Customer Reviews

Avengers: The Initiative, Vol. 1: Basic Training (v. 1)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Sure Iron Mans on the cover, but hes not really part of the story here. Although his stamp is firmly in place in this story about hero boot camp where you either make the grade or lose your powers. Primarily run by Yellow Jacket, War Machine, The Gauntlet, Henry Gyrich and ex New Warrior Justice. The story focuses on a handful of recruits and their trials and tribulations. You get a glimpse at what a total *sshole Gyrich STILL is after all these years, how morally bankrupt Henry Pym has become, and why Gauntlet shows the new recruits so much "Tough Love". As you can probably tell i find the people who run camp more interesting than the students. And that is mostly true, some of the new heros introduced are interesting as well though. Trauma and Hard Ball in particular. The art is nice and the writing is really above par. The stories vary and since the writers aren't married to any these just introduced student/heroes you literally NEVER KNOW whats going to happen next to these poor kids. A fun ride, more than worth the price.

Avengers: The Initiative is joy to read. Slott's writing makes this book good both in collected format and in chapterized reads. The first six issues of the title are mostly character driven, despite the huge character Slott has created, he manages to focus each issue in each character. This books is not as light hearted as the stuff Slott is known for (She-Hulk), its an extremely serious book, with political links to it and it also finds space to be funny. Slott manages to surprise us all the time and in these six issues of A:TI more stuff happens than in years worth of stories in other books and somehow, none of it feels rushed.

The first three issues are all stand alone and are all EXTREMELY enjoyable. The first issue introduces the new cast to the reader and it doesn't focus too much on a single character. The second issue focuses mainly on Cloud 9 and her guilt of what happened in the first issue of the title, in this installment The Initiative and the Rangers attack Hydra, and the action sequence is very enjoyable. Issue three has a guest appearance by no other than your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, and this issue focuses a lot on Komodo, once again this issue manages to tell a fun done-in-one story and heck, Slott writes a great Spider-Man, thank god Marvel put him in the Spidey Braintrust.

Issues Four and Five are Tie-Ins to the World War Hulk summer event at Marvel. The issues don't add much to the story in the WWH (though, we do get a reason why Iron Man's armor fails to kill the Hulk), but they help move forward the character arcs going on in the book. The first part (The Green Zone) focuses on Hardball and his moment of desperation. The second part is great as well, it debuts the Shadow Initiative, the black ops team, which is a great addition to the cast, specially with Trauma (my favourite character in this book) in it, this book also focuses largely on Trauma's character and his developments at controlling his power.

Issue 6 is the weakest of the bunch. Despite the story being well written, a nice done-in-one by Slott, which I hope will have ramifications in the future of the initiative, by the art by Steve Uy is BAD. His covers for some of the upcoming issues look much better than the work he puts here, if you can get someone to read this book outloud to you, your enjoyment of it will be higher.

All in all, Basic Training is a very solid start to this series. It is smartly written by Slott and has some great art provided by Stefano Caselli, who, despite not being mentioned above, is crucial to the overall enjoyment of this collection.

This is by far my favorite series to emerge from Marvel post-Civil War. The Intiative is Tony Starks idea fro each state to have a superhero team to look after the sate. In this story we are focused in one about five recruits to the Iniative each of them has a unique set of powersa and issues in using there powers. They are forced through a grueling camp to train them how to use thier powers. If you just want a look at what Civil War spawned I suggest you take a look at this one.

I thought that a lot of the Civil War ties have been weak, but not The Initiative. This series is off to a strong start.

From the first issue, you're introduced to some promising new characters. You think you know where the series is headed and - bam! - Slott throws you a very unexpected, even brilliant curve. I wish I could tell you what makes it so great without giving anything away, but I don't want to spoil any surprises for you. Just trust me - this book goes into some very unexpected places and that's a good thing.

Another good thing is the way Slott uses some of the Marvel U's existing characters to bring depth and tension to the series. Hank Pym, the former Marvel Boy and War Machine all have pivotal roles. Slott is respectful of their histories, but gives them some new twists and conflicts that really flesh these characters out. I also enjoyed seeing old favorite Danielle Moonstar.

The last few years have brought us at least two five-star series about younger heroes - Young Avengers and Runaways, Vol. 1. I wouldn't put The Initiative quite up there with those books, but it comes pretty close. As the series progresses into it's later issues, it gets more tied into other Marvel U events - particularly World War Hulk.

Some of the emphasis that could have gone into developing the new characters of The Initiative goes into catching the reader up on Dreaded Crossover Backstory. None of which is Slott's fault, of course, it's what happens when a series is too closely tied into these big Universe-wide events. They make for great marketing ploys but rarely great single issues.

Still, I strongly recommend Avengers: The Initiative Vol. 1: Basic Training. It's a solid book that you'll really enjoy. There's a lot of potential here; you might as well get on for the start.

What should the Marvel heroes do after the fall out of a Civil War? Why not start a group of registered super heroes to protect every state? At least that's Tony Stark's idea in the new title, The Initiative. I love the writing here and the art is great too. Two of my favorites serve as leaders at a sort of "boot camp" for new heroes. Jim Rhodes, or War Machine, and Hank Pym, Yellowjacket. I just wish the writer wouldn't always have to bring up the fact that Hank had some problems with Jan in the past. I'd say he has atoned for his sins enough. But anyways, this new character Trauma could pretty much carry the book on his own in my opinion. I could really care less about the other heroes, but maybe they'll grow on me as time passes. Plus, in this volume, you do get to see the Thunderbolts, and they rock! Peace and Love, Jake

After the great event that was the Civil War between our heroes (and the loss of Captain America), the Initiative plan is about to become the next legend coming from the House of Ideas !!

Civil War is over, Captain America is dead, and registration is the law. Dan Slott's (She-Hulk) Avengers: The Initiative picks up with Tony "Iron Man" Stark putting forth his plan for a superhero team for each and every state, and we see first hand what the new recruits are put through as they go on their way to becoming S.H.I.E.L.D. trained superheroes. A majority of the perspectives given in the first volume of Avengers: The Initiative are from Hank "Yellowjacket" Pym, She-Hulk, War Machine, The Gauntlet, ex-New Warrior Justice, and Henry Peter Gyrich; but it's Slott's characterizations of each that makes The Initiative worth reading. As a previous reviewer pointed out, seeing how morally bankrupt Hank Pym has become is a surprising treat indeed. Stefano Caselli's artwork is pretty good as well, and the book as a whole is a brisk beginning of a post-Civil War Marvel universe. Seeds are planted as well for the upcoming Secret Invasion mega-arc, which may very well turn the Marvel universe on its head even more so.

I really like this idea. Young heroes, some new some forgotten, trained by the best to be the best. Interesting premise with a handful of twists and turns. I enjoyed Slott's dialogue and the art was good until the last chapter of the trade by Steve Uy, which was disappointing. The drawback for me here was that the book suffers from almost too many characters as it is hard at times to keep everyone straight and the book is involved in other events in the Marvel Universe taking away from the characters growth and spotlight. Overall, a really good book that could be excellent in time.

I didn't expect much from this spin-off, but it really is one of the better books to come out of "Civil War." While the main Avengers books ("Mighty" and "New") have been somewhat disappointing (is Bendis being stretched too thin?), Dan Slott's "Initiative" is everything that you could look for in a comic book. Action, drama, and--most noticeably--a little humor to temper the seriousness. Having said that, this is a book about training young super-heroes to go to war, so it's not all fun and games: There are casualties.

I bought this one because of the ending of Iron Man, the movie, and Nick Fury's mentioning of the Avenger Initiative and I wanted a little insight about it before the movie comes out in a couple of years. While the artistry was exactly as to be expected, the story line left me a little cold. The one thing I really liked about this comic was that Captain America is no longer a wimp and definitely not a cheerleader anymore. I would recommend it for die-hard comic fans just to have it, but for occassional readers (especially those who have not yet read "Civil War") I'm sure you can find better.