Reviews 

Review: Avengers Academy #14

By | May 19th, 2011
Posted in Reviews | % Comments

Written by Christos Gage
Illustrated by Sean Chen

It’s Super Hero Prom and the Sinister Six in two big issues of the comic iFanboy named the “Best New Book of 2010”! First the Academy hosts a dance like none you’ve ever seen, guest starring the Young Allies, former members of the Initiative…and featuring smack downs and smooch downs! Then the trainees get a crash course in big-time villainy as they take on Spider-Man’s greatest foes, the Sinister Six, in a story that will have major ramifications when FEAR ITSELF hits next month!

This book is running on a steady incline in the “race to Josh’s must read pile” and this issue continues the hot streak the book has had brewing for several months now. Never before has a book come off my “to drop” list with such a fury of compelling storytelling, lovable character moments and intense action. Click on down for all the haps!

The issue opens with the majority of the academy staff involved in a disaster relief mission to quell an erupting volcano as our wily bunch of students look on in anticipation from the comfort of the Infinite Avengers Mansion. This, as you might imagine, puts a serious damper on their spirits as they all, in varying levels, put themselves and the team down for not getting tapped for this mission. Its at this point that Jocasta alerts the team that Electro is attacking a very important laboratory in France and Reptil bargains on behalf of the team for Tigra to set them loose on the classic villain. After a somewhat quick debate, the team heads into action with the approval of Hank “Giant Man” Pym and the stats leaning heavily in their favor.

However, shortly after encountering Electro, they quickly find out (and as regular readers of Amazing Spider-Man already know) that Electro does not run solo these days and the kids are very quickly ambushed by five sixths of the Sinister Six. It seems Doctor Octopus is putting a major plot into action and required the use of the “infinite” part of Infinite Avengers Mansion to use for transporting a giant, menacing device stolen from this lab. While this whole ordeal is going on, the Six (now with The Chameleon fully revealed) thoroughly trounce our young heroes, injuring Reptil and Tigra severely and breaking the spirits of all involved. By the time Giant Man, Jocasta and Quicksilver arrive, the damage was done to death. The six were gone, the team was injured and the lab was rigged to blow (resulting in a traditional fireball down (infinite) hallway scenario). However, in one of the most brutal scenes of the book, the French Authorities rip Pym a new one not only for the loss of all the work contained in the lab, but for sending the inexperienced, teenage Academy students to deal with a problem they had no business dealing with before banning the Avengers from French soil.

As one might imagine, this verbal altercation ignited a world-wide firestorm that swayed public opinion distinctly AWAY from the very idea of the Avengers Academy and bringing the kids and faculty both into even lower spirits than they were when the issue began. While I was initially taken aback by the dour nature of the story, I quickly realized why it needed to happen. A few issues back, Gage wrote a scenario where novice, undisciplined and extremely flawed teen heroes defeated one of the most powerful villains in the entire history of the Avengers. Effectively, this issue was a form of checks and balances on that event itself, seemingly to say “whoa whoa Avengers Academy…you aren’t that good yet…don’t get cocky” and to send that message to the readers that may have been skeptical of the events in issue 12 as well. This type of internal balance to make sure that the stories he is presented make sense in context is exactly why Gage deserves all the notoriety he’s achieved as of late. Dude knows how to craft a story and make an audience buy it, even if he does it in reverse order sometimes.

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As for that art, I really really wish that Sean Chen was the main artist on this book and that Tom Raney was the fill in. I’ve been a fan of Chen’s work since his run on Wolverine with Frank Tieri and I can honestly say that he has one of the most unique looks and feels of any artist in the industry today. When I see his expressive facial features, his proportionate character designs and his use of fluid line work, I immediately know that it is his work. That kind of consistency is truly rare in the the medium today, and he really should be applauded for it more than he currently is.

Overall, I really love the way that this book is playing out. I’m not sure how long the “young teen heroes literally in school” angle is going to remain fresh, but once it stops I have no doubt in my mind that Gage will be able to redefine the book to a new status quo and still manage to keep the characters lovable, the stakes high and the payoffs sweet and deserved. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, not many writers can truly grasp writing teenage characters, but if this book is any indication, then Christos Gage is well on his way to joining the ranks of Brian K. Vaughn, Nick Spencer and Brian Wood in the somewhat illustrious “able to write young adult characters with legitimacy” category.

Final Verdict: 9.0 – Buy


Joshua Mocle

Joshua Mocle is an educator, writer, audio spelunker and general enthusiast of things loud and fast. He is also a devout Canadian. He can often be found thinking about comics too much, pretending to know things about baseball and trying to convince the masses that pop-punk is still a legitimate genre. Stalk him out on twitter and thought grenade.

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