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thebibliomancer · 5 months

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Essential Avengers: West Coast Avengers #46: FRANCHISE

July, 1989

Great Lakes Avengers Assemble?!

I have been waiting for this.

I've read this issue before, in a collected edition of Dan Slott's Great Lakes Avengers miniseries. But now I have all the context leading up to this and I'll get to see what else this wacky group did in their early appearances.

And, hell. Out of everything in the Byrne run so far, this is his first shake up that's not deeply annoying!

Byrne is the one who pulls the trigger on the idea of a third Avengers team teased when Vision was trying to expand the Avengers. But not quite as he enVisioned it.

Hah.

Last times on West Coast Avengers: Between issues, Tigra, Hank Pym, and the Wasp joined the West Coast Avengers. Then Vision got kidnapped by every government in the world and disassembled into a pile of parts. Hank Pym puts everyone's favorite synthezoid back together but he's all white now and he doesn't have emotions and only has Avengers case files for memories.

The American government also forced the West Coast Avengers to take on US Agent or else reprisals. Hawkeye quit in a huff after US Agent tosses him after Hawkeye tried to punch him.

We learned in the big Avengers meeting over in Avengers that Hawkeye has a new group so let's get into it.

Geez, Mr Immortal, you're a bit manic there.

A bank robbery is happening at the Milwaukee Farmers and Merchants Trust. And we know this is Milwaukee because one of the robbers very considerately wears a Milwaukee jacket.

A dude we'll later learn is called Mr Immortal drops down from the ceiling, quips a bit, dodges some gunfire, hits a couple dudes, and then... doesn't dodge some other gunfire.

That looks like it hurts.

The robbers gather around the dead, deceased hero to make sure he's really dead.

And he's gotta be, right? Half of his chest is bulleted to hell.

And then things go to hell. For the robbers.

Flatman swipes the hostages with his stretchy definitely not a spoof of Mr Fantastic body. Big Bertha OH YEAHs through the wall. Dinah Soar flies through a Doorman shaped portal in another wall.

The Great Lakes Avengers are usually treated comically. They're a ridiculous team, operating in a ridiculous area, with ridiculous powers and the big joke about them in the Dan Slott series was how they were constantly overshadowed by the official Avengers and how none of the other heroes wanted to interact with them.

Except Squirrel Girl, who they hired by sorta lying that they were the real Avengers.

Ridiculous group with ridiculous powers they may be but in this action sequence, they're coordinated. They had a good plan to distract the robbers so the hostages could be pulled out of harms way. And then their ridiculous powers took down the gunmen no problem.

Yeah, these guys aren't going to be fighting Doctor Doom without hefty authorial fiat (but isn't that the way all comics work anyway?) but they're not bumbling amateurs.

And I appreciate that.

Last robber standing backs away in shock horror... right into the arms of Mr Immortal.

Who is not, in fact, dead. Or at least, he didn't stay dead.

Immortal, y'know?

Robber: "They're poppin' outta th' woodwork! Who are these geeks? Milwaukee don't have no super heroes!" Mr Immortal: "Guess again! Y'all are gonna be seein' a lot of us from now on! Y'all are gonna be seein' us in your nightmares!" Robber: "Wha...? No!! You're dead!!!" Mr Immortal: "Wrong-o, creep! I'm just as right as rain! But you aren't gonna be! By the time I get done with you... You'll prob'ly never be anything like right. Not never again!!"

Mr Immortal apparently goes a bit berserk after resurrecting.

He punches the robber down and then starts stomping him.

Flatman has to pull him off the guy. And Mr Immortal won't settle down until Dinah Soar talks to him in an empty text bubble.

Dinah Soar is the only one who CAN get him to calm down.

Flatman guesses its some kind of hypersonic. In the later Dan Slott series, its revealed that its actually True Love what does it. Yes, for serious. It was sweet, actually.

Last member of the team comes into the bank and tells the rest that there's a bunch of police and reporters who want to know what the devil is going on.

Mr Immortal goes out to address the crowd and press. When reporter Peggy Allen asks him who this group of do-gooders is, he dubs the team...

THE GREAT LAKES AVENGERS!

Hawkeye hears the news report in the random motel he's staying in after rage-quitting the Avengers.

His first instinct is to call the team and let them know about randos infringing the brand but then decides 'fuck 'em' because he's still mad about the government meddling in the team.

There's a knok knok knoking on Clint's door and making his bad mood worse, its Mockingbird.

He is very sarcastic about his day being ruined but she says she's here to save their marriage.

News to him. He thought they were dead set on getting a divorce.

But time off-panel and with a different writer has cooled Mockingbird's head. And since they're both going through some trying times now, maybe they should rethink things.

Hawkeye: "You mean now that I've been kicked off the team I founded I'm all of a sudden a pitiful soul so you've gone all maternal and decided to come back to the roost and take care of me! Well, thanks but no thanks, Bobbi!" Mockingbird: "You're not being fair, Clint. Although I guess that's nothing new, is it?" Hawkeye: "And just what is that supposed to mean?" Mockingbird: "It means you have all the sensitivity of a brick. I got mixed up with the Phantom Rider because he drugged me, used me, and when you found out, did you react like a husband whose wife has been assaulted? NO!! You went off on some stupid macho kick! And I was hurt enough to pay you back with your own coin. When I needed you -- maybe more than I ever have before -- you were too busy stroking your wounded male ego to notice. Something that could have bound us even closer together drove us apart. Well... that damage is done. Now I'm here to see if it can be undone. Because, heaven help me, in spite of everything, I still love you!"

I can't believe Byrne of all people is cutting through the bullshit and having Mockingbird say 'hey all that stuff we were yelling about wasn't the crux of the issue and you were being a major asshole, Clint.'

He's re-litigating a lot of Englehart's stuff. Redoing the Tigra plot. Revising Englehart's origin for Vision. Shoving people that had quit back onto the team.

I didn't expect him to use this power for good.

Because the Hawkeye/Mockingbird falling out was bad. Maybe in character for the two stubborn jerks. But it needed another look and here we are, taking another look.

Mockingbird doesn't even entertain the notion that its really a philosophical disagreement about cowboy manslaughter.

I'll have to see where it goes. Because it could go poorly in its own unique way.

Back over at the West Coast Avengers Compound, US Agent has made a good impression on one person and only one person.

The new cook, Mrs. Heyges, who is pleased to see someone that actually enjoys a big breakfast.

Most of the West Coast Avengers only have a slice of toast and some orange juice.

US Agent: "A man has to keep his strength up, Mrs. Heyges. And, of course, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Besides... You're almost as good a cook as my mother!" Mrs. Heyges: "Well, gracias, sir! I know that must be quite a compliment."

Based on her comments that she doesn't get to really cook for the others, US Agent muses that he should introduce a proper meal schedule.

Then, Tigra happens.

Looking for a proper meal of her own.

A.k.a. chasing a mouse.

She's seemingly gone full feral, although she doesn't have that same alien cat look she did last time.

Either Byrne thought better of it or it comes and goes for some damn reason.

She chases a mouse in, hisses and growls when US Agent grabs her, and sullenly creeps away when he slaps her for trying to bite him.

The cat instincts have taken over.

(I don't love that we're doing this again but it is better than her trying to hump everyone? I mean. Slightly better. The main reason I'm annoyed is that we're just doing this plot again. In a vacuum it wouldn't be so bad.)

(Also also, last time she jumped through a window to chase a bird. I can only assume she's destroyed the local bird population. Folks, Tigras are inside Avengers. Keep them inside for their own health and for the good of the ecosystem.)

Mrs. Heyges says that Tigra has been hunting the mice that get into the pantry. And she's new here and didn't really want to tell an Avenger what to do so she just sorta figured. Hunting mice was part of Tigra's job??

US Agent declares this very gross and decides something has to be done!

I mean. Something does need to be done. It speaks ill of everyone that nobody has noticed Tigra's issues until now. And the only dude that sorta knew she was going through something was Hawkeye and he stormed off in a huff.

I guess Wanda is going through some stuff. And Wonder Man is being kind of a creep about Wanda's stuff. And Vision is very neutral on everything these days. But fucks sake, Wasp or Hank Pym. You two are the adults here!

Over in the A-plot, Mockingbird has convinced Hawkeye to go to Milwaukee to check out the group calling themselves Avengers. Because it beats him sitting around feeling sorry for himself for rage-quitting the West Coast Avengers.

Although, he's rewritten history so that he was unjustly fired.

But since he had the impulse to go check out the Great Lakes Avengers, why not ride that impulse into something productive?

So over in Milwaukee, the Great Lakes Avengers check out mysterious lights over the Germania Building.

Mr Immortal sends Dinah Soar to check out the roof of the building and has Doorman make a portal (with his BODY) so Flatman can get inside the building and look for a way to let everyone else in.

Flatman thinks to himself how weird it is that when he goes through Doorman, he feels like he's briefly in another place entirely. Like, not even on Earth anymore.

Apparently, a subtle nod to Doorman's powers working through the Darkforce Dimension.

Up on the roof, Dinah Soar gets ambushed and captured by some manner of bola arrow.

At the mercy of this mystery assailant, Dinah Soar takes out a little whistle and sadly tweets on it.

Mr Immortal and Big Bertha hear the sad tooting and realize Dinah Soar is in trouble!

So Big Bertha gets Mr Immortal to hang onto her back and high jumps to the roof to get him there in a hurry.

To the mystery assailant's bafflement.

Mr Immortal: "You get clear now while I take care of this clown." Mystery Assailant who is definitely not Hawkeye: "'Clown?' Takes spunk to wear a suit like that and call somebody else a clown, pal!"

Glass houses, mystery assailant.

Big Bertha falls back to ground level, laughing all the way.

I am not sure why she does this. In other stuff, she's usually one of the more serious members of the Great Lakes Avengers.

Anyway, some more Great Lakes Avengers thoughts. Presumably Big Bertha could have pulled herself up onto the roof. She's got super strength. But mystery assailant has already captured Dinah Soar so Mr Immortal is going in alone to feel the guy out.

He doesn't die when he's killed. He's the best for gauging threat level.

He's also a clown, whether or not you think his costume is sillier than anyone else's. Lets say Hawkeye, for the sake of an example.

He acrobats around mystery assailant and proclaims "Okay, wiseguy... I don't know what your game is... but you're way out of your league... now that the Avengers are here!"

Leading mystery assailant to reveal himself to be... AN IMPOSTER DRESSED LIKE HAWKEYE??

Hawkeye: "'Dressed as Hawkeye...??' I am Hawkeye, an' I'm here to find out what you so-called 'Avengers' think you're up to! In case you don't know it, buster, the Avengers' name isn't up for grabs by any ol' Tom, Dick, an' Harriet!"

So Mr Immortal kicks him in the face for impersonating an Avenger. That's rude, y'know. Probably not a felony BUT MAYBE IT SHOULD BE.

Mr Immortal: "You think you can defeat the Avengers by pretending to be Hawkeye? The real Hawkeye would have blocked my attack easily!"

Mockingbird shows up and repays the favor by kicking Mr Immortal in the face for kicking Hawkeye in the face.

She explains that Hawkeye sucks ass at close quarters combat. I don't think that's entirely true but I like to think Mockingbird isn't above being a little petty.

Mr Immortal is alarmed that there's a woman impersonating Mockingbird now!

It turns out that Mr Immortal is almost current with superhero gossip.

He knows that Mockingbird and Hawkeye have split up, he knows that Mockingbird quit the Avengers. He doesn't know that Hawkeye recently also quit the Avengers.

So you can see where the confusion comes from.

You might not see why Mr Immortal decides his next move is to backflip off the roof.

Maybe he wanted to see how the "imposters" would react to it.

Well, not personally. He'd have to rely on someone else telling him how they reacted to it. He's temporarily dead from hitting the ground really hard.

But Flatman saw the whole thing and realized that Mockingbird sounds sincerely distraught that a dude just died.

Hawkeye: "Flatman?? I don't believe it! You got a partner called 'Ribbon?'"

Its funny that DC comics is apparently fictional within Marvel because the Avengers have also met the Justice League.

Silly comics.

Mockingbird berates Hawkeye's joke for being inappropriate. A man just died!

Flatman awkwardly explains that Mr Immortal doesn't really die.

So at Mockingbird's request, they all convene at Great Lakes Avengers' HQ... er... Big Bertha's place.

It's a fancy place.

Hawkeye asks how she can afford such nice digs but it turns out that when Big Bertha isn't superheroing, she's supermodel Ashely Crawford, darling of many Vogue covers. One of the highest paid models in the biz.

So Hawkeye asks what a successful model is doing "playing super hero."

And again, at this point the West Coast Avengers are silly. They're comical. They're not a joke.

Big Bertha: "I don't think of it as... playing, Hawkeye. None of us do. We're all just as serious about this as you are."

Yeah, Hawkeye!

Mockingbird asks how the group got together... and why "Great Lakes Avengers"?

We don't get the whole story now but it's implied that Mr Immortal go them together and stated that the name was his idea. He wanted to maintain the coastal theme but there's no north coast so...

But the real question that Mockingbird is getting at is who do the Great Lakes Avengers think they are, using the Avengers brand without permission? The Avengers are pretty fussy about who gets called Avenger! Says the lady who is not currently an Avenger!

I don't think she actually cares. But she assumes Hawkeye cares and she's here to get his mind on anything but fuming about US Agent or her.

Annnnnd Hawkeye has changed his mind!

Hawkeye: "I'm startin' to think maybe this Midwest team isn't such a bad idea. Your powers are kinda funky, and your code names stink... But with the proper management... my management... This could be a heckuva team!"

Ah, dammit, Hawkeye! You ragequit one team so you're going to force your way onto this one, huh?

I don't know how it will be handled immediately in this book but after the fact, in the later Dan Slott series, the Great Lakes Avengers view the whole thing pretty cheerfully.

The big league came down to coach their team. It gives them credibility and helps them be better at superheroing, which they're all pretty serious about.

I'll have to see how it unfolds as it goes though.

Current team lead Mr Immortal is still regrowing his brains and hasn't expressed an opinion on Hawkeye's pending takeover.

It is so funny though! Hawkeye gets forced out of the West Coast Avengers slash quits so his rebound is to just take over someone else's team!

He does the same thing when he accidentally screws himself out of a spot on Busiek's Avengers! Tracks down the Thunderbolts and goes 'my team now.'

It may be his real superpower.

Anyway, the other B-plot.

Wanda seems to be doing better after the whole husband robot thing and dropping a cliff on Wonder Man. Maybe. Hard to say. She's had a good swim, at least.

And then Roberto Carlos of the Avengers Compound Support Staff brings Wanda a letter from the Absolon College of Robotics.

Remember Absolon College had that big list of mutants to do Something With and Wanda is the one they settled on?

The letter claims that their research into artificial intelligence may be able to restore Vision back to his good ol' self.

Is... is it public knowledge that Vision was taken apart by the government and had his brain FUBAR'd??

Because if not, that's a red flag!

The other red flag is that the letter is from Jeremiah Random, which sounds like a made-up name!

This is going to end badly! And I'm not just saying that because the next time box says THIS ANCIENT EVIL!

Follow @essential-avengers because woo! Great Lakes Avengers! Love those guys! Like, comment, reblog maybe?

#essential avengers #avengers #west coast avengers #great lakes avengers #hawkeye #mockingbird #Mr Immortal #Flatman #Big Bertha #Dinah Soar #Doorman #US Agent #Tigra #Scarlet Witch #some avengers compound support staff #hawkeye bullies some newbie heroes for trademark infringement

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thebibliomancer · 4 months

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Essential Avengers: Avengers West Coast #48: THIS ANCIENT EVIL

September, 1989

Captain America and She-Hulk have found the Scarlet Witch... Maybe not the smartest thing they ever did...

Still love cover text.

So Wanda just wears ooze now.

Interesting fashion choice.

Wasp will probably have something to say about it, though, if the West Coast Avengers ever rejoin the A-plot in their own book.

I know the allure of having two linked books so characters can cross over as needed but this is still Avengers West Coast, the Avengers book occurring on the West Coast. Since I guess there aren't separate teams anymore.

Last times on Avengers West Coast: all the governments disassembled Vision for trying to take over the world that one time. Hank Pym put him back together but now Vision's brain isn't the same. No emotions. None of the other Avengers seem to care so Scarlet Witch takes Vision to Absolom College which offered to help. 'TWAS A RUSE and Dean Random dumps a bunch of evil ooze on Wanda!

This time: a lot of worldbuilding exposition.

Yup, that's right. The backstory is so extensive it goes back to the formation of Earth.

But the take-away is, like I said, Byrne is doing Sublime before Sublime.

The longer of it is that the Earth cooled, there was big rain, cellular life started to form, and the very first cell undergoes mitosis EXCEPT ONE OF THE COPIES IS EEEEEEEVIL AND EATS THE OTHER.

AND FROM THEN ON EVERY LIFEFORM ON EARTH HAS HAD THE MARK OF EEEEEEVIL IN IT.

Except mutants. Remember how that's the whole thing? The evil ancient gene or whatever wants to assimilate mutants and needed one that was easy prey? And since Wanda is having an emotional crisis currently...

Hey. You can see her toes. And she noted last issue that the ooze was dissolving her cape. Is she only wearing ooze now?

Byrne, why?

Also, what the fuck is a classic mutant type? What does that mean? And the later retcon that Wanda isn't even a mutant just makes this funny. These guys aren't good at their job.

Apparently, aside from just zonking her mind, the ooze and the tube are trying to understand the mutant gene and also reconstructing Wanda's memory and dumping the big exposition dump right into her brain. She needs to know this stuff, I guess.

Lady bad guy estimates that the process will be done in 72 hours.

Meanwhile, Captain America and She-Hulk and only Captain America and She-Hulk fly a Quinjet to Absolom, Texas to check on that Quinjet distress signal they got.

I wonder where this crossover fits with what's happening in Avengers. Cap went right from his announcement that he now ruled all Avengers to that whole Lava Man thing. And they're going to go right from that Lava Man thing into another story arc, to try to get help for Gilgamesh. And that's going to be a number of issues.

Avengers West Coast has to be way ahead of the Avengers East Coast timeline right now.

But I'm wondering because why is it just Cap and She-Hulk? Was everyone else on vacation?

She-Hulk calls to advise the traffic controller that they're going to be landing at Absolom College. In a nice touch, the traffic controller hears that the Avengers are emergency landing at a university and asks if the police or military need to be contacted too. Because Avengers deal with all kinds of shit!

But Cap tells the traffic controller that it's Avengers' business.

A bad guy informs Dean Random that another Quinjet is approaching, to Random's consternation. He thought that Wanda had severed ties with the Avengers before coming.

(Really, all she did was steal a Quinjet and hide her destination. That's not quite severing ties.)

While the assimilation process on Wanda continues, Mr. Random goes to meet with the Avengers and see what the hell they want on his college.

When Cap tells Mr. Random that they're investigating a possibly crashed Quinjet, Random spins a story that is partially true and also bullshit.

He tells Cap that Scarlet Witch and Vision visited, that Wanda left Vision with the college, and then took off. And he hopes that nothing happened to her after she left! He then offers Cap and She-Hulk a visit with Vision who will surely corroborate the story.

Meanwhile, SPAAAAAACE.

Starfox is searching an ancient planet for Nebula. Even though the Avengers told him that Nebula fell into a time warp and was lost in time. Because a mercenary told Starfox he'd seen Nebula.

Yeah, so I was wondering at what point the Nebula Kang thing got retconned to not be Nebula and apparently the time is now.

Guess Byrne decided he had a better idea for her than where Simonson left her. AND TO BE FAIR.

Nebula Kang wasn't interesting enough that I can muster up annoyance that the story is being retconned.

Anyway, Starfox does find Nebula and Gunthar of her space mercenary crew.

Gunthar found some stone tablets for her which have formula on them that will help her become more powerful than Thanos ever was!

Is it the Anti-Life Equation?

Don't call attention to Thanos' pretty direct inspiration!

Over in another subplot, there's a lady named Ann Raymond at a homeless shelter in Denver who is delirious and keeps telling staff that she needs to get to Los Angeles. She's carrying a newspaper clipping with the headline "Avengers Confirm Vision is Not Torch" which seems to be making her distraught.

Um. Whyy did the Avengers announce that to the news media? For one thing, that's personal biz and I'm sure Wanda did not approve having it blasted to the press since she still thinks Professor Horton is a lying sack of shit.

The way the Avengers are handling the Vision situation makes them feel more inhuman than the emotionless robot man.

Anyway.

Meanwhile, Captain America and She-Hulk meet with Vision. They ask him where Wanda is but he has no idea. He can only report that according to Mr. Random, Wanda took off.

The evil bad guys who are full of evil ancient bacteria or whatever decide they need to accelerate shoving exposition into Wanda's brain, in case the heroes cause problems. Sure, it might break Wanda's brain but surely they have no other choice.

So more past times exposition flashbacks. Life continued to develop on Earth. There were forests. Also lizards. And then dinosaurs. Should stopped there, dinosaurs were great. But while there were dinosaurs, there was also mammals.

This will be important later.

Cap and She-Hulk finish their tour with Mr. Random and Cap has some questions.

Sure, the Absolom College of Robotics looks pretty impressive but it's nothing compared to the tech that the Avengers have. So why did Absolom think they'd be better at fixing Vision's noodle than the Avengers were?

Mr. Random handwaves it that Absolom's robotics experts are providing a different perspective on the problem but Cap is skeptical.

Captain America: "Still, you would agree it is a great shame that Wanda should feel the need to turn to strangers after we did all we could do."

Diiiiiiid you though?

The Wonder Man elephant is still in the room. An additional thing that they could try but nobody seems interested in it except Wanda and everyone else has seemingly washed their hands of the situation and decided Vision is Good Enough.

Mr. Random gets called off to attend to something (probably something Wanda related) and tells Cap and She-Hulk they can finish the tour.

Both of the heroes are actually pretty skeptical of the situation, this facility, and all these people.

The Absolom robotics facilities looks more like a set designer's idea of what an impressive robot factory would look like and less like the real thing.

But rather than confront the peeps now, Cap decides they'll finish the tour like they're not massively suspicious and then sneak back later at night to poke around.

Meanwhile, back at Seattle, the Avengers West Coast (minus US Agent who has never done any Avengers business with the Avengers at all so far despite ostensibly being in charge and Tigra who nobody has noticed hasn't shown up, sigh) interview Professor Horton.

Horton reiterates that Vision could not possibly be the (robot) Human Torch.

CLEARLY ANY NON IDIOT AND ALSO ROBOTICS EXPERT WOULD NOTICE THAT, HANK PYM.

For you see, the Human Torch was an artificial human and definitely not mechanical at all in any way shape or form. Just a human ass human except 100% synthetic parts. Meanwhile, Vision has robot bits.

I don't know whether this is true of the Human Torch or not. I don't know whether this is closing a plot hole since Vision has been shown having mechanical parts. But I do remember that several times people have said that Vision is a synthezoid, meaning an artificial man with synthetic parts. But Horton seems to be redefining synthezoid to mean a mix of artificial organs and machine parts.

We're pretty far into this subplot by now. Why are we still rehashing this part of it?

Is it because I keep yelling at the comic how much I hate this subplot?

Anyway, Hank Pym tells Horton that he went on a Fantastic Voyage through Vision and sees his point. Probably should have seen it sooner.

I think that Fantastic Voyage is the story that did the art fail of showing Vision as more roboticy than he's supposed to be. He's supposed to be basically a man but artificial.

Anyway, Hank also reflects that they believed all of Vision's backstory Human Torch stuff because of Immortus.

Hank Pym: "Obviously, the 'master of time' lied. Why?" Immortus, watching this conversation on the time-a-vision: "Oh, never without good reason, my dear Doctor Pym. Never without good reason."

Oh, boy, I sure hope that good reason is really good.

Immortus suggests that it's a really good reason, such a good reason that it's beyond the comprehension of people with dumb minds. Also, he has Plans involving Scarlet Witch.

Big ones.

So he's also watching her subplot on a different time-a-vision.

On a completely different floor.

Why did you organize like this?

I do like the room that is just sideways to the stairs. Immortus lives in an MC Esher painting.

Anyway, back at the Scarlet Witch ooze side of the plot, all the memories have been jammed into her brain and the bad guys breached the genetic barrier that kept them from possessing mutants.

Mr. Random: "The genetic barrier has been breached. Soon we shall be able to abandon the dead end street of humanity... And then homo sapiens will go the same way as did the dinosaurs before them!"

So we'd better dial E for Extinction.

This is just the Sublime stuff! Did Morrison just rip off Byrne? Why??

The evil bad guys put Ooze Wanda in a room so she can rest and contemplate.

Ooze Wanda: "Suddenly I feel very sure about everything. It's as if every doubt I've ever had in my life has been scrubbed away. I begin to understand now some of the things my father has said. Things he said in the days my brother, Pietro, and I were part of his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. In those days long before we even knew he was our father... When he was, to us, only Magneto, Master of Magnetism." "Then he spoke often of the superiority of mutants such as us. Homo superior, he called us. He said we were the future. Said that some day soon all the humans would bow down to us... Acknowledge us as their rightful masters! Now i see that he was right! More right than even he dared guess. Humankind has reached the end of its era of domination. They must be left behind, like the dinosaurs, like the lesser mammals. Left to die out. And only That Which Endures shall remain!"

Aw, dammit. Getting ooze radicalized her into mutant supremacy.

Don't do ooze, kids, not even once.

Later that evening, Captain America and She-Hulk sneak back onto the Absolom College grounds to get to the bottom of things.

While She-Hulk points out that she's not built for a stealth mission "being six foot seven and bright green", Cap impresses by acrobating all over the place and pointing out where the security sensors are so She-Hulk can avoid them.

The two break into Mr. Random's office and Mr. Random's unsecured passwordless computer and find that Scarlet Witch is being held in a sub-basement. In fact, in the building right across from Mr. Random's office window.

So She-Hulk has an idea how to expedite the journey.

Instead of slowly making their way through the building, dodging security, and trying to find their way into the sub-basement, She-Hulk just uses herself as a kinetic bomb to plow a straight line from the roof to the basement.

And Captain America follows the path she left by riding his shield. Since its unique properties absorb the impact of falling twenty stories.

In the sub-basement, Cap and She-Hulk find a fortified structure, which Cap likens to a blockhouse. Looking like it was built to contain something.

But She-Hulk is Hulk strong and Cap asks her to knock. The door down.

Except. She plows through a lot easier than she should have if it was fortified as it looks. It's a trap!

Ooze Wanda is waiting for them and with a gesture, she buries Cap and She-Hulk in rocks.

Well, buries is a strong word. She lightly flings the rubble at them and then they fall over unconscious despite it seeming like it should take more than that to knock out a (she-)hulk.

Ooze Wanda: "I have not been turned. I have, rather, been shown the truth. The great and ancient truth which has dwelled within all living things since the dawn of time! The truth you will come to share... once you, too, are properly assimilated!"

... I thought humans were already assimilated?

How does this thing work, anyway?

And where did Wanda's pupils go? She had them a few pages ago. Did she catch Youngblood's Disease between then and now?

Meanwhile, in Milwaukee, Hawkeye is training the Great Lakes Avengers and yelling at them for not being up to his standards. Despite him only being in charge for one day.

Maybe its tough love but saying "I have never seen a more useless bunch of misfits!" is a bit harsh considering he just barged into their lives and unilaterally decided he was in charge.

Mockingbird interrupts his yelling at them to tell Hawkeye she caught a Quinjet emergency signal on the Avengers waveband.

Hawkeye: "All riigghht!! This is the moment I've been waiting for! AVENGERS ASSEMBLE! My former teammteas are in some kinda jam... an' we're gonna bail 'em out!"

Sooo. You go from yelling at them for not being up to Avengers standards to throwing them into the field for an unknown situation that may have endangered a professional Avengers team, all for a chance to show up his colleagues?

I'm starting to think Hawkeye is some kind of petty asshole sometimes.

Follow @essential-avengers for more deep insights like that. Like, reblog, and comment maybe.

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