Artist: John Romita Jr.
So here it is, Avengers vs. X-men. When I first heard about the premise of this book…I’m pretty sure I groaned. It just smacked of Civil War 2. I felt like we had done this just a few years ago. Which is not inherently bad; I loved Civil War. But it’s far too soon to recycle plot devices. So I went into this with skepticism.
The Phoenix Force is coming back and it’s targeting Hope. We’ve had a few glimpses of the Phoenix Force having something to do with Hope in the past, but whatever doubts readers may have had are surely gone.
The book starts off with a half-dead Nova crashing to Earth with a warning - the Phoenix is coming. After talking with Wolverine about what he knows of the Phoenix Force and its former hosts, Captain America and Iron Man discuss plans with the government. They have figured out where it’s going, what it’s coming for and what it could mean for the people of Earth. It’s decided that Hope should be taken into protective custody and further plans will be made. I will leave it at that, and if you’ve been reading any X-men in the past ten years, you’ll know that this plan will obviously not sit well with Cyclops and many of the other X-men.
It was a set up issue, which is required. The good thing is, it only took one issue to set this event up. The next issue will start with a bang and it should be fun. Bendis does a fine job; nothing stellar or mind blowing. The justifications for everyone is sound, the actions of the characters make sense, which is one problem I thought I was going to have. I half-assumed that they were going to shoe horn motives in this event just to sell copies. Thankfully, I was wrong.
Romita’s art is as good as his art gets. I know a lot of people aren’t Romita fans, and nobody can blame them. He admittedly rushes and does a piss poor job sometimes. But his stuff was good, and he’s big on action scenes, of which I assume this event will have plenty.
So, this issue leaves me with a few questions which will probably never be addressed. For starters, Utopia is considered to be a sovereign nation. Unless I’m mistaken, it’s recognized as its own country, of which I can only assume Scott Summers is considered its leader, president, etc. I wonder what the legal ramifications are for US sanctioned agents (The Avengers) coming uninvited and demanding extradition of a teenage girl, who is technically an endangered species. I also question the political ramifications of Utopia harboring a known mutant terrorist war criminal (Magneto). These things would be very interesting topics to be tackled.
I am actually pretty excited as to where this will go. I loved Civil War, not only for its art, but also for the entire Super Hero Registration Act that fueled the event. I couldn’t wait to see what happened next. I like the grey moral areas Marvel likes to explore, and if this title is handled properly, we could have another Civil War type event on our hands. I have faith in Bendis; he has written more good than bad. I just worry that this will lead to deus ex machina cop-out. And no one wants that.
By: Josh Loe
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