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Avengers #25

Jan 2014
Jonathan Hickman, Salvador Larroca

Story Name:

Carve a hole ... climb inside


Synopsis

Avengers #25 synopsis by Rob Johnson
Rating: 4 stars
The previously page just recaps last issue's rogue planet attack, with the assistance of a future Iron Man, and the merging of the planet with Earth as a weapon for the Illuminati. But this is all irrelevant for this issue.

SHIELD are investigating the site of an explosion in New York. They've called in Director Maria Hill because they've found a dead body with readings that suggest time-travel was involved. It's Henry Pym in an Ant/Giant-Man costume.

4 hours earlier on AIM Island some scientists report to Superia and the Scientist Supreme that they have mined a large chunk of exotic matter from the Negative Zone, and there doesn't seem to be any practical limit to how much they can get. They can use this to power the Auger, which they use for plucking things from elsewhere in the multiverse (and sometimes getting rid of things there).

They operate the Auger to see what they can find - it's always pot luck. It also seems that they only raid collapsing universes. And this time they get a set of Avengers looking like they belong in the earliest period of the team:- Captain America, Hulk and Thor, with Iron Man in an armour faceplate with points above the eyes, a normal-size Henry Pym in an Ant-Man costume and Wasp in an outfit from that time. But of course the presence of Cap and Hulk together means it's no early Avengers lineup we've ever seen. And more differences will become apparent as the tale progresses.

AIM soldiers have these Avengers surrounded with guns. But the Scientist Supreme tries talking 1st. The Avengers want to know where they are. Ant-Man recognises the function of a lot of their advanced equipment. Hulk is quite intelligent. But the team aren't familiar with the idea of alternate Earths. Thor uses Mjolnir to transport them away. AIM let them go. They decide it's time to stop just randomly retrieving stuff and start exploring the multiverse.

The Avengers have gone to New York, but they can't find what they call their 'fortress'. They reluctantly conclude that they really are on another Earth. They remember seeing such an other Earth in a pink sky back home, before they were pulled through a portal to here.

They wonder if there are Avengers on this world too. Or better yet, if there are no Avengers. They can become the world's heroes again, and this time avoid their mistakes. They make it sound like they ruled the world they came from. Especially when Thor orders the crowd to bow down before him as a god. And calls down a lightning strike which causes the crater SHIELD investigates at the beginning of the issue. And as he does so he declares this an Avengers World (reminiscent of the freed worlds in the Infinity event).

Back in the now, Maria Hill reviews CCTV footage of the event. But the lightning disabled all nearby cameras so they don't know what happened next. She's called in the (real) Avengers, in this case Black Widow, Captain's America and Marvel, Iron Man, Smasher and Thor. SHIELD troopers aim guns at them while Hill asks them where they were 3 hours ago when the crater blast happened.


 

Review / Commentaries


Avengers #25 Review by (February 2, 2014)
The publisher's blurb and elsewhere suggested that this issue would see the original Avengers from #1-2 brought forward in time, like the original X-Men have been. The cover image seemed to support this. But the presence of Captain America alongside Hulk inside tells us that this is no version of the original Avengers from Earth-616, and we quickly discover that they're from an alternate universe. So the Avenger's death that the blurb mentions is the alternate Giant-Man. This and the current Avengers World story both feature AIM Island. At the moment this storyline could happen before or after the Island mutates in Avengers World, because we don't see outside a lab. We can't even tell if Smasher is wearing the different colour uniform she gets in AvW#2 because we only see her head, which hasn't changed. The membership diagram here is the same as in last issue (but subtly different from the 1 in Avengers World). But this time the page functions by leaving the characters who aren't involved in this issue dark, and highlighting those who are. But our Avengers only show up on the last page, with Smasher instead of the Hulk who's highlighted. The collapsing universes mentioned are the type the Illuminati have seen being destroyed by incursions in New Avengers, as the pink sky and hovering alternate Earth attests. The Auger was used to retrieve Hyperion from his dead universe in #4. In #17 AIM used it to put something in a space *between* dead universes, until they had use for it again. This was the being generated by the origin bomb they found, also in #4. If Maria Hill believes it was our Avengers that did the damage, why hasn't she interrogated Bruce Banner who works for her? She also says that the dead Hank Pym doesn't seem *exactly* like the 1 she knows, so why didn't she ask the Avengers where *he* is when she called them in?


> Avengers comic book info and issue index

Elektra

Excelsioring your collection:
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Holy smokes, Batman!
(The Boy Wonder)

Salvador Larroca
Salvador Larroca
Frank Martin
Mike Deodato Jr. (Cover Penciler)
Mike Deodato Jr. (Cover Inker)
Frank Martin (Cover Colorist)
Additional Credits
Letterer: Cory Petit.
Editor: Tom Brevoort.

Characters

Listed in Alphabetical Order.

Black Widow
Black Widow

(Natasha Romanoff)
Captain America
Captain America

(Steven Rogers)
Captain Marvel
Captain Marvel

(Carol Danvers)
Hulk
Hulk

(Robert Bruce Banner)
Iron Man
Iron Man

(Anthony Stark)
Thor
Thor

(Odinson)

Plus: Andrew Forson, Smasher (Isabel Kane), Superia (Deidre Wentworth).