Avengers #255
May 1985 - Marvel Comics
Writer: Roger Stern
Penciller: John Buscema
Inker: Tom Palmer
Letterer: Jim Novak
Colorist: Christie Scheele
As she goes to leave, a ship docks, and two passengers, Skunge the Troll and an orange alien named Kehl attack her. The attack is called off by another passenger, a Rigellian named Gunthar. The last passenger, the apparent leader of the group, Levan apologizes. Captain Marvel stays behind because something doesn't sound right with these salvagers' story.
The Wasp returns home to learn of the Vision's takeover attempt and see him and the Scarlet Witch off, noticing that the Vision's voice has gone from flat and modulated to more human.
Meanwhile, Levan's crew acts on their duplicity, engaging Sanctuary II's star drive, temporarily nullifying Captain Marvel's powers, and abducting her millions of light years away from Earth!
SYNOPSIS:
Captain Marvel Monica Rambeau arrives at Thanos's abandoned starship, Sanctuary II, seven light hours away from Earth. Nothing seems amiss, as the station has been abandoned since Thanos's defeat. Back on Earth, both the US Government and the Avengers recover from the Vision's takeover of the world's computer networks. The Vision has decided to leave the Avengers and submit fully cooperate with a government investigation of his actions. Captain Marvel reports in and the Vision admits that he sent her on a wild goose chase.As she goes to leave, a ship docks, and two passengers, Skunge the Troll and an orange alien named Kehl attack her. The attack is called off by another passenger, a Rigellian named Gunthar. The last passenger, the apparent leader of the group, Levan apologizes. Captain Marvel stays behind because something doesn't sound right with these salvagers' story.
The Wasp returns home to learn of the Vision's takeover attempt and see him and the Scarlet Witch off, noticing that the Vision's voice has gone from flat and modulated to more human.
Meanwhile, Levan's crew acts on their duplicity, engaging Sanctuary II's star drive, temporarily nullifying Captain Marvel's powers, and abducting her millions of light years away from Earth!
REVIEW:
This is a recovery issue from a previous culmination of a subplot that took a year to develop. John Buscema returned to the Avengers with this issue and his style was a welcome departure from the previous regular artist, Al Milgrom, who could draw the most unattractive women. That's all the background you need for this review.
Roger Stern's story has to accomplish much in this issue, including recapping the previous storyline and introducing a new sub-plot. The best element that gets pointed out late in the story is how different the Vision's voice is, depicted visually by his word balloons, which use to be rectangular with rounded corners, and now are organic and oval. Roger Stern is unknowingly giving a lesson in how to convey the tone of voice here.
The art, as I've touched on, is exquisite. Captain Marvel had only briefly been drawn remotely attractive, yet despite the worst examples since her creation, John Buscema draws her as an attractive woman.
Roger Stern's story has to accomplish much in this issue, including recapping the previous storyline and introducing a new sub-plot. The best element that gets pointed out late in the story is how different the Vision's voice is, depicted visually by his word balloons, which use to be rectangular with rounded corners, and now are organic and oval. Roger Stern is unknowingly giving a lesson in how to convey the tone of voice here.
The art, as I've touched on, is exquisite. Captain Marvel had only briefly been drawn remotely attractive, yet despite the worst examples since her creation, John Buscema draws her as an attractive woman.
NOTES:
To my knowledge, this issue has not been collected in any trade, nor would I expect it to. This was not a very influential period in Avengers history, despite the solid creative force on it.
To my knowledge, this issue has not been collected in any trade, nor would I expect it to. This was not a very influential period in Avengers history, despite the solid creative force on it.
FINAL RATING: 7.5 (out of a possible 10)
Art-wise, it's fantastic, at least a 9, but this is a recap issue, and on its own just reaches for too much and doesn't deliver enough, albeit it does well enough to get by. For a while, this review was going to be for the issue following this one, which is much better. This was a good run for Avengers, up until the culmination of the Masters of Evil multi-issue storyline. I picked my copy up for a couple of dollars, and it should be easy enough to find at an affordable price.