Customer Reviews

Marvel Masterworks: The Avengers Volume 2

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"Marvel Masterworks: The Avengers, Volume 2" brings together issues #11-20, which means we begin with the Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Giant Man and Wasp lineup and end with Captain America, Hawkeye, the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver. In other words, instead of a group made up of characters sharing space in second tier Marvel comics books (e.g., "Tales of Suspense") the Avengers end up being comprised of various supporting characters. Except, of course, for Captain America, who has always been the group's best leader. So the history here is a bit more important than most of the stories, some of which are sub-par, and only a true fan of the series is going to want to go to the expense of picking up this volume.

The stories collected here and reprinted in color, unlike those in "The Essential Avengers" trade paperbacks, are written by Stan Lee and drawn by Don Heck: #11 "Spider-Man" has Kang constructing a robot of the web-head to join the Avengers, which requires the real Spider-Man to save the day; #12 "This Hostage Earth" has the Avengers tangling with the Mole Man; #13 "The Castle of Count Nefaria" involves an evil plan sending electro-images of the Avengers to threaten the U.N. and have the Avengers declare war on the world; #14 "Even Avengers Can Die" starts with the Wasp wounded by a bullet and it seems the doctor they need to do the operation has been replaced by an alien (my vote for the stupidest "Avengers" story of all time); #15 "Now, By My Hand, Shall Die a Villain" has the Avengers up against a team of bad guys consisting of Baron Zemo, the Executioner, the Enchantress, the Black Night, and the Melter.

With #16 "The Old Order Changeth" we have the aforementioned change in the Avengers lineup takes place and the group is no longer as muscle-bound as before; now it is clearly speed over strength; #17 "Four Against the Minotaur" deals with this change, asking the immortal question "With the raw power of Iron Man, Thor, or Giant-Man, how can the valiant Avengers hope to stop the Minotaur?" Well, they do; #18 "When the Commissar Commands" has the group against a giant Communist Chinese tyrant; #19 "The Coming of ...the Swordsman" has one guy with a sword taking on the Avengers. He does pretty well; #20 "Vengeance Is Ours" has the fight between the Swordsman and the Avengers complicated by the appearance of the Mandarin.

The last two-part story is actually the best of the bunch, which is rather surprising, but overall these 10 "Avengers" stories are average at best. When you have a group of superheroes it is really difficult to come up with some decent villains, and so Lee and Heck jettison most of the original group, where you hand Thor and Cap at the high end of the nobility scale, and replaced them with two of the angriest Marvel superheroes, Hawkeye and Quicksilver. The idea of reforming Pietro and Wanda was interesting, but why not do that in "The X-Men"? Still, the dynamics of this group are just strange enough, what with flying shields, shooting arrows, throwing spells, and running real fast. But for me "The Avengers" never really hit stride until the Vision joined their ranks and gave them a character they could truly call their own.

This is a good collection of Jack Kirby and Stan Lee's work. If you like old comic books this is a good book. The plot has glitches and the dialog is sometimes (often) stilted, but still a classic of sequential story telling.

Excellent for any Titanic True Beleiver (T.T.B.)and former members of the
M.M.M.S. Re-live the wonderful Silver Age of Marvel comics. Though simple
maybe even primitive by more contemporary standards, these are the stories
and the artwork that made comics great. Soft bound format makes this a book
you can enjoy for it's price point. We can all be reminded in these stories
of a simpler time, both for ourselves and for society.

In this masterpiece of collected Avengers comics are some of the greatest Jack Kirby covers ever drawn and or inked, especially the one that dons this cover...Thor is spectacular, Iron man jumps out at you Capt'America is always a treat and Giantman-with wasp are trademarks of Kirby's ability to bring lifE to A COVER...awes
ome!

Ok, comic books have always been comic books, we love them and they are colorful and fun. This volume of the avengers masterworks is probably one of the weaker ones but it's still fun and a good simple read. this book reprints these issues of the avengers 11-20 in full color and they look better than they ever did before. This is because comics were printed on cheap paper and the paper here is book style top notch paper. These type of stories are pure 1965-66 and you must remember that to readers at the time this was all new and fresh. The book was trying to find it's way in some regards but stan lee did a brave thing in issue 16 by removing all those first string heroes out of the avengers (except captain america) to focus on other heroes. That issue sports a classic cover too. Jack kirby( the king lives) does three issues of layouts while don heck (rip) takes care of the pencilling. He was never my favorite artist but he's good enough and that's ok. I would agree with the other reviewer that the series came into it's own later but to readers in 1965 that wasn't the case. they had a new title with marvel style stories and fun so in hindsight I doubt they expected more than this. And like I said the series just got better but it was never boring. And I have yet to read a masterworks that I didn't like. these are all reprints and they look better than ever. D.c did a great job with theirs until they went to scans recently. So avengers fans will want this one for their collection and casual comic readers who enjoy old comics will like them. The good thing about this era of comics was the continuity, the stories follow each other in order. Anyways the avengers may not to me have been as good a title as the fantastic four was but it was a good superhero team up mag from the very start. The justice league was also a good one but they didn't go for as much continuity until later than this era. Wally wood (rip) inks issue 20 and that helps the art for that issue as well.