The Avenging Hour

Its the introduction of the Avengers to the Ultimate Universe, called The Ultimates!!  What if The Avengers, but as reimagined by one of the most cynical comic book writers in the business?  The issues are problematic, but man, they are gorgeous to look at!

Its the final issue of the crossover of the century, between the JLA and the Avengers and everyone's invited...not just the heroes of both teams but all of the villains as well!  

Its issue 3 of the epic JLA/Avengers crossover and there's a problem with time, as the Avengers and JLA are remembering crossovers that never happened and moving through the histories of both teams.  

The JLA/Avengers crossover continues as both teams race to get the cosmic items of power first in order to win the Grandmaster's game.  But if one team wins, everybody loses!  And can Krona be counted on to uphold his end of the bargain if he loses?

We're hitting it about a year before it should come up in our timeline, but it made sense to do it after we finished the Kurt Busiek run on the main title...that's right, it's the four issue Avengers and JLA crossover from 2003 by Busiek and George Perez!  And it's an excuse to have Jason and John talk about some DC characters!  This issue is a lot of table setting, but we disc...

Daryl Lawrence of the X-Factor Files has written a book about Alpha Flight (True North, available from Barnes & Noble) and we thought we'd use that as an opportunity to talk about the crossover from the 1980's when the Avengers and Alpha Flight teamed up to save Marrina from Attuma!  We saw one issue of it in Avengers #272, but there were a ton of Alpha Flight issues leading up to th...

<sniff, sniff>  We are sad, as we examine the last two issues of Kurt Busiek's historic run on the book, one finishing up the Kang War and the other showing the inner workings of the Maria Stark Foundation (Avengers vs accountants!)!

The Kang War ends at last!  The heroes win (no surprise) but is Kang punished for what he has done?  And what is the final fate of the Scarlet Centurion?

This episode we start with a pseudo-Astro City issue, with Kurt Busiek and Brent Anderson teaming up to tell a story together about Wonder Man and the Scarlet Witch!  And then the heroes gather to fight Kang for the final time!

It's the silent issue from Nuff Said month, and then we finally get to move into the pay off for the Triune Understanding storyline!

We start with a Carol Danvers focused issue before jumping back into the Kang War with both feet!

It's a giant issue with four of the most important Avengers writers to this point and bunches of artists, most of them never having touched the team before!!  Oh, and it features Ultron, but not for some time.  

The Kang War kicks into high gear as we see battles being fought on multiple fronts and a surprising ally (or is he?) shows his face.

Its the 2001 annual and this year we're solving the mystery of just what is going on with Hank Pym!  And we've got three Hanks to do it with!  Which Hank will control all at the end?

Its the end of the Alan Davis run (sniff, sniff) as the Kang plot continues with a threat in Russia and another master villain enters the fray!

The Avengers have beaten Diablo, but now they have to face the menace of Kang and the Scarlet Centurion!  Kang wants to take over the world, but only for the best of reasons!  

The Avengers have a big green problem...actually a lot of big green problems when the population of an entire town are turned into Hulks!  Who's behind it?  Whoever it is, Silverclaw fights them alone!

Steve Epting sticks around for one more issue as Kurt Busiek surprises us all in bringing back one of the 90'siest characters to ever 90s, Bloodwraith!  And then the next art team of Alan Davis and Mark Farmer arrive to help usher in a new era for the team!

After what seems like forever, we're back to the main title, with not nearly as many side trips, since the limited series are going to be pretty...limited for the remainder of this Avengers volume.  We start out by checking in on the crew from Avengers: Infinity as they collide with the current Marvel crossover, Maximum Security!  And then former Avengers artist Steve Epting returns to help u...

Woo hoo!  This week we are interviewing one of my favorite writers....Fabian Nicieza!  We discuss a lot of his early work, which happens to include quite a few Avengers issues, as well as some Thunderbolts and his thoughts on the Avengers in general.  He's a super nice man who was so gracious with his time and we hope you all enjoy the conversation

The end of the miniseries and the end of at least one character in the miniseries! Characters we thought were dead turn out to be alive and other characters who don't die, just fade into oblivion.  Was the ending worth everything that led up to it?

It's random Eternals!  It's the plant Swordsman!  It's the living (?) embodiment of Death!  Face it True Believer: this miniseries has it all!

We're back for more of the Celestial Quest, as things get even weirder and we wonder....is that the real Thanos?

It begins here!  The eight issue Celestial Quest miniseries from epic Avengers scribe Steve Englehart, which surprisingly, features Mantis (who'd thunk it?)!  If you listened to our interview with Tom Brevoort, you already know how we feel about it, but why not find out in detail?

We finish off our discussion with Tim Brevoort, getting more into Volume 3 of the Avengers and all of the miniseries that from early in that run that we've discussed on the show!  As I said last week, Tom Brevoort is a prince of a man, generous with his time and his intimate knowledge of Marvel Comics.  We can't thank him enough and we encourage everyone to check out any title he might b...