New Avengers Vol. 7: The Trust

Collects New Avengers #32-37 written by Brian Michael Bendis and drawn by Leinil Yu and New Avengers Annual #2 written by Brian Michael Bendis and drawn by Carlo Pagulayan.

Marvel's next big event, Secret Invasion, is moving nearer and nearer and this book is pretty much a prologue to that event. I guess the prologue really started in the previous New Avengers book, in which it was revealed that (now deceased) Electra was a skrull! The New Avengers quickly conclude that Earth is invaded by skrulls and there's really no one they can trust. And thus trust becomes the major theme of this book, can they trust each other, can they trust other heroes and can they even trust the villains to be just ordinary super villains and not skrulls? At the same time, a subplot that will be picked up after Secret Invasion, in Dark Reign, is introduced here and actually occupies most of the book.

Dark Reign, as I understand it, and the going ons in this book fit well with Bendis' vision of the Marvel Universe. The quality of his stories vary, but I have to say that I like the overarching ideas he has. Although Secret War, Avengers: Disassembled, Civil War etc. may not have been without their faults, the whole idea that there is always something going on behind the scenes, something that keeps the reader alert to new developments is a breath of fresh air in the MU (remember when Secret Wars was a huge thing?). And the pace at which these developments have been introduced, Secret War is from 2004, has been pretty good, although there has been signs of 'event fatigue' along the way (just not in the sales numbers...).

I remember being a little disappointed with the previous New Avengers book, Revolution, but this book gets the series back on track. With a bunch of guest appearances (among them Mighty Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D.) and plenty of classic villains this book is certainly right in the eye of the storm of the Marvel Universe. In fact, I think this is a common trait for all the Avengers books (New, Mighty and Initiative) and that has really revived my joy of reading Avengers. In this book the reader is also treated to some pretty interesting character moments, e.g. Luke Cage getting increasingly paranoid and starting to suspect Jessica Jones of being a skrull. Bendis lets each character react in their own way to the new situation, and it adds a level of credibility to the characters as well as to the whole scenario.

There are definitely indications here that things are changing for the New Avengers. The heroes are having arguments among themselves, one of them announces his retirement from the group and another one of them even betrays them. This means there will be changes in the lineup, but I guess this comes as no surprise. Lineup changes is an Avengers tradition and with Spider-Man: Brand New Day on the shelves, we knew that at least one character would be taken out of the series.

This book introduces a new villain, The Hood, who is trying to organize the baddies based on the observation that when they operate on their own, they tend to get their butts handed to them in the end. I guess we will see a lot more of this guy later on, but I have to say that I think his appearance in this book is a little weak. I think it's that his powers, he has a demonic hooded cape that gives him various powers, are never really justified, why does he need them? Yes, he fights the Avengers, but his main purpose is organizing the baddies, so why not let it be at that? I guess we'll have to see how this character develops during or after Secret Invasion.

I like the art in this book, but I also realize that Yu's artwork is a matter of taste. It can seem a little quirky, and you might argue that it's better suited for different kinds of books, but his layouts are solid, his backgrounds detailed, his splash pages striking etc. so I'm very happy with him on this book. New Avengers deserves a top notch artist, and Yu fulfills that role very well. The only little complaint I have is that he draws all women's breasts insanely large, but I may be in the minority here...

If you're planning on reading Secret Invasion you should definitely consider starting here. New Avengers is really where all the seeds to Secret Invasion have been planted and that really shows in this book. You should, however, be aware that this is not a standalone book that you can just read and then let it be at that. It's connected to a bunch of other books and you will want to read those as well to get the most out of it.

7/10