Avengers #1 *Spoilers*

[nosocialize100]

Overall I enjoyed this issue. I think Jerome Opeña was the perfect choice as the slow pace of the book needs some beautiful panels to slow us down.

I reviewed the book using a bunch of imagery from within here if anyone is interested.

Onto spoilers!

spoilers:

The book opens with the beginning of time. No joke. Some Avenger history is recapped and it is alluded there was a spark that started something. That spark started with Tony Stark and Steve Rogers which we will start in this issue. CUT TO: Iron Man looking at an image or chart we've seen in previews. The center is the A for avengers. From it sparks nodes but they are empty. Tony wakes Steve Rogers from a nightmare, which we are shown had something to do with the Illuminati. Tony walks with Rogers and tells him it was Cap himself that inspired the Avengers. To be something bigger. CUT TO: One month later. Mars. A very green Mars with plants and everything. Ex Nihilo is shooting some sort of organic bomb at Earth. He calls the bombs Origin bombs and he's razing Earth to make it better. He has a new perfected human too. Abyss thinks he's wasting his time. She has a chart of her own (which looks similar to the Avenger chart Tony was looking at) and shows Nihilo the Avengers are coming. CUT TO: Space. The Avengers are in a space craft. Hawkeye shoots down the origin bomb just sent out using some kind of digital bow and arrow. The Avengers are in awe of Mars being terraformed. We get a shot of Earth and where ever these bombs hit doesn't look good. Tony is impressed. CUT TO: They land on the planet. Abyss throws some kind of black orb around Hulk. Iron Man gets pulled apart by vines coming from Nihilo. His suit loses power. Hulk gets whispers from Abyss to fight Thor as he thinks he's stronger than Hulk. They fight. Hawkeye and Black Widow get beat down by Nihilo. Captain America gets literally punched in the head over and over by a giant robot. Nihilo ships Cap off in the ship him came on back to Earth. He flys out of the ship and smashes into a building. Ouch. CUT TO: 3 days later. Cap is in a bed recuperating. Nihilo is inspecting the remaining Avengers who are tied up with vines. Steve is looking at the chart Tony was ogling earlier in the issue. Steve clicks a button and text appears on screen "wake the world." We see some people who are being called in to be Avengers. Steve says, "Assemble at dawn." He suits up and the final page is CUT TO: Captain America holding up his shield. A bunch of new members (and some old) are behind him. Falcon, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Spider-Woman, Captain Marvel, a female Captain Universe, Hyperion and some others I don't recognize.

end of spoilers

Good stuff indeed and I also wrote a whole host of reviews of the rest of the books at the link in my signature.

What did you guys think?

[Captain M]

It was too serious for me. I didn't enjoy it. :/

[nosocialize100]

It was too serious for me. I didn't enjoy it. :/

Judging by your member icon I believe you!

[Valeria Kementari]

meh, it wasn't that big of a deal. Cap has to gather a team of Earth's mightiest to defeat the über-powerful people on Mars and he chooses Cannonball and Falcon? That's just idiotic. It was ok but it wasn't the best thing ever like it was advertised.

[USERNAME TAKEN]

Good start but certainly not as good as the Newsarama reviewer made it to be.

8/10 for me.

[Desaad]

Well, it was good.

That is as far as I'm willing to go at this point, I guess?

It's well done. Ably done. Capably done. I'm intrigued, and it accomplished a lot in a short amount of space.

I'm...not blown away, I guess. It's interesting, without really being engaging.

But it's a first issue. That is the worst I'll say about it; it suffers from First Issue syndrome. It's not breaking any new ground, but its early. Certain bits of the dialogue and the narration were a little cliche.

I guess it gave me the same feel as a lot of Marvel NOW!. In fact, this felt like Incredible Hulk; promising, smartly written, but not really compelling on its own.

Still excited to watch this series build, the characters come out, and the themes strengthen. And it's certainly the best "Avengers" thing I've read in years (and certainly better than JL over at DC, too).

If it suffered, it was almost assuredly more for my expectations than for its own failures.

[sage6paths]

Too much hype before the issue came out. And then I read it and really wasn't that impressed. I'm sure Hickman will tell us the origins of Ex Nihilo and the others but like always he seems to have a problem with writing things that are just there without explaining anything. Also it may just be me but Hickman's inner dialogue is hella annoying. I liked it in Fantastic Four and Ultimates but all these words that seem to make the reader work harder to understand it is just wrong. People don't use most of the words that he writes. I did like the artwork though.
7/10

[Captain M]

Judging by your member icon I believe you!

Hey! I'm only 15. It's ok for me to not like this issue. You didn't have to say that...

[BrotherUnitNo_4]

It was too serious for me. I didn't enjoy it. :/

You could always give Avengers Assemble if you haven't yet. It seems to have seen a significant uptick in quality with the new creative team.

[nosocialize100]

Hey! I'm just 15. It's ok for me to not like this issue. You didn't have to say that...

No no I love your icon. I wasn't making fun. I was just pointing out you have a funny icon and your comment makes sense!

[Captain M]

No no I love your icon. I wasn't making fun. I was just pointing out you have a funny icon and your comment makes sense!

Oh, thanks. Sorry for overreacting.

[LeonardEugenius]

The issue was definitely good. I enjoyed the villains and am eager to see what happens with them. I wish there could have been less setup, but it's the first issue after all. My biggest complaint is that Cap leading the call to arms is tired. It's beyond tired. I just can't buy the reverence they give this guy. I was hoping for something less predictable.

[Kieran_Frost]

Oh... pity. I was waiting to read spoilers to decide if I'd pick it up... and yeah... Iron Man, Cap, Hulk, Thor, Cap, Iron Man, Abyss, Can, Thor, Cap, Iron Man, Abyss... pass. Shame, it looks beautiful. I'll stick to New Avengers.

[nosocialize100]

Well, it was good.

That is as far as I'm willing to go at this point, I guess?

It's well done. Ably done. Capably done. I'm intrigued, and it accomplished a lot in a short amount of space.

I'm...not blown away, I guess. It's interesting, without really being engaging.

But it's a first issue. That is the worst I'll say about it; it suffers from First Issue syndrome. It's not breaking any new ground, but its early. Certain bits of the dialogue and the narration were a little cliche.

I guess it gave me the same feel as a lot of Marvel NOW!. In fact, this felt like Incredible Hulk; promising, smartly written, but not really compelling on its own.

Still excited to watch this series build, the characters come out, and the themes strengthen. And it's certainly the best "Avengers" thing I've read in years (and certainly better than JL over at DC, too).

If it suffered, it was almost assuredly more for my expectations than for its own failures.

I think you hit the nail on the head with the word, "engaging." It's certainly building on something, especially with that epic opening page. Anyone not familiar with Hickman won't realize he's probably got some insane master plan that contains details scattered even in this issue. Like Hyperion for example.

[Ravin' Ray]

Beautiful Opeña art. I wonder if Hickman took notes from the Silver Surfer mini with the High Evolutionary terraforming the Moon and part of the earth affected as well.