This hardcover collects Avengers Prime #1-5, issues #1-12 of the 2010 Avengers series, along with Annual #1 and New Avengers Annual #1.
These were originally collected as -
Avengers Prime (Avengers (#1-5)
Avengers by Brian Michael Bendis Volume 1 (#1-6)
Avengers By Brian Michael Bendis - Vol. 2 (#7-12 & 12.1)
At the time, I gave all three volumes 5-star reviews -
Avengers Prime
This adventure occurs just after the events of ‘Siege’ and is sub-titled ‘Siege Aftermath’. It features Thor, Tony Stark/Iron Man and Commander Steve Rogers, who in the immediate aftermath of the Siege event, indeed, in the ruins of Heimdall’s observatory (adopted from the Thor film, by the looks of it) Thor is commenting on the destruction of Bifrost, as Steve and Tony Stark are having a heated argument of Stark’s culpability for the Osborne Affair, when the three adventurers are pulled through a dimensional rift into one or other of the Nine Realms.
After a bit of adventuring and even a bit of romance with some elves, (Steve – “I am a friend of your Lord Thor”; Elf leader – “Eat him!”), Steve gets a coat of chain-mail and a shield; Tony, in unpowered armour, meets some giants and Fafnir the dragon; and Thor meets the Enchantress, and discovers that due to Asgard’s displacement, the Nine Worlds are intermixed and up for grabs, and Hela has grabbed them. Steve and Tony meet up and fight Fafnir, Thor is given a good kicking by Hela, and everyone meets up to sort it all out. In the course of all this, Tony and Steve manage to regain their friendship with each other and rekindle their camaraderie with Thor, though the Nine Worlds still remain to be sorted out.
This is a quick read – I read it on a short bus journey – but it is immensely entertaining and very-well drawn. It also fills in a gap in the core Avengers storyline, and does actually advance the overall Avengers’ world-picture.
Avengers (2011) v1
I remember the first new Avengers line-up, when Captain America was left alone to find a new team, back in Stan’s day. The novelty wears off after a few decades. Even the writers began to notice this, and I remember (Jim Shooter? and) George Perez having Captain America commandeer a bus to take the thirty-odd Avengers gathered for a particular threat to their destination.
Anyway, back to the present – where we start in the future as a group of ‘young’ Avengers kill Immortus. We then see Steve Rogers recruiting a new team of Avengers, New Avengers and a third team which I don’t recognise (I am not a regular reader nowadays – I just pick up the shiny pretty covers in my local library). However, this volume is the ‘original’ Avengers, with Thor, Iron Man and a Captain America, with various others.
Their first meeting is interrupted by Kang the Conqueror, who manages to get half a sentence out before Thor knocks him into the middle of next week. After that, things calm down when he whips out his weapon and frightens Iron Man into letting him speak in peace. Apparently, Time is broken (due to Kang repeatedly attacking Ultron, who has conquered a future Earth, and failing to defeat him time and again).
Anyway, it to cut a long story short, the Avengers have to go to the future (or the past) and fix things, with hilarious consequences, as we get the usual things-out-of-time appearing in the present, with guest appearances by Killraven, riding Devil Dinosaur, and Apocalypse and his Horsemen. Anyway some Avengers go to the future, having recruited the former Marvel Boy (“My name is not Alien Boy”; Wolverine: “Sorry, I thought it was”) to assist with time technology. The future Iron Man and Hulk explain things, things appear to get fixed, after the Avengers explain things in a reasonable voice to the Future Ultron; and Kang kills everyone in the future, leading to the ‘young’ future Avengers killing him again, which is where we started. Go figure.
I assume either it never happened, or it will lead into a later/future story line. All that aside, it is well-drawn (if you like John Romita JR’s artwork, and entertainingly written by BM Bendis. The characters interact characteristically, and there are enough ‘hang on a minute’ events to keep even a Chris Claremont plotline happy.
If you like the Avengers, Mr Bendis’s work, or just an entertaining (though possibly confusing) comic book, you will like this one.
Avengers (2010) v2
This is a well-drawn and entertainingly written volume. The characters interact characteristically, and the story is excellently plotted and unfolds with great timing.
A former villain, the Hood, escapes from prison after meeting an Inhuman and learning the secret of the Infinity Gems. He mages to collect two of them from where they have been hidden by the ‘Illuminati’ of the Marvel Universe, before he bumps into the Red Hulk. The Hulk manages to reach the Avengers to warn them of what is going on, and then they all find the Illuminati with their hands in the cookie jar. Tony Stark then has to explain what has been going on to a rather angry Steve Rogers, as the other members of the group all get briefed by their various acquaintances in the background.
Steve quickly formulates a plan, and teams are despatched to guard or recover the still hidden gems, as the Watcher turns up to watch events. There are a number of excellently staged scenes as each group meets up with the Hood, and fare better or worse as circumstances and plot dictate. Even Thanos makes an appearance.
It all ends happily for the moment, and the Hulk is invited to join the Avengers, while off in a dark place, Steve Rogers invites himself into the ranks of the Illuminati. This is an excellent adventure, and highly recommended.
The stories from Avengers Annual #1 and New Avengers Annual #1 were collected in Avengers by Brian Michael Bendis - Volume 5 .
The two annuals contain a story in which Simon Williams, formerly an Avenger known as Wonder Man, recruits a team of superheroes and decides that it is time that the world saw the Avengers for the menace that they really are, they being responsible for such things as Ultron, the Scarlet Witch and her little ‘incidents’, the Civil War, the Incredible Hulk and his little ‘incidents’, the Dark Avengers and their little ‘incidents’, for none of which they have ever been held accountable:
“…There is a very good chance that I’m not even real… I died a few years ago. I died. You know this. And the only reason I’m here today is because Wanda Maximoff missed me and used her powers, and brought me back. Out of thin air.”
The story then continues in issues #31-34, the finale of the 2010 series.
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