Avengers #90: Review

Jul 1971

Roy Thomas, Sal Buscema

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Avengers #90 Review by Rob Johnson (October 15, 2022)

Yellowjacket hasn't been seen since he and Wasp left the team in #75. Wasp popped back to join the Lady Liberators in #86, and hung around to be with the Avengers in the retcon Fantastic Four World's Greatest Comic Magazine #11.

Carol Danvers was last seen in Captain Marvel #18 where the new-look CM saved her from his nemesis Yon-Rogg. She'll be back in the post-Thanos CM#34,35,40. And then the effects of the Psycho-Magnitron explosion in CM#18 will finally turn her into a superheroine in the Ms Marvel series.

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Gwen Stacy, beauty queen of Standard High School, was Peter Parker's (alias Spider-Man) first great love.

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Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Avengers #90 Synopsis by Rob Johnson

Last issue Captain Marvel escaped from the Negative Zone but suffered a build-up of radiation that might kill him and might even destroy the world. His mind was also affected so 3 Avengers (Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch and Vision) plus Rick Jones had to catch him and bring him to the Cape Kennedy Hospital where the radiation was drained out of him. But Ronan The Accuser staged a coup and took over rule of the Kree Empire from the Supreme Intelligence, and now he's sent Sentry 459 to kill his hated enemy Mar-Vell.

The giant robot has broken into the hospital recovery room where CM is still unconscious. The 3 Avengers try unsuccessfully to hold him off (Vision is still weak from using his solar energy to help de-radiationise Marvel). The Sentry grabs Mar-Vell who wakens to hear that the Kree plan has changed. The Kree Captain is to be taken to where Plan Atavus is being initiated, which horrifies Mar-Vell. Then they dematerialise.

The Avengers don't know where to go to follow them so they allow Carol Danvers, Security Chief for the Cape, to get a report on what happened out of them. Then as they fly their quinjet back to New York they get Rick Jones to tell them what he knows about the Kree, which of course we see as flashbacks. The Inhumans backup tales in Thor #146-147 revealed how the Kree visited Earth and triggered the birth of an advanced species that would become the Inhumans, and Sentry 459 was left to monitor their progress as they built the island city of Attilan and developed the Terrigen Mists to given themselves superpowers. The Fantastic Four fought the Sentry in FF#64, then Ronan in #65. The Kree sent Captain Mar-Vell to investigate current earth (Marvel Super-Heroes #12-13 and CM#1-21). He fought the Super-Skrull of the rival Skrull Empire, but gradually his sympathies moved towards humanity. Then his love Una died and he got involved with the Supreme Intelligence who changed his costume and let him return to Earth. But instead (in CM#17) he got stranded in the Negative Zone and only the Nega-Bands Rick wears could free him for short periods. Until last issue.

When they reach Avengers Mansion they see an alarm indicating they have a message waiting. It's been left by Goliath who returned while they were away from his mission (#88) with Captain America, Falcon, Iron Man and Thor. Then *he* got a call from Janet Pym to say that there was a problem in Alaska where she and Henry Pym were. Clint Barton left to go to their aid and he hoped the others would follow. Which they do, including Rick.

Goliath meets up with Jan who reminds him that her hubby Hank was sent by the US Government to study the effects of oil drilling on Alaska's wildlife. But they lost contact with 1 of the scientific outposts. She and Hank shrank to their Wasp and Yellowjacket roles and flew to investigate. They found a circle of the Arctic ice converted to a jungle by rotating beams from a 'lighthouse' in the middle. As they drew nearer they were attacked by an oversize dragonfly. YJ used his cyberhelmet to tame it as their steed. But as they got even closer Hank realised what was going on, knocked Jan out and strapped her to the dragonfly's back and set it to carry her to safety as he himself entered the mystery zone. The dragonfly died of the cold before it got very far and Jan called the Avengers.

Goliath gets back in his quinjet and leaves Wasp alone. His thoughts tell us that he can't work with women since Black Widow ditched him (#76). But then Wanda's face replaces Natasha's in his mind until he hurriedly wipes it away. He lands and is soon attacked by what looks like a large mutated (and not slothful) 3-toed sloth. He defeats it but is blasted from behind by Ronan with the Sentry.

Meanwhile the other Avengers arrive in another quinjet, having picked up Wasp on the way. They are met by the Sentry and Goliath who is under Ronan's control. They fight and Wasp gets KO'd by Clint's swatting hand. Ronan has Captain Marvel captive and awake within the 'lighthouse'. The villain lets us know that the Kree left this citadel here along with the Sentry when they 1st came as a safety measure. Now the evo-rays of Plan Atavus will return Earth and its inhabitants to the state they were when the Kree 1st found them. The fact that Earth superheroes have been able to defeat Kree forces marks the planet as a potential future threat to the Kree Empire, and Atavus will prevent that happening. And the last image we see is a devolved Yellowjacket menacing his unconscious wife.

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