Avengers Age of Ultron: Real Superheroes

Splash page brought to life

I just watched a movie where lives were at stake, the Earth was threatened by larger than life beings, hellbent on death and destruction and the complex group of individuals with various dark origins and uncontrollable raging powers who were there to stop the villain, still took the time to save lives and inspire each other, the world and the audience to go on and fight the good fight. It's ironic that back in the day, Marvel comics was the "gritty" real world alternative to the godlike and sometimes cheesy pantheon at DC, because if someone 25 years or so ago, read that description of the movie I just saw, they'd probably guess it was the Justice League, and not a screen version of one of the Avengers' darkest tales, Age of Ultron. Of course, that could be because Age of Ultron is a fairly recent comic, but still, you get the point. Everything Warner Bros got wrong with Man of Steel and the apparent tone of the upcoming Dawn of Justice, Age of Ultron addresses head on. It makes me wonder how much of it was intentional.

I'd watch the hell our of this movie.

Right off the bat, the movie opens with no preamble, in the middle of an epic battle. Each Avenger is showcased one by one in their own moments of general badassery, all while bantering. It's pure comic book fun, complete with a super slow motion splash page moment or two. I'm sure much of what happens in this opening scene and throughout the movie was teased or set up on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., but I don't watch that show and it doesn't matter one bit. It's a thrilling opening that seems to pick up right where the first movie left off in terms of the tone, though it's clear some time has passed. I also haven't seen Iron Man 3 or Thor 2 and didn't feel lost for a second. I'm sure if you've seen everything they've done, then each chapter is that much more rewarding, but it's not at all necessary. 

Spader nailed it.

But, back to the tone. The banter is a big part of what made the first Avengers so successful for me. On the one hand it's fun. But on the other, the type of banter we get reveals depth to these people. And I say people instead of characters intentionally. But it's not the only thing that reveals their depth. We have moments of real humanity that drive the plot forward for each of them, particularly for Black Widow and Hulk/Banner, a relationship that deserves its own movie. And make no mistake,much of what's revealed is dark and heavy, but it never overwhelms the movie. Instead it serves to make what these human beings do that much more meaningful. If I had to pick only one flaw out of the many in Man of Steel, the biggest one is that we never really get Clark Kent. For all the flashbacks to his childhood, we never really hit on anything that has any baring on him as a human. On the contrary, the minute his human father dies, it's like he decided he's not human at all, and immediately latches on to Jor El the instant he sees his hologram. There's never a moment of doubting whether he's human or alien. He's not one of us and that's all there is to it. And because of that we can never really latch on to anything in the movie.

Vision needs to be seen more.

Anyway, Age of Ultron was great, is what I'm saying. If I have one issue with it it's that Vision was underused after all the build up. Especially since Paul Bettany nailed the character in the few scenes he did have. I'm curious where the franchise goes from here. The next big chapter will be Captain America: Civil War, and I'm sure the arguments the heroes had here set up the bigger ones they'll have there. Then comes Avengers: Infinity War, which might be pushing it for me, to be honest. I'm one episode away from finishing the Daredevil series on Netflix and kind of wish Marvel would scale back a bit and tell more of those street level stories instead of trying to get bigger with each one. But who knows. It is a little concerning that Joss Whedon won't be on board for the Infinity War. Let's hope he doesn't take all the humor with him.

Comics of the Week

One thing ends, a new one begins and yet another just stays consistently great. Hard to argue with any of it, really.

Flashpoint #5 may not have had the most mind blowing revelations, but it did deliver what I had hoped would happen. Flashpoint directly sets up the DC reboot. It would have been a waste had this not been the case. Now, I am looking forward to seeing how much of what we saw in the Flashpoint tie ins will pop up in the new DC books. Overall, the wrap up of the Flashpoint universe did seem a little rushed. Suddenly all these characters, who had last been seen making their way to this final battle in their tie-in books, just start appearing but not really doing anything. At point, Grodd's army shows up and Barry Allen says "Grodd too?" and that's about all we see or hear of it. The real payoff is in the end when Barry shows up in the regular/new DCU and delivers a letter to Bruce from Thomas Wayne. We've already seen a kinder, gentler Bruce since his return from the dead, and this moment reinforces this idea for the new universe. It will be interesting to see how much Barry remembers about Flashpoint and the old DCU as time goes on. Clearly, they've left the door open to go back if needed. I don't fault them for that, and really, it makes sense creatively.

Sometimes what makes a comic book great is the promise it sets up for upcoming issues. I would say this is what takes Justice League #1 to the next level. Basically, it's a great first issue, even if you know nothing about DC. For months, we've all been waiting for the reboot with anticipation, dread, disdain, excitement, fear, etc. Now that it's here, this first book really feels exactly like what they promised. It's a whole new world. Yes, the characters' essences are still there, but you really aren't sure what's coming next. I like that. For all the talk from fans about how DC and Marvel always do the same thing, it's been interesting to see them rage against this change. And from past experiences with "change" I understand that. This is not the same as before. It really feels different. It's not a Heroes Reborn take on the characters. It's not a Crisis in which characters are de-aged and histories compressed. This really feels like a fresh take on characters, rather than just a new version of the same events we've seen over the years. Granted, it's one issue in, so who knows where it's going, but like I said, it's the promise of the next issue(s) that makes this great. And that promise has me excited.

Then there's Uncanny X-Force #14. This has been one of my favorite books being published since I read the first arc. What Remender has going here is what makes X-Men books so great, but there's something else here that is just special. This team is on there own, with little to no interference from the rest of the Marvel U. It almost plays out as if this were the only book to ever feature these characters, even though they have these elaborate histories that influence them and the story in every way. I know a little about these histories, but even if I knew nothing, I'd still love this book. To top it off, this issue features the return of Jerome Opeña on art. If I need to say more about why that is something to drool over, then you haven't read the first arc of this series and you need to do so. Interestingly, Wolverine is out of commission for the majority of this issue, and even though he's the character I'm most interested in, the others are so compelling, even Deadpool, that I didn't notice how little of Logan there was until the end. If you love X-Men, pick this series up. If you don't love X-Men, pick it up anyway, and it may change your mind.

Comic Event Season

We can bitch and moan about big comic book events all we want, but they aren't going away. Lately it seems events never really end, either. They just sort of morph into the next one or spin off into separate mini events until the next big one comes along. Either way, I think the key is to make the event what you want it to be. These are just stories, so just approach them as stories not as life or universe altering events. Of course, this would be easier to do if the publishers handled it properly on their end.

Right now, Marvel is into Fear Itself. Several ties have come out and the core Fear Itself book released issue 2 last week. I have decided to read only the core book. My thought is that you should be able to follow the story and get something out of it without having to read everything. The publishers themselves tell you this. So, is the case with Fear Itself? NO! They lie! Fear Itself, the book, is horrible. It's so condensed that nothing actually happens. Whether or not this is true of the whole event itself, I can't say, but as a series goes, Fear Itself started off ok with issue 1, but number 2 didn't do anything at all to move the story forward. So far, all we know is that this so-called Serpent character has unleashed all these hammers on the world, which are picked up by various people, who in turn are possessed by the Serpent's army. Meanwhile, Odin has recreated Asgard and chained up Thor. Still no clue who this Serpent person is or what he wants. Taking your time with a story is fine, but you have to give me something each issue.

It seems as though, instead of rewarding readers for reading all of the tie ins, Marvel is punishing readers for only reading one book. It's a missed opportunity to do something interesting with the medium. Properly done, what should happen is that no matter what title you follow, you get a complete story. Not THE complete story, mind you, just a story. Then, if you read other tie ins, you get more pieces to a larger story coming together. The main book, however, should be the backbone of the whole thing and not just rely on snippets to be expanded upon in the other titles. It should make me want to pick up the tie ins, not because I have to in order to know what's going on, but because you've given me enough to care about that I now have an interest in going deeper. If what you want is a story where you need what is being told in all the tie ins, then do it as a series of OGN's. To me, that's just common sense.

Last week, Marvel also released X-Men Prelude to Schism #1. While only a prelude to the upcoming X-Men event, I found it much more satisfying than Fear Itself. Nothing much happened in the book, but we did get a good set up of where the characters are at, particularly Cyclops. We know some kind of threat is at hand that has put Scott in the position to decide whether to fight or evacuate Utopia. And, really, in a prelude, that should be all we need to know. Whether this event will actually change everything for the X-Men, as advertised, or not, doesn't really matter, so long as it's a satisfying story.

Today, DC releases Flashpoint #1, which already looks promising. The many mini-series associated with Flashpoint look to be interesting. DC is once again playing with alternate realities, which is, I think, what they do best. And in those situations, events have a better chance of doing what I think they should. There's a much better chance that reading any of the minis will be satisfying, regardless of the bigger picture of the event. I will probably be following most of, if not all of Flashpoint, but I already predict the main story will not be the best part.

Brightest Day, Dim Ending

Brightest Day came on the heels of Blackest Night, supposedly to help reintegrate the resurrected characters back into the DCU. Some of the series worked well to do this, introducing new characters along the way. But the final issue squandered what was built up over the year and sold the main characters short in favor of what was basically a DC marketing ploy.

The best parts of the series involved Deadman coming to terms with his life. Here was  character that I never really cared for, suddenly becoming compelling and vital. Over 23 issues, we followed Boston Brand on his journey to determine who the real guardian of Earth would be, often believing it would wind up being Boston himself. By the end of it, his fate is not just tragic, it's completely cruel and unnecessary. I understand that once a character gets what he wants, there is no conflict and the story is basically over. So, if we want to continue to see Boston Brand be vital, then he has to lose something by the end of Brightest Day. However, what we got instead was a return to exactly what he was before Brightest day started. So, ultimately, DC could have just left the character alone if this is what they intended all along.

Of course, the big news of the series was bringing two major Vertigo characters back into the regular DCU. Mind you, this did not happen until the last 2 issues. Before that, there was really no clue that these characters would be appearing. One of them only shows up as a teaser in the last 2 pages of the last issue. A few months back, Lex Luthor encountered Death of the Endless, another major Vertigo character in the pages of Action Comics. It's been argued that it was out of context, and I don't agree with that, I think it was in context, but at the very least, it didn't take a whole maxi series to bring the character in. The same thing could have been done with the other two characters (I'm trying not to spoil it, even though it's all over the Internets anyway). There was no reason the characters couldn't come back in the pages of any of the current DC books. Maybe Superman could have bumped into them on his walk across America.

So, Brightest Day is over and now we head into DC's big event of the Summeer, Flashpoint. Like most events, this is being hyped as changing the DCU forever. Well, that remains to be seen, and although I'm skeptical about the outcomes of big events, Flashpoint does seem like it could be fun. Time travel, alternate realities, what's not to love about that?