“Original Sin” has been nothing short of crazy over in its main series, as our Confession Booth column will be more than happy to inform you. Now, Marvel’s upping the game with not one, not zero, but MULTIPLE Original Sins in its new anthology series, “Original Sins!” Allegedly, everyone has one.
So as to not ruin that for all involved, let’s read our spoiler-free review below, no?
Written by Nathan Edmondson, Ryan North, and Stuart Moore
Illustrated by Mike Perkins, Ramon Villalobos, and Rick GearyEVERYBODY HAS ONE…
Now that “Original Sin” reached its “Event Horizon” (the moment in every event series where the story arbitrarily bleeds over into the rest of the line), we’re getting revelations behind literally every Marvel character. Seriously, for a high profile title, the list of characters at the top is relatively obscure: “Deathlok. Young Avenges. Lockjaw.” This ain’t your “Thor & Loki: What The Hell Do You Mean We’re Related To That Character From Spawn?!”
Nah, “Original Sins” takes the relaxed opportunity to spin some tales regarding some lower-tier characters in the Marvel Universe and, by using “Original Sin” as a jumping off point, “Sins” doles out some pretty interesting stories.
For one, the Nathan Edmondson/Mike Perkins “Deathlok” series that was teased yesterday makes its debut of sorts within the pages of “Original Sins”. Henry Hayes, a veteran and analog to J. August Richard’s character from Agents of SHIELD, is chilling in Grand Central Staiton when someone triggered by the events of “Original Sin” #3 remembers the secret history of this never before seen Deathlok. From there, Mike Perkins takes us on a visual journey of what type of life this new Deathlok unity lives. From a car chase in Moscow to a straight-up fight with one of the helicopters from Half-Life 2, we’re clearly shown how Hayes will be unlike any other Deathlok unit seen before. In many ways, he’s more of a badass Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy; indestructibly versatile. Then suddenly the plot shifts, those in control take back their power, and everything goes to hell in a tragically brutal way.
Honestly, and this will be a recurring theme, this Deathlok story has very little to do with “Original Sins” itself but still presents an incredibly intriguing premise that will define the forthcoming “Deathlok” book. Considering that within the 24 hours after I heard about the new title and before I read this story, I could not care less about what I thought was a lazy Agents of SHIELD tie-in, but now? Yeah, obviously this book was created as a means of drawing in the TV crowd but it’s a book I would be utterly satisfied with. Intriguing, complex, and creating layers of unseen depth that go in a completely different direction than the character, who already was pretty complex to begin with, has ever seen before. Think of it as “The Winter Soldier” but with a normal man who doesn’t have a Steve Rogers to save him.
In the second segment of the issue, Ryan North and Ramon Villalobos tackle the Young Avengers, or rather Teddy, David, and Noh-Varr. After the Noh-Varr’s break up at the end of the last volume of “YA” and after spending days in his space station in his underwear crying and eating space pizza while listening to sad music, he gets back into the superhero game when he discovers that Extermantrix is part of “Original Sin.” From there, we get an amusing road trip where Villalobos gets to stretch his comedic muscles as seen during the brilliant flirting scene between “Coulson” and an agent I’m gonna go ahead and guess is the Marvel Universe’s Pornstache. To his credit, Ryan North also gets to show off his (very) funny side with some snappy dialogue, panel border commentary and Buzzfeed jokes that hit the right note between being relevant and too reference heavy. All that takes a sudden sharp turn into the dark when The Hood, one of Marvel’s underrated villains, shows up to put a damper on things by looking goddamn terrifying. Seriously, excellent design from Ramon Villalobos that takes everything that was sort of weird about The Hood and amps it up to eleven.
And really, if the Young Avengers story is meant to be the continuing thread throughout “Original Sins” then it might just be worth the buy, especially if you’re a Young Avengers fantastic like myself (or as I call myself, “YA boy”). It definitely has next to nothing to do with “Original Sin” itself, (what the hell does in the first place) but it looks like it’ll become an interesting forums for some neat one-shots to spring forth and, if they’re anything like the Deathlok or Young Avengers segments seen here, we’re definitely going to get some entertaining stuff.
Also, the two page Lockjaw comic from Stuart Moore and Rick Geary is straight up adorbz. Not much has to be said there.
Final Verdict: 7.4 – Browse. If you’re into these characters, then dig in. If not, maybe just browse it first.
