Avenger Books

This book was a real let-down, and considering the creative team, it shouldn't have been. Since the `70s, George Perez has been regarded as the ultimate Avengers artist, and rightly so. When you're dealing with a team that has so many past and current members, who better to draw gorgeous splash pages featuring so much detail that you'd need a magnifying glass to catch it all? And as for Kurt Busiek, this is the guy who wrote the ultimate Avengers story - Avengers Forever - so he certainly has credibility. So when it was announced in the late `90s that Busiek and Perez were teaming up on the new Avengers comic, it seemed like the natural choice for a perfect creative team. After reading the trade paperback AVENGERS: LIVING LEGENDS, I can say "so much for that". In fact, these stories have to be the worst of their work on Avengers. It's some pretty lousy stuff, due to Busiek's writing, and no amount of good art can save that. Actually, it's not really so much a fault of the individual stories as it is the lame subplots running through them.

This trade collects issues 23 - 30, starting off with the interesting romantic triangle of the Vision, Scarlet Witch, and Wonder Man. This situation has been cooking since waaaay back in West Coast Avengers, and it does finally receive some perspective and resolution here. Next is the return of the Exemplars, a pretty cool team of villains in pure Jack Kirby style. Concluding the book is the menace of Kulan Gath, who is doing everything he can in order to assure his ascendancy to godhood, and too bad if the entire planet gets in the way. So, it's a solid lineup of stories; unfortunately, they are undercut by the tedious subplot involving the Triune Understanding, a new-age organization that first covertly targets the Avengers for protests over supposedly racist recruiting practices (but while simultaneously protesting against the inclusion of mutants), then sets up the Avengers on a charge of breaking and entering, and finally calls it even by installing a member of their own organization on the team - the hero Triathlon. It's one ridiculous situation after another, and as the Avengers have faced issues like this in the past, I can't see why their responses would be so passive. Some Avengers get the right idea and leave, rather than deal with these inexplicable issues - too bad this reader didn't do the same! Also, Triathlon has to be the most annoying character I've come across in quite a while. Ooh, an "angry black man" that speaks entirely in smart-alecky, derogatory asides - how modern! Way to go, Busiek: incorporating a tired comic-book stereotype straight out of the Silver Age. Wally Wood's Ken Hiro of MARS Patrol has nothing on Triathlon.

So, while Busiek seems to have added these subplots in order to make the comic a bit more involving, it's those very subplots that drag it into absurdity and near-parody. You can safely pass on this book.

Wow! This was a major league disappointment!

With talent like Kurt Busiek and George Pereze there is no reason for subpar stories like these. This TPB collects Avengers 23-30 and if you haven't read them...YOU AREN'T MISSING ANYTHING!

Ok, the artwork is sensational...so if you like great art you'll be satisfied as Perez is hands down the best illustrator of any team superhero book in comics history.

Story lines? BORING! A lot of pointless team shuffling brought about by racist picketers. It leads to Triatholon joing the group...so we can have a minority character. Now, I'm all for equal representation, but the way this was written reminded me of comics from the 1960's. A sad commentary on our time. There's a reason we don't see characters like Triatholon and Silverclaw making a difference in the Marvel Universe. BECAUSE THEY'RE LAME! They should not be wasting pages in the Avengers when there were so many BETTER characters to choose from.

I'm a comics fan of over 28 years and I can safely say, I HATED THIS TPB! It just shows that not every issue of a title (or in this case 8) needs to be reprinted into a collection.

As a Avengers fan, I bought this book because I'd missed out on many of the earlier issues, and wanted to catch up.

This collection brings together issues 23-30, from the Vision/Witch/Williams triangle to the Kulan Gath storyline. The highlights are most notably in issue 23, where the Vision and Wonderman talk it out for several pages (some might complain, but I found this as an excellent peice of character development)and the escalation of the Avengers v.s Triune conflict, leading to Triathalon being inaugarated as an Avenger. The line-up shuffle up was done very well, though (unlike some of the old shakeups, which could often become confusing, and even downright meaningless).

However, the overall imression was that there wasn't anything spectacular about it. All it does is collect several chapters together, and doesn't really add much to the stew, so to say. It was, in my opinion, a decent worth for my money, but I'd say pass it if you aren't a giant fan of the Avengers, or if you already have issue 23.

When I picked up this book I expected to learn a few interesting facts about Bush Sr., but also to get a good overview of the times he lived in. (Most of which was before I was born) There is a bit of that, but mostly it's a poor attempt at canonization.

Over and over again it emphases that George, in spite of his wealthy heritage was humble and kind, all around good guy, great friend of all, etc, etc. I'm sure George was a great guy and quite possibly when the book was written this info needed to be shared. However, for today's student of history reading for interest and entertainment this book just doesn't work.

If you're looking for fictionalized fluff of how "Rubber"--Mr. Eugenist himself's biographers who write deliberately inspired falsehoods to promote the Bush cause; then here's the book for you!

George and his Skull & Bones cronies -- including daddy Prescott, grandpa Walker, the Harriman's, et al. -- fed this self-alleged war hero from the not always so covert Eastern Establishment's-based silver spoon from an early age. GW is no war hero! He illegally entered the War at too young an age. Then, flailed in the cockpit when multiple eyewitnesses saw "Poppy" George Bush bail on two crewmates sending them to their deaths. Or maybe not? With each election he had set up that he won he'd change his bio and rhetoric to suit the constituents.

Fact many times over tells how father Prescott cashed in on the banking he did to supply the Nazi-killers and the only reason he wasn't nabbed for war crimes like one of his associates was due to one of his other cronies getting the post to pick & choose who got prosecuted.
The story goes on but its not to be found in drivel such as Flight of the Avenger, "Plucky Lad" , "The Family" or any authorized bio of this evil family.

Much of the downright evil can be backed up with diligent research, if you care to look it up in reputable media of the times.

One such book that has much respected documentation is Tarpley's unauthorized biography of this flight [as in abandoning his mates] of an avenger.

Registered Republican

The story of George Bush's WWII service as a naval pilot. During the war Bush was the youngest Navy pilot to earn his wings. Shot down by the Japanese, he was later rescued by an American submarine and spent several weeks on board as it completed its combat patrol. Also talks about his romance with the future Mrs. Bush.

Let me state for the record: I love the Avenger. The Avenger is second only to Doc Savage in my pantheon of Pulp Era heroes.

I usually do not review to many of my favorite books on Amazon, hence none of the pulp era series like Doc Savage and The Avenger. Everyone knows I love them, most everyone already loves them, and so I spend my time usually reviewing lesser known or offbeat books.

However, when I recently reread this book and then saw the other review on it here, I just had to say something. I was that pissed off.

This Avenger book, wholly unlike the other ones written by Paul Ernst in the original pulp era series, sucks. The main problem is that this is -- let me check the cover -- an Avenger book wherein the Avenger is a guest star. That is called a major no-no. I will leave off the weak plot, weak characters, etc., and just state emphatically that if you are going to write a hero pulp adventure you better feature the hero. Briefly getting mentioned on page twenty-something and then finally showing up on page 78 or so for some of the action is just, well, not very heroic.

I am like the other reviewer: This one was hard to finish.

A real shame to, because The Avenger is one of the best characters to come out of the Pulp Era and second only to Doc Savage in cool gadget team adventuring. I have no idea why Ron Goulart so screwed up this book and therefore the characters in it. He was handed one of the golden treasures of the Pulp Era and promptly flushed it down the toilet.

If you want to read the Avenger series, start at one and read through to 24 or so. After that, do your self a favor and reread Doc Savage tales.

Until I read this book I had never read a single item in the Avenger series. In retrospect, that is somewhat surprising, as I am a big fan of the Doc Savage series. Both were "written" by Kenneth Robeson, a house name for a staff of writers. However, the premise of both is the same, a pulp, semi-mindless set of serial adventures carried out by a group but featuring a star. The leader of this group is a man whose operative name is the Avenger. Unlike the main character in the Doc Savage series, the Avenger is in no way superhuman. He is smarter and braver than most, but hardly superhuman.
The setting of this story is a small town in Connecticut during the Second World War. There is a small college there and many government operatives have moved in to conduct secret research that goes by the code name Project 20. They have discovered a drug that will turn a man into a wild beast and one of the team is taking it. That man is a member of a local German spy ring and he is killing people and trying to frame the project leader. His goal is to remove the leader so that he can take control and run Project 20 so that it benefits Germany. The intervention of the Avenger and his group, including the dynamic Nellie, foils the plot and the spy ring is broken up.
The action and excitement in this book is nowhere near as interesting as what takes place in the Doc Savage series. The dialog is stiff and often predictable and the good guys always shoot the guns out of the hands of the bad guys. Every bullet fired by the bad guys is just off the mark and the spies are inept at covering their tracks. I found the book difficult to complete.

Mr Sinister is Evil, I admit, BUT here he is at least shown more 3-D. Great Work Marvel!

Well here we are in the next round of the Onslaught war with the mutant monster taking on X-Man and X-Force, with Mr. Sinister waiting to pick up the pieces of who survives. Nothing much interesting happens in this story. At the end, Onslaught is growing more powerful and neither X-Man or X-Force have the power to stop him. Now if they had Godzilla appear in this book and he battled Onslaught, he could have destroyed Onslaught right there and we would have been spared the rest of this awful tale.

Having read some of the original issues when this series first came out in the early 90s, I decided to pick up the assembled stories in the 2 Galactic Storm volumes... and now I wish I hadn't. Frankly, they're exactly what you'd expect from a 90s Marvel crossover- there's a loud of loud noise, mindless action and disjointed plot threads. I'm as big a fan of action and loud noise as the next comic book fan, but this just didn't work for me. Thor's nagging self-doubts have been done better elsewhere with more interesting characters, and the artwork was a little below average.

The reason I gave this a 3 star rating was for the finale, which actually painted a pretty intriguing moral dilemma. That alone made the book something above a complete waste, but come on. When they published this sucker they put some pages out of order- it's pretty obvious they didn't care all that much about the book itself.

This graphic novel contains the conclusion to the Galactic Storm series, which was originally published by Marvel in the Annual issues of their various on-going series (Capt America, Avengers, Thor, etc...). As a rule of thumb story lines that involve Annual issues from multiple comic series are wretched.

This one is no exception. The story telling is choppy, because each Annual covers one hero (or set of heroes). The art is middling to bad, again because its an Annual; Marvel and DC feel its ok to let quality slip. Marvel even managed to get two of the issues in this book out of order.

Go ahead, buy it. I dare you.

I was a fan of the Avengers television series when it first aired. The quirkiness of John Steed and his two companions Emma Peel and Tara King was a sharp contrast to the roughness of other shows involving secret agents.
Unfortunately that quirkiness is not captured in this book. Steed is sent to Hong Kong to serve as a courier for some secret documents. As he is leaving the building, there is a small riot and the case handcuffed to his wrist is exchanged for one containing approximately 250 million dollars. Not knowing who it belongs to; Steed and Tara King go on a wild spending spree in an attempt to bring the owners out into the open. The plot also involves agents of the governments of Taiwan and the People's Republic of China, none of which seems to be able to bring their A game. Although there are many characters, none of them seem to be that interesting and the repartee between Steed and King never gets beyond her desire to spend as much money as possible. The action is weak and never actually grabs you.

And a couple of the stories collected here are ok, but the bulk here is mostly disappointing. Look elsewhere for your Avengers fix.

I was a fan of the Avengers television series when it first aired. The quirkiness of John Steed and his two companions Emma Peel and Tara King was a sharp contrast to the roughness of other shows involving secret agents.
Unfortunately that quirkiness is not captured in this book. Steed is sent to Hong Kong to serve as a courier for some secret documents. As he is leaving the building, there is a small riot and the case handcuffed to his wrist is exchanged for one containing approximately 250 million dollars. Not knowing who it belongs to; Steed and Tara King go on a wild spending spree in an attempt to bring the owners out into the open. The plot also involves agents of the governments of Taiwan and the People's Republic of China, none of which seems to be able to bring their A game. Although there are many characters, none of them seem to be that interesting and the repartee between Steed and King never gets beyond her desire to spend as much money as possible. The action is weak and never actually grabs you.

A major problem with this book is that a lot of it doesn't have the Avengers in it! It is almost like he wanted to write a spy story, and had to put them in.

When they do appear, it improves. I'd really give this a 1.75. 1.5 for the non-Avengers part, 2 for the rest. Will round this one down.

Yet another British spy traitor. Maybe they should just tell us in a story that they haven't found a mole recently, might be quicker.

Spying flying trapeze artists.

The writer insults his fans, calls them 40 year old virgins who live in their parents basement when anyone dares say a bad word about his books, he is so bad he went from writing a bunch of books a month, to be currently fired off every book, from two companies, so you know how well the writing must be.

The characters do not act anythign liek they should, for example Hank Pym who in a bout of insainity 20 years ago slapped his wife once, and then faced trial for that and other crimes, and then reformed and and patched his life back together, him and his now ex-wife are even lovers again, everything is back to normal

or so it seemed till this writer, he writes him as a nut, everyone acts like he will beat his wife again over one slap 20 years ago, he all of a sudden hates women, when a mother dies he speaks badly about her, facts about his life are messed up.

but he's not the only one, Cap is shown as a man who can't even comfort kids who just lost a mother, Hawkeye insults the dead mother in front of her kids, everyone acts like the biggest jerks in the history of the world, nothing liek they are.

the new captain britan kills enemies, is unknown, yet is invited to join the team? she lectures the team on why killing is right and they don't know anythign about killing, yet the writer must have forget many avengers have killed, stoof trial over it at times.

so many plot holes pop up, i can't mention because it would spoil the book, but they are really really bad, stay far far away.

Despite some promising aspects, poor characterizations make this story arc one of the weakest in the title's near 500-issue history. The author succeeds in creating a moving and poignant event in the selfless heroic sacrifice of a young mother. In her resurrection however, she is saddled with a horribly cynical burden. For the most part, the Avengers are portrayed as a superhero team completely unable to function due their own personal problems, and lack of professionalism. Themes that could be quite effective are treated in jerky, unconvincing fashion. Long-time followers of the title will find several inexplicable developments, and unrecognizable charters.