This one’s a slightly skewed version of Avengers #221, wherein a diminished team had to pick 2 new members, and the cover invited you to guess who it would be. Quite funny how 5 of the original 7 members of New Avengers are among the choices, but none of them made the cut. It was Hawkeye and She-Hulk who joined the team, for the record. Inside, we have art by Jim Cheung, John Dell and Justin Ponsor again. Ya never know who it’ll be. This one starts with a reprise of Nick Fury telling Spider-Woman to be a double agent for Hydra, like he did in NA 14, and then a faithful recreation of her going under the knife, Frank Cho’s juvenile breast implants and all. And then…
So that’s how it works. I mean, insofar as that is anything. They put a thing on her face and say alakazam and she’s Jessica Drew. But there we have it. Spider-Woman has been a Skrull literally the entire time. That’s pretty wild. We jump ahead a few weeks to the Skrulls figuring out how to get Jessica back on at SHIELD. They’ve managed to replace one of the people who gives the entrance exams, and can get him to make sure she’s back in. Once that’s done, they plan to replace a whole buncha SHIELD personnel. And that’s just the beginning.
The corruption the Avengers have been trying to root out of SHIELD? Why, it’s this event. And yet again, it’s been there the whole time.
And that takes us to New Avengers #1, and through the prison break in a series of panels with narration confirming the Skrulls hired Electro to blow up the Raft. Sauron going to the Savage Land and SIlver Samurai going back to Japan were their true goals. What they didn’t count on was the Avengers reforming.
So, we revisit “Jessica” meeting with Madame Hydra and negotiating a new deal to spy on the Avengers, then revisit Spider-Woman officially joining the team. Then we get to a bit we didn’t see the first time, Tony telling a story about the old days involving Wanda, Spider-Woman asking where she is, anyway, and an awkward silence.
So stupid that she’s not even Magneto’s daughter anymore. This leads to a confrontation between Spider-Woman and Maria Hill, who does not trust her and doesn’t like her being in SHIELD, let alone an Avenger. Then “Jessica” is advised by Hank Pym that the Avengers and X-Men are meeting to decide what to do about the Scarlet Witch. They decide they will kill her no matter what, and say Hank snapped and let him take the fall. But, of course, instead, House of M happened.
We’ll check back in on the Skrull Queen’s reaction to all that later.