Uh-oh! Cool effect on the cover. We begin in the recent past, with Brother Voodoo in Dr. Strange’s house, trying to out-magic him, the Mighty Avengers outside, the New Avengers still hiding inside. Until…
“Also, my Aunt’s dying, guys, I don’t know if you heard.”
Reasonable feelings from Luke, but ultimately untrue. It would be nice if the abject stupidity of Civil War turned out to be a supervillain plot, but no. They’re all debating the situation, while Wolverine desperately tries to get the topic back to helping Echo, when Clint Barton walks in. They’re all still cloaked. Dr. Strange explains he knows Clint is alive from New Avengers 26, and he thinks they can trust him. So they become visible, and Wolverine wants to know if Clint found Wanda, and an tell Clint is lying when he says “no.”
Exposition continues, Cage does not trust Clint, Clint tries to leave, Strange wants him to stay. So Strange casts a spell that would make anyone without pure intentions “have a seizure,” and everyone passes (Even the very nervous Spider-Woman). With that settled, Clint will go to Japan, but he doesn’t have a supersuit after weirdly sticking it to the wall in Avengers Mansion, so obviously, he’s the new Ronin. Which would be even more obvious to anyone who watched those Avengers movies. And that catches up the flashbacks, so we’re in the present for the rest of this story. We drop back into Cage offering to talk last issue.
These 2-page spreads are pretty annoying for this project. It’s so funny to me how Bendis has Wolverine get messed up all the time. It’s so obvious that he happens to be the only one who gets blown up or stabbed 40 times because he’s the only one who can live through it. When you keep playing that card, it gets pretty silly.