Ultimate Comics Avengers #3
Posted: Tuesday, October 27, 2009
By: David Wallace
Mark Millar
Carlos Pacheco (p), Danny Miki, Dexter Vines & Allen Martinez (i)
Marvel Comics
"The Next Generation: Part Three of Six"
After a strong opening issue that benefited from a favourable comparison to the dire
Thinking about the possible reasons for this, I initially wondered whether the switch in artist from Bryan Hitch to Carlos Pacheco was to blame--but to be honest, Pacheco has been turning in excellent work, and I find it difficult to find fault with the book on a visual level. I also wondered whether the shake-up of the status quo of the Ultimate Universe in the wake of Ultimatum might have restricted Millar on an editorial level--but frankly, the book has made only a couple of passing references to the events of that miniseries, and I certainly don't get the sense that Loeb's big crossover is preventing Millar from telling the kind of stories that he wants to tell.
After considering the book a little longer, it finally occurred to me that there might be a very simple explanation for my lack of enthusiasm for what was once the best superhero book on the stands: I'm not sure that Millar's book is really about heroes any more.
Of course, some readers would argue that Ultimates was never about heroes: that Millar's modifications to the classic Silver Age characters that made up the Avengers effectively erased the heroic cores of those characters, compromising them to such an extent that they couldn't be seen as superheroes any more. I disagree with that, however. One of the things that made Millar's original reinvention of the Avengers so perfect was that he gave the characters human flaws and weaknesses without ever moving the characters so far away from their roots and their core characterisation that they became unheroic. So, Captain America is a slightly brutish and right-wing soldier, but he's still a patriotic tactical genius and a man-out-of-time who stands up for old-fashioned American values; Thor might not be sure whether he's really a God or not, but he's still a hugely powerful defender of humanity who rises above the petty concerns of mere mortals; and Tony Stark might be an alcoholic, womanising old dog, but he's still a philanthropic billionaire who would rather put his Iron Man technology to good use saving the world than simply raking in the cash that's generated by Stark Industries and living the playboy life.
With Ultimate Comics Avengers, however, Millar has gradually been introducing a new team of Ultimates who are simply not heroic in any way: they're immoral or amoral characters (who are often explicitly shown to be aware of that fact) who might bear a resemblance to the Ultimates of old, but who don't share the same heroic and selfless motivations that the original team did. We spend most of this issue getting to know these characters a little better--and to be honest, it's not a very pleasant experience.
An opening sequence involving War Machine sees Millar make quite a departure from the version of James Rhodes that we saw in Orson Scott Card's two Ultimate Iron Man miniseries (so I guess that they're now considered out-of-continuity), presenting us with a character who will happily incinerate a group of unarmed civilians in order to facilitate a rescue of hostages in the Middle East. The "Red Wasp", who we meet a little later, is an ex-terrorist with an "obedience chip" and a Prozac addiction. Gregory Stark is a stuck-up, unpleasant arms manufacturer who doesn't share his brother's sense of morality or lust for life. And we also get glimpses of a new Hulk (grown from Banner's stem cells), a new Black Widow, and a new Spider-Man, none of whom can offer any redeeming (or, crucially, entertaining) character traits at this stage.
These characters might appear under the guises of the super-heroes that we know and love, but they aren't heroic at all. In fact, they all come off as bastards. And a bastard with amazing powers is still a bastard: at a push, you might call him a super-bastard, but simply having amazing abilities doesn't mean that you automatically get to be called a superhero. And these super-bastards just aren't as much fun to read about as the Ultimates were.
All that said, I'm not going to be too harsh on Millar just yet, because even if he is writing about complete bastards instead of flawed heroes, he still has some interesting points to make about the kind of people we elect to power, and the kind of people that would probably end up as government-sponsored super-soldiers in the real world (and he's doing so with marginally more success than Marvel's current "Dark Reign" event). Of course, I'm also sure that Millar is setting the stage for the original Ultimates to return, to oust these pretenders, and to retake their crown as America's premiere super-team--but even if that's the case, there's a sense that he's rehashing ideas that he's already used in his run on The Authority (and, to an extent, the "Grand Theft America" arc of Ultimates 2) and I think he managed to handle those ideas a lot more successfully in those books.
On top of this, the plot of this arc isn't particularly strong. Captain America's decision to turn against S.H.I.E.L.D. because they concealed his secret lovechild from him seems like a knee-jerk reaction--and I don't get a sense of what he's actually trying to achieve with his rebellion, which makes it feel as though he's simply lashing out for no good reason. The Red Skull is mentioned, but never manifests, leaving the threat that he poses vague and nebulous when it might have been nice to have a more tangible sense of peril to put extra pressure on our "heroes." And the decision to furnish Nick Fury with an ex-wife to play the part of the new Black Widow seems like a soap-opera development too far--although it does make me wonder whether the writer is setting up a tasteless pun, and Fury isn't going to survive this opening arc.
Despite the issue's weaknesses, there are still one or two inspired moments. The introduction of the sinister, unsettling new Spider-Man is laudably underplayed, with a "less is more" approach that immediately makes me want to learn more about him. The very first page encapsulates the tone of the Ultimates perfectly, with War Machine rising above the desert territory in a manner that feels inspiring and escapist, yet also carries uncomfortable undertones of Western dominance of the Middle East by force, and the idea that "might makes right." The action scene featuring the new Wasp is a slick, punchy, well-choreographed sequence that effectively establishes her as a deadly threat (despite her gaudy, retro Silver-Age-inspired costume). And there's a moment towards the end of the issue that will make Transformers fans very happy indeed, culminating in the over-the-top final page of War Machine in all his glory.
It's perhaps no coincidence that artist Carlos Pacheco is responsible for most of these moments, and his artwork certainly helps to redeem the book to a certain extent. He captures the same militaristic details and grounded quality that Bryan Hitch brought to the book, yet mixes them with a slightly more colourful, bold approach to the characters' costumes and the book's locations--all of which makes the title look very attractive, even if the tone of the artwork does feel slightly at odds with the cynicism of the writing.
I don't want this review to sound like I'm criticising the book simply because I don't like the characters that Millar is introducing here. After all, some of my favourite stories revolve around nasty, unpleasant characters (From Hell's Sir William Gull, for example, or TV's House). However, the writer hasn't managed to make these unpleasant characters fun to read about, and for that reason, it's hard to really connect with this issue, or to enjoy it as much as his previous Ultimates work.
I also wonder whether Millar might be misjudging the mood of his audience. Over the last ten years, he's made a success of infusing his superhero stories with a certain nastiness and an extreme quality that has made for some very original and challenging comics in a genre that is always at risk of stagnating. However, I'm starting to get the sense that the zeitgeist might be ready to move on. After a decade of the kinds of "realistic" takes on superhero teams that we saw ushered in by The Authority (and after the none-more-bleak Ultimatum) I feel as though the readership might be ready for a lighter, brighter, more optimistic approach to superheroes--and this is anything but.
What did you think of this book?
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