Thursday, January 8, 2009

Avengers: The Initiative vol. 2 - Killed In Action


Collects Avengers: The Initiative #7-13 written by Dan Slott & Christos Gage and drawn by Stefano Caselli (#7-11) and Steve Yu (#12-13) and Avengers: The Initiative Annual #1 written by Dan Slott & Christos Gage with art by Salvador Larroca, Clayton Henry & Paul Neary, Steve Yu, Tom Feister & Carmine Di Giandomenico and Patrick Scherberger & Dave Meikis.

The attempt to cover up the accidental death of Initiative member MVP goes completely haywire as he wakes up again, although this time as a super-strong zombie-like uhm... thing, pissed off and out for revenge. And with his left arm replaced with the deadliest weapon in the universe. Needless to say, it takes a lot of B and C grade heroes to deal with this kind of trouble, and a lot of heavy punches are dealt here. And this guy is not content with a bit of happy slapping either, there is literally liters of blood spilled here. Meanwhile, the New Warriors, unhappy with upper management, decide to jump ship, foreshadowing some interesting things to come, and in the end the first class of the Initiative graduates, making room for new recruits.

Killed In Action keeps up the high quality of the first book, Basic Training, while shedding more light on some of the characters and continually introducing new subplots. This time the stories seem a little less self contained, with the MVP storyline taking up most of the book, but there are so many subplots that it feels like something new is happening all the time.

One thing that I immensely enjoy about this series is the characterization. Before reading the first book I was worried that the characters might be a little bit boring, mostly because I didn't know many of them I guess, but those worries have been proven completely unfounded many times by now. Baron von Blitzshlag, the extremely morally questionable ex-Nazi employed by the Initiative, is quickly becoming my favorite current Marvel character, and several minor characters are having a bit of a golden age of their own here: Henry Pym, Taskmaster, War Machine, Henry Gyrich, Constrictor etc. And then there's the new characters, through whose eyes we get to look into one of the darkest and at times most cynical corners of the Marvel Universe.

Although this book is about new heroes, in the tradition of New Mutants and similar titles, the tone is rather dark, definitely a lot darker than I expected before reading it. Twisted morals and double standards seem to be central themes here, and how the new heroes react to this is an important part of the story. But the new heroes themselves are not as blue-eyed as they seem, and this adds another layer to the story, removing the book from the black and white hero-beats-the-crap-out-of-a-villain-every-month genre. There is also a lot of humor here, which saves the it from becoming too depressing and makes it a pleasant and enjoyable read despite the dark themes. Few Marvel books has this kind of thematic sophistication today, and in that regard the book is a bit of a gem.

Another thing that this series has in spades is interesting subplots that swirl and merge and guarantees that the reader will never be bored. A good example is the subplots of MVP dying and the three Scarlet Spiders which turns out to be connected, or the New Warriors subplot or the multiple little seeds planted in the annual which hint at both Hydra and skrull involvements later on as well as the return of a character from the beginning of the series. There's a lot of stuff to keep track of and sometimes it can get a little confusing, but it meshes very nicely, and the result is a very entertaining story that never lets go until it ends.

The art in this book, most of it by Caselli, is very good, and I'm especially impressed with how well the drawing and coloring complements each other. The coloring by Daniele Rudoni is really good, and I can only imagine that Caselli and Rudoni must work very closely together to create this level of quality.

I certainly recommend this book, but you will want to read the first volume before this one. This has turned out to be a the surprise hit of 2008 for me, and I'm eagerly awaiting more. Slott has positioned himself as a heavy weight Marvel writer, and this series shows why.

7/10

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