Challa, Inhuman king Black Bolt, Henry â€œThe Beastâ€ McCoy and Namor the Sub-Mariner – joined as a clandestine Star Chamber dubbed The Illuminati; devising and stockpiling weapons to ensure when and if such an event occurred, our world would the one to survive.

They invited Steve to join their council but when the unimaginable finally happened, his inflexible moral code baulked and he stopped his fellows deploying their planet-shattering ordnance against the intruder Earth.

Instead he used the incomprehensibly powerful totems known as the Infinity Gems to avert the crisis, but destroyed them in the processâ€¦

Knowing another incursion would inevitably occur, the cabal of geniuses returned to their original plans and, when the Sentinel of Liberty again objected, Stark had Dr. Strange tamper with his memories before kicking him out of the smart guys’ clubâ€¦

Now as ‘Infinite Avengers’ opens Rogers is suffering a plague of nightmares and begins to remember those Illuminati meetings he â€œnever attendedâ€â€¦

He recalls the power of the Infinity Stones pushing the invading Other-Earth back and ending the incursion. He sees them shatter again and experiences the fury of the other Illuminati but also notes something he missed then: the Time Gem did not shatter – it simply vanishedâ€¦

Awaking with his memories restored, the furious and morally-outraged Star-Spangled Avenger recruits Hawkeye and Black Widow and goes seeking redress. He is soon joined by Thor, Hyperion and newest member Starbrand who follow him without question as he tries to arrest Stark for treasonâ€¦

When justifying his position fails Iron Man resorts to physical resistance but, whilst the battle escalates, everything suddenly stalls as the Time Gem suddenly appears and finally shatters, yanking everybody 48 years into tomorrowâ€¦

The drama resumes ‘Fifty into the Future’ as the time tossed former team-mates materialise and start fighting again. It takes the sudden intervention of a squad of contemporary superheroes including aged iterations of Hawkeye and Hyperion and a young female Starbrand to stop the warâ€¦

The oldest members of the Avengers Union have urgent advice for their earlier selves and the ancient archer also has a secret message for Steve which the dotard delivers before attempting to kill Stark in a fit of righteous fury. As the heroes pull him off the wounded technocrat, fragments of the Time Gem reappear, drawing Stark and the young Hawkeye back to their original time whilst pushing Cap, the Widow, Thor, Starbrand and Hyperion ‘500 into the Future’â€¦

Earth 422 years from their origin point is a disturbingly alien place but once again the unwilling chrononauts are greeted by a new and callously arrogant iteration of Avengers, including an aging Thor who is no longer worthy to hold the magic hammer Mjolnir.

Easily overcome, the time-travelling team are quickly imprisoned and that era’s Captain America cruelly taunts the icon he has been compelled by The State to mimic.

Steve is horrified to discover that implacable Avengers enemy and prime Artificial Intelligence Ultron infests every aspect of this forlorn tomorrow and cannot resist as his counterpart implants some appalling weapon within him, intended to attack the future.

No sooner is it buried within him than the Time Gem again draws its victims back into â€œFractured Temporal Spaceâ€, dispatching Thor and Hyperion back whilst propelling Steve, Starbrand and Black Widow ‘Five Thousand into the Future’â€¦

Awaiting them in paradisiacal gardens 5045 years from their own time is super-psionic Franklin Richards (immortal son of the Fantastic Four‘s Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Woman).

The sweet boy they all know has become a near-omniscient being and reveals to them the astounding changes in the solar system and humanity itself. He also has the answers to the Earth-incursion crisis and some crucial advice to solve the 21^st century team’s internecine strifeâ€¦

Franklin then asks Cap for the message Hawkeye had given him so long ago, but before the Avenger’s further questions can be addressed the Gem returns, hurling the Widow and Starbrand back and pushing the solitary last avenger ‘Fifty Thousand into the Future’â€¦

In an incredible automated revolution the planet has become a sentient whole: a Worldcore which questions and challenges the time-lost primitive before attempting to inhume him into their perfect community of â€œIdeology Made Actionâ€.

As Captain America valiantly resists, a battalion of distressingly familiar conceptual Avengers manifest and the electronic infection implanted within him in Planet Ultron’s era activates. As a result the coldly perfect tomorrow dies and, aware that his life is now over, the Sentinel of Liberty slips unresisting back into Fractured Temporal Space but is saved by the last person he ever expectedâ€¦

Or at least a distant descendant, as ‘The Last Avenger’ sees the teenaged Young Avenger Kang – clad in Iron Lad armour – brings the weary warrior to the end of time to join the boy’s older selves Kang The Conqueror and Immortus. All three products of chronal multiplicity, temporal divergence and fractured time are claiming to be Earth’s last Avengersâ€¦

After extracting and capturing the wildly reacting Time Gem they give the unyielding Super-Soldier the answers he’s been seemingly forever looking for, but when they demand that, after Steve returns to his time, he allow the Illuminati to destroy any Earth caught in an incursion, they make a fatal errorâ€¦

Captain America will always find a noble, ethical solution and after escaping back to his origin era he begins to implement it by declaring war on the smartest heroes on Earth.

To Be Continuedâ€¦

Cosmically complex, conceptually challenging, confounding and ultimately cataclysmic, this collection also offers a plethora of astounding covers-and-variants by Frank Cho & Jason Keith, Leinil Yu & Gho, Stephanie Hans and Paulo Manuel Rivera plus a potent portion of digitally-diverting extra content for tech-savvy consumers courtesy of AR icon sections all accessible through a free digital code and the Marvel Comics app for iPhoneÂ®, iPadÂ®, iPad TouchÂ® & Android devices at Marvel’s Digital Comics Shop.

Vast in scope, suspenseful, compelling and superbly illustrated Infinite Avengers is the kind of comicbook blockbuster aficionados adore but its only fair to warn that casual readers might be best served by reading previous volumes before taking in this particular Fights ‘n’ Tights Celestial Conundrumâ€¦
â„¢ and Â© 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

January 9, 2015January 10, 2015

Inhuman: Genesis

By Charles Soule, Ryan Stegman, Joe Madureira, Marte Gracia & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-623-6

During mega-crossover blockbuster Infinity, mad Titan Thanos invaded Earth and clashed with The Inhumans‘ ruler Black Bolt. The almighty monarchs wrestled to a standstill and, as a last resort, the embattled Inhuman king crashed the flying city of Attilan onto New York and into the Hudson River. This act was simultaneously linked to a release of the Hidden People’s mutagenic Terrigen Mist into the atmosphere where it triggered mutation in millions.

Follow-up event Inhumanity traced the effects of that global inundation as millions of mortals were killed or transformed by Terrigen fallout, proving that Human and Inhuman were not necessarily different racesâ€¦

The Inhumans came into existence 25,000 years ago, after Imperial Kree explorers landed on Earth and tampered with the genetics of a tribe of primitives, just as they had on hundreds of other worlds.

Millennia later Randac, one of the rulers of the intellectual super-race that subsequently developed, took that meddling to its ultimate end by devising the Terrigen Mist process, which enabled citizens to mutate into infinitely unique individuals of astounding power.

The measure originally met with much opposition and many citizens of Attilan quit the city forever, setting up their own isolated enclaves and increasingly interbreeding with their less evolved cousins.

Even as Inhumans retreated further into myth, isolation and dogma, and lately moved away from earth to carve place in the wild voids of deep space, their alien-altered genetic heritage was slowly spreading and disseminating throughout baseline humankind.

Now the Terrigen cloud slowly mixing with the biosphere has activated all those dormant genes, metamorphosing unsuspected millions into new lives and forms.

All this came to the attention of global guardians The Avengers when Inhuman royal diplomat Karnak became their unlikely prisoner. In comfortable custody, the wily warrior described the last moments of the mobile metropolis, how his people evacuated the doomed city and passed en masse through the chimerical living teleport door Eldrac; scattered to the place that living portal deemed they â€œmost needed to beâ€â€¦

Whilst Karnak ruminated, his cousin Queen Medusa arrived. Believing herself widowed and facing the shattering burden of saving her people without the aid of the messianic Black Bolt, she was further shaken when her ferociously logic-enslaved kinsman continued his evaluations and calculations until, suddenly arriving at an inescapable conclusion he simply would not abide, he killed himself before her eyesâ€¦

Since that moment Medusa and the world’s metahuman heroes have sought to contain the crisis, but the rise of many factions – from criminal scientists and exploitative geneticists to full-blooded rogue Inhumans (like exiled former king The Unspoken) – all seeking to monopolise the transformative pods and super-powered â€œNuHumansâ€ are making the task increasingly difficult.

The job is even further complicated by the recent emergence of clandestine Inhuman colonies which have hidden themselves from both humanity and the denizens of Attilan for thousand of years also seeking to steal or recruit their share of the exposed and mutated new peopleâ€¦

Collecting Inhuman #1-6 (from June 2013 to November 2014), the epic Genesis of a race in crisis resumes as Queen Medusa struggles to integrate the many scattered factions of Attilan Inhuman, returning – and often hostile – â€œlost tribesâ€ and burgeoning NuHumans into a united whole.

The tale of ‘The Queen in the Sky’ by writer Charles Soule, illustrators Ryan Stegman & Joe Madureira and colourist Marte Gracia begins in Bergen as the Terrigen cloud forever changes another horrified mortal, whilst in New York Medusa is informed that long-missing Eldrac has been finally locatedâ€¦

Back in Norway Nuhuman Kristian is shaken from shock by a wild creature named Lash who offers his own skewed and biased take on Inhuman history and a lethally partisan doctrine of survival worthiness. The ferocious judge hails from the clandestine enclave of Orrolan and believes that only the truly deserving should benefit from the blessing of Terrigen transformationâ€¦

In Battery Park the Queen patiently negotiates with S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who have mistaken Eldrac for a piece of rubble. That done she then passes through his psychically-triggered portal to land in Illinois in the middle of a firefightâ€¦

She is just in time to save pregnant Gabriela, her brother-in-law Dante and the ghastly cocoon-pod which used to be their mother from Lash’s murderous attack. The Darwinian scourge of NuHumans is delighted to be held at bay by Dante’s furious flame-throwing abilities and chooses to withdraw instead of facing the furious Medusaâ€¦

The next chapter finds Dante and family safely ensconced in the remains of Attilan where it rests as the Hudson River’s latest island and resisting the urgings and insistent probings of Inhuman surgeon Vinatos. The short-tempered doctor is unable to make these latest converts understand that their mother has failed transformation and simply died within her cocoonâ€¦

There is a more urgent matter to be addressed, however. Dante’s tendency to explode into uncontrollable flammable fury is posing a danger to all and Medusa assigns her cousin and chief warlord Gorgon to teach the boy control.

His methods are brutal but extremely effectiveâ€¦

Gabriela is a problem less easily handled. Although she has not – apparently – been affected by the Mist cloud, her unborn baby hasâ€¦

As Medusa entertains human envoy Captain America – visiting the tiny sovereign state in a friendly and not-at-all official capacity – in Brooklyn former gangster Lineage rehearses for his own impromptu audience. He feels his newly gained ability to glean knowledge from anybody he shares DNA with – ancient or modern – will be of great interest to the embattled queen, but will have to wait as news comes in that A.I.M. agents are attempting to confiscate a fragment of Attilan from Central Parkâ€¦

The bloody battle is mercifully brief once she and the Sentinel of Liberty join forces to end the murderous endeavourâ€¦

In the aftermath the Queen uses her people’s advanced technology to broadcast a message to the world inviting everyone touched by Terrigen transformation to become part of the new nation of Attilan, but her big day out ends on a shocking note when Lineage finally approaches with hints of much-missed husband Black Bolt’s intentions at the moment he instigated the Terrigen releaseâ€¦

Issue #3 finds Lash back in Orrolan with a boy named Jason: someone who has survived his first test of worthiness. The lad is then introduced to other super-powered residents but cannot help wonder what their uncompromising mentor’s final game plan isâ€¦

In Attilan Dante’s training is going well and Gabby suggests that his new Inhuman name should be â€œInfernoâ€. The title seems to inspire him and he begs to be allowed to join the secret squad Medusa is leading against Lashâ€¦

The surprise invasion of Orrolan is shockingly sudden and the subsequent battle savage and short. Jason – AKA Flint – exacts massive damage through his control of stone and rock, but the Queen’s goal is not conquest but union. When Lash hears what Lineage has to say he reluctantly withdraws his opposition to her plans and ruleâ€¦

With Lash’s charges now part of the constantly-expanding population of Attilan, the next chapter sees the introduction of enigmatic seeker â€œReaderâ€ who spectacularly saves young Nuhuman Xiaoyi from a division of Chinese soldiers rooting out potential â€œsecurity threatsâ€ to the People’s Republic.

Whilst that’s occurring, on Attilan island thunder god Thor is on hand when Medusa opens the borders to human tourists and traders. The event almost ends in a bloodbath when assassins try to kill her, but after the Avenger and Inferno apprehend the shooters only the queen is unsurprised to find her assailants are all NuHumansâ€¦

As Lineage works behind the scenes, cautiously ingratiating himself to anybody of potential use to him, Medusa experiences a massive shock when her nation’s greatest monster resurfaces with an astounding demandâ€¦

Long ago Black Bolt and his cousins Medusa, Gorgon and Karnak impossibly overthrew the reigning king – the most powerful Inhuman ever born. The monarch had overstepped his authority and stole the race’s most puissant weapon, the Terrigen-fuelled Slave Engine.

The device was created to balance the scales should the teeming hordes of humanity ever attack the pitifully small race of outcasts, but the complacent and too-soft King deemed it an abomination; stealing and hiding it from his fellows.

Although defeated and banished he would not return it, and for his crime his name was stricken from all records and was forever â€œUnspokenâ€. When he returned in recent times all pretence of nobility was abandoned and he tried to eradicate humanity and conquer the worldâ€¦

The story resumes here and now in ‘Empty Throne’ as the villain – now wizened, aged and powerless – repeats an offer of marriage to Medusa, declaring his right and ability to lead the Inhumans to glory. When that ploy fails he tries to convince the appalled and still grieving Medusa that he knows where vanished Black Bolt isâ€¦

Across the water in Greenwich Village Inferno is listening to Jason’s incredible life story. The African boy had been adopted by American parents but only learned after the Terrigen outbreak that he had been born into one lost tribe of Inhumans and brought to the USA by another. By the time Lash found him Jason was the only survivor of the body-warping falloutâ€¦

Medusa knows that the fallen king’s true purpose is to ferret out any remaining Terrigen to restore his faded powers and locks the audacious scoundrel up. It is exactly what The Unspoken intended and he uses his ages-old technical knowledge of the fallen city to uncover one last stash of the miracle crystals and take overâ€¦

When Dante, Jason and new NuHuman friend Naja try to return to Attilan they are brusquely turned away by armed guards. Realising something bad is happening and desperate to get back to Gabby, Inferno leads a three-person commando raid and, with the aid of Dr. Vinatos, succeeds in tipping the balance back in Medusa’s favour in a brutal ‘Trial by Fire’.

The cost however is both tragic and horrificâ€¦

With the Unspoken securely imprisoned, Lineage again begins his games within games, secretly taunting the defeated usurper with stolen Terrigen crystals as he reveals that he truly knows where Black Bolt isâ€¦ and who’s got himâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

Blending themes of growth and alienation with hearty slices of excessive action and political intrigue, Inhuman: Genesis also offers a gallery of 11 covers-&-variants by Stegman, Madureira, Gracia, Jeff Scott Campbell, Humberto Ramos and Ed McGuinness, and comes with a selection of digital extras accessible via the AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses once you download the free code from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet.

Suspenseful, dramatic, action-packed and brandishing a potent metaphorical message, this is a compelling and entertaining slice of Fights ‘n’ Tights fiction to satisfy the most jaded comicbook palates.

<br />

January 5, 2015January 4, 2015

Hulk: Banner D.O.A.

By Mark Waid, Mark Bagley, Andrew Hennessy & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-619-9

Once upon a time, Robert Bruce Banner was merely a military scientist accidentally caught in a gamma-bomb blast of his own devising. As a result, any undue stress could cause him to transform into a gigantic green monster of unimaginable strength and fury.

As both occasional hero and bombastic brute he rampaged across the landscape for decades, becoming one of comics’ most popular characters and most enduring multi-media titans.

Over the years he has undergone numerous radical changes in scope, character and format to keep his stories fresh and his exploits explosively compelling, whilst the number of gamma-galvanised grotesqueries crashing about the Marvel Universe has proliferated to inconceivable proportions.

The days of Bruce going green with anger at the drop of a hat are long gone, so anybody taking their cues from TV or movie incarnations would be wise to anticipate a smidgen of unavoidable confusionâ€¦

In a world of numerous Hulks, She-Hulks, Abominations and every kind of ancillary colour-swatched atomic berserker, the MarvelNOW! event saw the Jade Giant reinvented in a stripped-down, back-to-basics but startlingly original manner which energised new and old fans alike.

The big change occurred after S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Maria Hill was â€œpersuadedâ€ to provide perennial fugitive Banner with resources and funding in order to sanitise his devastated scientific reputation. In return Hill could call on the Hulk as a living weapon of last resortâ€¦

One of the smartest men on Earth, Banner had lost years of success, progress and peer renown whilst trying to cure himself of the Hulk. Concerned about his legacy, the fugitive genius had at last decided to make his future headlines as a scientist, not a shattering force of nature – for as long as he could possible manage – rather than fruitlessly seek to cure his affliction. Additionally, in return for S.H.I.E.L.D. science labs and trained assistants, the beleaguered boffin would give the spy agency first use of his discoveries and inventionsâ€¦

Despite the occasional catastrophic aberration now and then, the arrangement proved a success and both Banner and his emerald other became valued assets of the global peacekeeping force and key components of the latest assemblage of Mighty Avengers. However, after facing an escalating string of string of crises – the latest of which involved sinister scientific maverick Ted Goodrich and his reactivated rogue think-tank The Enclave – Banner was assassinatedâ€¦

This volume (collecting Hulk #1-4, published from June-August 2014) picks up the tale as S.H.I.E.L.D. agents forcibly second brilliant neurosurgeon Dr. Aaron Carpenter for a top secret medical emergency.

The opening of 4-part saga ‘Who Shot the Hulk’ finds the medical wizard cautiously operating on old college associate Banner; marvelling at the precision needed to shoot someone in the brain twice and not kill them whilst simultaneously terrified that his slightest misstep could unleash the monster withinâ€¦

As Carpenter works other teams finishing harvesting gamma-infused flesh, blood and other biological samples but he only begins to suspect something is awry when the shadow-enshrouded lead operative instructs him to implant a device which will allow the Hulk to be controlled like a weapon.

â€¦And then the mystery-man admits that they are not S.H.I.E.L.D. agents at allâ€¦

Thankfully the decision to connect the device is taken out of Carpenter’s hands when one of his surgical team allows Banner to awaken and the furious Hulk manifestsâ€¦

As chaos ensues the impostors attempt to kill everybody but the Gamma Goliath is unstoppable. In the resulting carnage the medics all escape but the villains vanishâ€¦

Two weeks later genuine S.H.I.E.L.D. operatives Maria Hill and Phil Coulson track down a â€œJohn Doeâ€ in a rural hospital and are apprised of the long-missing Bruce Banner’s condition. One of the three smartest men on Earth is physically fine but irrevocably brain damagedâ€¦

The story picks up as Hill and Coulson pursue a fruitless task in trying to determine who shot, abducted and tried to weaponise the Hulk. The list is too long to contemplate but, even as they ponder, the mystery-man is using Banner’s bio-samples to resurrect the one old foe S.H.I.E.L.D. have confidently crossed off their listâ€¦

Meanwhile in Hightown, Colorado Reverend and Ms. Bassey are caring for their severely impaired grandson Bobby. They are particularly careful to never let him become overly frustrated or angry. Later, however, when a pack of bullies target the simpleton things get exceedingly strange as the thugs are suddenly surrounded by heavily armed agents and the truth comes outâ€¦

No sooner is Banner’s covert protective custody exposed than another crisis erupts and Hill is forced to actually brutalise the child-like man and rouse the Hulk within. The reason becomes clear when definitely deceased gamma monster The Abomination smashes into the town like a missile. Their enigmatic evil enemy has resurrected the creature using Banner’s DNA, unleashing a radioactive zombie programmed to hunt and destroy its debilitated nemesisâ€¦

As the enraged jade juggernauts wade into each other and subsequently raze the town, Hill realises it’s only a feint when masked soldiers phase through the walls in a sneak attackâ€¦

In the third episode Hill, despite easily defeating the ghost warriors, loses control of the overall situation when The Avengers, alerted by the escalating catastrophe in Colorado, storm in to rescue their long-missing comrade. Amidst a blockbusting battle Banner appears, with very little sign of ever having been lobotomised by bullets.

His recovered intellect doesn’t stay long and he quickly destabilises into confusion, fear and worse. As the Avengers struggle to stop the gamma-zombie, Hill realises Hulk’s gamma-charged rapid-healing abilities are restoring Banner’s brain but not his mind and warns Bruce that if he fully transforms his personality might be erased forever.

With the Avengers utterly unable to slow Abomination’s attack, Banner has only one choice to makeâ€¦

The final chapter opens with a flashback to the moment Banner first convinced Hill to let him join S.H.I.E.L.D. It involved blackmail and the placing of incriminating time-sensitive files with ferociously independent lawyer Matt Murdock – AKA Daredevil – to ensure that if anything happened to the fugitive physicist everybody would sufferâ€¦

Back in the now, with hell unleashed in Hightown, the Hulk finds an unbeatable advantage and destroys the undead Abomination, seemingly dooming Banner forever. When the dust settles the Avengers claim the debilitated victor and Iron Man swears to save his childhood intellectual rival. Some time later, through use of the most dangerous and proscribed bio-technology available, he seemingly succeedsâ€¦

As Hill reaches an unhappy accommodation with Daredevil, in Tony Stark‘s futuropolis Troy one troubling question remains unanswered. Although apparently restored to rational brilliance, there is still a troubling doubt about the rapidly recovering patient. What cost has the biologically potent remedy had on the traumatised mind and battered soul within? Can Banner possibly be the same man he was before?

To Be Continuedâ€¦

Sporting a stack of AR icons (Marvel’s Augmented Reality App featuring printed portals to online story bonuses and extras for everyone who downloaded the free software from marvel.com onto a smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet) and a Baker’s Dozen of covers-&-variants by Jerome OpeÃ±a, Dean White, Bagley, Jason Keith, Michael Del Mundo, Chris Samnee, Gerald Parel, Mike Grell & Skottie Young, this razor-sharp, tension-soaked, blisteringly action-packed and astonishingly compelling read offers a fantastic new beginning for one of Marvel’s oldest and greatest star turns.

This fresh and exciting epic brilliantly mixes astounding adventure with clever characterisation and an addictive excess of furious Fights ‘n’ Tights spectacle into a tale no comics fan could possibly resist.
â„¢ & Â© 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

December 30, 2014December 29, 2014

The Ultimates volume 1: Super-Human

By Mark Millar, Bryan Hitch, Andrew Currie & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-0960-0

After Marvel’s financial problems and creative impasse in the late 1990s, the company took stock, braced itself and came back swinging. A critical new concept was the remodelling and modernising of their core characters for the new youth culture.

The Ultimate imprint abandoned monumental continuity – which had always been Marvel’s greatest asset – to re-imagine major characters in their own self-sufficient universe, offering varying degrees of radical makeover to appeal to the contemporary 21st century audience and offer them a chance to get in on the ground floor.

These revised star concepts all sported fresh, fashionable, modernistic, scientifically feasible rationales for all those insane super-abilities and freaks manifesting everywhereâ€¦

The nervy publishing experiment began in 2000 with a post-modern take on the Ultimate Spider-Man. Ultimate X-Men followed in 2001, and the Mighty Avengers were radically refashioned into The Ultimates in 2002 with Ultimate Fantastic Four finally and officially joining the party in 2004.

Creepy vigilante Spider-Man was still Peter Parker but now the secrets of the high-school geek – brilliant but bullied by his physical superiors – were shared with certain loved ones. The world was increasingly plagued by mutants: a dangerous, oppressed ethnic minority scaring the pants off the ordinary Americans they hid amongst.

The still clandestine Fantastic Four were two science nerds and their dim pals transformed by a science accident into monsters, and global peacekeeping militia S.H.I.E.L.D. had a UN mandate to keep a wary eye on anything or -body regarded as extraordinary.

The stories, design and even tone of the heroes were retooled for the perceived-as-different tastes of a more mature readership: those tired of or unwilling to stick with precepts originated by inspirational founding fathers Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and Stan Lee, or (hopefully) new consumers unprepared or unwilling to deal with five decades (seven if you include Golden Age Timely tales retroactively co-opted into the mix) of interconnected story baggage.

This new universe quickly prospered and soon filled up with more refashioned, morally ambiguous heroes and villains but eventually even this darkly nihilistic new universe became as continuity-constricted as its ancestor.

Eventually, in 2008, imprint-wide decluttering exercise â€œUltimatumâ€ culminated in a reign of terror which excised dozens of superhumans and millions of lesser mortals in a devastating tsunami which inundated Manhattan, courtesy of mutant menace Magnetoâ€¦

Long before that, however, the third reinvention to win a (semi) regular series was The Ultimates and this slim volume collects the first stunning story-arc (spanning March-August 2002), revealing the less-than-noble motives behind forming the team whilst scrutinising the pitifully flawed individuals who will eventually comprise the squadâ€¦

Written by Mark Millar with art by Bryan Hitch & Andrew Currie, it all begins in 1945 with ‘Super-Human’ as Captain America leads an American Army raid on an impregnable Nazi base in Iceland.

Steve Rogers has been chemically remade into the perfect warrior. The grimly uncompromising symbol of freedom is the only successful result of a project to create super-soldiers but has turned the tide in numerous battles across the war torn world. Now, with combat companion Bucky Barnes and a battalion of doomed men, he races to stop a prototype atomic missile aimed at the heart of the Land of the Free.

Too late to prevent the hell-weapon’s launch, the valiant crusader clings to the missile and suicidally brings it down over the polar seas, saving the world and passing into legendâ€¦

And in 2002, at the top of Mount Everest, controversial industrialist Tony Stark makes a decision that will change his world foreverâ€¦

The second chapter begins right now in New York City following the devastating rampage of a monstrous Hulk. Robert Bruce Banner had been working on recreating the super-soldier formula for years but had only succeeded in turning himself into an unstoppable horror of unrepressed rage which tore the city apart and terrified the teeming masses of the world

Now his boss – S.H.I.E.L.D. supremo Nick Fury – approaches the supposedly cured and recuperating Banner regarding a long-term plan to create a state-controlled team of metahumans to face the uncertainties of the rapidly changing world. Banner had been in charge of the R&D, but now Fury is bringing in a despised rival over him to lead the projectâ€¦

At the Super-Soldier Research Facility in Pittsburgh biologist Henry Pym and his wife Janet Van Dyne are celebrating their promotions. Pym has already demonstrated devices that allow him to control insects but his greatest success is Jan herself.

She can reduce her size, grow wings and fire devastating stings. The arrogant scientist can’t wait to laud all his new ideas for superhumans over Bannerâ€¦

Back in the Big Apple Stark is exulting in his new Iron Man armour and discussing his upcoming role in the slowly coalescing team S.H.I.E.L.D. super-team with Fury.

At S.H.I.E.L.D.’s new HQ – the Triskelion – Pym smugly confronts his disgraced and fallen rival before demonstrating his newest triumph by growing extremely ‘Big’â€¦

Relegated to the fruitless and seemingly impossible dead-end task of recreating the original super-soldier serum, Banner’s self-respect takes another agonising knock after hearing how a Stark deep sea expedition has recovered the still living body of Captain Americaâ€¦

’21^st Century Boy’ opens with Pym testing his abilities in his new costumed identity as Giant Man before switching scenes to the Triskelion where Banner and Fury’s interview with Steve Rogers goes catastrophically awry. Only Pym’s last minute intervention stops the revived and disbelieving hero from trashing the entire baseâ€¦

With Fury as his guide Rogers slowly reconciles to life decades after he â€œdiedâ€, but visiting the aged and dying Bucky (who married Steve’s fiancÃ©e after he was lost) and his own parents’ graves only fills him the ultimate warrior with apathy. It takes a direct request from the current President to convince Captain America to join Fury’s growing squadron of metahumansâ€¦

In ‘Thunder’, as Jan helps Steve adapt to the everyday shocks of living in the future, Fury pursues his last selection for the team. However Thor is utterly unlike the others, free from ambition, patriotism or informed self-interest. The libertarian rebel, radical activist and anti-capitalist hippie claims to be an actual god and wants nothing to do with state-sponsored fascismâ€¦

Frustrated, Fury returns home in time to be drawn into a session of badinage and mockery aimed at the now-redundant Banner and his new team’s lack of anybody to fight. The chinwagging is overheard by the crushed scientist who subsequently uses Rogers’ blood samples to amp up his own chemical concoctions. Before long the monster is loose again and providing the PR opportunity The Ultimates have been begging forâ€¦

‘Hulk Does Manhattan’ finds the mismatched and woefully unprepared team chasing the terrifying engine of destruction as he catastrophically tears through the city, but they are no match for the beast until Thor – ever-mindful of the harm inflicted upon innocent mortals – explosively and unexpectedly joins the fightâ€¦

This first outing then ends on a disturbingly dark note as Thor, Rogers and Stark have a frank and distressing discussion of their possible futures even as ‘Giant Man vs. The Wasp’ exposes the toxic relationship of the apparently perfect metahuman couple.

As the lovers’ argument escalates, the true secret of Jan’s powers is exposed, things are said which can’t be unsaid and the domestic dispute explodes into wilful murderâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

With a cover-&-variants gallery by Hitch, Currie & Paul Mounts, this fascinatingly slick and cynical saga offers a sharp and sinister entrÃ©e into one of Marvel’s other Universes that will impress open-minded vintage fans of the medium just as much as the newcomers they were ostensibly aiming for. Moreover, if you’re a fan of Marvel’s movie enterprises, this is one of the tales that most resemble â€“ and, indeed, informed – them, so you should be right at homeâ€¦
Â© 2002, 2005 Marvel Characters Inc. All rights reserved.

December 27, 2014June 17, 2014

House of M

By Brian Michael Bendis, Olivier Coipel, Tim Townsend & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-1721-6

When mutant Avenger the mutant Scarlet Witch married the android Vision they conceived – through the agency of magic and Wanda Maximoff”s undiagnosed ability to reshape reality – twin boys.

Over the course of time it was revealed that her sons were not real and, as the years passed, the shock of that revelation slowly drove her insane.

After tipping completely over the edge Wanda engineered the destruction of her other family – the vast and varied assemblage of the Avengers – orchestrating the death of her former husband and some of their oldest friends.

The World’s Mightiest Heroes were shut down and rebooted in a highly controversial storyline known as Avengers Disassembled, which resulted in the formation of both The New and Young Avengers. That publishing event also spilled over into the solo titles of team members and affiliated comicbooks such as the Fantastic Four and Spectacular Spider-Man, which all ran parallel story-arcs to accompany the main attraction.

The tale told of the worst day in the Avenger’s history as the Witch manipulated people and events: betraying her oldest, closest companions and causing the destruction of everything they held dear. The chaos-storm was only ended when mystic master Doctor Strange and mutant patriarch Charles Xavier took the dazed and crazed Wandainto their personal protective care.

This follow-up company crossover conjunction – by Brian Michael Bendis, Olivier Coipel & Tim Townsend and released originally and primarily as an 8-issue miniseries from August to November 2005 – saw reality rewritten again when Wanda apparently had another major lapse in concentration; reformatting history such that Homo Superior now dominated a society where mere humans (â€œsapiensâ€) were an acknowledged evolutionary dead-end living out their lives and destined for extinction within two generations.

Moreover her true father Magneto ruled the mutants; regal head of a glorious dynasty which exerted political control over the entire planet.

It took a dedicated band of heroes and a great deal of luck to put that genie back in a bottle, but the repercussions of the repair job were both profound and world-changingâ€¦

Re-presenting the core fortnightly miniseries House of M, and The Pulse: Special Edition, this collection also contains covers and variants by Esad Ribic, Joe Quesada & Danny Miki, Terry & Rachel Dodson, John Cassaday, Brandon Peterson, Mike McKone, Greg Land & Matt Ryan, Salvador Larroca, Chris Bachalo, Joe Madureira, Tim Townsend & Olivier Coipel, and The Pulse – an inspired 12 page faux issue of M-world’s top mutant gossip mag, which offers engaging and pertinent snippets of congruent stories in other titlesâ€¦

Following a handy scene-setting recap page the drama begins in devastated former mutant homeland Genosha, where Xavier is at last forced to admit that his psychic surgeries are not helping Wanda.

The desire to restore her non-existent children is too strong and the traumatised Scarlet Witch constantly tinkers with reality to make her dreams real. After much impassioned debate with her despondent father Magneto and brother Quicksilver, Professor X finally weighs up the horrific potential consequences and considers other optionsâ€¦

Meanwhile in New York Wonder Man, Ms. Marvel and The Falcon visit the New Avengers at Stark Tower preparatory to the latest assemblage going public. Thus they are on hand when the X-Men come calling: rallied by Xavier to discuss the final fate and disposition of the Scarlet Witch.

In Genosha her father and brother argue on: one seeing no option but the final sanction and the other determined that Wanda must not die.

Opinion is just as divided amongst Avengers and X-Men. Unable to reach a decision, the huge group opt to visit Wanda and try to get through to her one last time.

By the time they reach Genosha she has vanished. Fearing the world might end at any second they frantically search until they are all consumed by a blinding lightâ€¦

The second chapter begins in a very different New York, where decrepit nonagenarian war hero Steve Rogers draws a well deserved pension, millionaire celebrity Peter Parker, his wife Gwen, son Richie and close relatives May and Ben Parker all live in lofty luxury and teeming billions of mutants run the world, safeguarded and policed by colossal robotic Sentinelsâ€¦

All the heroes who sought out the Witch now live perfect lives that match their deepest, most secret hearts’ desires, but there is a painful undercurrent of tension amongst the rapidly declining, soon to be extinct Homo Sapiensâ€¦

Wolverine awakes screaming. His greatest desire has always been to recover his lost memories: destroyed and discarded by more than a century of brainwashing, mind-wiping and intervention by a succession of sinister enemies. As consciousness returns he remembers everything.

Especially how a moment ago the world was completely differentâ€¦

In this new universe he is leader of an elite team of mutant peacekeepers. The Red Guard are the prime enforcers of the House of M and agents of the Royal Family of Magneto: de facto rulers of Earth.

Appalled he leaps from the ominous floating aircraft carrier dominating New York and plunges to Earthâ€¦

Healing factor in overdrive he then lurches through the streets of the city searching for Xavier and a solution to this insurmountable problem. Hard on his heels are his former subordinates in the Red Guard, all convinced their formerly ruthlessly rational commander has gone crazy.

In his frantic flight, the desperate fugitive stumbles into other-world old comrade Luke Cage who is, in this place, a cunning gangster leading a band of human rebels fighting mutant oppression. Shockingly, amongst his motley crew is masked archer Hawkeye – one of the cruellest casualties of the Scarlet Witch’s first killing spreeâ€¦

Playing with his grandchild in the idyllic paradise of Genosha, Magneto is unaccountably troubled at the perfection of his existence even as, in New York, Sentinels track and attack Cage’s â€œHuman Avengersâ€. Thanks to teleporter Cloak, Wolverine and a few of the gang escape, taking with them a strange little girl named Layla Miller.

She is a mutant and amongst her arcane and undisclosed power-set is the ability to reawaken a person’s memories of the world Wanda overwroteâ€¦

Convinced Magneto used his crazy daughter to remake the world to his advantage, Wolverine is exultant to have a weapon to offset all the dictator’s advantages and with Cage begins tracking down and restoring former allies.

The game plan remains unchanged: find Xavier and use his telepathic powers to force the Witch to restore the real world.

In Genosha, meanwhile, Magneto again finds himself drawn to the simple tomb of his greatest friend and occasional enemy Charlesâ€¦

The next stage in Wolverine’s campaign is to use his now restored and grimly determined Avenger and X-Men allies to take control of the Helicarrier dominating New York, piloting it to Genosha and engaging the House ofÂ M’s forces as Layla works her own special mutant magic and reawakened mystic master Stephen Strange attempts to deal with Wandaâ€¦

Throughout the horrifying ordeal everybody involved has assumed that Magneto made his daughter reorder reality to suit his dark ambitions, but the magician’s confrontation shockingly reveals a different hand and motive behind the grand change and, as the universe begins to unravel once more, the appalled and furious Master of Magnetism unleashes his own power against the traitor who betrayed his friends, family, species and planetâ€¦

â€¦And at the heart of the chaos and carnage Wanda Maximoff, whether at the peak of her madness or in a chilling moment of clarity, utters three little words.

â€œNo more Mutantsâ€â€¦

Dawn breaks on New York City and all the battered participants at the centre of the apocalyptic struggle awake in their own – as far as they know – proper beds. For those that remember, the world seems back to its true state, but when the shell-shocked protagonists gather together to compare notes they realise some things don’t jibe.

Wolverine still has all the memories of his long and previously clouded life; Wanda has utterly vanished again; there is evidence that Hawkeye might be alive again and, most unbelievable of all, the almost one million members of the mutant sub-species are now just humanâ€¦

Across the Earth less than 200 super-powered Homo Superior remain. Governments are scrabbling to process the fact and form policies whilst the pedagogues of the religious right claim God has smitten the unclean and exhort decent – human – men and women to finish the good workâ€¦

Scientist Henry Pym has an even more chilling warning. Reminding us of Einstein’s dictum â€œEnergy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only be changed from one form to anotherâ€, he ominously ponders on where all the powers, radiations and assorted exotic energies formerly wielded by the ex-mutant population have goneâ€¦

Although Marvel continuity was skilfully interwoven throughout the event, this particular tale stands alone perfectly without any need to refer to the many attendant miniseries: offering an engaging, fast-paced thriller brimming with tension and stuffed with bombastic spectacle.

House of M is an action-packed, spectacular adventure that will delight lovers of epic Fights ‘n’ Tights fantasy and beguile casual readers looking for an easy but enthralling entry into the madcap world of Costumed Dramas.
Â© 2005, 2006 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

December 1, 2014

Guardians of the Galaxy: Guardians Disassembled

By Brian Michael Bendis, Dan Slott, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, Nick Bradshaw , Jason Masters, Todd Nauk, Cameron Stewart, David Marquez, Michael Oeming , Paolo Siqueira, Ronan Cliquet de Oliveira, Phil Jimenez, Dexter Soy, Gerardo Sandoval & others (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-636-6

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Fabulous Fun for Cosmic Connoisseursâ€¦ 7/10

A few years ago a plethora of cosmic crises forced the champions and remnants of many heroic races to band together and save the cosmos. Although said crises were largely averted, some of those Sentinels of the Spaceways eventually got their band back together, determined to keep the universe a safe place. After a lot of quibbling they finally agreed to call themselves the Guardians of the Galaxy.

The boisterous, officially unaligned rabble were led by a half-breed Terran who was revealed to be the unloved son of J’Son of Spartax – undisputed ruler of an aggressively militaristic interstellar empire – and no friend of Earthâ€¦

Peter Quill AKA Star-Lord was aided in pacifying an unruly and increasingly martial universe by Drax the Destroyer, Rocket Racoon, Groot, Gamora (â€œDeadliest Woman in the Galaxyâ€) and extra-dimensional new recruit Angela whilst staying one step ahead of the militaristic Spartoi and their alliesâ€¦

The self-appointed Guardians’ ongoing troubles stem from a recent compact of major interstellar powers and principalities. This coterie of rulers had formed a Council of Galactic Empires and unilaterally declared Earth â€œoff limitsâ€; quarantined from all extraterrestrial contact, but that high-minded declaration hadn’t stopped some of the signatories from breaking their own embargo or being mightily ticked off whenever Quill’s crew kicked them off Terra and back into space.

Not long ago the situation worsened when Emperor Kallark of the Shi’ar (AKA alien superman Gladiator) informed his kingly colleagues that Jean Grey – former host to the overweening Phoenix Force – was back from the dead and he was going to try her for her crimesâ€¦ even though, as a chronally displaced child, she hadn’t technically committed them yetâ€¦

With the Guardians’ timely assistance this venture led to another galling debacle and defeat for the Shi’ar by Earth’s X-Men. Individually every leader of the Council had reason to want the Guardians dead and thus they singly opened covert operations against them. Cold and distant J-Son, of course, had his own good – if undisclosed – reasons for wanting his son curbed and controlled, if not deadâ€¦

This treasury of space terrors and attendant sidebar tales collects Free Comic Book Day: Guardians of the Galaxy, Guardians of the Galaxy volume 3 #14-17 and Captain Marvel volume 7 #1 spanning June-September 2014, plus pertinent historic material from Amazing Spider-Man #654 (April 2011) augmenting and clarifying the big screen experience for new readers who might not know as much about the latest Earth-born addition to the squad whilst providing an immense amount of spectacularly bombastic fighting fun for all.

Following a most useful recap page, further enticing background is provided by ‘Welcome to the Guardians of the Galaxy’ by Brian Michael Bendis, Nick Bradshaw, Scott Hanna & Morrie Hollowell (from Free Comic Book Day: Guardians of the Galaxy #1, July 2014) as erstwhile Guardian Tony Stark runs down the history and capabilities of the stellar centurions before offering paraplegic war veteran Eugene â€œFlashâ€ Thompson his vacated place on the teamâ€¦

The story picks up in GotG #14 with the soldier – in his transmorphic guise of Agent Venom – beginning his tour of duty by visiting an armaments fair on crossroads world Knowhere with the intention of upgrading his weapons. The culture-shocked earthling is accompanied and watchdogged by resurrected (and cosmically reconstructed) fellow Earther Draxâ€¦

Whilst Flash is gone, however, the assembled forces of the Council strike, overwhelming the Guardian’s ship and capturing the skeleton crew aboardâ€¦

As Star-Lord awakens in custody on Spartax, elsewhere Gamora is ambushed by a bounty hunter she previously humiliated. Hauled off to Moord, homeworld of the Brotherhood of Badoon, she fully expects to die; but not soon and certainly not quietly.

On Knowhere, another sneak attack captures Drax despite Venom’s every effort to save his new comrade, and on a cell in Spartax, J-Son confronts his wayward heir with the (utterly erroneous) fact that nobody can save the Guardians now, before disclosing just what he needs from his sonâ€¦

The second chapter (with additional art by Cameron Stewart) opens with Rocket under the scalpels of questing Kree vivisectionists, even as Gamora is being tortured to death by a legion of Badoon monsters on Moord. Drax awakens on a Shi’ar space station and finds himself on trial by Kallark for daring to aid the X-Men. The grizzled warrior’s only response is to challenge Gladiator to a duelâ€¦

Back on Knowhere Thompson is relieved to be rescued by a team of Avengers but soon smells a rat and discovers he has fallen into the shape-shifting hands of a band of Skrulls intent on separating him from the alien Symbiote which provides all his powers. In deep space the malevolent Brood, having tired of their examinations of Groot, jettisoned the tree being into space to fall blazing into the atmosphere of searing, arid hellworld Rigel 8.

Negotiations having stalled on Spartax, Peter Quill tells dad exactly what he thinks of him before leaping to his death out of a skyscraping citadel windowâ€¦

Issue #16 (illustrated by Bradshaw, David Marquez & Jason Masters) furiously follows up as the tide finally turns in favour of the hard-pressed heroes. As the Skrulls fatefully learn the folly of messing with a symbiote and its chosen host, Gladiator at last gives Drax the death match he’s been demanding and on Moord inexplicably absent cosmic hunter Angela locates her missing partner-in-carnage Gamora. The resultant loss of (Badoon) life is incomprehensibleâ€¦

Plunging to his death on Spartax, Quill is plucked from disaster by the just-in-time intergalactic Avenger Carol Danvers – a feat he smugly claims prior knowledge of – and discloses that his revelatory conversations with J-Son have been broadcast to the entire populace. With the whole empire aware of their ruler’s plans for – and opinions of – his subjects, rebellion begins to shake the homeworldâ€¦

In a far distant place the strategically savvy Kree Supreme Intelligence realises the tables have turned and orders his researchers to put Rocket back together, speculating that perhaps it’s time for the cagily conservative pragmatists to consider their options with the impossibly formidable Quill and Coâ€¦

With art by Bradshaw and Michael Avon Oeming, the Guardians portion of the collection concludes as Star-Lord and Danvers escape Spartax and begin rounding up their errant membership, assisted by freely offered intel from the Kree Supremor. However many – especially Groot and Rocket – are neither whole nor heartyâ€¦

Only one member remains missing and the reunited team wearily make their way to Knowere to begin their search for Agent Venomâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

The remainder of this sterling chronicle offers a delightful plethora of additional insights and personal exploits beginning with the lowdown on Flash Thompson’s unique association with one of the most terrifying creatures in the universeâ€¦

‘Rebirth’ by Dan Slott, Paolo Siqueira, Ronan Cliquet de Oliveira & Greg Adams first appeared as a back-up in the monster-sized Amazing Spider-Man #654.

Once upon a time Spider-Man spawned an implacable enemy called Venom: a deranged and disgraced reporter named Eddie Brock who bonded with the alien entity Parker brought back from the Secret Wars.

The â€œhigh-tech smart-suitâ€ was in fact a semi-sentient alien parasite called the Symbiote and almost ended up possessing and consuming the horrified hero until Parker escaped and destroyed it. Or so he thoughtâ€¦

Brock willing joined with the creature to become a savage, shape-changing, dark-side version of the Wallcrawler, but after numerous spectacular clashes, the arachnid adversaries eventually reached a brooding dÃ©tente and Venom became a â€œLethal Protectorâ€, dispensing a highly individualistic brand of justice everywhere but New York City.

Since then many other hosts have bonded with the ebony parasite, including Brock’s wife Ann Weying, Mac Gargan AKA the Scorpion, and even Franklin Richards and other members of the Fantastic Four.

Eventually the Government took control of the Symbiote and in this terse tale we see how the military then offered it – with many strings attached – to Flash Thompson: Spider-Man’s greatest fan and a war-hero who came back from Afghanistan without his legs.

A recovering alcoholic, Eugene became the star of a military black-ops operation which uses the Symbiote to carry out under-the-radar missions vital to US security.

In return, Thompson gets to be a hero (of sorts), feel useful again, serve his country and get out of his wheelchair prison for 48 hours at a time. Agent Venom even became a Secret Avenger, serving directly under Steve Rogers.

Of course there were drawbacks: the parasite is a voracious deadly menace, constantly seeking to permanently bond to its wearer, and is classed as one of the most dangerous entities on the planet. If the new Venom should go berserk or if the human host stays bonded for more than 48 hours, his war-room controllers will simply detonate explosives attached to Thompson’s body and start the project over with another volunteer. It’s what they had to do with the previous wearer, after allâ€¦

This is followed by the untitled story of how Avenger Carol Danvers finally deems herself worthy of her universe-saving predecessor and accepts the mantle of Captain Marvel (Captain Marvel volume 7 #1 by Kelly Sue DeConnick & Dexter Soy).

The process involves a titanic struggle against the Absorbing Man, a pithy pep talk from Sentinel of Liberty Captain America, mild mockery from Spider-Man and the funeral of her greatest inspiration before the cosmic champion heads of to the stars and a rendezvous with Star-Lordâ€¦

A fascinating peek into the â€œchildhoodâ€ of an iconic star comes next as Andy Lanning, Phil Jimenez, Livesay & Antonio Fabela take us to Planet X to tell ‘Groot’s Tale’ before the marvellous madness ends with a tantalising glimpse of Things to Come as Dan Abnett, Gerardo Sandoval & Rachelle Rosenberg visit Earth circa 3014 and reintroduce Arnold Drake, Gene Colan & Steve Gerber’s original Guardians of the Galaxy in ‘Fight for the Future’.

As â€œoldest Earthman aliveâ€ Vance Astro, Jovian militia-man Charlie-27, crystalline scientist Martinex, Centauri warrior shaman Yondu and all knowing space god Starhawk brutally demolish a Badoon concentration camp on conquered planet Terra, they are searching for one particular prisoner: young Geena Drake whom the portents show holds the fate of humanity in her scabby teenaged handsâ€¦

Thrilling, edgy and ferociously fast-paced, this spectacularly seductive tome also includes a gallery of covers and variants by Bradshaw, Ed McGuinness, Mark Farmer, Justin Ponsor, Joe Quesada, Dexter Vines, Javier Rodriguez, Adi Granov and Alvara plus a bunch of electronic extra attractions provided by AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) offering access to story bonuses and background bumph once you download the free code from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet.
â„¢ & Â© 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

November 7, 2014November 6, 2014

Original Sin

By Jason Aaron, Mike Deodato Jr., Frank Martin & many and various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-632-8

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Solid Superhero Blockbuster Entertainmentâ€¦ 8/10

Once upon a time massive crossover events starring an entire company’s pantheon of superstars were rare and eagerly anticipated occurrences. These days, however, it seems costumed champions and aggregated universe-savers stagger from one catastrophic crisis to the next with barely time to wipe their boots or iron their capes.

Still, it’s hard to complain when the results are as gripping and controversial as Original Sinâ€¦

Spanning April to August 2014, this chunky volume collects miniseries Original Sin #0-8 and the 5-issue follow-up anthology Original Sins, taking a good, hard look at the dark underbelly of the Marvel Universe, removing a number of major characters and laying the groundwork for more shocking revelations in the months to comeâ€¦

The main event is written by Jason Aaron, with Mike Deodato Jr. illustrating and Frank Martin providing the colours, but before that all unfolds issue #0 cunningly provides invaluable background with artists Jim Cheung, Paco Medina, David Meikis, Mark Morales, Guillermo Ortego, Juan Vlasco and Justin Ponsor setting all the plates spinning in ‘Who is the Watcher?

Sam Alexander is still just a kid but he’s also the newest Nova of the alien peacekeeping force pledged to policing the universe. He’s inherited the role from his dad, a drunken deadbeat the boy had always believed to be a delusional fantasist.

Now the boy spends his days on the moon, trying to befriend the austere and aloof cosmic voyeur Uatu the Watcher, an impossibly powerful, immortal being who views all that occurs throughout the vast multiverse but never acts on any of itâ€¦

As a tenuous relationship develops Sam learns the tragic origin of the Watcher race’s sacred vow of non-interference and gleans another secret: his long-vanished father is not deadâ€¦

The shocks come thick and fast in this thriller which is more murder mystery than celestial Armageddon scenario so I’m attempting to reveal enough to tempt without giving anything awayâ€¦

In ‘No One is Watching’, a quiet dinner for Wolverine, Captain America, Black Widow and super spy Nick Fury (the original WWII one, not the son who’s currently appearing in all those movies) is interrupted by an ominous phone call. Thor is on the Moon and has found The Watcher murderedâ€¦

Rapidly relocating to Luna the heroes see that the all-powerful celestial has not only been shot in the head but cruelly mutilated. His huge, all-seeing eyes are missing. Moreover his fantastic citadel has been demolished and the incredible storehouse of artefacts and weaponry from across the universe pillaged.

Grizzled veteran Fury points out that the limited number of people who even knew about the cosmic observer, let alone possessed the power to harm him, means the suspect pool must necessarily include not only villains but heroes tooâ€¦

Meanwhile in the great Necropolis of Wakanda, the Black Panther is being updated by a shadowy figure calling itself The Unseen. The nebulous source also emphasises that in the days to come, with the kind of technologies the killer now possesses, nobody can be trusted, urging former King T’Challa to lead a distinctly offbeat team in a clandestine parallel investigation of the cosmic assassinationâ€¦

Soon mystic master Dr. Strange, current Ant-Man – and former criminal – Scott Lang, Winter Soldier â€œBuckyâ€ Barnes, telepathic X-Man Emma Frost, â€œdeadliest woman in the galaxyâ€ Gamora, former CIA spook and mercenary Moon Knight and wanted mass-murderer Frank – The Punisher – Castle are following up leads somehow not available to Fury and the Avengers, even as on Earth The Thing battles a monster which might be connected to the crimeâ€¦

The creature is a Mindless One from Dormammu‘s Dark Dimension but this particular destructive horror now has a personality and even telepathic powers. It also wants to die and even with Spider-Man‘s aid Ben Grimm is unable to stop it committing suicide using the Ultimate Nullifier which used to belong to Uatuâ€¦

By the time Fury and the Avengers arrive all that’s left is a scene of devastation, and the retired super spy officially takes over the investigation of what is now clearly a much bigger and growing problemâ€¦

Splitting up, the secret searchers travel to vastly differing locations in ‘Bomb Full of Secrets’ with the Panther, Frost and Ant-Man heading to the under-Earth kingdoms and uncovering a vast graveyard of monsters, whilst Castle and Strange voyage to a mystic realm where a magical leviathan has been killed by a incredibly large bore gamma bulletâ€¦

On Earth Fury has captured another rampaging No-Longer-Mindless One and is on the trail of the unlikely culprits who have brought the eldritch berserkers to Earth. Dr. Midas, his daughter Exterminatrix and The Orb were never A-List villains – or even contenders – but with one of Uatu’s eyes in their possession not only do they have access to everything the Watcher ever saw but the actual organ also mutates and transforms anything in its proximity into immensely powerful things never meant to beâ€¦

When a full team of Avengers raid the bad guys’ New York lair, a cataclysmic struggle ensues which ends as the Orb unleashes all the stored knowledge within the eye. In an instant, heroes, villains and innocent bystanders alike are engulfed in a wave of uncomfortable answers as every hidden detail of trillions of lives seen by Uatu for millions of years is randomly released and psychically downloaded like a ‘Bomb Full of Secrets’ into the mindscape of the worldâ€¦

In the aftermath ‘Trust No One, Not Even Yourself’ sees the city reeling with the shock of uncounted disclosures – from stolen snacks to secret affairs to murders all coming to light – whilst at the centre of the Earth Ant-Man has finished recovering hundreds of gamma-bullets from the unending field of monster corpses.

In deep space Gamora, Winter Soldier and Moon Knight have followed their trail to a dead world. It takes a subtle shift of perspective and a sneaking suspicion to confirm that they are standing on a colossal, once-living planet-sized organism riddled with gamma-bulletsâ€¦

The frustrated spacefarers chafe at the lead which has resulted in a dead end, but everything changes as Winter Soldier suddenly teleports out, blowing their ship up as he leaves. The Unseen’s covert investigators now have their first solid suspectâ€¦

On Earth Fury is pondering upon who might have Uatu’s other eye when Winter Soldier beams in and kills himâ€¦

‘Secret Warriors’ then focuses on growing divisions as Punisher and Dr. Strange steal Fury’s body whilst Barnes, holding the eye taken from his most recent victim, heads to the Watcher’s shattered lunar home before beaming into a hidden satellite.

His infiltration of the stellar fortress coincides with the arrival of his understandably aggrieved former associates and another brawl breaks out. The carnage is only curtailed when The Unseen appears…

It is a trusted ally who has been playing them all from the startâ€¦

The betrayer then recounts ‘The Secret History of Colonel Nicholas J. Fury’, disclosing how half a century ago a man named Woody McCord died battling an alien invasion, one of hundreds the hidden hero had stopped without the world even suspecting.

With the covert assistance of millionaire industrialist Howard Stark and his shadowy cabal, the replacement had become a â€œMan in the Wallâ€, spending all his days killing monsters, repelling demons and despatching extraterrestrial threats to mankind.

But with his death another – still relatively clean and idealistic – soul had to step in and continue doing all the unavoidable dirty jobs proper superheroes would baulk at.

This was achieved with no one the wiser whilst keeping up appearances in the â€œday jobâ€ as a shiny, bright public championâ€¦

With clearly nothing as it seems, ‘Open Your Eye’ reveals how Dr. Midas, the Orb and Exterminatrix attacked Uatu, taking his eye. In the now The Watcher-mutated Orb demands the traitor tell the rest of the truth.

The second Man in the Wall is now dying too and convened the Panther’s investigation team to ferret out a suitable replacement ready to defend Earth with absolute resolution, deadly gamma bullets and no remorseâ€¦

As the failing warrior explains the true circumstances of Uatu’s death in ‘Nick Fury Vs. the World’ the possessor of the Watcher’s other – until now missing – eye is shockingly exposed and the fighting resumes. With Midas making one final push for ultimate power, the mess gets even messier as the Avengers, having pursued their own lines of enquiry, bust in and a frantic free-for-all beginsâ€¦

With all the secrets laid bare and an event of cosmic importance clearly occurring a group of other Watchers materialise – and does nothing – as the Man in the Wall clashes with Earth’s champions; citing morality and expediency until Midas’ final gambit interrupts everything and already-transformed Orb steals the other eye, triggering a devastating detonation. When the dust settles a transmogrified Orb is loose to roam the Earth, a third Man in the Wall takes up the gamma-gun and waits for the next invasion and a newly transformed figure haunts the Moon as ‘The One Who Watches’â€¦

The miniseries generated 44 tie-in issues scattered through 14 other titles, but this compilation skips right to the end, to spotlighting a number of quirky vignettes from Original Sins #1-5, focusing on the fallout from the wave of secrets which were released to blanket the world after The Orb triggered Uatu’s eye.

Eschewing strict chronology for comprehension the exposures begin with all five chapters of Young Avengers serial ‘Hidden in Plain Sight’ (by Ryan North, Ramon Villalobos & Jordan Gibson) which sees Hulkling, Marvel Boy and Prodigy attempt a different way of dealing with demon-possessed felon The Hood.

The skeevy rat wants to extract all the knowledge forcibly inserted into the heads of an entire building full of recreational drug-takers who were all high when the â€œSecrets Bombâ€ went offâ€¦ not for himself, of course, but because the data is basting the minds of the already brain-fried kids and killing them.

Happily complying with such a selfless request, the Young Avengers seem to have forgotten one basic fact: demon-possessed felons have secret agendas and often lieâ€¦

Following swiftly on, ‘Terminus’ (Nathan Edmondson, Mike Perkins & Andy Troy) finds S.H.I.EL.D. agent Seth Horn pressing commuter Henry Hayes on his other identity as cyborg assassin Deathlok.

The psychic fact-insertions might have pushed incontrovertible truths into people’s heads but it did nothing to augment common sense or self-preservationâ€¦

That is also apparent in ‘Black Legacy’ (Frank Tieri, Raffaele Ienco & Brad Anderson) as writer Rebecca Stevens stalks Dane Whitman and challenges him with the bleak history of the curse of the Ebony Blade – a fearsome plight the traumatised Black Knight is already agonisingly aware ofâ€¦

‘Whispers of War’ (Charles Soule, Ryan Brown & Edgar Delgado) finds newly Terrigen-enhanced (see Inhumanity) Lineage suddenly party to the true story of King Black Bolt‘s greatest mistake and thus apprised of a fresh and now unavoidable conflict with the star-spanning Kree in the offing, whilst ‘Checkmate’ (James Robinson, Alex Maleev & Chris Peter) proves to ambitious businessman Gil Carmichael that insider information isn’t everything when the exposed secrets are Dr. Doom‘sâ€¦

Nick Fury then callously reveals to lifelong comrade Dum Dum Dugan ‘How the World Works’ (Al Ewing. Butch Guice, Scott Hanna & Matthew Wilson) after which the funnier side of secrets comes to the fore in ‘Lockjaw: Buried Memory’ (Stuart Moore, Rick Geary & Ive Svorcina), Howard the Duck learns his place in ‘Before Your Eyes’ (Ty Templeton & Paul Mounts) and a Daily Bugle archivist uncovers the wrong review of Spider-Man’s early showbiz career in ‘Bury the Lead’ (Dan Slott, Mark Bagley, Joe Rubinstein & Mounts).

The glimpses into minds’ eyes ends with ‘Catharsis’ (David Abadta, Pablo Dura & Erica Henderson) as an anonymous Inuit flashes back to a distant moment in the arctic with a star spangled ice-cube before the whole shebang concludes with an outrageous and hilarious sequence of false memories starring Marvel’s biggest stars in ‘The No-Sin Situation’ by Chip Zdarskyâ€¦

With 43 covers-&-variants by Cheung, Ponsor, Julian Totino Tedesco, Mark Brooks, Paulo Manuel Rivera, Skottie Young, Art Adams, Zdarsky, Steve McNiven, Agustin Alessio, Gabriele Dell’Otto, Stephanie Hans, Guice, Marco Checchetto, Paul Renaud, Mike McKone & Jeun-Siik Ahn, this is a stunning and sensational saga that will delight any Fights ‘n’ Tights fan with a passing knowledge of Marvel history and comes fully loaded with digital extras accessible via the AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses if you download the free code from marvel.com onto your smartphone or Android-enabled tablet.

November 4, 2014November 4, 2014

Inhumanity

By Matt Fraction, Kelly Sue Deconnick, Warren Ellis, Samuel Humphries, Matt Kindt, Christos N. Gage, Jonathan Hickman, Olivier Coipel, Nick Bradshaw, Todd Nauck, Matteo Buffagni, AndrÃ© Lima AraÃºjo, Paul Davidson, Stephanie Hans, Simone Bianchi & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-614-4

During earlier mega-crossover blockbuster Infinity, mad Titan Thanos invaded Earth and clashed with the Inhumans’ ruler Black Bolt to a standstill. As a last resort the embattled Inhuman king crashed the flying city of Attilan onto New York and into the Hudson River, simultaneously releasing the Hidden People’s mutagenic Terrigen Mist into the atmosphere where it triggered mutation in millions, proving that Human and Inhuman were not necessarily different racesâ€¦

Collecting assorted incidents of Terrigen exposure – specifically Inhumanity #1-2, Avengers Assemble #21.INH to 23.INH, #24-25, Avengers A.I. #7, Inhumanity: The Awakening #1-2, Inhumanity: Superior Spider-Man #1 and New Avengers #13.INH (spanning December 2013 to May 2014) – this epic chronicle of a game-changing publishing event takes a look at the fallout of that colossal catastrophe wherein a vast portion of the planet discovers everything they believed about themselves was wrong whilst coping with the shock of developing new and scary unnatural abilitiesâ€¦

The drama begins with Inhumanity #1, by Matt Fraction, Olivier Coipel, Mark Morales and Laura Martin (with flashback sequences illustrated by Leinil Francis Yu, Gerardo Alanguilan, Dustin Weaver & Israel Silva), as in the immediate aftermath of the cataclysm the Inhuman called Karnak is arrested by the Avengers.

His incomparable ability has been to infallibly detect the flaw and weakness of anything – object, person, even concept – but as he wearily describes the history of his people to his captors/hosts he reaches a startling fresh conclusionâ€¦

The Inhumans came into existence 25,000 years ago, after Imperial Kree explorers landed on Earth and tampered with the genetics of a tribe of primitives, just as they had on hundreds of other worlds.

Millennia later Randac, one of the rulers of the intellectual super-race that subsequently developed, took that meddling to its ultimate end by devising the Terrigen Mist process, enabling citizens to mutate into infinitely unique individuals of astounding power.

The measure originally met with much opposition and many citizens of Attilan quit the city forever, setting up their own diasporic enclaves and increasingly interbreeding with their unevolved cousins. As the Inhumans retreated further into myth, isolation and dogma, their alien-altered genetic heritage was slowly spreading and disseminating throughout baseline humankind.

Now the clash with Thanos has unleashed a Terrigen cloud that will slowly pass over the entire planet, activating all those dormant genes and metamorphosing possibly millions into new lives via body-altering cocoonsâ€¦

The diminutive warrior also speaks of the last moments of the city, the final official use of Terrigen and how his people evacuated the doomed city: passing through the chimerical living teleport door Eldrac; scattered to the place the living portal deemed they â€œmost needed to beâ€â€¦

As Karnak continues his ruminations, his cousin Queen Medusa arrives. Believing herself widowed and facing the shattering burden of saving her people without the aid of her messianic man Black Bolt, she is further shaken when her logic-driven kinsman continues his evaluation and arrives at an inescapable conclusion he simply will not abideâ€¦

Inhumanity #2, with art by Nick Bradshaw & Todd Nauck (augmented by Scott Hanna, Tom Palmer, Antonio Fabela & Andres Motta), follows Medusa as she copes with a fresh tragedy, the aching responsibility of repairing New York and the horrific tidings that a variety of human villains and scientists are stealing and experimenting on the cocoons of the newest and most vulnerable Inhumansâ€¦

As the Avengers’ top brains try to assess the scale of transformations, evil men are murderously hijacking her freshly revealed fellows whilst some full-blooded Inhumans – such as exiled former king The Unspoken – have organised into militias to reclaim the transformative pods and slaughter the sub-Inhuman transgressors who took them.

Worst of all, most inhabitants of fallen Attilan remain missing, included cousin Triton and all of the city’s childrenâ€¦

With such pressures engulfing her it’s almost a relief to learn of an A.I.M. science citadel where the technological terrorists are vivisecting confiscated cocoons and furiously lead a vengeful squad or outraged Inhumans against itâ€¦

The story shifts to a more personal mode with Avengers Assemble #21.INH to 23.INH and #24-25, written by Kelly Sue Deconnick and Warren Ellis with art by Matteo Buffagni, Paco Diaz& Nolan Woodward. Here the focus is on novice super-hero Anya CorazÃ³n – the latest Spider-Girl – as she strives to rescue someone close to herâ€¦

With Terrigen pods now a highly valuable commodity, rogue genetic researcher Dr. June Covington – AKA The Toxic Doxie – takes delivery of one and barely escapes a lethal booby trap which kills her favourite assistant.

Covington’s MO includes assimilating genetic discoveries and improvement into her own body and taking vicious, excruciating vengeance on those who cross her, so the failed ploy by A.I.M. agents quickly takes up all the outraged mad scientist’s attentionâ€¦

Meanwhile at Avengers Tower the big guns are being swamped by the Inhuman pandemic and haven’t time to listen to the junior arachnid as she demands some help to recover two stolen pods, one of which contains her Social Studies teacher Mr. Schlickeisenâ€¦

Finally, after plenty of sniping and her explosive tantrum, Captain America orders Spider-Woman Jessica Drew and Black Widow to assist and the trio quickly track down an errant A.I.M. cell run by wicked whacko Kashmir Vennema. Sadly the spider squad is promptly overwhelmed whilst learning that Schlickeisen is already dead, just as elsewhere Toxic Doxie takes over a rogue science lab to begin her mission of research and retributionâ€¦

Breaking free, the Arachnoid Avengers escape and return to base but Anya is unsatisfied and wants to go back, declaring that her teacher deserves a decent burial. This time grizzled warrior Wolverine and scary scientist Bruce Banner tag along and soon extract information out of a severely rattled Vennema.

Mr. Schlickeisen was gimmicked up and sold to Covington and now Spider-Girl has a fresh target to huntâ€¦

Whilst Toxic Doxie completes her Terrigen-assisted biological improvements, Wolverine takes Anya aside for a little private tuition and technological upgrading before they hit the trail for the maniac’s last known whereabouts. They’re too late but the battle against her abandoned and crazed associates yields more useful intel, such as the fact that Schlickeisen is still aliveâ€¦

Iron Man then assumes the role of on-the-job trainer, teaching Spider-Girl the value of research and preparation whilst deducing where the body-in-question is stashed. After rescuing the still comatose New Inhuman they have a solid idea of what new enhancements Covington has added to her body arsenal and that’s she’s readying an attack on the A.I.M. faction that set her upâ€¦

With the victim safe and a target location provided, Anya then gets the promotion of a lifetime, leading a team of veteran Avengers in a blistering raid to wrap up all the bad guys in her own web of justiceâ€¦

This fast-paced and deliciously light-hearted action romp gives way to a far more emotive and evocative tale in Avengers A.I. #7.INH (Samuel Humphries, AndrÃ© Lima AraÃºjo & Frank G. D’Armata) which examines the experiences of a recently transformed New Inhuman.

As Hank Pym‘s quirky cybernetic team encounter Daredevil and a lonely old lady mutated into a nauseating monster, the shock of her fate seems likely to drive poor Doris over the edge until a most unlikely robotic saviour talks her downâ€¦

Inhumanity: The Awakening #1and 2 by Matt Kindt & Paul Davidson then traces the efforts of a combined group of teen heroes from the X-Men’s Jean Grey School and Avengers Academy as they respond to the desperate social media cry for help of young Fiona who hatched out of a pod as a bird girl and was immediately targeted by online trolls and High School bullies.

The young thugs posted what they did to her on the web, but that proved to be very unwise as her angry little brother also mutatedâ€¦ and his power-set was far from benign or inconsequentialâ€¦

Sharp, witty and painfully relevant, the solutions proffered and accommodations reached in this no-easy-answers yarn are remarkably astute and optimistically hopefulâ€¦

Inhumanity: Superior Spider-Man #1 by Christos N. Gage & Stephanie Hans offers more emotional insight as arch-villain Doctor Octopus – currently inhabiting the body of the Wondrous Wallcrawler (see Superior Spider-Man: My Own Worst Enemy) – battles a tragic human victim of circumstance determined to exploit a Terrigen transformee. The original motive might have been cruel and ultimately selfish but a misconceived battle soon teaches everyone something about true power and responsibilityâ€¦

The portentous wrap-up provides a dark glimpse of horrors yet to come when The Illuminati clash over the Terrigen crisis in New Avengers #13.INH.

Scripted by Jonathan Hickman and illustrated by Simone Bianchi, the response of the world’s most powerful and important individuals (Black Bolt, Namor, Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Hank McCoy, Dr. Strange and Black Panther) is framed against a background of an even greater disaster – the ongoing collapse of the multiverse as alternate Earths randomly smash into each other.

On Earth-23099, a subtly different Illuminati conclave convenes to combat the threat of a Terrigen Bomb detonated by Maximus the Mad as another world hurtles towards them. From this malign Earth come unstoppable Black Priests who destroy everything and everybody. With their grim harvest completed the cosmic clerics then turn their gaze to our worldâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

With cover-&-variants by Coipel, Dean White, Bradshaw, Skottie Young, Mike Deodato Jr., David Marquez, Davidson, Hans, Bianchi and Jorge Molina, this comprehensive exploration of a strange new phase for troubled planet Earth offers suspense, drama, explosive action, wry humour and a potent metaphorical message as it describes the reunification of two deliberately distant branches of mankind, and comes fully equipped with the usual digital extras accessible via the AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses once you download the free code from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet,

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