Stack Attack Throw Back! Week of 12/3/2008

New Comic Book Day (NCBD) has been pushed back due to the Thanksgiving holiday but I won’t let that stop me.  Your regularly scheduled Stack Attack will be dropping Saturday morning.  In the mean time get your eyeballs ready for a new segment I’m calling, “Stack Attack Throw Back.”

When there is a lapse in NCBD, expect a review/run-down on a classic or not-so classic trade paper back.  For all of the uninitiated, a trade paper back is more commonly referred to as a graphic novel. This is a misnomer.  A trade paperback merely compiles a run of a series — i.e. issues #5-#15 — that pertain to a specific story arc. We call them “trades” for short.

Recently I picked-up six trades at the Storm Watch Comic’s Black Friday Blow-out sale for only fifty four bucks.  This session of Throw Back we’re going to stroll down Marvel memory lane with:

Avengers Disassembled collecting issues #500-#503

Marvel Zombies 2

This seminal storyline marked the first time Marvel poster-boy Brian Michael Bendis tackled Marvel’s poster team, The Avengers.  This storyline would also mark the beginning of the end for our dearly departed Captain America.  At the time the original issues came out I was flat broke, so I had to read about the series via Wizard magazine – truth be told, I wasn’t the biggest Avengers fan.  I’ve always been more of a JLA kid.  But, show no concern Geekscapist, I beat the Avengers Arcade game for the Sega Genesis and in the Arcade and have always been a fan of the core team, just not the comics — Sorry for the minor digression.

The series opens on a random day in the life of an Avenger.  The gang: She-Hulk, Wasp, Hawkeye, and Ant-man, kick back around the kitchen table and talk about villains they would have sex with.  Hawkeye and Ant-man do most of the talking while the ladies play offended. Then, out of the blue, comes an Avengers Red Alert.  Jack of Hearts, a recently diseased team martyr, crypt-walks up to Avengers Mansion.  Ant-man rushes to his aid.  Too bad for Ant-man, ol’ Jack Hart is a walking time bomb. 

At this point, the pace for Avengers Disassembled has been set.  It’s a series of really bad events ranging from a drunk Tony Stark (Iron Man) Speech at the UN to a Kree invasion.  Bendis keeps a break neck speed for all four issues.  It’s an engrossing and entertaining tale.  At one point in the story Avengers old and new reunite to handle the menace.  The one problem I had with the story, and still have with most Marvel crossovers, is the inclusion of Dr. Strange.  One minute the sky is falling and then the next the good Doc shows up and solves every problem.  Dr. Strange has become a crutch for Marvel crossovers.  Strange whips out a spells, or the eye ofAgamotto, and BAM! the series gets wrapped up with a nice little bow on it. 

Spoiler Alert! (but you should definitely already know this) the puppet master causing all of this grief was none other than Scarlet Witch, a fellow Avenger.  The twist can be seen from a mile away but is effective none the less. The Scarlet Witch was so hurt by the loss of her fake kids – she used her mutant powers over magic and reality to fake make her self pregnant and she hurts everyone around her (why can’t she just make like Angelina Jolie and adopt?)

I definitely enjoyed this trade.  The art is dynamic.  Finch, the man on pencils, is a solid storyteller but all of the guys he draws look like Brad Pitt (not that that’s a bad thing).  If you haven’t picked this bad boy up in some way shape or form, I suggest you do.

Hardcover graphic novels are nice if you like to be completely uncomfortable while reading your comics.  Unless you have a reading desk (circa 1800) you will get a mean case of carpal-tunnel.  Then your hands will look like gnarled zombie hands.  See what I did there? 

“You have to read Marvel Zombies!”  That’s what I heard all over the Internet and Wizard magazine.  Personally, I avoided the series, due to it’s campy nature, like… well… a zombie attack (that’s twice with the clever zombie references…okay, maybe not so clever…but points for reference!)  The idea of a zombie outbreak in the Marvel U didn’t excite me at first. Then, one day I was at Atomic comics on South street, Philly.  I had a little extra Robert Dinero in my pocket and decided to give Marvel Zombies 3 a try.  Big mistake.

I heard so many good things about the original.  I figured I was just out of the loop so I decided to pick up “the best in the series”, Marvel Zombies 2 aaaaaaand Boring.  Capital “B”. Bolded. The series is slow and cheesy.  The Black Panther was the leader of the human beings still left on Earth and the former Marvel heroes were zombified, endowed with the power cosmic (they ate the Silver Surfer), and were ripping through the galaxy eating everything in sight.  Reading that last sentence makes the comic actually sound interesting. Don’t be fooled, fool. 

The Marvel Zombies, after devouring the galaxy (It only took them 40 years – WTF?), decide to head back to Earth.  T’Challa, the Black Panther, is losing control of the humans.  He eventually gets turned into a zombie, and then we find out that “the hunger” can be controlled.  We know the hunger can be controlled because THE FUCKING ZOMBIES TALK!  They laugh! They joke!  They retain almost all of their logical mind!  That is not a zombie.

The big show-down between T’Challa and the Marvel Zombies is alright.  I’ve read better fight scenes in comics.  The fight ends when – get this – the Marvel Zombies lose the hunger.  All I could do was shake my head.  The Marvel Zombies have eaten everyone and everything in the known Universe and then suddenly they aren’t hungry any more.  They want to help rebuild humanity.  My mind was blown.

The art is decent.  The story is ridiculous.  Now I’m stuck buying the rest of Marvel Zombies 3 because I am a bit of a completist. Kirkman deserves a cease and desist from George A. Romero.  I do suggest you buy this book because, like a zombie attack, misery loves company.

That’s it for Stack Attack Throwback and don’t forget this week’s New Comics will be reviewed on Saturday.

Until next tme, I’ll be devouring your flesh and then joking around about it.

-Nick Gregorio