All-Out Avengers #3 // Review
Captain America is getting the snot beaten out of him by a few Red Skulls. The rest of the team is having a fun time elsewhere. They’re in a better position to fight their Red Skulls. Black Panther and She-Hulk are having a lot of fun beating the hell out of an endless supply of identical fascists. (They’re ALL Red Skulls. Hard to tell how many the mad scientist Arnim Zola pumped out.) Earth’s mightiest heroes are buried in Nazis in All-Out Avengers #3. Writer Derek Landy extends a fun, all-action series in a deeply enjoyable direction with the aid of artist Greg Land and Jay Leisten. The action is given further definition by colorist Frank D’Armata.
It’s all happening in an orbital space station. The Red Skulls are everywhere. They’re having a hell of a time with the Avengers, but they’re also having a hell of a time with the Red Skull. Johann Schmidt knows things have gotten out of hand. The other Red Skulls were meant to be vessels for him. Now they are their own army. And now the Red Skull must fight alongside the Avengers to defeat...the Red Skulls. Given how long everyone involved has been around, the situation is weird, but it’s not the strangest thing they’ve all had to deal with.
Landy takes a really fun premise, throws it in a weird direction, and then deftly ties it in to the larger run of the series. It’s the same overall format that he’s been working with in the series so far. The action is witty and explosive enough that the format of an All-Out Avengers issue hasn’t gotten old yet. With Red Skull being the central villain, Captain America gets a bit of a close-up this issue. And what with the action taking place in a realm of advanced tech, there’s also a great deal of time spent with Iron Man. Landy juggles action with the rest of the team in a satisfying adventure drama.
Land and Leisten are perfect for this kind of action. A formless sea of Red Skulls get crunched in a variety of different ways by all of the Avengers who are present. There’s a clever contrast between Schmidt and the rest of the Skulls that is subtle and cunning. It’s also worth noting that the Avengers manage to look totally aware of what they’re doing in the middle of combat while also engaging in active conversation with each other. It’s not easy for an artist to bring across both of those things at once. Typically the dialogue feels detached from the rest of the action, but Land and Leisten manage a brilliantly subtle posture about the heroes that feels like it’s engaging on both verbal and nonverbal levels.
It’s difficult to tell how long Landy could keep the current format going before it starts to feel boring and repetitive. The action sequences playing out in the first three issues of the series maintain great momentum and gain a great deal of momentum simply by staging compelling action sequences. The plot that Landy has tying them all together is just extra.
