As with last week, I didn’t pick up as many comics this week due to temporary financial issues. As such, I didn’t pick up Journey Into Mystery or Gambit, as much as I wanted to. The comics I did buy include Uncanny X-Men 2, Uncanny X-Force 2, Young Avengers 2, Uncanny Avengers 4, FF 4, Avengers Arena 5 and Batman Incorporated 8. These are my unscripted first impressions.
In case you’d rather read my thoughts, here they are in three or less sentences.
Uncanny Avengers 4 was awesome. It concludes the fight between the Uncanny Avengers and Red Skull, who now has Xavier’s telepathy powers. It’s a great fight scene, and there are some well-written dramatic scenes afterward. The ending teaser is simply crazy too. This is definitely worth checking out if you like either the X-Men or the Avengers … unless you don’t want to see them working together for some reason.
FF 4 was great. It’s mostly about She Hulk (my favourite of the hulks) as the moloids try to sabotage her date. It’s a great way to explore her fun, spontaneous nature. There’s also some story development to balance the issue out. If you like Jennifer Walters, or you’ve been enjoying this series so far, you should definitely pick this up. It feels as though Matt Fraction understands the She Hulk at least on a basic level, and that’s a relief to me.
Avengers Arena 5 was alright, but the series as a whole is starting to feel repetitive. As with the other issues, it focuses mostly on one character and his/her past. This time, we have the first jerk of the series – it’s almost refreshing to see a character we almost want to see killed. If you’ve been enjoying this series so far, at least check this issue out, but Dennis Hopeless will need to start changing things up soon if he wants this series to do well. Also, nobody dies in this issue.
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Uncanny X-Men was very good. With the set-up out of the way, we’re getting some very good characterization, particularly with Emma and Magik. And the new kids are fun.
Uncanny X-Force was great. I’m loving this series. The Fantomex’s dragged this issue down a bit, but otherwise, it was fun while still being compelling.
Young Avengers was amazing, obviously. The page of them walking around on the panels was brilliant. Not quite breaking the fourth wall, but close.This is one of my favourite books ever, I think. You need to stick with it. It’s worth it.
Uncanny Avengers was goo. I loved the Skull trolling his lackey. “Now THAT time you should have asked why.” Hilarious. And it was good otherwise.
FF was great. This is such a fun yet heartfelt series. Fraction and Allred excel at that.
Avengers Arena was well-written, but I still can’t support it. The big plus to this issue is that it’s moving away from only focusing on a single character in each issue. We do get to see some of the others. That’s good. That’s necessary.
You missed out by not picking up Gambit or JiM. Especially JiM. Gambit was a lot of fun (and included the absolutely magical line “Lady Stiltman out!”), but JiM is one of the best solo titles Marvel’s putting out. It’s such a phenomenal book. This week, in particular, had a bunch of amazing pages of people reacting to the monsters showing up around the world. Tokyo reacting to Rro is especially clever, though Monica meeting the Emperor of Mars is also special. So, so good. But it’s still advancing the plot and, more important, Sif’s characterization.
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