Reprints Avengers #157-166
Written by Gerry Conway, Jim Shooter.
Penciled by George Perez, John Byrne, Sal Buscema, Don Heck, George Tuska.
Inked by Pablo Marcos.
The Avengers are home at their mansion on Christmas Eve. Suddenly the mansion is attacked by their ex-teammate, the Black Knight! Or, to be more accurate, by a statue of the knight claiming to be the real deal. He takes out all of the Avengers except the Vision. Can the synthezoid defeat the Black Knight statue?
Later, tensions are rising between the Vision and his "brother", Wonder Man, AKA Simon Williams. The android Vision had Simon's brainwaves transferred into him when he was created. Now Wonder Man seems to be interested in Vision's wife, the Scarlet Witch. The two heroes slug it out until Iron Man breaks it up.
 |
| Vision tangles with his "brother" Wonder Man. |
In the middle of this, the Avengers are called to the Rocky Mountains to halt the attack of Graviton! He controls gravity and easily defeats the team. Graviton then pulls an entire town into the sky and takes it to New York City. The villain threatens to drop the town on New York, which would kill thousands of people.
 |
| Graviton takes down the Avengers. |
 |
| Graviton pulls a town out of the ground. |
Following that battle, Wonder Man's brother Eric Williams, AKA Grim Reaper attacks the Avengers mansion. He defeats and imprisons the team and decides to place Wonder Man and Vision on trial. The Reaper says only one man can truly be his brother Simon and if he rules against either one of them, the verdict will carry a sentence of death!
 |
| Wonder Man decks Grim Reaper (note the error in the top right panel: Reaper's scythe disappears!) |
Next up, the Avengers are attacked by Ant-Man! Henry Pym has lost his memory and thinks it's the early days of the Avengers. He wonders who these Avengers are and presumes they're enemies. As Ant-Man, he sends hordes of ants to attack the Avengers. Thankfully, the Wasp is able to defeat him.
 |
| Ant-Man attacks the Avengers! |
We eventually learn that Pym is being manipulated by his own creation, Ultron! The mechanical madman needs Pym's technical expertise to construct a bride for him. Ultron attacks the Avengers in their mansion headquarters and captures Wasp. He plans to transplant Wasp's life-force into a robot body. It looks like Ultron will finally defeat the Avengers...but Iron Man has an ace up his sleeve that could save the team.
 |
| Ultron returns. |
Subsequently, Iron Man summons Hercules to New York. Herc brings along his teammates from the Champions, Black Widow and Iceman. When they arrive, Iron Man attacks them. We learn that Iron Man is being forced to do this by the giant Greek god Typhon, who is holding Beast hostage. Eventually, the heroes figure out what's going on and team up against Typhon.
 |
| Scarlet Witch uses her Hex power against Ultron. |
Finally, the Avengers' old enemy Count Nefaria shows up in New York. He seeks out Power Man, Living Laser and Whirlwind and offers to boost their superpowers. The villains call themselves the "new" Lethal Legion, they rob a bank and encounter Captain America, Wasp and Yellowjacket. At the same time, Nefaria is meeting with former Nazi scientists in an attempt to gain super powers for himself.
 |
| Cap & Yellowjacket battle the Lethal Legion. |
The Legion is giving the Avengers all they can handle. But all of a sudden, their powers disappear and they're easily dispatched by the heroes. Nefaria shows up and reveals that he has siphoned off the Legion's power and given it to himself. His scientists have helped him become one of the most powerful beings on Earth. Nefaria picks up an entire 40-story building on drops it on the Avengers. The battle appears lost, but Thor shows up and gives the Avengers hope.
Review:
A mostly great collection, with some exceptions (see story & art below). It's interesting that this hardcover mentions Ultron in its title, but the longest (and best) storyarc is the three-part Nefaria story. I guess Ultron has more drawing power than Nefaria.
Story:
This collection starts out with a weak entry. The story that centers on the Black Knight statue isn't very good. We never learn why the statue attacks the Avengers or who is behind said attack. Many years later it was retconned that (SPOILER ALERT) Ultron was controlling the statue, so I guess it makes sense in that context to include it here.
But most of the book contains excellent examples of Bronze Age stories. These are some of Jim Shooter's best Avengers stories. We get two-parters that feature battles with Graviton, Grim Reaper and Ultron. I've always seen Graviton as a poor man's Magneto, but he's portrayed as an A-list villain here (his first appearance).
The Ultron portion of the book is great, too. I truly felt sorry for Hank Pym, ranting maniacally at the Avengers due to Ultron's brainwashing. Not to mention the Wasp, who has some of her life-force stolen while (seemingly) losing her husband to madness.
After Ultron is defeated, we get another fill-in story featuring Typhon. This is a difficult story, because there's an attempt to shoe-horn it into continuity. The previous story ends with Pym's aforementioned rant, the Typhon story gives us a one-panel explanation of the treatment Pym is receiving, and the next thing we know, he's back to normal. Weird.
Lastly, the Count Nefaria three-parter is the highlight of the book. It features one of the greatest battles of the Bronze Age, as the newly super-powered Nefaria gives the Avengers one of their toughest fights. I also liked the way Power Man is initially reluctant to join Nefaria.
Art:
Two issues reprinted here contain less-than-stellar artwork. The first story is penciled by Don Heck. He did some great work in the Silver Age, but Heck's art in the 1970s wasn't so great. Same goes for the Typhon story drawn by George Tuska, another great artist who'd seen better days by the Bronze Age. Tuska's portion comes right after George Perez', and the change is quite jarring.
But the pencils by Sal Buscema, Perez, and John Byrne are all excellent. Take a look at this page here from Perez:
While I'm not crazy about the helpless depiction of the Wasp here, I love the way Perez uses halves of her and Jocasta to frame the action. Byrne and Buscema deliver some of their best Avengers work here as well, and Pablo Marcos (who inks everything in this book) does a good job as inker, embellishing the pencils without ever detracting from their power.
How does it look?:
The pages here look great, as you can see by looking at the scans in this review, including this great splash page:
The Avengers: Bride Of Ultron is a great book, featuring some of my favorite Avengers stories. It's great to have them in glossy reprints after all these years. It's definitely worth picking up, but the "fill-in" stories prevent me from giving it my highest rating.
J.A. Morris' rating:
.5
3 and a half Sals.
 |
| Thor takes on the super-powered Count Nefaria. |
Review:
A mostly great collection, with some exceptions (see story & art below). It's interesting that this hardcover mentions Ultron in its title, but the longest (and best) storyarc is the three-part Nefaria story. I guess Ultron has more drawing power than Nefaria.
 |
| The Whizzer tries to stop Count Nefaria. |
Story:
This collection starts out with a weak entry. The story that centers on the Black Knight statue isn't very good. We never learn why the statue attacks the Avengers or who is behind said attack. Many years later it was retconned that (SPOILER ALERT) Ultron was controlling the statue, so I guess it makes sense in that context to include it here.
But most of the book contains excellent examples of Bronze Age stories. These are some of Jim Shooter's best Avengers stories. We get two-parters that feature battles with Graviton, Grim Reaper and Ultron. I've always seen Graviton as a poor man's Magneto, but he's portrayed as an A-list villain here (his first appearance).
The Ultron portion of the book is great, too. I truly felt sorry for Hank Pym, ranting maniacally at the Avengers due to Ultron's brainwashing. Not to mention the Wasp, who has some of her life-force stolen while (seemingly) losing her husband to madness.
After Ultron is defeated, we get another fill-in story featuring Typhon. This is a difficult story, because there's an attempt to shoe-horn it into continuity. The previous story ends with Pym's aforementioned rant, the Typhon story gives us a one-panel explanation of the treatment Pym is receiving, and the next thing we know, he's back to normal. Weird.
Lastly, the Count Nefaria three-parter is the highlight of the book. It features one of the greatest battles of the Bronze Age, as the newly super-powered Nefaria gives the Avengers one of their toughest fights. I also liked the way Power Man is initially reluctant to join Nefaria.
Art:
Two issues reprinted here contain less-than-stellar artwork. The first story is penciled by Don Heck. He did some great work in the Silver Age, but Heck's art in the 1970s wasn't so great. Same goes for the Typhon story drawn by George Tuska, another great artist who'd seen better days by the Bronze Age. Tuska's portion comes right after George Perez', and the change is quite jarring.
But the pencils by Sal Buscema, Perez, and John Byrne are all excellent. Take a look at this page here from Perez:
While I'm not crazy about the helpless depiction of the Wasp here, I love the way Perez uses halves of her and Jocasta to frame the action. Byrne and Buscema deliver some of their best Avengers work here as well, and Pablo Marcos (who inks everything in this book) does a good job as inker, embellishing the pencils without ever detracting from their power.
How does it look?:
The pages here look great, as you can see by looking at the scans in this review, including this great splash page:
J.A. Morris' rating:
.5
3 and a half Sals.
