Its certainly been a while since I did an article such as this, but I thought it was the perfect time to share with you guys my thoughts on the Avengers in the Marvel comics, and why I absolutely despise what’s being done with them right now.
The problem was present before but with the success of the Avengers film its gotten completely ridiculous and unbearable, now some one at Marvel got the bright idea of expanding the Avengers into multiple different teams that would serve different functions, for example Secret Avengers which was followed a black ops team of X-Force style Avengers in their adventures.
Now the idea is actually pretty cool and I don’t have a problem with it, my problem is the execution, while Secret Avenger has delivered on its promise and has justified its existence as a book, after Marvel NOW I have to ask, why in the hell is there an Avengers and New Avengers book?!
First of all Uncanny Avengers is the flagship Avengers title and flagship Marvel title in general, second, the main problem with Avengers and New Avengers is the fact that they have been the same thing for years now, its the same story lines being told over and over in each book just happening to different characters.
These two titles could be salvaged if they had say a different writer on them, but no they got Jonathan Hickman who’s writing capabilities go from convoluted sci-fi BS…. to more convoluted sci-fi BS, so these books are literally going to be the same thing just with a different artist on it, this wouldn’t bug me if say New Avengers was canceled, oh but then Marvel couldn’t whore out this team for some more cash.
While there are three Justice League books at DC, all of them actually are different and aren’t just generic copies of one another, the main Justice League book is the worlds greatest heroes battling an enemy they cant defeat alone, Justice League Dark is the team that consists of the big magic characters of DC dealing with magic based threats, that not even the main Justice League team can beat!
I don’t know what the premise is behind Justice League of America, but it seems its a similar deal to Uncanny X-Force, a team of super heroes willing to keep the peace by any means necessary, again a book that just from its premise is different enough from the other two JL titles to justify its existence.
But now onto my main problem with the Avengers, every single character is a member in some way, true a large number of DC characters also served on the Justice League and its various incarnations of the years as well, however only a small fraction of heroes from the DC universe are in these three teams, at Marvel EVERYONE from Moon Knight to Jessica Jones is an Avenger!
Because it makes so much sense for all of these people to be on the same team…..
First of all characters such as Moon Knight, Daredevil and Punisher should NEVER EVER interact with the Avengers, they are characters that could cross over with each other from time to time but should remain in their own small corners of the Marvel universe where they work best.
Second, this completely destroys the very point of even having on going comic book series based around a singular hero, everyone is an Avengers and everyone is in New York anyway, this makes it almost impossible to read anything with Thor, Captain America or Wolverine constantly showing up where they don’t belong.
The best example of this is Slott’s Amazing Spider-Man, which should just be renamed THE AVENGERS AND THEIR PAL THE WEB HEADED MORON! Slott constantly throws in the Avengers in his stories when there’s absolutely no point to them being there, they literally just randomly show up, have some horrible banter with Spider-Man and fly away to do their own thing.
They serve absolutely no story purpose what so ever, but again since the Avengers movie made 1.5 billion we have to throw them in every goddamn book and whore them out some more.
This is what Marvel always does, they get something popular, they whore it out and milk it so much until you never, ever want to see it again then leave its shriveled defiled corpse to be eaten by the crows.
The situation is so bad that Greg Rucka, one of the finest writers in the industry left Punisher, one of the best on going tittles at Marvel because they forced him to do a contrived mini event where the Punisher has to fight, who else but the Avengers of course! Because that totally makes sense and doesn’t ruin one of the few genuinely great books at your company (sarcasm).
So the Marvel universe at this point is pretty much just Avengers and X-Men, oh boy do I have something to say on the 25 X-Men books but that’s another rant for another time, I think its completely pointless to make every single hero in your universe a member of the same exact team and when it starts making great writers leave your company, you know something’s not right.
So that’s my rant about the Avengers in the comics, what do you guys think? Did I hit the nail on the head or did I completely miss the mark?
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Cricket
Nov 17, 2012 -
There’s too many teams in the Marvel Universe. Worst part is when there’s no consistency amongst other titles and characters just show up to sell more copies of the title.
I think DC is going this route too, they have a new JLA team or something coming out next year.
Game Raging Psycho
Nov 17, 2012 -
They did have this with Justice League and Justice League International, but since JLI is canceled that issue is gone, the new JLA team does look and sound different enough from the standard Justice League team to justify their existence.
Also you don’t really notice that kind of thing with Justice League since not every DC character is a member of the team and they’re pretty much separate from the rest of the universe.
DC does have a lot of teams too, but DC doesn’t just call Stormwatch, Justice League: Stormwatch or something along those lines, teams like Suicide Squad, Stormwatch, Batman INC and the Outlaws are their own thing and don’t need the JLA sticker slapped on to it.
Red Hood and the Outlaws does have the Batman sticker on, but again, aside from Red Hood occasionally teaming up with the Bat family during cross over’s like Night of the Owls and Death of the Family, its entirely separate from the rest of the Bat books.
And that is my main problem with the Avengers, they just show up in every book to boost sales, its just whoring out the team until everyone gets sick of them and never want to see them again.