Friday, April 30, 2010

Mighty Avengers #36

This issue brings us to the end of the Mighty Avengers series, and to say it's been a mixed bag would be an understatement.

The comic started out as a close companion to the New Avengers title (both of which were written by Brian Bendis), but it stumbled almost immediately when artist Frank Cho was unable to keep up with the schedule required to produce a monthly comic.

For the past year or so it's been given over to a new creative team, and presented as an alternate Avengers team, running around the edges of the ongoing Dark Reign stories (which are thankfully about to end).

The great thing the comic did was to restore Hank Pym to the forefront of Marvel heroes by focusing on his intelligence and establishing him as the Earth's "Scientist Supreme" (which is somehow connected to the idea of a "Sorcerer Supreme").

With that being said, this final issue didn't live up to my expectations. The previous issue ended with a revelation about the nature of Pym's "Infinite Avengers Mansion" that had me hoping for the return of a certain beloved character, but that story didn't play out here (though presumably it could somewhere down the line).

Instead, we have yet another confrontation with Ultron, lots of improbable battles and over-the-top plot twists, and a bit of a spoiler for the final issue of Siege.

You get the sense that writer Dan Slott had too many ideas to cram into this final issue - it has that "20 pounds of potatoes in a 10-pound bag" feeling.

Khoi Pham's art also seems a bit uneven - outstanding in places and thin in others. Of course, any artist would have to pause when asked to draw 10 billion Jocastas.

It'll be interesting to see where Pym and the other members of the team go from here, but there are lots of Avengers titles in our future, so hopefully they'll find a good place to light.

Grade: B

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