Avengers # 13 Review Or All White, All White, All Whittee (Kevin heart voice)

Previously…

When Marvel Now! Started last year in July, they had decided to create a large more diverse team to tackle bigger threats and appeal to a larger fan base. With Jonathan Hickman helming the project, I figured I should check it out; he’s never let me down before. So, I picked up this latest copy of Avengers hoping to find something worthwhile, I did not. 

Situation

We find our main team of Avengers in the Savage land tending to the zebra striped evolved children early series villain Ex Nihilo created. Our heroes have lost their young charges and are now searching high and low for them between sincere talks between Thor and Hyperion. It turns out that the villain The High Evolutionary has set up shop and kidnapped them to find out what makes them tick. Our heroes eventually find them with a bit of help from a local and a battle ensues with the Terminus robot becoming active and then being deactivated just as quickly. The issue is book ended with another Thor/Hyperion heart to heart.

 

Story

I have said it before and I'll say it again, I love Hickman's writing, however that doesn't mean that there is anything in the Avengers worth caring about. Sure, Hyperion has a bit of revelation toward the end of the issue but that doesn't mean that it felt real. I didn't care about this book, not the characters or the story, its all very run of the mill. The attempt to endear the reader to Hyperion's plight misses it's mark with me and would've been more believable if he weren't another version of superman. Even worse the convenient man-sized plot device that leads them to The High Evolutinary's stronghold courtesy of the ever-aloof Captain Universe. The only good thing about this issue was the way Hyperion ended the fight between Thor and Terminus before it really got started.

Pictures

When you're dealing with Mike Deodato and superheroes you're gonna get quality. The Hyperion's angry scowl reminds you never piss off anyone with powers like superman, and the cracks in the face of the character Garook are hauntingly inhuman. Frank Martian's semi-metallic colors do a great job of bring the High Evolutionary to life and letting us know that this is a self augmented man and not some guy in a costume.

The Real

You'd think that a team with 18 heroes in it would have a lot of diverse characters especially when it claims diversity. I for one think that white people are underrepresented in this one as in all comics and hate that the companies add minorities to create diversity for its own sake. But in all seriousness I find it funny that the best this issue can muster in the way of minority representation is an aloof and confused, albeit powerful, Captain Universe who only ever shows up for two seconds and then walks back into some corner of the comic. I mean seriously, there are 18 people on this team 9 of them are white men that's half the team. Out of the 9 that are left 4 are white women and what we're left with is 1 Asian, 2 black guys and 1 black woman. Dear Marvel, don't promise me gold and give me lead, it's not cool. If you're an Avengers fan you'll like this, the rest of us will be reading Saga.

Rating 2/5

All images credited to Comic Book Resources