Hopeless Begins the Games In "Avengers Arena"

[CBR News]

In "Avengers Arena," two teen heroes have lost their lives at the hands of the villainous Arcade and writer Dennis Hopeless, who spoke with CBR about the series and its direction for the future with exclusive art!


Full article here.

[Home made ectoplasm]

Convinced Bloodstone and Anachronism are gay now.

[Dog]

Issue #1 fell flat for me, but I was surprised how much I enjoyed #2. Looking forward to more.

[BrotherUnitNo_4]

Convinced Bloodstone and Anachronism are gay now.

At least one of them will be.

This was a great interview and gives us quite a few things to look forward to.

Already we see Kid Briton feeling distanced from the rest of the Braddock Kids.

[Dragonage2ftw]

This sounds like the book will start getting "funny" and just start outright making character deaths have even less meaning then before.

Also, I don't like how he said that Nico and Chase will "run away" twice. That kinda makes them seem like cowards.

[Majin Gojira]

I think at this point if someone SNEEZES in Arena there's gonna be an article about it.

To some of Hopeless answers:

I don't think he knows how desperate and even more pathetic that makes Arcade if he has all this power and can only pick on children.

Turns out the health bars are just story telling devices. I expressed before how I found that a little shallow if that was all they turned out to be, and now it's confirmed.

Wasted potential.

In the first part of this initial arc, we learned the rules of the game in "Avengers Arena."

My laughter echoes throughout the room.

The moment someone steps out of character and kills just to kill, we've lost our credibility.

True, but some would argue that's already happened.

One thing that really stands out in these first two issues is Kev Walker's character acting.

That's the first time I've ever heard drawings referrred to as "acting". I hope to never hear that again. But I probably will.

I'm not great at teases but let's see -- Cammi and X-23 do snow angels. Kev Walker draws the hell out of Darkhawk in battle mode. Chase and Nico run away twice. Kid Briton grins a lot. Cullen Bloodstone grins once. And Arcade takes a well-earned beating.

Well, at least he is improving on his ballyhoo skills. Minimizing the high school angle and making it more about choices is a good way to sell it.

And that last line is the first thing I've actually started to look forward to in Arena.

Not that I feel he has been totally honest in his teases so far, so I can't really stay excited.

Edit to add: The art also shows what appears to be The Runaways saving Cammi from an avalanche. And she gets all paranoid about Chase burning her out of the snow.

Not bad as far as plot developments go.

[BrotherUnitNo_4]

This sounds like the book will start getting "funny" and just start outright making character deaths have even less meaning then before.

Also, I don't like how he said that Nico and Chase will "run away" twice. That kinda makes them seem like cowards.

Well they are Runaways. Also, why wouldn't people be excited that Arcade gets his face kicked in?

[Dragonage2ftw]

Well they are Runaways. Also, why wouldn't people be excited that Arcade gets his face kicked in?

Letting the "games begin" kinda implies whackiness.

The running away part just comes off as trying to hard.

If Arcade gets his butt kicked, then yes, I am excited.

[graffiX]

I'm liking this book a lot. Really interested to read that Arcade-only issue.

[BrotherUnitNo_4]

That's the first time I've ever heard drawings referrred to as "acting". I hope to never hear that again. But I probably will.

Well look at it this way. A Kev Walker drawing behaves nothing like a Greg Land drawing. They not just look different but the way they interact, move and emote is different. For a visual medium you can learn a lot by the body language of characters.

[Majin Gojira]

The running away part just comes off as trying to hard.

I think we need to start a list of "Things Arena is Trying to Hard to Do" sometime soon.

[BrotherUnitNo_4]

Letting the "games begin" kinda implies whackiness.

The running away part just comes off as trying to hard.

If Arcade gets his butt kicked, then yes, I am excited.

I get no sense of wackiness, just that after the first arc lines will be drawn and some characters will give in to Arcade's rules and actively try to get rid of the other cast members.

Correction, Kid Briton looks like he'll be unable to cross that line.

[Majin Gojira]

Well look at it this way. A Kev Walker drawing behaves nothing like a Greg Land drawing. They not just look different but the way they interact, move and emote is different. For a visual medium you can learn a lot by the body language of characters.

Eh, all good art should be emotive and evocative. That doesn't make it something it's not, only good.

And Kev Walker's art is good, complain about this all I may, that is something I'll never deny.

[JaggedFel]

This sounds like the book will start getting "funny" and just start outright making character deaths have even less meaning then before.

Also, I don't like how he said that Nico and Chase will "run away" twice. That kinda makes them seem like cowards.

Running away is a viable technique although I don't see a threat that would require Nico to run from anyway besides Darkhawk.

[0bsessions]

I'm curious who's going to beat down Arcade. Honestly, I think a really fun and interesting angle for extending this past a couple arcs would be if Arcade really does get taken down quickly. Hopeless has said that there's a reason no one's finding the kids, what if that reason is that one of the kids (Or maybe even an overzealous compatriot of the kids, say one of the Avengers Academy kids) ends up killing Arcade, leaving the heroes no real way of figuring out where the kids are?

Letting the "games begin" kinda implies whackiness.

The running away part just comes off as trying to hard.

If Arcade gets his butt kicked, then yes, I am excited.

You're arguing semantics. The Roman Coliseum matches were called "games" too, not exactly wacky in my estimation.