What They Say:
Red Skull is using his new powers to incite violence against mutants across the globe! • Scarlet Witch and Rogue make a terrible discovery that will haunt them forever! • The UNCANNY AVENGERS feel the full might of Red Skull’s S-Men
Creators:
Writer: Rick Remender
Artist: John Cassaday
Color Artist: Laura Martin
Letter: VC’s Chris Eliopoulos
The Review:
In the mid-2000s, the Scarlet Witch—mutant, daughter of Magneto, and soon-to-be former Avenger—went insane. Her reality warping powers affected her sanity and the multiple tragedies she faced in her life finally came to a head. She attacked the Avengers, killing Hawkeye and her husband, The Vision, and later remade the world in her father’s image, creating the so-called House of M. She was defeated by a coalition of super heroes who remembered the world as it once was. After her defeat she whispered three words: “No more mutants” and this spell decimated the mutant population, erasing the X-gene in all but a handful.
Enter the Phoenix: a cosmic creature of vast power and potential for destruction and creation. The Phoenix has always seemed to have an affinity for mutants—beginning with assuming the identity of mutant Jean Grey. This cosmic entity made its way to Earth and imbued five mutants with its power: Cyclops, Emma Frost, Namor the Submariner, Colossus and his sister Magick. They used the power to remake the world, only to be defeated by their darker natures and the Avengers.
As the Phoenix force left Earth, it gave its population a gift and reactivated X-genes across the globe. Mutants are now considered a threat again, perhaps even more so due to Cyclops’ actions. Seeing this, and thinking on Cyclops’ remark that the Avengers never did anything to help mutantkind, Captain America creates a new Avengers team composed of regular Avengers such as himself and Thor, as well as mutant heroes. He puts the command of this team on Alex Summers (aka Havok), brother of Cyclops, and not a moment too soon because the Red Skull has returned with a plan to eradicate the mutant race. The Skull might just win, too, as he possesses two powerful weapons: Honest John—the Living Propaganda, and the brain of Charles Xavier, the world’s most powerful telepath, now deceased.
This issue takes place in New York and marks the Skull’s first public appearance since gaining Xavier’s powers. It should be noted that this version of the Skull is not the original, but a clone created from the original’s brain waves from the end of World War II. His plan is to use his newfound telepathy to create a new, “Everlasting Reich.” Although he despises mutants (as he does anyone that does not fit his Aryan template for humanity), his attacks against them are more to give people a common enemy that he can use to frighten them into accepting his rule. Submit to me and I’ll save you from the mutant boogeyman, he’s basically saying.
The Skull incites a riot in New York with his telepathy, pounding peoples’ skulls with fear, hatred, and aggression and directing it against mutants. Havok, Captain America, Wolverine, and Thor arrive on the scene and Cap gives control of the team to Havok, who splits them up to do damage control and find out who is responsible for the carnage. They run into the Skull’s S-Men (men and women that allowed their bodies to be weaponized through science or magic in order to revenge themselves on the mutant race) and meet up with Rogue and the Scarlet Witch, who had been the Skull’s hostages.
For the most part, this is an enjoyable issue, but it’s almost enjoyable despite itself. I’ve been a huge fan of Rick Remender’s writing on the current volume of Captain America, but his style is very different here. I’m not sure if it’s because this is a team book and the focus is greater than on a single-character title, but this issue is far too expository for its own good, reminding me of the work of John Byrne. The captions are written in a third person omniscient point of view, at times describing the events taking place and at others describing what is going on from certain characters’ viewpoints. It’s surprisingly heavy-handed and distracting and doesn’t really add anything to the overall narrative. For example, in one panel we see the Skull talking and off to his right we see a group rising from a puddle of water. There are two caption boxes in the panel. Box one says, “A puddle of water glimmers and flashes to life. Transformed into a portal by Dancing Water.” Box two says, “Her deceptive beauty standing in stark contrast to the corrosive hatred that has long since encompassed her soul.” The text in both boxes is unnecessary. We see people rising out of the water, one of which appears to be composed of water. Dancing Water’s beauty if evident thanks to Cassaday’s art, and those of us that have read the previous two issues know that she is allied with the Skull—and even those coming to this cold find that out in the next panel—so her “corrosive hatred” can easily be inferred. Remender falls under the beginning writer trap of telling rather than showing, and it makes the issue unnecessarily bloated with text.
To give another example: later in the story Captain America falls victim to the Skull’s relentless telepathic assault We’re told this in captions and shown it in panels when Cap falls to his knees among the rioters, saying to himself things like, “They’re right—how can it be so clear now—America needs this.” We see Cap fall victim, so it doesn’t need to be said.
If you can look past that, though, this is a fun issue. The X-Men have always worked best as social commentary, and the Red Skull seems like an enemy they should have been fighting since the very beginning. From a purely fanboy point of view, it’s cool to see X-Men and Avengers come together in one team, and it’s nice to see Havok not only command Captain America (the leader’s leader in the Marvel U), but to do it with confidence and competence.
As there are strong and weak points with the writing, there are strong and weak points with the art. I typically enjoy John Cassaday’s art. I think he has a real flair for posing and conveying action, but some of his character models seem a bit off. His Captain America, for example, doesn’t quite look right. Recently Marvel changed Cap’s costume, perhaps to better reflect his movie uniform, but Cassaday’s Cap is 90% classic costume with just a chin strap and knee pads. It looks like a half-hearted attempt to comply with Marvel’s new character model, and I’d rather he just draw classic Cap instead.
His Thor does look awesome, though.
Unfortunately the missteps in the art and writing make this a solidly middle-of-the-road issue. I like the story being told, but not the way it’s being told. The Red Skull is a fantastically evil villain, and it seems like a no-brainer that he would be fighting the X-Men. As a character he embodies everything the X-Men fight against, and this story-arc brings about some of the great themes of X-comics: racism, fear of the Other, and the vileness of people that capitalize on those emotions. Adding the Avengers characters to this gives it a fresh perspective and makes it part of the larger Marvel U, making the shared universe of these titles feel even more connected, which I enjoy.
In Summary:
So far this is the weakest issue of the series. The writing is far too expository and some of the character models just don’t work in Cassaday’s style. However, the story—or perhaps the idea of the story—and the chance to see characters that don’t typically interact work together on the same team is enough for me to carry it through. I’ve read enough of Rick Remender’s other work to have faith that this issue is just a hiccup, and I’ll be there next month (Thor willing there won’t be any further delays) for issue 4. If you haven’t checked out Uncanny Avengers yet, this issue is not a good jumping-on point, but the title overall is strong enough to warrant giving it a shot. Recommended.
Grade: B-
