Time for some Avenging, in a darker style. Maybe. It might be time for a big detour that doesn’t seem like it should be this, or any, team’s first outing. We begin with a 2-page sequence of Morgan(na) Le Fay going forward in time to kill a young Victor Von Doom in his sleep for his future transgressions against her. This is, of course, picking up the thread from Mighty Avengers 11. But she decides if she does that, he won’t know why he died or who did it, so she just leaves. Ok!
What sense does any of this make? Why would he want to protect the world? Why would ex-Hydra agents want to protect the world? They’re bad guys! Meanwhile, in Latveria, Doom is fighting for his live against le Fay and her horde of monsters as the now-former SHIELD agents who brought him radio home for help. Then we’re with the Dark Avengers, watching the footage of their unveiling. Norman tells them if they ever talk to the press, they’re out, and if they ever cause trouble internally, they’re out. He encourages them to get to know each other and become a team. I’m summarizing pretty aggressively because this entire comic is 2-page spreads and it’s killing me. Like this:
Almost all the dialogue in this spread is from New Avengers 50, cutting off right when Spider-Woman showed up. But this came out a month before. We cut away to Doom and Le Fay’s magic battle for a page, which is just them sticking their hands out and yelling gibberish (I never thought Bendis wrote good magical incantations. No one sounds cool yelling “bavaloomni!”), until Le Fay wins. Doom is blasted by magic energy, then smushed by a monster. Then it’s back to Avengers Tower.
Deodato has now used that panel of Doom 3 times in 2 issues.
The Poser models just get more obvious as we go. Look how stiff Sentry’s pose is. No one would draw it like that freehand, it’s boring and awkward. Near as I can tell, he’s not yet tracing a model for every single figure, like he will for years to come, but each issue seems to have more obvious 3D models than the last. Meanwhile, Le Fay is about to plunge a knife into Doom when…
They may not be real Avengers, but they can sure get their plane destroyed immediately like a real Bendis-written Avengers team!
Well, that was rude. The team comes to look at Doom, make sure he’s not dead, and spitball for awhile, and then the Sentry screams and disappears in a fiery explosion.
That makes no sense. What, if they kill her here, she can just come back from her time? Her past self will somehow know her future self died and come forward sooner? What?
The Dark Avengers’ first shot outta the gate is just a big brawl over nothing in Latveria. Not… what I would’ve done! But I wouldn’t have done this entire concept and Bendis is one of the best to ever do it, so what do I know?