All-Out Avengers #1 // Review
“In Medias Res” would have been a far cooler title. (Honestly. Anything is better than that title they’re using here.) It’s a fun idea, though: a series of issues featuring Earth’s Mightiest Heroes that start in the middle of the story. So you’re just getting the action and the resolution. Say there’s an alien invasion, for example. The heroes fending off the invasion don’t have time to explain it to the reader. They’re too busy dealing with it. They call it All-Out Avengers. The first issue is written by Derek Landy. His fast-paced action story is shot across page and panel by artist Greg Land and inker Jay Leisten. Frank D’Armata handles the color. It looks like it’ll be a fun idea for a series IF they can keep it together long enough to build a bigger narrative pattern.
Captain Marvel has been taken over by some kind of alien intelligence. Thor is ready to beat the hell out of it. IF he can harm it (and that’s a big if), he will want to do so without harming Captain Marvel. Iron Man will help out the best he can, but this is the least of the Avengers’ troubles. Black Panther and Spider-Man are commandeering an alien spacecraft while Captain America and Spider-Woman are in the mother ship dealing with a woman who can cut a zero in everything--a zero in the fabric of time and space.
Landy finds the pulse in the middle of an alien invasion story. It’s not easy to do so without a hell of a lot of set-up. Superheroes have been fending off alien invasions in the pages of comic books for over three-quarters of a century now. What makes this guy think that he can make THIS alien invasion stand out? It’s the action, of course. Landy finds the appeal in the action...just the right moment in the middle of everything. It’s fun. It’s flashy. Every character seems fresh, distinct, and interesting. The balance here feels almost perfect.
Land and Leisten are an amazing team for a series that starts right in the middle of the action. There’s excellent attention to the interpersonal drama of the action without compromising the speed of the kinetics involved in a battle between beings of great power somewhere in the middle of Marvel Manhattan. D’Armata delivers the usual kind of radiance and luminosity that any good colorist would, but the specific dynamics of Land and Leisten’s work allow D’Armata to do some beautiful work with textures that lend substantial depth to the action.
There are eight characters. And then there’s one major villain. It’s a big ensemble for a story with no introduction that drops right in the middle of the climax. It’s all juggled with great finesse by the entire team. The fact that the story involves quantum teleportation is a pretty cool thematic synchronicity. The next issue finds a similar group of Avengers who have been captured by mega-villain Doctor Doom. Somehow Doom has gotten ahold of Captain America’s shield on the cover. That can’t be good.
