Avengers: The Initiative #15

One-sentence summary: This series continues the Secret Invasion tie-in arc with a rather blah issue.

I've been a pretty big fan of the last few Initiatives. I thought they were fairly tightly scripted with a good mix of action and humor. Last issue did the same, while being, what I thought, a pretty good tie-in with Secret Invasion that might actually have some implications. This didn't surprise me, since I was pretty happy with their tie-in with World War Hulk, praise I gave exclusively to them.

That being said, this issue was a let-down for the same reason Secret Invasion as a whole is sort of bleh, and that's that nothing happened. Great, we get some background on a character for an issue. Woo. Awesome. Is it particularly amazing background? Not really, no. It's ok. It'd be ok if it had been a page or so of exposition in order to use it later in the issue/arc as material, but it's clearly just a one-shot with this character. Ugh. I'm so tired of everything having to do with Secret Invasion being mired for the past 2 or 3 months in the exact same 5 minutes.

That being said, who knows -- maybe they'll finally get to do something next issue.

Amazing Spider-Man (Post-One More Day)

I'm just going to give a quick review of the way they've been handling Spider-Man since the controversial reset. I'm not sure what the current issue number is, so...whatever's current.

One-sentence summary: This is probably the best Spider-Man has been in long while.

I've been a Spider-Man fan since before I could read -- due to this, I can't really tell you what drew me initially to him. The colorful cast of villains? The substantial non-superheroics which are such an essential part of the character? The light-hearted delivery of the book? Probably a mixture of these.

As someone who has been buying Spidey books for the past 20 years, I can tell you my heart has been broken by it a number of times. The clone saga was the first blow, but, worse than that was the recent turn of it into a super-dramatic, super-serious comic. That's not to say Spider-Man should never be serious -- Kraven's Last Hunt is an excellent example of good, serious Spider-Man. But, having each month be this melodrama, to have some character circling the drain (i.e., dying slowly) at almost any moment, Spider-Man swearing terrible vengeance, etc...it just got old, and it got depressing.

I went into this new fashion of Spider-Man with some hesitancy; after all, they were beginning it with arguably the worst retcon that has ever been done. But it was with good intentions; they saw the same problems with Spider-Man as I mentioned above, and the lack of much that made the title unique and gave it its character. Though in an initially awkward manner, they've essentially dealt with this.

By having a near-weekly, on-going series, it's a bit of a new thing we're dealing with here. The old standards of comic book pacing are, well, essentially moot. I've enjoyed how they divide up some of these smaller arcs into three, maybe four issue stories; while not super-intense, these do allow for some development, and a conclusion to the main plot, within a month or so. The only issue I really have with things as they are are their current use of sub-plots. Even with three issues a month, some of the developments are moving very slowly, to the point where I'm wondering if they'll come up again. However, this isn't a big complaint -- more like growing pains (on whose side, I wonder).

So, let's do a quick checklist: Colorful cast of villains? Check. Substantial plots regarding the non-superheroes? Check. Light-hearted delivery? Check. Hopefully it's clear why I feel the way I do about the new take on the book.

She-Hulk #20

One-sentence summary: The big wrap-up for the last twenty issues of She-Hulk, it doesn't disappoint with plenty of self-referential jokes and general goofiness, as well as an excellent job of wrapping up loose ends.

Really, this issue does such a remarkable job wrapping up every loose end that you can tell that Slott isn't just a huge comic book fan (which the subject matter of She-Hulk really should've clued you onto), but also knows their weaknesses well too and avoids those mistakes. It makes me wonder how he would do on a more serious title; I hope I see more of his stuff soon.

But, back to She-Hulk. It's been a good run, but it's almost over. We hear in this how She-Hulk defended the Marvel universe from annhilation over the Ultimate due to the fact that the Marvel is "fun." Also, honestly, I think I would probably buy a book that was just Stu's adventures across the Marvel universe, desperately trying to avoid comic book characters.

This was a good issue. It'll be sad to see She-Hulk move on, but I accept it and I'm sure that a more serious take on the character could be nice too. We still have one more issue left, though I don't know what else they have to do. Also, I love the last panel reveal on this, and truly hope that that's all that's ever said about it.

Avengers Initiative #4

One-sentence summary: Probably one of the best World War Hulk tie-ins yet, it both advances the plot behind Initiative as well as giving significant details on World War Hulk.

I've been on the fence about Avengers Initiative for awhile. It seems like a pretty logical idea to me as far as a comic goes, and I have a soft spot for any comic which introduces main characters who can actually die (seems dark, I know, but it just usually makes a better comic). I've so far enjoyed Iniative, so I was a little dismayed to see that this was a World War Hulk tie-in, which, in my mind, immediately changed the title to "Read about the Iniative getting smashed by Hulk!" Imagine my pleasant surprise when that wasn't what it was, really.

This issue barely involves the hulk, directly at least. There's one interesting plot twist it details which, rather than affecting WWH, explains an incident in greater detail, which I thought was neat. It makes it so you don't feel the book was absolutely pointless to the main story (e.g., Ghost Rider), but it doesn't really change anything for those who are only following the main story. I really liked this, and I hope more tie-ins pick up on that (as they're probably told by editors they can't do anything radical).

It also, rather logically, did not have the Initative going after the Hulk. This would just be dumb; instead, they have them helping regular people, each using their powers appropriately. The end, yes, seems to be leading into next issue being "Hulk's Friends Smash," but, hey, at least it's not the Hulk smashing -- I could do with the variety.

Also, the regular story of the Iniative was advanced at least somewhat, even if to a slightly lower extent than a regular issue would do. All in all, this was my favorite tie-in in recent memories, as it actually read like a tie-in and not a 22-page filler issue of ads for whatever the current saga is.

I could pretty easily recommend this to people who are buying the Initiative, as well as people buying what they can of World War Hulk stuff. Not a bad issue at all -- a good job to all involved.