Longbox Special: Under Siege: The Finale

Here we are at the end my friends.  The end of Marvel’s latest super hero epic.  No longer will we be

I’m going to break with my usual format this time around and just go ahead and talk about this weeks final five books interchangeably.  Where to start though?  Let’s start with how much of a fizzle I felt Siege #4 was.  Up until this point, Bendis had been ratcheting things up with each issue and giving us a little bit of pay off each time.  This issue should have been the big pay off, the last boss battle, the part of the story that should have hit us hard in the face and make us want more after.  It didn’t really deliver that feeling, it felt more like a disjointed sequence of events that didn’t really mesh well.

Opening with Loki’s plea to his dead father to help the heroes overcome the Void seemed to play against what Loki had been working towards all this time.  The argument can be made that he didn’t think it would get as bad as all this but I have to ask just why would it matter to him?  From what we’ve seen in the Siege: Loki one shot, he wanted to be free from all that Asgard represented.  Doesn’t its fall mark the biggest freedom he could get from it?  I can understand a desire to save his fellow Asgardians but he decides to power up the assembled heroes, leaving his brothers and sisters to simply stand by and watch.

Once the heroes are powered up, things really don’t improve much, mainly because there isn’t much difference in how they appear.  We get little snippets of pretty cliche dialogue telling us things like Iron Man’s batteries are charged and his systems are online.  Great.  Iron Man is on par with my car.  The battle itself is underwhelming with the heroes taking shots at the Void until the Void destroys the Norn stones and Loki along with them.  Then a non-suped up Thor proceeds to essentially hit the Void until it doesn’t move anymore.  Why didn’t he just do this in the first place when he had more power at his disposal?  Finally, he kills Bob and whisks his body off to a burial in the sun which lacks any kind of emotional weight.

This lack of emotional weight carries over in The Sentry: Fallen Sun where heroes gather to remember The Sentry.  The book plods along and is fairly unremarkable as a memorial or farewell to the character.  Of course there are the hints that he’ll be back.  Also, apparently he and rogue hooked up.  Great.

Siege: Embedded also managed to fall flat for me.  It was a lot of Ben Urich just watching stuff happen and reminding us how small normal people are in the face of an event of this magnitude.  The problem was that the book just didn’t feel big enough and I wasn’t sold on Ben’s sense of awe.  It does give us a bit more Volstaag, which has always been enjoyable in this book.

Finally, there are two books that wrap up their runs along side the final installment of Siege; Dark Avengers and Avengers: The Initiative.  Of the two, Avengers: The Initiative is arguable the weakest.  It attempts to tie up all of the loose ends of the three stories it’s been weaving throughout the past few months.  It also tries to set things up for the book set to replace it, Avengers Academy (or whatever they’re calling it).  I really liked this book when it was focused on Taskmaster simply because he seemed like such an unlikely protagonist for the story.  Things got bogged down when they started putting focus on fairly uninteresting side stories.

Dark Avengers was the one book that gave a really good send off to itself.  It’s also been the only book to really portray Norman Osborn in something that resembles a sympathetic light.  The coda that Osborn gets at the end of the book is some really fantastic writing from Bendis.  I wonder where that kind of writing was for the last issue of Siege?  If I haven’t mentioned it before, Victoria Hand was also an up point of this book.  I’m happy to see that she made it through this and will be around for what follows.

So that’s it, the end, fin, I’ve got no more to say really.  I had considered throwing The New Avengers Finale into this week’s article but it technically isn’t part of Siege.  Also, it was pretty lacking too.  Siege built itself up pretty nicely as did some of the tie-in books but in the end it didn’t feel like it delivered the goods.  Sure, things are set up for Marvel’s Heroic Age and all that, but it would have been nice to have a better end to Osborn’s Dark Reign.  In any case, it was fun doing these pieces even though it pulled me away from doing proper comic book reviews (if one can call my reviews proper).  Maybe we’ll do this again sometime.  Maybe I’ll just drink myself into a stupor instead.  Take care and be well...

Longbox Special: Under Siege

So here we go again with another big week for Marvel’s latest big event book.  This time around feels almost like a repeat of the last time they put out five books in a week.  Two of them are fairly lackluster, two are decent entries, and the fifth book makes me wonder why it was included at all.  Anyway, let’s have at it...

Might Avengers #35 is the book that made me scratch my head and wonder at why it’s being included as a Siege tie-in book this week.  The main focus of the book is on Pym and the return, once again, of Ultron.  The book skirts along side Siege but never gets itself directly involved.  There’s a call to arms from Steve Rogers, Vision and the other Mighty Avengers have taken off to assist, and Jarvis is shown leaving with the mystery case, which was delivered to Tony Stark during last week’s entry into the main event book.

Otherwise, this book features Hank, Jocasta, and a couple members of G.R.A.M.P.A as they are attacked by an army of Ultron controlled Jocasta bodies.  It’s all build up to a reveal that Pym built his Infinite Avengers Mansion on the body of The Wasp who it turns out is the sole inhabitant of Underspace, the opposite of Overspace, the realm where Eternity resides.

The book itself is fine for a Mighty Avengers story but I haven’t been following them for some time now.  Supposedly the next issue is a Siege tie-in as well, but if it’s anything like this issue I have to wonder at why this book is being included.  It forwards little to nothing of the main event story and serves mainly as a revelation to the fate of The Wasp.

Thunderbolts #142 is the book that Mighty Avengers #35 should have been.  However, like the last installment of this book, there’s just not anything going on that I really find myself caring about.  The action picks up where the last issue left off with the Mighty Avengers, sans Pym and Jocasta, fighting with the Thunderbolts who have been tasked with retrieving the Spear of Odin.

There is, of course, a lot of hitting and shooting and what not, all leading up to the eventual retrieval and fight for the spear.  There’s some indication that not all members of the Thunderbolts are behind Osborn and would rather see him not come into possession of such a devastating weapon.  Things get complicated when Asgard comes falling from the sky and the spear is lost in the rubble only to be recovered by an Osborn loyalist on the team.

I’ll admit that this issue wasn’t as bad as last but then again there was a lot more action and not so much talking going on.  Still, there was really nice development with the Thunderbolts just in the reveals of certain characters and their loyalties.  All the same, I could have spent my time better elsewhere.

Thor #608 wasn’t really that better elsewhere but it certainly picked things up a bit from last issue.  A prophecy made last issue comes to pass and puts one of the Asgardians on the spot.  Braxton is a battlefield for another pair of warriors, and Kelda visits with Bill’s family to break the bad news to them.

Tyr leads the Asgardians from the back lines terrified of a prophecy pertaining to the death of the god of war.  Upon seeing the corpse of Ares, he faces his own cowardice only to engage with The Hood who is now wielding the Norn Stones.  Volstagg and Ragnarok battle in the streets of Broxton until Volstagg retreats, the memory of Soldier Field still fresh in his mind.  This battle concludes itself in the shadow of Asgard.  All the while, Kelda has made her way into town to face the parents of Bill who take his death understandably hard and would rather have nothing to do with Kelda at the moment.  H.A.M.M.E.R forces show up to take Kelda into custody, a request she seems willing to see through.

Of course this issue wraps itself up with the fall of Asgard, something most of the books address this week.  It’s unclear if the floating city dropping on Ragnarok has taken him out of the fight or not.  This is another issue that is a vast improvement on the last but that’s not saying too much considering how weak that one felt.  Considering how key Thor is to what is happening, it’s surprising how distant this book feels from the heart of things.

Avengers: The Initiative # 34 splits its focus right down the middle of the book, starting up where the last issue left off.  First off, the Avengers Resistance is busy trying to take down Camp H.A.M.M.E.R.  Then, The Hood and most of his lackeys are called to Asgard, taking them out of one fight and into another.

Things look bleak for the team attempting to take down Osborn’s training facility, which is being overseen by a significantly powered-up Hood and his equally powered up thugs.  It’s in the eleventh hour that Penance makes his move and joins the fight, seemingly evening the odds.  This is all just in time for The Hood and company to be called by Osborn for back-up.  The book follows them to Asgard as they join the fight we see in the main book.  Constrictor and Diamondback suffer a bit of miscommunication as Asgard is brought down before she can reveal her affections for him.

Again, the fall of Asgard is the coup de grace for the events of a tie-in book but it’s an effective plot point to help tie in the events from one book to the next.  This time around, it looks like they’re pulling focus away from Taskmaster and spreading it out.  It makes me wonder if this is the beginning of the transition towards the end of this title.

Finally we have New Avengers #63 where two relationships are explored and, of course, Asgard goes boom.  Bendis is still using this book to explore more of the interiors of characters as opposed to focusing on the events of the event book.

This time around we get a look at the couples on the team, first up is Luke Cage and Jessica Jones.  They talk about being superheroes and parents, how those two things need to be prioritized in their lives for the sake of their kid.  Next is Clint and Bobbi’s relationship, which has seen its fair share of strain since her return after the Skrull invasion.  Her and Clint spend some time doing some old school hero stuff taking down a B-List villain and talking about the future.  Both of these stories are juxtaposed against the team’s attack on Osborn and his forces that are moving against Asgard.  With the city taken down, there are of course questions as to the fate’s of some of these characters.

New Avengers has managed to be a fine side book to the Siege event and plays itself very well as not being key to the events and more key to the characters.

Okay, there we have it, another week and another five books down.  Soon we’ll be moving into April and with it, the end of Siege.  I’m not sure how much I’ll miss writing these weekly bits up since I always seem to find myself at a loss in the how to address things.  Mind you, Second Coming is starting up this next week in the X-Books and I do like me some mutant story events.

Giant-Sized Longbox Special: Under Siege

So Marvel seemed to give us all a break a few weeks back when there were no Siege books followed by a week with only one.  Well, this past week, they made up for it with not one, or two, or even three, but five total Siege tie-in books.  Most were good, a few, not so much.  In any case, it’s given me a lot to write about and so I’m skipping a normal Longbox review to give you this giant-sized Under Siege. 

Thunderbolts #141 is probably the weakest of the books released this week.  To be honest, I haven’t really been following it since its roster changed after Secret Invasion so I’m only passingly familiar with the characters from their appearances in other books.

The story is a Mission: Impossible-style set-up with Norman Osborn setting the team to locate the spear of Odin stashed away somewhere in the armory of Asgard.  Already down two members (Ghost and Headsman), the Thunderbolts head off on their mission.

There is little here that really got me interested or invested into any of the characters and Osborn is written in a fairly unremarkable way that doesn’t seem to resonate with his character in the other Siege books.  The only thing this book really does is serve to bring the Mighty Avengers into the battle and that doesn’t happen until the last page.  By that time, I was ready to take a nap.  Here’s hoping the actual Mighty Avengers tie-in book does a better job with this.

Thor #607 improves things a bit for me but really just made me miss Straczynski.  Gillen’s writing on the book so far has been good but this tie-in feels very herky jerky.  It moves all over trying to fill in gaps with the Asgardians leading up to Osborn’s siege.  It also skips ahead in Volstagg’s story, possibly picking it up following the events of the most recent Siege: Embedded.

The Asgardians hear about what has happened in Chicago and Loki takes out the seers Heimdall and Knut so that there is no warning about what is to come.  Meanwhile, Kelda heads off to town to speak with Bill’s family about what has happened to him prior to all of this.  The story catches up with the siege as Osborn’s forces move on Asgard and Volstagg sits in a Broxton prison cell and watches Thor gets taken down on television.

The police of Broxton, feeling sympathy for the Asgardians and their situation release Volstagg and post a video to the internet in an attempt to rally public support.  As Volstagg hits the streets, Ragnarok hits, literally in the form of the Thor clone.  While I enjoyed a lot of the elements that were played with in this issue, I don’t think they were given real room to breathe.  Not bad, but not great.

Dark Wolverine #83 continues to follow Wolverine’s son Daken during Osborn’s assault on Asgard.  In the previous issue it was revealed that the Norns (think Greek fates but in colder weather) have taken an interest in Daken seeing him as the bringer of Ragnarok.  The issue ended with an interesting turn of events and a cliffhanger that seemed to put things at odds with what’s been going on the main Siege book.  Of course it was just an illusion used by the Norns to open a dialogue with Daken.

The action moves back to the real world where Daken is sent out to track down Thor in Braxton, a sequence that is handled very briefly in Siege #2.  The Norns continue to play with Daken’s perceptions and reveal their plans for him as well as expand on a point made for the siege of Asgard.  Asgard’s presence on Earth has set things out of order in the grand scheme of the universe and the Norns need Daken to set things on the right path by bringing about Ragnarok.

Daken beholds the future the Norns speak of and is told he has been chosen as the agent of Earth to bring about the rebirth of Asgard.  Daken is taken in by the promise of destruction and death on such a scale, but of course doesn’t give himself over to the plans of another.  Just as with Osborn, Daken moves contrary to the direct wishes of the Norns claiming his own agency.  Things sync back up with the real world and the post cooking of Daken by Thor.  I’ve been enjoying how well this book has been tying in and telling its own story.

New Avengers #62 picks up from #61 with Spiders -Man and -Woman fighting one another and Captains America dealing with Living Laser.  Bendis brings the words and the action in a way that always seems to make me happy.

While this book serves mainly to fill in the gaps of how Steve Roger’s and his Avengers come together with Nick Fury’s Secret Warriors, it is done in a well thought out way and brings the original Captain America back into the fold of some of his old team mates.

Bendis’s ability to write good action and witty dialogue brings a humanity to his books that I really love to see in a super-hero story.  He also manages to balance it out as a New Avengers story as well as tying into the larger Siege event.

Avengers: The Initiative #33 continues to follow Taskmaster’s and Diamondback’s stories as they are engaged first-hand in the attack on Asgard.  The book opens though with the members of the Avengers Resistance attacking The Initiative’s training facility, now under the control of The Hood.

Taskmaster finds that he’s put himself on the wrong end of Osborn’s temper in his attempt to be a part of taking down Thor.  This leads him to a realization a lot of people have had about Osborn long ago and so Taskmaster is now bringing his own motivations into question.  Diamondback, acting as a double agent, stands ready to try and assist Thor as best she can when Maria Hill shows up and takes the pressure off of her.  Constrictor pulls her out and gets her back to Asgard in time to witness the events of the fight between Sentry and Ares as well as the arrival of a famous shield in flight.

Back at The Initiative training camp, the resistance moves in only to be confronted and immobilized by The Hood.  Penance is being held in his quarters, unable to assist, and Night Thrasher is given an opportunity to see his brother resurrected from the dead.  All he has to do is kill Tigra.

So that’s it for this week Under Siege.  It was a rough one for me and here’s hoping that they don’t drop that many books on us in one week like that again.  Sure, it’s good for revenue but hard on the review.  See you guys next Sunday.

Longbox Special: Under Siege

Last week we got a look inside some of the histories and motivations of two of Norman Osborn's Avengers, Daken and The Sentry. This week we get a look at what's on the mind of Osborn's newest inner circle man, Taskmaster, as well as finding out what Captain America's Avenger's are up to.

Avengers: The Initiative #32 is another good character piece with subplots that carry on from outside the “Siege” storyline. This time, the focus is on Taskmaster, man in charge of the Fifty State Initiative and recent addition to Norman Osborn’s cabal of super-villains following the departures of Emma Frost and Namor. Taskmaster is another character I only know about in passing and this issue fleshes out his history and motivations. I just wish it would explain why he wears a skull mask and a LARPer outfit.


Taskmaster has come to realize just what it is that keeps himself and other lower-tier villains from the kind of greatness that Venom, Bullseye, and the like enjoy. Craziness. He has decided that the siege on Asgard is his chance to take a hold of greatness as opposed to his usually playing it safe. Taskmaster used to make his money by training the thugs for others while keeping below the radar and out of the way of jail time and the fists of heroes.


This issue continues to explore the relationship of Diamondback and Constrictor, two members of the Initiative who sit on different sides of the fence. Constrictor is a close friend of Taskmaster’s and so has enjoyed some of the perks that go along with being buddies with the boss. Diamondback, however, is a mole for the Avengers that have gone underground. To complicate matters even further, she’s gotten involved with Constrictor. Both of these characters try to come to terms with their relationship and just want the assault on Asgard holds for them.


Thirdly, because there’s always a third thing, there’s the subplot of the Avengers Resistance made up of former Initiative members Tigra, Night Thrasher, Justice, and Ultragirl. The amazing thing here is that these b-players have been taken and actually have something interesting going on. They managed to get information that connects the incident at Soldier Field to Norman Osborn. Of course their plan is not just to expose Osborn, but to stage an attack on camp H.A.M.M.E.R and shut it down.


The issue concludes with the repelling of Thor’s intervention at Asgard and brings the Diamondback/Tasmaster story-lines to a convergence.

New Avengers #61 is set just before the siege on Asgard and puts The Hood back into play as the man to take down Captain America’s Avengers. Unlike the other “Siege” tie-ins thus far, this is less of a character piece and more of a straight up action segment. What we have are The Hood’s syndicate of criminals getting powered up by the Norn Stones, a gift from Loki to The Hood, and going after Cap’s Avengers.


Captains America are looking over the recently demolished remains of Steve Roger’s former headquarters. There’s not much time for talking before Steve and Bucky are attacked by The Living Laser and The Corruptor. The Corruptor uses his newly enhanced abilities to control the minds of others to pit Bucky against Steve in what could be considered a cliché fight between heroes. The conclusion looks to be typical for the set up but that seems to be something saved for the next issue.


Also going on Spiders-Man and -Woman stand watch on a nearby building monitoring activity at Osborn’s Avengers Tower, where things seem to be ramping up for something big. This is actually the more wordy of the two stories going on here and probably the more interesting. Jessica (-Woman) asks Peter (-Man) about Osborn since he’s fought him so many times in the past. This turns into a reinforcement of the idea that it’s just a matter of time before Osborn loses it and the empire he’s created for himself comes crashing down on his head. What else is kind of interesting here is that there are a bunch of throw away tie-in references to stuff like S.W.O.R.D and the Spider-Woman comic as well as the possible undoing of the Brand New Day storyline that’s going to be revisited this year. Before long, the two are also attacked by a duo of newly powered up criminals Madrill and Griffin, who I’m assuming are bottom of the barrel characters that Bendis likes to grab at times like this to add some flavor to the mix. It’s another mind controller, Mandrill, who gives Spider-Woman the order to kill Spider-Man and then to give him the location of the other Avengers.


I have to say that once again, these are two well done tie-in books that don’t rely so heavily on the main title. I’ve been very impressed with how Marvel has managed to address stuff that’s been going on in these titles, keep that stuff moving forward, and still connect it to the event without making either critical to the other for understanding. If you’ve been reading this books before “Siege”, you’re still going to enjoy Gage’s and Bendis’s work on them. If you’re only hooking in for the event book, you’ll get some nice spice added to the stew. Hopefully they can keep this up in February.