Avengers Solo #4 - On the cover, are the helicopters chasing them, are they rushing towards the 'copters, and we're seeing the reflection in the windows of those buildings. Basically, is Hawkeye shooting at the helis, or at something else.Hawkeye was probably supposed to follow the van that whisked away the doctor inside the Trace armor at the end of the last issue, but you know Hawkeye. He got impatient and decided to save her, and they wind up with Dr. Forrest in the process, who was involved in the study that gave these women powers. Forrest provides his version of the events, but there's no one to corroborate that, so take it for what it's worth. Hawkeye and the others make a plan to find Angela Golden (the one behind the whole thing) and stop her, I guess. I'm not sure what precisely their goal is, besides not being killed by Ms. Golden's amped-up goon squads.
One problem I'm having with this mini-series is none of these characters Hawkeye's trying to help are making any impression whatsoever. I can't even remember which one is wearing the armor at a given moment most of the time. Roger Robinson is back this issue as the artist and it's a little easier to tell what's going on, though there are still times I can't entirely figure how the action in one panel connects to the one following it.
Legion of Monsters #4 - Morbius finally figured out the virus came from him, but he's ready to give up and simply destroy the Monster Metropolis before the infected inhabitants leave and begin wreaking havoc on the rest of the world. Elsa, surprisingly, is not down with the "blow up all monsters" plan, and sure enough, the Dimensional Man they locked up in issue 1 becomes important at the end. The real key lies in Morbius figuring out who is exerting control over the virus, and once that's determined, things fall neatly into place. No explosions required.It does seem a little strange that Elsa became so deadset against just killing all the monsters. Sure, she'd developed a fondness for Jack, werewolf or not, but she's still a monster hunter. It's nice that she's mature enough to be discerning about which ones she kills. Juan Doe does get a little weak on the backgrounds during action scenes, by which I mean they vanish, but otherwise, I think he does a lot with relatively few lines for expressions. I'm pretty satisfied with that mini-series.
Villains for Hire #2, 3 - I like some of the little details there, like the gun crumpling where it's being bitten. Although, I thought the fin was part of Tiger Shark's head, rather than a piece of costume. Maybe that varies depending on how animalistic he is. He was considerably less human in that Deadpool story in '09.We start off with Misty's crew beating Purple Man's bunch to another deal, which has apparently finally exhausted P.M.'s patience. Which leads to Headhunter buying off Tiger Shark and Bombshell so he can learn the location of Knight's headquarters. That accomplished he sends Scourge off for recon, and Scourge gets to see Misty shoot Paladin in the back. Well, then. From there, Purple Man sends his entire bunch to attack her. Misty's attempt to call in her crew for protection falls apart when Tiger Shark blows the lid on her identity. Oh, and because Purple Man will pay them to switch sides as well. Misty's good, but she can't beat all those crooks on her own, especially not if she's being controlled by someone else.
Whoever handles the recap pages needs to get their act together. The villains are listed according to which crew they work for, but they're all screwed up. Monster and Crossfire are both listed under Misty's crew, even though Kilgrave called in Monster to deal with Crossfire, for example.
You can tell they had to speed things up after the mini was shortened to 4 issues. I don't imagine everyone was going to switch sides so quickly originally. It's not terrible, but given this story had been written as sort of a power struggle between the two sides, it would have been more interesting to see Kilgrave gradually buy away Misty's crew, but for her to have enough time to try some sort of reprisal.
I don't think Villains for Hire would have been a great mini-series if given the chance to run it's originally planned length, but the compression after it had already started isn't helping.
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