Alpha Flight #6 – Not too much to say. Fun title. Glad the original team (plus Puck and Marrina) are back but nothing out there special about it. I liked Northstar better with the X-men but he definitely belongs with Alpha Flight (who are miraculously the only dead people to survive Chaos War, I might add). I’ve been wondering though if Namor even knows that Marrina is alive? Last he saw her was as a mutated monster over Norman Osborn’s control that he had to kill…maybe a reunion is in order? I wonder how Emma Frost would feel about that…Good series but should stay as a limited. I had heard rumors that it was being bumped up to ongoing but not a good idea.
Annihilators: Earthfall #3 – Alright Ronan, lets pull it back a little bit. I don’t know a lot about the Accuser’s earlier stories as a straight up villain, but I’ve really learned to love the character ever since War of Kings and his marriage to Crystal. BUT. Isn’t destroying the entire United States a bit much? This isn’t the first time there’s been a mass possession or infestation of some kind so why is this Kree butting his blue into Earth business. I didn’t see anyone blowing up cities or countries when Inferno took over New York and threatened to spread. And is it me or does his hammer now do ANYTHING it needs to do whereas it used to be mostly just a powerful hammer? Other points, I love the kiddie Magus angle, not because its innovative (since they are doing it over in Uncanny X-men right now with Sinister) but because It’s so cute to see little purple kids run around. Let’s just hope that this brings back Adam Warlock because that’s where I see this going. You know, until the next event in the cosmic line.
Astonishing X-men #44 – Eh…I don’t know. I mean it was a good story, if you don’t know anything about the characters…at all. But come on, Storm shows up out of the blue a week early (like Ororo wouldn’t have called?) and no one bats an eye lash that shes back to the Mohawk? The team almost threw up last time when she showed up at Logan and Mariko Yashida’s marriage and this time nothing? OK fine. She attacks Scott (even if it wasn’t seriously) and Emma doesn’t at least give her mind a cursory scan? Hmm. She kisses him out of nowhere and it STILL takes him a double take to realize it’s not her. He and Emma deserve to get captured to power some weird ass city. As I said, if I never read X-men before and didn’t know much about the characters it was a great issue, but unfortunately I have so I was a little disappointed which is a shame because this book is always top notch in my opinion. Oh, and there were Sentinels.
Avengers Solo #2 – I’m a little lost on the main story. It’s a bit all over the place with a lot of, what seems to me like gratuitous pointless action. And there’s Hawkeye fighting Paste Pot Pete (oops…I mean the Trapster), and some guy is held hostage by a merc but the merc turns out to be his sister then some chick with her face bandaged. None of it is really making sense. What I DO like is the back-up story. As Secret Avengers falls further and further down my list (its down with FF and Ghost Rider now), Avengers Academy just keeps getting better and better! I love Finesse, and the more acclimated I get to the Avengers and their history the more that Hank Pym becomes my favorite Avenger (after Scarlet Witch of course). This issue also furthered my theory that the entire Academy set-up is becoming a reformed Avengers West Coast…and now they are fighting robot versions of…THE AVENGERS WEST COAST! LOVE IT!
Secret Avengers #19 – God I am so over this book. I really hope that when this arc is over, we jump ahead to post Fear Itself (since Steve is still wear his Super Soldier suit) and this book gets a big overhaul. I mean I love random storylines that don’t really move the main continuity forward much but this title continues to dump dense story after dense story on us. I am sure we are leading up to some huge showdown with the Shadow Counsel and the evil Nick Fury LMD but come on already lighten up. And this was basically about weaponize Super Soldier Serum…in Pot form. Yes that’s right, Pot…as in Marijuana. The big bad guy at the end held up his stash and said “I smoked a great deal of this”. Really Ellis? He sounded like someone who just ate all the mushroom because he thought the police were coming. EPIC FAIL! The highlight of this issue was Sharon Carter screaming “al-Qaeda! al-Qaeda !” at a group of hookers. Because that’s what should be in Avengers comics…Super Soldier Weed and hookers.
Vengeance #5 – Ok I am not afraid to say it…I have almost NO idea what’s going on in this series. And yet I just can’t stop reading it. It’s completely enrapturing but I still feel like I have no idea what is going on. This new Teen Brigade is absolutely amazing and I really hope at least most of them make it through this and are seen again because Ultimate Nullifier and Ms. America Vasquez are just incredible. I really enjoy how they are always messaging each other instead of using 3-D holographic wristwatches to communication, it’s nice to see some REAL technology at work for once. And really, who ISN’T happy to see Beak and Angel again??? The oddest mutant (or former mutant) couple ever to be seen and they just keep on going. I’d really like to see more of their babies. As for the plot, who knows. I know the In-Betweener is involved but I don’t really get why he’s a kid now. Where exactly is Ms. America? Hopfully next issue will clear all this up, but more than likely I will have to go back and read all 6 issues back to back to get a clear picture of what’s going on.
