"Those Comic-Con Crowds Are Out of Control," in Avengers (vol. 3) #22, by Kurt Busiek (writer), George Perez (penciler), Al Vey (finishes), Tom Smith (colorist), RS & Comicraft (letterers)
I had a few issues from after Roger Stern's run - the Acts of Vengeance tie-ins and one other random one - but decided to skip 'em and jump right to this. The Kurt Busiek/George Perez, Heroes Return run (I was blessedly unaware of the Heroes Reborn version when it happened, and have read nothing about it that would make me go check it out now.) We'll touch on the latter half of Busiek's stint next week, the issues after Perez had left the book.
I didn't actually start buying this title until about five issues after the Ultron Unlimited storyline, when Marvel did a 100-page "Monster" issue around a roster shake-up. It wasn't actually 100 pages of new comics, but a new story and then reprints of older issues that also dealt with lineup changes. Which was fine. Those back issues were new to me. That's how I first learned about Cap's Kooky Quartet.
The run has this nice mix of big threats that you need a whole team of super-heroes to combat, plus a lot of character subplots that either continue in the background as a way to flesh the cast out, or eventually come to the forefront. There's a long-running one with a religious organization called the Triune Understanding that plays out in various ways, a lot of them involving the Avengers losing a PR battle with the seemingly-benevolent group, but also some friction between them and thier new Security Liason, and one of their team members, Triathlon. Or there's the Scarlet Witch-Vision-Wonder Man triangle. Or Justice struggling to adjust to actually getting to be an Avenger. There's always stuff happening, and even if you aren't interested in one subplot, there's probably another that'll hook you.
And there's big action. This Ultron story, there's some big fight scene in almost every issue, but they work in service of the story and the characters. The Avengers following a false lead, or Ultron catching a small group of them while they're separated because they're the particular Avengers he's most interested in. Hank Pym getting to try and face down his demons over creating Ultron. Perez seems a little rushed by the end of this arc - the work looks quite a bit rougher, less polished than normal - but there is a lot of rubble, robot parts, and damaged costumes for Perez to handle in his typical, lovingly detailed style. And besides, the Avengers are pretty trashed by the time they actually get to Final Boss Ultron, so maybe the rougher look actually fits.
As I said, we'll be back to this book next week, although with a different artist.
4 comments:
Perez isn't my absolute favorite artist, but boy howdy can he draw a crowd scene!
Yeah, one of the few articles I remember from when I read Wizard magazine was one he did about things to remember when drawing big crowd scenes, or those shots of every Avenger ever. Like not placing characters with the same color costumes where they overlap, or emphasizing the differences in how different characters move.
Kurt Busiek's run on Avengers is one of my favourites. When I went back to the beginning with the Essentials, I saw how much of Busiek's run was a love letter to Steve Englehart's Avengers stories, but it still somehow felt new.
Not everything worked as well as it could, but Busiek kept on throwing ideas out there, and there was so much going on, that it was never boring.
Kelvin: I think you're dead on about there always being enough going on to keep it interesting. Lots of subplots, both ones focused on characters, and ones that were more plot-oriented.
Engelhart's kind of hit-or-miss with me, but I don't know that I've read much of his Avengers stuff. I liked his Silver Surfer fairly well, some of his Defenders stuff (although I prefer Gerber on that book).
Post a Comment