“Avengers” #1

With the Avengers currently involved in the biggest movie in the world, Marvel is once again relaunching their comic book counterparts. But, is “Avengers” #1 actually a ‘Fresh Start,’ or just another one of Marvel’s false start relaunches? Find out the answer to that question, along with some spoilers in our review.

Written by Jason Aaron
Pencilled by Ed McGuinness
Inked by Mark Morales
Colored by David Curiel
Lettered by VC’s Cory Petit

Thor Odinson. Steve Rogers. Tony Stark. The Big Three of the Avengers are reunited at last! And just in time to save the world from total annihilation at the hands of their most powerful enemies yet: the 2000-foot-tall space gods known as Celestials. Behold the coming of the Final Host. Who will answer the call to assemble for a wild new era of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes? Hint: one of them has a flaming skull for a head. And what strange, world-shaking connection exists between the Final Host and Odin’s ancient band of Prehistoric Avengers?

Since the end of “Secret Wars” in 2015, the Avenger’s books have struggled to find time same sense of scope that Jonathan Hickman’s run brought to the title. They existed for a few years as a couple different, disconnected titles which only came together when an event like ‘Secret Empire’ demanded it. It has felt like there was something missing from the Avengers line, a sense of gravitas, some kind of importance. After all, Avengers: Infinity War is the biggest movie in the world, shouldn’t the comic match up? With “Avengers” #1, the series once again has the sense of scope and ambition that characterized the title during Hickman’s tenor.

Jason Aaron starts “Avengers” #1 by picking up some of the threads that “Marvel Legacy” #1 left off in September of last year. The issue starts with another flashback to the Avengers of 1,000,000 BC who are still dealing with an invasion of Celestials on a very pre-historic earth. We still aren’t given much in the way of detail about these avengers, but it seems like Aaron is playing the long game with these characters and the story. Some of Aaron’s best Marvel work, like “Thor: God of Thunder,” worked with this kind of juxtaposition of different time periods and storylines. So, while these characters feel a little disconnected from the story right now, I trust Aaron will bring them back around in a satisfying way in the long run.

This story seems like one focused on the long run. While Aaron might not be gearing up for a run on this title that is quite as epic a run as what he is currently doing on Thor, he is writing a story here with scope. While this is a first issue with a bit of table setting that needs doing, getting the main characters of Thor Odinson, Steve Rodgers and Tony Stark back together and part of the Avengers, once it gets to the main brunt of the story, there is no doubt that we are in it. Dead Celestials, giant sky portals, huge creatures called that call themselves The Final Host and are capable of killing Celestials. All of this picking up from that first “Marvel Legacy” issue, giving long time readers at least some follow-up on questions that have been hanging in the air for almost nine months now.

However, that isn’t to say that “Legacy” is required reading for this story. In fact, you might be almost better off skipping “Marvel Legacy” #1 all together in relation to this story, as some of the links between the two end up being more confusing than anything else. I’m sure part of that comes from the change in editorial direction since the Marvel Legacy initiative, and just the amount of time since that issue came out, but there are a few inconsistencies that, reading the two back to back, actually makes this issue more confusing than it needs to be.

If you do read “Legacy” before coming to this story, though, one of the most jarring changes from that story to this one has nothing to do with plot inconsistency but comes down to the look of the book. The main story portions of “Legacy” were illustrated by Esad Ribic, whose art resembles nothing so much as an airbrushed metal album cover, in the best way. Ed McGuinness and Mark Morales, here, bring a very different style to the story.

The linework here isn’t bad by any means. McGuinness is a talented artist, and his lines are very clean, his characters stature and body language conveying much about what their feeling. Facial features are expressive, and while this issue isn’t super action heavy, the bits of it where there is action are very well done. But the tone that is struck by the art work seems a little divorced from the story that Aaron is telling. Aaron seems like he is trying to continue the epic tone of the “Legacy” one shot, whereas McGuinness is bringing a more cartoony, exaggerated look to the book. These tones of epic gravitas and cartoony action are a bit at odds with each other in this first issue.

That is the real question that is left open by the end of this issue. Not whether the plot will be able to come together, or the mysteries that are being presented will be able to be solved, but whether the book’s team can come together in a way that is a bit more cohesive than this first issue. Everyone on the book is extremely talented in their own way, but do their individual styles work together? That question is still up in the air. But, from what I’ve read in this issue, I hope so. There is a lot of promise in “Avengers” #1, and I hope that the series will just get better as it goes on.

Final Verdict: 7.0 – “Avengers” #1 has a bit of inconsistency trying to figure out what it wants to be, but at it’s heart this seems like the start of a great new era.