Uncanny Avengers #2

[Marvel Boy]

The plot progresses somewhat, but Havok still has no team to lead.

Havok does have a good, touching moment with a survivor as the Avengers help in the aftermath of Avalanche's attack. Cap and Logan have a nice discussion on the state of human/mutant affairs and frankly, I like Cap's reasons for picking Alex over Logan for leading this new squad.

The rest of the focus is on Rogue, Wanda, and Red Skull.

I've always liked Rogue though I was unaware she had hooked back up romantically with Magneto. Her escape attempt was an interesting display of her powers. Loved her reaction to what happened to Xavier, especially since Remeder threw in a flashback to when she joined the X-Men back in UXM #171.

Wanda....I don't know about Wanda. The whole time I've been reading Marvel, I've been confused over Wanda. She's a mutant, no, she's a witch, wait, she's a mutant witch. Her hexes affected probablities, then her hexes were magic. Then she got Bendis-ized and she could alter reality itself. Now, she's a mutant with elemental chaos magic who with enough power could still affect reality. O-kay.

Interesting yet rather simple twist with Red Skull. Although the last time I really read him was way back in Mark Gruenwald's run on Cap, when we learned in Cap #350 that he was brought back in a clone of Steve's body. Here, he's just your more basic clone.

I liked the attention towards his views on mutants, which I'm unsure if that had ever been addressed before now. I know Skull has had run-ins with Magneto (including one cool issue where they fought and Magneto ended up trapping Skull in an underground bunker) but I thought that was due more to Magneto's past in Nazi concentration camps than mutant hatred.

So if you are planning any 'Master Race', then people with powers would seem to qualify as superior breed, to the Skull anyway. Skull with his own enhancements due to Xavier now seems terrifying on a whole new level.

As for the art, it was good though Cassaday really needs to tone down the chain mail on Cap. He's starting to look like he has feathers on his chest.

Oh, and it seems Daredevil is still an Avenger after all. In the first double spread, as the team searches the rubble for survivors, Matt can be seen atop rubble on the very top right of the scene.

Another decent issue. Hopefully, after two issues of Cap saying he is the leader, Havok will actually lead someone in a capable fashion.

[Shiryu]

Interesting yet rather simple twist with Red Skull. Although the last time I really read him was way back in Mark Gruenwald's run on Cap, when we learned in Cap #350 that he was brought back in a clone of Steve's body. Here, he's just your more basic clone

If I understand correctly, this isn't our traditional Red Skull, but a clone of his made just before the end of WW2 and recently awoken. In other words, there are two Skulls around.

Also, the original Skull in the cloned Captain America body has been killed off some time ago in Cap, by the Winter Soldier. He is back now, but in a new body I think.

[tomspasic]

Wanda is a mutant. Mutants, like humans, can learn magic or witchcraft. Therefore, when Wanda learned magic and witchcraft she became a witch, adding that to her probability altering "hex" powers.
So she is a mutant witch. So she can throw "hexes", her mutant power, and cast spells, like Doc Strange, and also mix the two. So far, so simple.
At some point her mutant powers were deemed to tie into "chaos magic", something which seemed wholly stupid and unnecessary to me, but then I'm not John Byrne.
And then Bendis came along and wrote the crap he wrote and suddenly she's a Cosmic Cube (effectively, not literally). But a "cahraaazy" one, cos, y'know, she's just a chick, and in Bendis world chicks can't handle power without getting the crazy.
So there you are, a character with a fairly straightforward power (point-and-bad-luck-happens) gets some character development (learns magic), then a pointless retcon linking her to "chaos magic", and then an even worse retcon making her all-powerful but feeble-minded.
No wonder you were confused...

[Marvel Boy]

Part of Wanda's problem, or at least my problem with her, is that her base mutant power is hard to show in a visual medium. It's not like Iron Man shooting repulsor beams or Pym shrinking. To understand what her hexes affected, you need either a thought balloon or a caption box, two traditional comic elements that Bendis has eliminated oh-so thoroughly.

Throwing magic bolts around is easier. But like Doctor Doom, her magic abilities are highlighted or subdued depending on the current writer's need. For example, that whole subplot with finding a new Sorceror Supreme after Strange 'quit', I don't know if Wanda was ever considered for that title, but I would have liked to have seen that.

[tomspasic]

Dec 6, 2012 0:32:30 GMT -5 Marvel Boy said:

Part of Wanda's problem, or at least my problem with her, is that her base mutant power is hard to show in a visual medium. It's not like Iron Man shooting repulsor beams or Pym shrinking. To understand what her hexes affected, you need either a thought balloon or a caption box, two traditional comic elements that Bendis has eliminated oh-so thoroughly.

Throwing magic bolts around is easier. But like Doctor Doom, her magic abilities are highlighted or subdued depending on the current writer's need. For example, that whole subplot with finding a new Sorceror Supreme after Strange 'quit', I don't know if Wanda was ever considered for that title, but I would have liked to have seen that.

I think that a good artist/writer team can easily convey Wanda's Hex powers, it just takes a couple of panels to do it right, maybe three: One, Wanda points. Two, we see a thugs feet, with the shoelaces tangled. Three, a medium shot of thug falling down.
Or panel one Wanda points at curtains behind villain, panel two, villain is caught up in curtains.
You may need some slightly expository dialogue, like "hey, how did my laces get all tangled up?" or "He'll be tangled in the curtains for a few seconds" to convey that she knows what's happening, and they probably don't.
But I think that her power is something that actually works particularly well in the medium of comics because ideally it requires pictures and words.
Only idiots think that caption boxes and thought balloons should be eliminated from all comics. And writers who get paid by the page, since you need a lot more pages if you do without captions or thought balloons.
I've never understood why "voice over narrative" caption boxes are deemed OK in our Brave New World, but authorial narrative caption boxes and thought balloons are not.
But then I don't understand why everyone's costumes need neon piping now, either.

[wundagoreborn]

I like the very early days when Wanda would hold her hands together over her head like a Bollywood dancer. It was goofy fun, and you knew she was doing something.

[starfoxxx]

My LCS guy says this book might have shipping-on-time issues.

.....still waiting for #3......

[tomspasic]

I keep forgetting about this book due to the delays.
It's supposed to be the "flagship" book, but seems like the least important one to me, simply because it seems largely absent.
This is where multiple team books and no inter-book continuity can really hurt a title. If we were seeing some signs of this book in other titles, just a passing reference or newspaper headline, it would feel like it was happening and relatively important. As it is, it's in it's own little bubble and might as well be an elseworlds tale.
It will probably read ok when it's finally collected for trade, in the distant future, but has pretty much lost my interest based on all the delays.

[Marvel Boy]

Havok's Avengers squad is hunting down Cable and his group for some form of crime over in the Cable and X-Force title. I haven't read that much of it so I don't know if the squad is really up and running yet.

But these delays are hurting, I keep forgetting to check to see if #3 has been released. Not the best of ways to build up loyal readers.