Marvel Comics: May 2009 Archives

When a new Marvel character appears, they’ve quickly got to establish their rep…by fighting an established hero!  As a young lad, I had devoured all the early adventures of the X-Men and loved Hank McCoy.  Imagine my surprise in 1972 when I saw Hank looking like a grey monkey in  Amazing Adventures #12!

One Avenger: Dead on Arrival!  It looked like the newly mutated Beast had severely beaten down Iron Man on this cover, perfectly executed by Gil Kane.  Had Hank McCoy turned into a villain?  The blurb was right, I couldn't afford to miss it.

Naturally, it was all a big misunderstanding, and Hank became a hero—and blue—after a few issues.  Nuff said.

Wow.  Brian Bendis has been hyping Jim Cheung's artwork in the Avengers 2009 Free Comic Book Day issue, and he wasn't over-exaggerating.  Cheung's artwork is a tour de-force.  He's one of my favorite Avengers artists and he's really knocked himself out drawing this story that features both the New and Dark Avengers, with Thor making a guest appearance.

The story by Bendis is extremely new reader friendly, narrated by Spider-Man, who introduces all the characters and explains why there are two Wolverines and the whole Dark Avengers concept.  It's a done-in-one issue story where the two teams must band together to fight Ymir, the Frost Giant.  I think it's a bit difficult to give all the characters a chance to shine in this story.  Spider-Man, Wolverine, Ares, and Osborne's Iron Patriot get the most attention.

Two things really standout here visually: the new costumes for both Captain America and Thor are truly bad-ass.  Unfortunately, Thor's appearance is very brief and Captain America is kind of hovering in the background.  It's cool to have Bucky as Cap, but we haven't seen him take a strong leadership position as Steve Rogers did.

This Avengers issue is one of the finest comics ever produced for Free Comic Book Day.  I'd happily pay $3.99 for it, and I look forward to seeing it collected in a hardcover collection.  Nuff said.