Avengers Assemble #17 – Review

By: Kelly Sue DeConnick (story), Matteo Buffagni/Pepe Larraz (art), Nolen Woodard (colors)

The Story: The enemy within is revealed and the Avengers battle him/her on several fronts.

The Review: It can be frustrating and inconvenient to follow multi-part crossovers, particularly when chapters of the story appear in a title that you don’t normally read.  Despite my affection for the character, I dropped Captain Marvel almost a year ago because the time-traveling Thelma and Louise storyline just didn’t hold my interest.  It hasn’t helped that the Captain Marvel title in which this story would have started disappeared from the shelves for 2 issues, then was resurrected for an issue and will have the concluding chapter of this story. Between this nonsense and the ridiculous “death” of Peter Parker, Marvel is doing everything is can to drive fans nuts. I understand the effort is to sell comic books, but it seems disrespectful.

Despite being one of the most three dimensional heroines in the Marvel universe, the current Avengers Assemble doesn’t carve out any new character edges for Carol Danvers. As Ms. Marvel, Carol was an enormously powerful, capable and at times ferocious fighter as well as a charismatic and effective tactician and team leader. In this story arc her powers are seriously curtailed, yet she remains a tough and resilient warrior. An ancient enemy that Carol believes dead has returned to use her in order to conquer earth and destroy her in the process. The Avengers meet the global threat, but this is Carol’s story.

The penultimate chapter of the story arc is all action. Each member of the Avengers is dispatched to suppress the rise of an untold number of sleeper Kree robot soldiers and despite each hero’s best efforts, the odds are just too great and the enemy within completes his ultimate weapon, crippling and disabling Captain Marvel in the process. Things look extremely bleak for our heroes virtually guaranteeing my purchase of the Captain Marvel title that will wrap up the story.