"New Avengers: Secret Invasion"

 

            The following is a review of the graphic novel “New Avengers: Secret Invasion” as presented in Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection format. It is NOT a review of the Disney+ series “Secret Invasion.”

            The Illuminati is a secret organization comprised of several of the world’s most powerful heroes: Sorcerer Supreme Doctor Strange; Black Bolt, king of the Inhumans; Charles Xavier, founder of the X-Men; Reed Richards, founding member of the Fantastic Four; Namor, the Sub-Mariner, ruler of Atlantis; and Iron Man, founding member of the Avenger. These six men worked together to shape the superhuman world. To keep the trust between the group members, the Illuminati’s existence had been kept secret from everyone, including the members’ teammates and families. Years ago, after the Kree-Skrull War, the group traveled to the Skrull homeworld to let the Skrulls know that Earth would not tolerate any more attempts at Skrull invasion. Things did not go well.

            Years ago, on Skrull World Satriani, Skrull King Dorrek had Princess Veranke exiled for preaching the Skrull prophecy that a devourer of worlds would destroy the Skrull Homeworld and that the Skrulls would find a new homeworld on a blue world. Dorrek had his scientists working on clones of Earth’s heroes based on the samples they were able to acquire when they held the Illuminati prisoner. Years after Veranke’s exile, Galactus, devourer of worlds, did indeed come and consume the Skrull Throneworld. Years after that, Veranke was found and brought out of exile and coronated as Queen. The Skrulls believed in the ancient prophecy Veranke believe, and the Skrulls believed the blue world they were promised was Earth, and so the Skrulls planned an invasion of Earth using Super-Skrulls. Over the years, Skrull technology had grown so advanced that the Skrulls were able to create Super-Skrulls so perfect a Super-Skrull could copy a person’s powers and have if the Super-Skrull remained in the form of the person that the Super-Skrull was copying, the Super-Skrull would be completely undetectable, and anyone would believe the Super-Skrull was indeed the person the Super-Skrull was impersonating. Queen Veranke did not wish to just order the invasion of Earth; she wished to be part of it. And the person she chose to impersonate in the invasion of Earth was Jessica Drew/Spider-Woman, once an agent of Hydra, once an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. And now an Avenger.

            As far as the Avengers knew, Jessica had lost her powers, and Hydra had offered to get them back for her if she would act as a double agent. She went directly to S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Nick Fury and told him the truth, but Rury surprised Jessica by telling her to take the deal. She was working in secret with Fury until he quit S.H.I.E.L.D. and went underground. Since then, she had been a double agent, reporting only to Fury, but Fury was no longer in charge. As far as the Avengers knew, every day had been a death-defying double cross for Jessica. And then Captain America made her an Avenger, putting her in even more danger. Putting her in a horrible position. The Avengers agreed to work with her and Fury to find out who was behind all the mysterious goings-on. But what really happened was when Jessica accepted to undergo Hydra’s operation that would restore her spider powers, the Hydra agents performing the operation were actually Skrulls. The Skrulls abducted Jessica, and Veranke took Jessica’s place. Veranke planned to destabilize S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra, eliminate the mutants, and turn the superheroes against each other. Veranke had Jessica placed at the Raft, and Veranke was at the Raft the night of the breakout which brought about the formation of the New Avengers. She had also had former Avenger Hank Pym/Yellowjacket replaced with a Skrull agent. Veranke told Viper/Madame Hydra that now that Spider-Woman was an Avenger, Spider-Woman deserved a better payment than before for now being a triple agent. Fury’s replacement as Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. Maria Hill informed Spider-Woman/Veranke that Hill was not happy that there was a New Avengers and that Hill would be keeping an eye on the newly formed team. The Yellowjacket Skrull informed Veranke of a joint Avengers/X-Men operation on Genosha to confront Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, who had lost control of Scarlet Witch’s reality altering powers and had been the reason for the disbanding of the original Avengers. Both Skrull agents were in attendance of this operation.

            Then the world burned away to white. Wanda transformed the entire world into a utopia where mutants were the dominant species and most everyone was given their heart’s true desire. Her fathers dream had become a twisted reality – he was lord and master of the ruling class, the House of M. Only Wolverine seemed to remember the world as it was and gathered his fellow heroes to try to bring reality back. When reality was restored, Wanda stripped most of Earth’s mutants of their X-genes. This act, the realization of part of the Skrulls’ plans coming to fruition, coupled with the destruction of the Skrull homeworld, brought Veranke and her agents to believe that Earth would indeed become their new homeworld and their invasion would succeed.

The New Avengers learned that the shape-shifting aliens known as the Skrulls had invaded the Earth. And, since they could not tell who was really a Skrull, they could not trust anyone to be who they seemed to be, including each other. This sent the Avengers into a tailspin of mistrust. Recently, the Avengers stopped the Hood’s newly organized gang of super villains, but the Hood broke his cohorts out of S.H.I.E.L.D. custody and took them right back to the Avengers. The attack at the Sanctum Sanctorum was fierce, and though the Avengers won the day, they did so at the cost of Doctor Strange, who lost both his mastery of the Mystic Arts and his home. Luke Cage’s wife, Jessica Jones, fled the battle in mortal fear for their child’s safety. Jessica found asylum with the registered Mighty Avengers, even though she betrayed her husband’s beliefs by doing so.

            When Parker Robbins/The Hood rescued Whitney Frost/Madame Masque from S.H.I.E.L.D. custody, the pair discovered the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents interrogating Madame Masque were Skrulls. The Hood and Madame Masque brought a Skrull agent back to the Hood’s organization’s hideout to interrogate the Skrull. The Skrull revealed that the Skrulls had planned to replace Madame Masque and revealed the Skrulls’ plans of the secret invasion to the Hood’s organization before the Skrull passed away from injuries inflicted upon the Skrull by the Hood and Madame Masque. The Hood also realized that one of the members of his organization, the Slug, was actually a Skrull in disguise. The Hood took out the imposter Slug and burned the building and the evidence of the Skrull invasion. During the battle in the Sanctum Sanctorum, the Hood had realized his namesake hood was trying to take possession of him and wanted to learn more about the demon behind the hood. Parker threatened the demon, saying Parker would dispose of the hood if the demon did not reveal itself to Parker. The demon revealed itself to Parker to be Dormammu, ruler of the Dark Dimension.

Luke called Jessica, who informed Luke Jessica was at Avengers Tower, and Jessica had signed the Superhuman Registration Act. Luke went to Avengers Tower to talk to Jessica face-to-face. Jessica told Luke he could see their baby Danielle if Luke registered, and that she didn’t believe the New Avengers’ theory about a Skrull secret invasion. The Mighty Avengers joined the confrontation, and Luke accused them of potentially being Skrulls, which they all both denied and claimed they had no idea what Luke meant by the accusation, save for Spider-Woman, a former member of the New Avengers who switched sides. Spider-Woman told the Mighty Avengers that the Skrull reference was classified S.H.I.E.L.D. information and Director Tony Stark/Iron Man was the one who should explain this to the team. Carol Danvers/Ms. Marvel decided to let Luke go. Danny Rand/Iron Fist obtained a new hideout for the New Avengers following the loss of the Sanctum Sanctorum.

            Maya Lopez/Echo had a conversation with James Howlett/Logan/Wolverine. Echo was not completely convinced that there was a Skrull secret invasion occurring. Echo went out on patrol one night and ran into someone whom she believed to be Matt Murdock/Daredevil, but who actually turned out to be a Skrull. The Skrull told Echo it was going to kill Echo and replace Echo in the New Avengers. The Skrull then attacked Echo, but Wolverine had followed Echo and was able to aid Echo in the fight and the two New Avengers were able to force the Skrull to retreat. Echo and Clint Barton/Ronin became romantically entangled.

            A Skrull ship crash-landed in the Savage Land. When both Iron Man’s public Mighty Avengers team and Luke Cage’s underground New Avengers arrived there, Luke opened the door of the ship, only to be met with a gathering of Earth’s heroes from a more innocent time. From out of the pod came Captain America, Spider-Man, Hawkeye and others who declared that they had been held captive by the shape-shifting Skrulls and had only now returned to Earth. The standoff between the Avengers of yesterday and today burst into violence. The battle upset the natural balance of the Savage Land, and a giant Tyrannosaurus rex scattered the fight.

            Peter Parker/Spider-Man found himself face-to-face with Kevin Plunder/Ka-Zar, Shanna the She-Devil, and Zabu. Ka-Zar told Spider-Man that Skrulls had infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. and were mining the Savage Land’s resource, Vibranium. The New Avengers had stumbled onto the operation on their first mission, and the Skrulls had tried to kill the New Avengers. Spider-Man didn’t believe Ka-Zar’s story, or that Ka-Zar was a human. Suddenly, Spider-Man, Ka-Zar and Shanna were attacked by Steve Rogers/Captain America. Ka-Zar’s allies were able to shoot Captain America with a dart, which revealed that this was not really Captain America, but a Skrull in disguise. Shanna then tested to prove if Spider-Man was the genuine article, and Spider-Man passed the test as human.

            All looked lost, but the Skrulls’ plans quickly unraveled when the mighty Thor summoned both the humans and Skrulls to a battle on the fields of Central Park: for the first time in years, the original Avengers were united, and Nick Fury was back on the battlefield. And for the first time ever, with the help of the super villain kingpin the Hood, heroes and villains fought as one. The turning point came when Norman Osborn, once the villainous Green Goblin and recently the leader of the Thunderbolts, stepped up and made the kill shot that took out the Skrull Queen. The humans prevailed, barely, over the alien army. In the aftermath, the international peacekeeping organization, S.H.I.E.L.D. was dismantled. Its director, Tony Stark, took the fall for the invasion and was ousted from his position while Norman Osborn came out a hard-as-nails media hero and was put in charge of the Initiative and all it encompassed. Secretly, Norman had called a meeting of controversial figures: Namor, the king of Atlantis; X-Men leader Emma Frost; ousted Latverian monarch Doctor Doom; Loki, the God of Mischief; and the Hood.

            Osborn proposed an alliance between himself, Namor, Emma Frost/White Queen, Doctor Victor Von Doom, Loki, and the Hood. They would all get whatever they wanted, their kingdoms and immunity, so long as they publicly endorsed Osborn and agreed to sign up with his Initiative. Secretly, Doctor Doom believed Osborn’s plans as head of the Initiative would fail and Osborn would implode and was just waiting for it to happen.

            During the battle in Central Park, Jessica Jones had left baby Danielle Cage with a Skrull impersonating the Avengers’ butler Edwin Jarvis. Amidst the chaos, the Skrull fled with Danielle. The Mighty and New Avengers and the Fantastic Four united to find baby Danielle. Reed Richards tried to use his Skrull detecting technology to find the Skrull Jarvis, but the tech would not work on the Super-Skrulls. The Avengers found a Skrull impersonating a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, but the Skrull expired before it could give Jessica Jones information on the location of the Jarvis Skrull and Danielle. Luke Cage, in desperation, turned to Norman Osborn for help. Osborn agreed to aid Luke as long as Luke registered. Luke agreed to Osborn’s deal. Osborn, who had taken several Skrulls into custody following the battle in Central Park, had Mac Gargan/Venom assist Osborn in interrogating the Skrulls, and Osborn, Venom, and Luke learned of a Skrull meeting place. Luke went to the Skrull meeting place, and Bullseye aided Luke in insuring the safe return of Danielle. Luke confronted Osborn at Avengers Tower and told Osborn he was breaking the deal. Back at the New Avengers’ hideout in the Bronx, the team witnessed Osborn come out in public as the Iron Patriot and unveiled his new team of Avengers, supervillains disguised as previous heroes from the original and New Avengers teams. Ronin, who had just reunited with his ex-wife Bobbi Morse/Mockingbird, was furious with the Avengers rebrand, and wanted to take the Avengers name back from Osborn and his Avengers lineup. Spider-Woman went to Avengers Tower to lead Osborn and his Avengers into a trap set in the abandoned Hellfire Club. However, instead of being attacked by Osborn’s Avengers, the New Avengers were confronted by the Hood and his organization. The New Avengers were barely able to escape the assault. Ronin went public on television speaking against Norman Osborn and Osborn’s Avengers team, vowing that the New Avengers would take Osborn down.

            Dormammu planned to have the Hood find and eliminated Doctor Strange, and Dormammu told the Hood that the Hood was meant to be the next Sorcerer Supreme. Simon Willaims/Wonder Man also went on television and had a public meltdown. Doctor Strange found Billy Kaplan/Wiccan and told Billy that Billy was potentially going to be the new Sorcerer Supreme, but that there was a list of other potential candidates, including Doctor Doom. Doctor Strange would have to bequeath several ancient artifacts to the next Sorcerer Supreme. The New Avengers decided that Ronin would be assuming the role of team leader, and that Carol Danvers/Ms. Marvel would be second in command. However, the New Avengers were uneasy with Spider-Man, not knowing his secret identity. Ronin told Spider-Man if Spider-Man didn’t unmask for the team, Spider-Man could no longer be a New Avenger. Reluctantly, Spider-Man unmasked as Peter Parker. Jessica Jones had gone to high school with Peter and revealed that she had been in love with Peter back in ninth and tenth grade. Peter, however, did not remember Jessica Jones at all, which made Jessica angry. The Hood attacked Wiccan and Doctor Strange, and Strange managed to teleport to the New Avengers’ new hideout, Bucky Barnes/Captain America’s apartment in Brookyln. Doctor Strange told the New Avengers he had to find the next Sorcerer Supreme. With the Hood being a potential candidate, the New Avengers decided to go with Doctor Strange on his quest, against Doctor Strange’s wishes. Ms. Marvel and Captain America revealed they had taken an Avengers Quinjet before the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D. Doctor Strange used the Eye of Agamotto to search for the next Sorcerer Supreme. The Eye led the New Avengers and Doctor Strange to New Orleans, Louisiana. The Hood and Madame Masque also followed to New Orleans. The Hood attacked Daimon Hellstrom, who might potentially have been the next Sorcerer Supreme. Madame Masque shot the New Avengers’ Quinjet out of the sky. Dormammu took control of the Hood. The Eye of Agamotto went to Jericho Drumm/Brother Voodoo, who became the next Sorcerer Supreme. The New Avengers and Brother Voodoo fought Dormammu to save Hellstrom and end the threat of the Hood once and for all. Norman Osborn went on television to discredit Ronin. Ronin decided the only solution now was to end Norman Osborn’s life.

            Okay, that plot synopsis was rather lengthy. Let’s move on to my own individual input for this review. For those of you who have never read a Tim Cubbin review, I’ll begin by telling you my segments following the plot analysis starts with my own personal opinions about the graphic novel. So, we’ll start with the basics, kicking off with what did I think of this book. I found this book to be relatively enjoyable for what it was. The big problem with this book is that while it is called “New Avengers: Secret Invasion,” it doesn’t actually contain any of the main issues of the “Secret Invasion” limited series, instead just collecting issues of “New Avengers” and the “Secret Invasion: Dark Reign” one-shot that came out around the time of the release of the “Secret Invasion” event. I will say there were a lot of expository pages explaining the story going on around the time of the event, which were enough to suffice reading through this book. I enjoyed the drama throughout the book, with the strain on Luke Cage and Jessica Jones’ marriage and watching them try to save their relationship was a key point throughout the book. I particularly liked how she revealed she had a crush on Peter Parker back in high school, with Peter barely remembering her as “Coma Girl.” This was, of course, following Spider-Man’s “One More Day” storyline where everyone forgot Peter Parker was Spider-Man, including the New Avengers. I enjoyed the backstory of how Luke first fell in love with Jessica. The “Secret Invasion” story arcs themselves were interesting to me, despite being presented out of order. When I did this review, I arranged the storyline chronologically, so the order of the story in this review is not actually the order the story was contained in in the book itself. Because of the disjointedness of the main storyline and the fact that the whole story of “Secret Invasion” is not actually in this book, this was a little difficult to piece together. I have read the whole “Secret Invasion” event many years ago and I hate to say it, but I really don’t remember it all that well. I feel like the purpose of this series was to give background information on the “Secret Invasion” event as a lot of the stories of the event were about the history behind the invasion, with a little bit of new stories to further the New Avengers’ storyline. I also enjoyed the conflicts with Norman Osborn, and his duplicity of sending the Hood’s army after the New Avengers instead of his Dark Avengers. The Sorcerer Supreme storyline was also entertaining, and I enjoyed the battle with Dormammu and Daimon Hellstrom. Next, we have to talk about the art. The artwork in this book was a mixed bag of opinion for me. While I enjoyed the work of Jim Cheung and Billy Tan, and the stylings of Chris Bachalo, I can’t say I’m a fan of Michael Gaydos, David Mack, or Alex Maleev. Some of these artists have come up on this blog before, so some of my regular readers already know how I feel about these artists. However, a majority of this book was on the enjoyable side, so there was more artwork that I liked compared to artwork that I disliked, so that’s a plus at least. Next up, we’re going to discuss my opinion about the title. I’ll simply just say calling this book “Secret Invasion” was a perfect title for this book as that is what the majority of this book is comprised of and I honestly don’t think any other title would suffice to fit this book. The final component I’m going to voice my opinion on here is going to be the cover. The cover depicts a group of Skrull Avengers battling the founding members of the Avengers. I will say that I thought this was a horrible cover for this book. The battle shown does not actually happen in this book and I feel like it was wrong to use to represent this particular book, and I don’t even know why it was used as a cover for an individual issue when the event portrayed on the cover never actually occurred within the pages. However, overall, I had a relatively positive opinion about this graphic novel.

            Okay, now that I’ve gone on for quite some time, let’s move on to my next individual segment, which is discussing accessibility. In this segment I answer the question of is this book accessible. I’ve been over this word over seven dozen times now in so many of my reviews, but I know that every time I do a review, I have readers who have never been to this blog before, so I have to explain myself in using this word once again. So when I ask if this book is accessible, I mean, can a person who knows nothing about the Avengers, Secret Invasion, or Marvel obtain this book by whatever means they use to get their hands on it, and then read the main story of this book, can they understand the story as written based solely on just what is contained within the pages of this book. I will say that answer is a resounding no. As I said before, this book doesn’t actually collect the “Secret Invasion” limited series, and it has stories that tie in to “Dark Reign” as well, so that’s two events in one book that are touched on but the main storyline is not actually included. And this book is Vol. 4, and it continues directly from where Vol. 3 left off, so not having been a regular follower of the “New Avengers” series is highly detrimental to following this volume. If you’re a person who has never read a Marvel Comic book before, you will not be able to properly follow these stories as they are presented in this volume without experiencing some areas of difficulty. An odd side note on accessibility is even if you have followed “New Avengers” from the beginning, you will find a spot of confusion if you did not follow the Spider-Man comics from around the time, as when Spider-Man joined the New Avengers, the team knew his secret identity, but following “One More Day,” Spider-Man’s secret identity was wiped from everyone’s minds, including the New Avengers, so not knowing that storyline will leave a reader scratching their head, thinking why do the New Avengers not know Peter Parker is Spider-Man now when they knew his identity from the start of the series. All around, I would say this book has very low accessibility to new readers and if you’ve never read a Marvel Comic book before and are looking for a place to start, I would tell you that I highly do not think that this book is the right one for you to begin with.

            So, now we’re going to move on to one of the core elements of my review: the numeric score. I would love to say it’s the reason we’re all here, but the fact of the matter is that every segment in my reviews is the most important to some people and everyone has a different favorite segment to read when they come to my reviews and a different reason to keep coming back if they are a regular reader. But the numeric score is one of the key sections of my reviews and is one of my most crucial segments. So, I will start off by explaining my scoring system. It’s actually extremely simple. I score on a scale of whole numbers ranging from one through ten. One is the lowest score I can give, and if you want to be really dramatic and extra, that means that this book was so awful that every remaining copy not sold should be rounded up off the shelves and out of the warehouses and put through the worlds biggest shredder and be completely destroyed, then Marvel should go find all the original prints for these issues and wipe them clean so this abomination can never be reprinted again and can be extinguished from living memory except in the hands of true collectors who for some reason don’t want to give them up and I shall dub them as weirdos. On the other hand, ten is the highest score I can give, and that’s a sign of sheer perfection, and I will do everything I can to promote this book until I can get all my comic book reading friends to read this book too so we can have discussions about it for hours, and if they don’t like this book, I won’t be able to understand why but I will give a good argument on why I think this is one of the best books I have ever read in my entire life. When I review a graphic novel, I am considering four main factors: story, art, title, and cover. In order to get a ten, a graphic novel needs to have an exciting and engaging story that I enjoy from beginning to end and can find nothing to complain about, consistently visually pleasing artwork that looking at enhances the already excellent story, a title that accurately represents the majority of the story contained in the book, and a cover that perfectly depicts the majority of the content contained inside and what is shown on the front of this volume is actually delivered within the pages of this book. So, when considering this particular volume, we have a story that was enjoyable but was incomplete, artwork that for the majority was enjoyable, a title that was a perfect representation of the book, and a cover that failed to deliver on what it promised. So, when all the factors are put together and thoroughly assessed, the score I have to give this book is… a seven! Overall, for what it was, I found it to be relatively enjoyable, but this book is a companion volume for “Secret Invasion” and should not be considered as the only book in your collection if you want to read the “Secret Invasion” event.

            Next up on our list of topics is our recommendation segment. In this segment, I answer two separate questions. The first question is, do I, Tim Cubbin, personally recommend this graphic novel to you, my readers, or to anyone else unfortunate enough to get caught up in a conversation with me about this graphic novel? The second question I answer is, regardless of if I would actually personally tell anyone directly to read it or not based on my preferences, whom do I think would be the kind of person who would find this graphic novel most enjoyable, and I don’t mean fans of Marvel, the Avengers, Secret Invasion, Brian Michael Bendis, or any of the artists, I mean the characteristics that a person likes that would get a high level of entertainment out of this book? To answer my first question, in general, I would recommend this book to people who want to read it, but the caveat is that this book requires outside knowledge, so I wouldn’t recommend this book to people who have no experience with Marvel Comics, but if you really want to read it now, based solely on the words I’ve just spent the past six hours typing, I’d tell you to go for it, just go to your favorite online retailer, preferred bookstore, favorite comic shop, local library, or hit up your friends who have this book and read it. If you do read this book, please feel free to let me know what you think. Leave a comment on this blog itself, or on Facebook, Threads, or X, I would love to hear your opinion. Everything I post on this blog is my own personal opinion, I don’t expect everyone to agree with my opinions and I respect the beauty that every human has a right to feel how they do, so if you agree or disagree, I’d love to know. I don’t usually get comments, so I’d really appreciate it if you’d drop a few words for me. Anyway, as for the audience I feel most inclined to enjoy this book, I’d say it would be people who enjoy stories about alien invasions, stories about deception among friends, stories about magic, and stories where the roles of friends and enemies are blurred.

            Okay, I’d say we’re at the point where we’re close to wrapping up. I do have a few things I’d like to say before I click publish. First off, I have been doing this blog for over five and a half years. I’ve posted on this blog 190 times already. In addition to having done over seven dozen reviews, I’ve also written short stories, poems, articles, essays, and editorials. My reviews extend beyond just graphic novels, I’ve reviewed prose novels, entire comic book events, and manga as well. I will say I post on a very frequent basis. I collect every Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection and Ultimate Epic Collection as soon as I can after its release and post a review on this page as early as I can after reading it, so you can figure I post a lot. If you enjoyed this post, feel free to check out my reviews “New Avengers: Assembled” “New Avengers: Civil War” and “New Avengers: The Initiative” for more New Avengers content. My next post is going to be “Annihilation: Conquest Prologue” you can expect to see that within the next two months after the posting of this review. Keep checking back for it if you’re interested. I guess that’s really all I have to say for now, so I’ll just leave you with the words, Tim Cubbin… out!

"Young Avengers: The Children's Crusade"

 

                The following is a review of the graphic novel “Young Avengers: The Children’s Crusade” as presented in Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection format.

                Erik Lensherr/Magneto became interested in the Young Avengers, particularly Billy Kaplan/Wiccan and Tommy Shepherd/Speed, who might be the reincarnated children of Magneto’s daughter Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, essentially his own grandsons. Both Scott Summers/Cyclops and James Howlett/Logan/Wolverine warned Magneto to stay away from the kids.

                The Young Avengers (Cassie Lang/Stature, Eli Bradley/Patriot, Kate Bishop/Hawkeye, Tommy Shepherd/Speed, Kate Bishop/Hawkeye, Teddy Altman/Hulkling, Billy Kaplan/Wiccan, and Vision) battled the supremacist group the Sons of the Serpent. Steve Rogers/Captain America, Tony Stark/Iron Man, and Carol Danvers/Ms. Marvel arrived to assist the fight. Wiccan lost control of his powers and put all the members of the Sons of the Serpent into comas. The Avengers feared he could potentially have the same powers as the Scarlet Witch and be the Scarlet Witch’s son. The Scarlet Witch had lost control of her powers and killed Avengers Clint Barton/Hawkeye, Scott Lang/Ant-Man, and Vision; created a world where Magneto ruled; and when the World of M failed, robbed millions of mutants of their powers with a single spell. After the World of M, Scarlet Witch disappeared, and no one had been able to find her. Wiccan refused to believe the Scarlet Witch was acting of her own free will when she committed these acts. The Avengers took Wiccan in for assessment. Hulkling volunteered to stay with Wiccan. The rest of the Young Avengers broke Wiccan and Hulkling out. Magneto found the Young Avengers and asked for Wiccan and Speed’s help finding Scarlet Witch. Wiccan refused to go without the rest of his team. The Avengers (Steve Rogers/Captain America, Tony Stark/Iron Man, Peter Parker/Spider-Man, Carol Danvers/Ms. Mavel, Logan/Wolverine, and Luke Cage arrived and fought Magneto, but Wiccan teleported the Young Avengers and Magneto to Wundagore Mountain in Transia, birthplace of the Scarlet Witch. They began to search for Scarlet Witch when they encountered Pietro Maximoff/Quicksilver, who tried to separate Wiccan from Magneto. Quicksilver attacked Magneto, and during this attack, destroyed a Doombot disguised as the Scarlet Witch. Wiccan tried to sneak off to teleport to Latveria, the country ruled by Doctor Doom, but he was discovered by Quicksilver and the Young Avengers before he could make the jump. The Avengers turned to Simon Williams/Wonder Man for help finding Scarlet Witch due to an energy bond the two shared. Wiccan managed to sneak away from the Young Avengers, Magneto, and Quicksilver and teleport to Latveria. He used his magic to disguise himself as Scarlet Witch to see if the guards would lead Wiccan to the Scarlet Witch. Wiccan was brought to a room where he came face to face with Scarlet Witch. She had no memories of her life as an Avenger or the Scarlet Witch and no magical powers and informed Wiccan she would be getting married the next day. The groom arrived in the room, and it was Victor Von Doom/Doctor Doom, who rendered Wiccan unconscious. The Young Avengers, Magneto, and Quicksilver managed to travel to Latveria, but they arrived at the same time as the Avengers. Doctor Doom used a spell to heal Wiccan, but the spell robbed Wiccan of his powers and locked Wiccan up. Wanda freed Wiccan and asked Wiccan to tell Wanda about the Scarlet Witch. Wiccan agreed if Wanda would help him escape. The Avengers and the Young Avengers got into a battle. Wolverine was about to end Wanda’s existence when Nathaniel Richards/Iron Lad arrived and stopped him. Iron Lad had come from the future where he found out that Scarlet Witch and Wiccan were killed at this point in time and traveled to the past to save both their lives. Iron Lad, the Young Avengers, and Wanda escaped into the Timestream. Iron Lad informed the Young Avengers he had developed new technology that would allow them to inhabit a moment in time without altering in. Stature asked Iron Lad to take them to the day the Avengers ended so Wanda would be able to remember. Stature reunited with her father Ant-Man before Jack of Hearts exploded and killed him. Seeing Jack of Hearts restored Wanda’s memories and powers, and Scarlet Witch teleported herself, the Young Avenger, and Ant-Man back to the present. Scarlet Witch lost control of her powers again. Clint Barton/Hawkeye, Jessica Jones, and Hank McCoy/Beast arrived at the scene with the Young Avengers. Wiccan talked to Scarlet Witch, and she regained control and recognized Wiccan and Speed as her sons. Beast decided to see if Scarlet Witch could undo her “no more mutants” spell. Jessica Jones suggested they go to X-Factor Investigations, the mutant detective agency, (Jamie Madrox/Multiple Man, Guido Carosella/Strong Guy, Geveedra-Seven/Shatterstar, and Juilo Esteban Richter/Rictor) Rictor was one of the mutants who had lost his powers on M-Day. Rictor agreed to let Scarlet Witch try to undo the spell on him, and Rictor got his powers back. The X-Men (Scott Summers/Cyclops, Anna Marie/Rogue, Piotr Rasputin/Colossus, Ororo Munroe/Storm, Emma Frost, Bobby Drake/Iceman, and Remy LeBeau/Gambit) arrived outside X-Factor Headquarters, looking for the Scarlet Witch. The Avengers fought the X-Men. Wanda knocked them all out and teleported herself and the Young Avengers back to Castle Doom. Doctor Doom revealed to Wiccan that Wiccan had never truly been depowered. Doctor Doom asked Wiccan and Scarlet Witch to join him in casting a spell to return the powers to the mutants of the world. Patriot tried to take out Doctor Doom while the three were casting the spell, but his shot hit Scarlet Witch, giving Doctor Doom the reality altering power of the Life Force. Doctor Doom teleported the Young Avengers and Scarlet Witch back outside X-Factor Headquarters. Doctor Doom arrived and asked the heroes to surrender to him. When the heroes refused, Doctor Doom fought the combined X-Men, X-Factor, Avengers, and Young Avengers. Not everyone walked away from the fight.

                Doctor Doom summoned his niece, Valeria Richards. The Scarlet Witch would be coming for Doctor Doom, and Doctor Doom wanted to restrain Scarlet Witch and harness Scarlet Witch’s powers for good purposes. Doctor Doom presented Valeria with a list of candidates who could help him in this effort. Valeria went to S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Maria Hill, who partnered Valeria with Agent Phil Coulson. Valeria and Coulson recruited Elsa Bloodstone, John Walker/U.S.Agent, Valkyrie, Delroy Garrett/3-D Man, and Walter Newell/Stingray in the mission to Latveria to capture the Scarlet Witch and use her powers to undo Doctor Doom’s sins.

                The Young Avengers were invited to the new Avengers mansion, where they had to deal with the security system.

                Iron Man guilted Stature for destroying Iron Man’s car.

                Thor gave the Young Avengers good weather to play baseball in.

                Okay, now that we’ve got the plot summary out of the way, let’s get to the Tim Cubbin part of this review. I’ll start, as always, with my own personal opinions about the book. I found this book to be highly enjoyable. I thought “The Children’s Crusade” was a great storyline. I liked the whole web of family drama. I enjoyed the fatherly portrayal of Magneto. Seeing Magneto trying to save his daughter was touching (for those of you who are thinking you want to correct me about Magneto not being Scarlet Witch’s father, yes, I am aware that Marvel decided to declare he is not, this book was written before that retcon). It was also interesting seeing him accepting the role of a grandfather and seeing just how far he would go for family. Wiccan’s character development was also interesting to observe over the course of the book, watching how his decisions got him in trouble over and over again, but how he really wanted to find his family and absolve his mother of her crimes against the Avengers and mutantkind. I loved seeing X-Factor in this book, they are one of my favorite teams and I honestly wish Marvel would make Modern Era Epic Collections out of this run, it really deserves it. Rictor getting his powers back was great. I loved the war between the Avengers and the X-Men, and the Young Avengers and X-Factor having to take a side. I especially enjoyed watching Wolverine in his own solo vendetta against the Scarlet Witch where he was neither X-Man nor Avenger. I liked seeing the return of the Scarlet Witch. I enjoyed her development from being Wanda Maximoff, the bride of Doom, to the Scarlet Witch, Avenger, and mother. I enjoyed how Heinberg brought back Ant-Man through time travel. I liked seeing Iron Lad return. I will say, however, that the “Avengers World” issues felt out of place in a “Young Avengers” Modern Era Epic Collection. None of the Young Avengers played a starring part in it. It somewhat connects with the main story, and I can see the reason that the editors decided to include these two issues in this book, but they still really felt to me like they didn’t belong in this particular collection based on the main storyline being completely separate and from quite a time apart, and also for not including the Young Avengers in starring roles. That’s not to say I didn’t find the story interesting. It wasn’t my favorite part of the book, but I still found it to be relatively enjoyable. The “I am an Avenger” short stories were fun; I found them to be enjoyable for the brief bits that they were. As far as the art goes, for the majority of this book, I found the art to be excellent. My points of unenjoyment come from two of the “I am an Avenger” stories. Otherwise, I thought the art was fantastic. As far as the title goes, this book could not have been given any other title but “The Children’s Crusade,” and if it had, that would have been a crime in my opinion. It was the title of the series that was the majority of this book, so no other title would have made sense. I will say, though, that I feel it was a little odd to make this series into a “Young Avengers” Modern Era Epic Collection as this was not a “Young Avengers” comic series. The title was officially “Avengers: The Children’s Crusade,” and included the one-shot “Avengers: The Children’s Crusade – Young Avengers,” but this was not officially designated as a “Young Avengers” limited series. I can see the editors’ reasons for making this a “Young Avengers” Modern Era Epic Collection, the whole book focuses on them, but this was called an “Avengers” limited series at the time. As far as the cover goes, I feel the choice was perfect, it features the Young Avengers in the foreground, the Scarlet Witch in the midground, and the Avengers in the background. It is an excellent representation of the content of this book, and I am satisfied with the editors’ pick. All-in-all, I thought this book was a great read and I highly enjoyed myself consuming it.

                Next up, we’re going to discuss accessibility. Now, I’ve done over seven dozen Epic Collection reviews at this point, and I’ve explained myself every time, but I know that I have newbies reading my reviews every time I post, so I have to explain myself once again. When I’m talking about accessibility in graphic novels, I’m talking about if people who, for example, have never read a Marvel Comic book before can hear about this book and decide to read it, then actually read it, and understand it completely as is without any prior of outside knowledge of the backstory or the history of the characters. This book does draw on a lot of backstories such as “Avengers Disassembled,” “House of M,” and “Decimation,” but for the majority, it is self-contained. The hiccup is including the two issues of “Avengers World” from the “Axis” storyline, which does break the self-containment and draw on some outside knowledge. That said, I do still feel that this book is highly accessible. The stories are presented in such a way that I feel having no outside knowledge of Marvel Comics would be super detrimental to. Marvel goes as far as to advertise this as essential reading for fans of Marvel Television’s “Wandavision” and “Agatha All Along,” and I concur that fans of those series would possibly find enjoyment with this book as it highlights Scarlet Witch and Wiccan, both prominent figures in the two television series, but I wouldn’t go as far as to say it’s essential myself as the storylines have no actual connections, the television series did not actually adapt “The Children’s Crusade” in the shows. I will say that I do feel that even though this book is marketed as Vol. 3, Vols. 1-2 are not necessary reads before reading this book, as the stories are not directly connected to or continued from the previous volumes. If you’ve never read a Marvel Comic before and are looking for a jump on point, I would say that this is a relatively decent one.

                Next up, I’m going to score this book on a numeric scale. I know some readers primarily come to this blog to hear about the story and read my numeric score, I know that some of my other segments aren’t as popular or as big of a draw, but I still feel that every segment in my reviews has validity, just some more than others, and the numeric score is one of my key segments, not to dismiss the importance of any of my other segments. Anyway, I score on a very basic system. I work with a scale of exact integers ranging from one through ten, no point somethings, just whole numbers. If I give a graphic novel a score of a one, that means that this book is a pile of trash that should be collectively gathered and set on a massive pyre, then all the plates containing prints of these issues so reprints can be made should be wiped so this horrible book can never be reproduced and is completely erased from existence, sparing anyone the pain of spending their money obtaining this book. However, a score of a ten means that this book is sheer perfection, and I will never understand it if this book doesn’t become a bestseller that needs to be reprinted every few years because there are no copies available on the shelves anymore because it is completely sold out. Okay, so I’m not actually being serious about this, I’m just trying to make a point. Anyway, I don’t give out tens very often because I don’t very often find books to be perfection. So, let’s talk about what I’m looking for when I give a numeric score. I’m looking for a compelling story, fantastic art, accurate title, and adequate cover. Now, this book did have all of that, yet I still don’t feel like this book was perfection. Again, the “Avengers World” issues felt a little out of place being in a “Young Avengers” Modern Era Epic Collection, it didn’t quite fit like a glove in my opinion. And some of the art in “I am an Avenger” was a little wonky. So, I do have to deduct. However, I still feel like this book deserves a high score, the problems with this book weren’t too detrimental in my opinion. So, when I churn out my numeric score, it’s going to be… an eight! I thought it was an excellent read and I highly enjoyed it.

                Moving on in our list of topics to discuss, we’re going to my recommendation segment. In this segment, I answer two questions. The first is, do I, Tim Cubbin, personally recommend that you, who have just spent the past however many minutes you’ve been taking to read this, should read this book if you are now interested in reading this book, based solely on the words I have just spent the past few hours typing? The second question is, beyond the obvious of the people who are already Marvel and Young Avengers fans, who do I think should be reading this book, regardless of the fact if I would personally tell you to read it or not? The answer to the first question is probably obvious, but yes, I would recommend this book to you, my readers. If you are reading this review and now want to read this graphic novel, I recommend going to your favorite bookstore or online retailer, or your favorite comic book store, or your local library, or to your Marvel-obsessed friend’s house, and look for this book and read it as soon as you possibly can. If you do read this graphic novel, feel free to express your opinions. Comment or post or tweet anything you’d like to say, I’d love to hear from you. Everything I write in this blog is my own personal opinion and I don’t expect any of my readers to agree with what I say. We all have our own minds and think our own thoughts, and I invite you to feel however you want to feel about what I have to say, and if you disagree with me on anything I write, I’d really like to know so we can discuss our opinions. As far as to answer the second question on who the best audience is, I’d say that it includes teenagers and young adults, the LGBTQ+ community, and people who like stories about family drama.

                Okay, we’re getting to the wrap up point. So, I do have a few things to say before I log off. First, I’ve been doing this blog for over five years now and have done over 180 posts. I’ve done plenty of reviews of Epic Collections, Modern Era Epic Collections, and Ultimate Epic Collections. If you want to read more “Young Avengers” posts, feel free to check out my reviews of “Young Avengers: Not What You Think” and “Young Avengers: Dark Reign” for more content. I purchase every Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection and Ultimate Epic Collection as soon as I can after it is released and put up a review of it as soon as possible. I’ve done over seven dozen reviews just like this, so there are plenty more to read. My next review will be “Daredevil: The Murdock Papers” which you can expect to see within the next two months following this review, so keep checking back for it. There are also short stories, poems, essays, articles, and editorials, so keep checking out timcubbin.blogspot.com for tons more content that I’m sure you’ll like. I post on a very frequent basis, so keep checking back regularly, and tell your friends, family members, and coworkers about my blog so I get more readership. I’ll be doing this blog for as long as I possibly can, so you can expect that to be for quite a while. That’s all I have to say for now. Until next time, Tim Cubbin… out!

"Young Avengers: Dark Reign"

                The following is a review of the graphic novel “Young Avengers: Dark Reign” as presented in Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection format.

                The Young Avengers are a group of teenagers united by the Avengers Failsafe Program, a protocol designed to assemble the next wave of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. The team consists of Eli Bradley/Patriot, Billy Kaplan/Wiccan, Teddy Altman/Hulkling, Kate Bishop/Hawkeye, Cassie Lang/Stature, Tommy Shepherd/Speed, and Vision. After the destruction of Stamford, Connecticut in a televised superhuman battle, the Superhuman Registration Act was passed, that required anyone possessing paranormal abilities to register with the government, divulge their true identities to the authorities and submit to training and sanctioning in the manner of federal agents. Anyone with superpowers who refuses to register is now considered a criminal. Some heroes, led by Tony Stark/Iron Man, see this as a reasonable request. Steve Rogers/Captain America leads an underground movement in resistance to the Act. The Young Avengers were recruited to Cap’s team. In California, there was another team of superhuman teenagers, the Runaways, who had discovered their parents were a group of supervillains known as the Pride and had stolen weapons and resources from their parents, then ran away from home, and eventually went on to defeat their parents, who chose not to take a side in the superhero Civil War and instead tried to fly under the radar. Their team consists of Nico Minoru, Chase Stein, Molly Hayes, Victor Mancha, Karolina Dean, Xavin and Old Lace. While at a Farmer’s Market in Los Angeles, the Runaways witnessed a fight between the supervillain Flag Smasher and a group of government Cape Killers and stepped in to defeat Flag Smasher, but were then forced to flee from the Cape Killers, and during their escape, Victor was badly injured. The battle made the news all the way in New York on a station the Young Avengers were monitoring. Vision received a painful feedback watching Victor’s injury. The Young Avengers decided they wanted to help, and asked Captain America if they could go to L.A., but Cap told them no. The Young Avengers went behind Cap’s back and stole a Quinjet to fly to L.A. Molly, who had been upset by Chase and had gone outside the Runaways’ hideout, encountered the Young Avengers. Molly had a misunderstanding with the Young Avengers and attacked them, but Molly was defeated. The Young Avengers brought Molly back to the Runaways’ hideout, where Vision and Victor had an adverse reaction to being in proximity to each other. Meanwhile, S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Maria Hill visited the Supervillain prison the Cube, where she asked the Warden for an asset to find the Runaways. The Warden offered the Kree super-soldier Noh-Varr/Mavel Boy, who specialized in tracking, particularly since one of the members of the Runaways, Xavin, was a Skrull. The Young Avengers and the Runaways had a fight until Patriot and Nico were able to talk and the Runaways realized they were all on the same side. They discovered that because both Vision and Victor were built by the android Ultron, the two had a connection. Noh-Varr found the two teenage teams and attacked them. During the fight, Vision’s arm was detached in Noh-Varr’s chest, and Xavin, Karolina, Wiccan and Hulkling were captured during Noh-Varr’s extraction and brought to the Cube, where the Warden performed experiments on Hulkling, interested in his mixture of Kree/Skrull DNA. The two teenage superhero teams had to team up to infiltrate the Cube and rescue their abducted teammates.

Following the Civil War, which Iron Man’s team won, Captain America surrendered and was assassinated. Iron Man was promoted to Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. Stature decided to register and join Iron Man’s Fifty-State Initiative and submitted to training at Camp Hammond, while the rest of the Young Avengers continued on fighting crime without Stature, despite their outlaw status. Patriot witnessed Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier leaving his grandparents’ home, and curious to find out what the conversation was about, enlisted Wiccan and Hawkeye to help track him down. Patriot, Hawkeye, and Winter Soldier had a team-up against Advanced Idea Mechanics, then Winter Soldier told Patriot about the legacy of the superhero name “Patriot.” Hulkling found out his father, Mar-Vell/Captain Marvel, had returned from the dead and decided to meet with him and tell Captain Marvel about their familial relationship. Wiccan and Speed went looking for the woman they believed to be their mother Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, who had disappeared following the House of M. In Cresskill, New Jersey, they encountered the villain Master Pandemonium, who gave them the answers they sought. Vision, who was still trying to sort out having the brainwave patterns of both the android Avenger Vision and the Young Avenger Nathaniel Richards/the future Kang the Conqueror, sought out Stature, whom Nathaniel had feelings for when he was a human. While Vision and Stature talked, they were attacked by A.I.M. and had to team up to defeat the villains, and the two were left to sort out their feelings. Cassie was in a battle against the supervillain the Growing Man. Though she defeated him, her stepfather Blake was injured and hospitalized, fighting for his life. Cassie felt horrible guilt, and the Young Avengers had to support her through it. Hawkeye and Patriot went on a non-date, which was interrupted by Clint Barton/Ronin, the former Hawkeye. He challenged her and won, taking back both his name and his bow. Kate and Speed decided to break into the Secret Avengers’ hideout so Kate could steal Clint’s bow back.

The Skrulls initiated a Secret Invasion of Earth, which a group of Skrull religious fanatics believed belonged to them due to a prophecy after the loss of the Skrull homeworld. Skrull Commander Chrell had been tasked with killing the Skrull Prince, Dorrek VIII, A.K.A. Theodore Altman/Hulkling. The Runaways were in New York with their new member Klara, whom they had rescued from the year 1907, when the Skrulls attacked Manhattan. Xavin turned against his/her team and knocked the Runaways out. Nico and Victor woke up and were able to escape with their unconscious teammates. The Young Avengers and the Fifty-State Initiative kids also fought the Skrulls. Xavin decided to try to help Hulkling escape from the Skrulls sent to kill Hulkling, despite having been trained to kill Hulkling. Wiccan and Speed joined up with Xavin and Hulkling. They were attacked by Skrull agent X’iv but managed to escape. The Runaways revived and saw the Young Avengers were in trouble. X’iv captured Speed and Wiccan, and Chrell captured the Runaways, but they were able to break free. The two teenage teams had to join forces again to protect Hulking and survive the Skrull Secret Invasion.

                Earth’s superhumans were able to defeat the Skrulls, and former supervillain Norman Osborn shot and killed the Skrull Queen, but Tony Stark was blamed for failing to stop the infiltration and Osborn was selected to replace Stark and S.H.I.E.L.D. became H.A.M.M.E.R. and Osborn became Iron Patriot and the leader of the “Dark Avengers.” A new team of young vigilantes, Enchantress, Executioner, Melter, Big Zero, Egghead and Coat of Arms were going around New York City, fighting crime and calling themselves the Young Avengers. Their methods of fighting crime were extreme. They had a base in the Invisible Manor in Central Park. The real Young Avengers, using Wiccan’s magic, found the imposters, and the two teams fought. Team leaders Patriot and Melter began to talk, and Enchantress ended the fight. Patriot told the imposters if they wanted to be Young Avengers, they had to earn the name and they would watch them and see if they deserved to be called “Young Avengers.” Executioner was getting advice from his mother, who, unbeknownst to him, was actually the supervillain Princess Python. Executioner also figured out Hawkeye’s secret identity of Kate Bishop and tried to use this information to force his way onto the team. The Young Avengers staged a fight and had Kate Bishop with Executioner in public and Vision impersonated Hawkeye so as to cast doubt on Kate’s secret identity. The Young Avengers decided to accept Coat of Arms and Enchantress onto their team on a provisional basis, while the rest of the other team had to take a new name. Melter did not take this well and contacted Norman Osborn. Osborn immediately planned to take advantage of the youths. Hawkeye informed Executioner his mother was a supervillain, and he put her out of his life permanently. Vision received a download from Egghead, revealing Enchantress’ connection with Norse Goddess/supervillain Loki, and Enchantress was thrown off the Young Avengers. In revenge, the youths teamed up with Osborn’s Dark Avengers and fought with the Young Avengers in a battle to decide just what makes one worthy of the name “Avenger.”

                Osborn, intent of invading the city of Asgard floating over Broxton, Oklahoma, fabricated a tragedy reminiscent of the explosion that ignited the superhero Civil War. Blaming the Asgardian, Osborn began a mad Siege of their city that resulted in its fall and destruction. Patriot and Hawkeye were buried under rubble, while Wiccan, Speed and Hulkling were left to battle the Wrecking Crew.

                Okay, so now that we have an overview of the plotlines handled, let’s get on to my personal part of this review. So, the first thing we’re going to discuss is my personal feelings about this book. What I’m going to start with is that I genuinely loved this book. I thought it was fantastic. I found the stories to be exciting, fun, well-written, engaging, and interesting. I enjoyed reading all of them. I will say going in I was a little skeptical. I was predicting this to be an editorial nightmare. What I mean by this is the content. At the times of the original publication, between 2006-2010, there were no ongoing Young Avengers series, so this volume is made up entirely of four limited series and a one-shot. This book also crosses through four events, Civil War, Secret Invasion, Dark Reign, and Siege. I was expecting a total mess as Epic Collections focus on characters rather than events, so this only includes the Young Avengers issues of these four events. For the most part, the stories were self-contained. They generally fit into the events but were mostly their own separate stories that were self-explanatory and didn’t usually require mastery-level knowledge of the events to understand the stories contained in this book. The one exception is Siege, which continues from the starting point of Siege and leaves off with “Continued in Siege.” Having been out of touch with the comics during the times after Civil War, most of this was new content for me. I have read Secret Invasion, but I have not totally mastered the storyline. However, I found this book to be relatively navigable, despite jumping between events and not having a linear storyline. I just felt like not having read Siege was truly detrimental to my enjoyment of this book, but it wasn’t too much of a hurt. But I’m getting totally ahead of myself here. Let’s talk about what I liked. I thought their team-ups with the Runaways were great, the two teams were compatible and worked together well, their conflicts and dynamics and their resolution together were absolutely perfect. Both teams having Skrull team members made for an excellent pairing between the two teams, and Vision and Victor both being the “children” of Ultron made for a great connection. As some of you know, Civil War is one of my favorite comic storylines, so watching the teenage heroes trying to make it through the War was entertaining for me. I think my favorite series in this book was “Young Avengers Presents,” it was an opportunity to examine each character individually and I found it to be fascinating to read. Dark Reign was interesting as well, seeing a new team parallel to the Young Avengers was enjoyable, comparable to Dark Avengers, which I have previously read and enjoyed, so reading the “Young Masters” storyline was entertaining. Siege was the one part I had a slight problem with as I felt like it really didn’t do much in the way of a story. It essentially was a filler, and that’s what it felt like, and that was detrimental to my enjoyment of this book. It was just a way to put the Young Avengers into Siege, and it really didn’t feel necessary. It was mostly Patriot and Hawkeye trapped in rubble, which really isn’t entertaining, and even Wiccan, Speed and Hulkling battling the Wrecking Crew felt dull. It was my least favorite story in the book. But I guess that’s all you can expect out of a one-shot. I think the character I enjoyed reading the most in this book was Stature. She was very complex and conflicted. I liked watching her change from the Young Avengers to the Fifty-State Initiative back to the Young Avengers. I especially enjoyed her “Young Avengers Presents” issue where she was dealing with the guilt of almost killing her stepfather. I loved the depth of character development that she went through, and I felt she was the character to watch in this graphic novel. The romances also enhanced the storylines as well, particularly Patriot and Hawkeye’s will-they-won’t-they? Vision’s conflict and trying to identify as Jonas was also interesting to read, and his relationship with Stature made for an interesting issue. I also liked the theme of family, both biological and as a team, I found the emotional depth between the characters to be very moving. I feel like this book had great writers, and it sure had a lot of them, but I feel like all of them did an exceptional job working with the stories they got. What truly surprised me about this book was the art. This book has a plethora of artists, and I feel like every single one of them actually drew visually appealing artwork. As many of my previous readers know, sometimes books with one artist meet my dismay, but a book with nine different artists seems likely that there would be an artist I would take umbrage with. Alas, every artist in this book impressed me. I found all the art to be brilliant. I think the last thing I would like to talk about is the title. Modern Era Epic Collections have to use titles that will sell. Unfortunately for me, sometimes that feels like a misnomer, and I really do not like that. So, the editors of this book went with “Dark Reign.” This book was comprised of four limited series and one one-shot and carried through four events. The longest series in this book was “Young Avengers Presents” which was six issues, each one being standalone. The longest storyline in this book was “Dark Reign” which lasted for five issues. So, I am compelled to believe that “Dark Reign” is an appropriate title for this book. New Avengers has already taken “Civil War” and plans to take “Secret Invasion” anyway, so there really isn’t a better title that they can choose for this book without causing a redundancy, and I do not believe Marvel wishes to cause that, so this title works. Even Dark Avengers was given the title “Osborn’s Reign,” so the title wasn’t used before. All-in-all, I thought this book was superlative and an excellent effort by the writers and artists at Marvel from the time periods. Despite not having an ongoing series and no linearity and spanning over the course of five years, this book still worked and was extremely cohesive. It was entertaining and had it all: action, drama, humor, and romance, pretty much everything you could ask for in a comic book. Yes, there was the one flaw of Siege, but I feel like the rest of the book mostly made up for that, and I thought this book was great.

                Next up on our agenda, we’re going to talk about accessibility. Now, I know I’ve been over this over six dozen times at this point, but I know that I always have new readers every time I make a post, so I have to explain myself each and every time, so here we go. Some of my new readers may not get what I mean when I use the word “accessibility.” So, allow me to explain myself yet again. When I say “accessibility,” I mean is this a book that a person who has never heard of the Young Avengers before can pick up, read this book, and understand what they’ve read. I feel like this book borders on the line of being extremely inaccessible and having a slight sense of accessibility at the same time. I already explained the fact that this book crosses over into four events. Now, if you’ve never read a Marvel comic book before in your entire life, I will tell you not to read this book. Yes, it does feature blurbs that partially explain the story, but it’s just not enough for someone who has no experience with the Marvel Universe to understand. I don’t care if you’ve seen every Marvel movie, cartoon, and television series, and played every Marvel video game, it’s just not going to be enough to prepare you to read this book. However, the stories are all standalone from the event with the exception of Siege, so they touch on the event without actually following the main story of the event, rather just feeling like another Young Avengers story than part of an event, with the exception of Siege, so there is the possibility of being able to understand this book. That said, I feel like this book requires extensive background knowledge of Marvel to completely be understood, and even I didn’t fully understand Siege, especially since it ends with “Continued in Siege,” so you’re not even getting a complete story in this book. This book is definitely not for Marvel beginners, it should not be the first book you pick up if you’re trying to get into Marvel Comics.

                Okay, I’ve been blathering on for a very long time at this point, I feel like we’re at the junction of when I should move on with this review and just get to the moment we’ve all been waiting for when we started with this review, and that would be my numeric score of this graphic novel. My scoring system is extremely simple. I score on a scale of one through ten. One is the score I reserve for horrible pieces of trash books that should be removed from the shelves, and have every copy be destroyed, and then never have that book be reprinted again. Ten is a score that means this book is perfection and every copy should be bought off the shelves, read multiple times, and be reprinted every year because more people need to buy this book. Both one and ten are my rarest scores. Very rarely do I find a book to be so bad that it should be considered a one, I can usually find something in a book to boost the score to a two or a three. Likewise, ten is reserved for perfection, and a book very rarely meets my standards of perfection. Usually when I write a review, the best score a book can usually hope for is a nine, I’m usually going to automatically deduct one point for some reason. I essentially score on how good the narrations of the graphic novel are. I usually deduct points for factors such as disliking art, as this is a graphic novel after all, and that has to be taken into account when reviewing this book, as well as grievances with stories, and title misnomers. Now, this book had a relatively good selection of narratives, but there was one issue I did find a flaw with. As it was, I don’t feel that this book was perfection. But the art was astonishing, so I have no reason to deduct points for that, that even boosts the score. And I have no problem with the title. So, I’m taking everything about this book into consideration to do my score. I’m taking the entirety of this book, story, art, and title, throwing them all into my metaphorical blender that I save for mixing book review smoothies in. I’m going to turn it on now and blend it until the mixture is completely liquid. Then I’m going to grab a nice cup, empty my blender into the cup and I’m going to look at this score. And when I look at this score, it’s… an eight! That’s actually an exceptionally good score. I found very few problems with my enjoyment while reading this book. I generally found this to be a delightful read and visually stunning. The efforts of the writers and artists were excellent, and I feel like they did an extremely commendable job working with what they had to work with in the Marvel Universe at the time they were producing the issues contained in this graphic novel.

                Wow, I’ve been going on a long time, you’re probably getting really bored with me, so I think it’s time to move on to the final topic we have to discuss in one of my Tim Cubbin reviews, and that would be the recommendation. Now, when I do the recommendation segment of my review, I always answer two questions. The first question is, do I, Tim Cubbin, personally recommend this book to anyone who I tell about this book? The second question is, regardless of the answer of question number one, who would I recommend this book to, or who would I say is the target audience, or who should be reading this book? So, I think the answer to the first question is probably relatively obvious, but I have to officially answer it anyway. Yes, this book gets my personal recommendation. Now, moving on to question number two, I feel like the perfect audiences for this graphic novel would be youths or LGBTQIA+ individuals. This book has characters that represent these identities, and I feel like reading this book if you fall into one of both of those categories would be extremely empowering as you can easily find characters in this graphic novel that you can identify with. Of course this book also has characters from other Marvel media that’s out there, if you’re a fan of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and know characters such as Kate Bishop/Hawkeye from “Hawkeye,” or Billy Kaplan/Wiccan from “Agatha All Along,” or Cassie Lang from “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” or Eli Bradley from “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, ”or Vision from “Avengers: Age of Ultron,” or if you watched “Runaways” on Hulu, you’ll find characters in this book you’ll enjoy reading the exploits of. If you’ve ever read any comics of “Young Avengers” before and had any level of enjoyment in them, this book is definitely for you. If you’re a fan of any of the events in this book, Civil War, Secret Invasion, Dark Reign, or Siege, I would absolutely recommend picking up this book and giving it a read as it expands those stories. And if you’re just a diehard Marvel fan like me, I’d tell you to add this book to your collection as well, I feel this book would be a welcome addition.

                Well, I’d say we’re up to the point where I’ll begin signing off. There’s still a few more things I have to say before I log off. First off, I’ve been doing this blog for almost five years now and have done over 160 posts. I’ve done over six dozen book reviews just like this one, so if you liked this one, feel free to check out more of timcubbin.blogspot.com for more, even look up “Young Avengers: Not What You Think” if you want more Young Avengers content. I’ve also written short stories, poetry, essays, articles, and editorials, so there’s plenty of other types of content for you to see here too. I post on a very frequent basis, I collect every Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection and Ultimate Epic Collection as soon as I can after their release and if possible, throw up a review on this blog just for all of you guys to check out. At the moment, I just got a new book about an hour ago, so you can expect to see a review of that within the next two weeks, this I actually a Vol. 3, so I have to reread Vols. 1 and 2 first, then read the new collection, then I need to find a day when I’m free to sit down and write a review for you guys, so that might not be for a little bit, but it should definitely be sometime during the following week from my posting of this review, so keep checking out timcubbin.blogspot.com until it’s ready. I’m going to keep posting on this blog for as long as I can, so that’s going to be until I go blind, lose control of my hands, or pass away, so expect this blog to keep going on for quite some time, as I’m still only thirty-seven and still have plenty of life left in me. If you think this looks extremely professional, it’s because I have a bachelor’s degree in English with a concentration in journalism but due to life circumstances have been unable to pursue it as an actual career, but I keep this blog going anyway just to honor my years of sacrifice in college. So, I guess that’s really all there is to be said at this point. I’ll be back soon, but until then, Tim Cubbin… out!

"New Avengers: The Initiative"

 

            The following is a review of the graphic novel “New Avengers: The Initiative” as presented in Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection format.

            And there came a day, a day unlike any other, when Earth’s mightiest heroes found themselves united against a common threat! On that day, the Avengers were born – to fight the foes no single super hero could withstand!

            Years ago, a war between the Kree and the Skrulls, two interstellar races with unimaginably advanced technology, raged not only across the stars, but on the surface of the Earth itself. The mighty Avengers were able to keep the threat at bay, eventually disabling the Skrull attack fleet and bringing the conflict to an end. The Illuminati is a secret organization comprised of several of the world’s most powerful heroes: Sorcerer Supreme Doctor Strange, Black Bolt, King of the Inhumans, Charles Xavier, founder of the X-Men and mutant rights activist, Reed Richards, founding member of the Fantastic Four, Namor the Sub-Mariner, Ruler of Atlantis, and Iron Man, founding member of the Avengers. These six men have worked together to mold and shape the status of the superhuman world and the world around it. To keep the trust between the group members, the Illuminati’s existence is a secret to everyone including their teammates and family. How and what they have done together has remained a mystery… until now…

            Following the Kree-Skrull War, the Illuminati travelled to the Skrull Homeworld to inform the Skrull Emperor that they would not tolerate another invasion attempt on the Earth, something the Skrulls were planning on doing since it had been foretold that their world would be destroyed and they would overtake the Earth as their new Homeworld. As they attempted to leave, the Skrulls apprehended the Illuminati and performed rigorous tests on the organization. Though they were able to escape captivity using their vast abilities, the Skrulls were able to harvest samples from the Illuminati for future plans of attack upon the planet Earth.

            The Infinity Gems grant cosmic-level abilities to their wielders. There are six Infinity Gems: Power, Mind, Space, Time, Soul, and Reality. The Mad Titan Thanos constantly quested to obtain all six Gems in his insane quest to bring “balance” to the universe. Reed Richards decided the best way to stop the Gems from ending up in the wrong hands was for the Illuminati to obtain all six Gems. They were successful, but the temptation of the Infinity Gauntlet almost overtook Reed Richards, so he gave one Gem to each member of the Illuminati for safekeeping.

            The Beyonder had once gathered an assortment of thirty-seven heroes and villains from Earth and forced them into a Secret War to fight to the death for whatever they deeply desired. Charles Xavier used his telepathic abilities to discover that the Beyonder was a mutant Inhuman and tracked his location to a planetoid named Ceres. Black Bolt did not remember a mutant going through the Terrigen Mists to obtain his Inhuman abilities, and the Illuminati believed that his presence was a threat to the universe and traveled to Ceres to convince the Beyonder to leave.

            A young Kree soldier named Noh-Varr who called himself Marvel Boy attacked Earth. He was overwhelmed by Earth forces and imprisoned, but the Illuminati visited him in the super villain maximum security penitentiary the Cube to try to convince him of human-Kree coexistence and to earn his way out of his imprisonment.

            After being reborn during the “House of M”, Clint Barton/Hawkeye, who died when Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch lost control of her powers and caused the original Avengers to disband, went to Doctor Stephen Strange, hoping to find Wanda and obtain the closure he felt he needed. Doctor Strange warned Clint that he probably would not find either Wanda or the closure he was looking for. Clint traveled to the foot of Wundagore Mountain in his search and stopped a woman from having her purse snatched. Upon meeting her, he passed out. When he woke up at her home, the woman introduced herself as Wanda Maximoff, but this woman did not have either the powers or the memories of the woman Clint was looking for. They connected, but Clint left afterwards, having not found the closure he was looking for.

            Following the passing of the Superhuman Registration Act, the superhero Civil War and the assassination of Steve Rogers/Captain America, Tony Stark/Iron Man, now Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. set the Initiative into motion, a plan for training and policing superheroes. While taking down the supervillain Paul Duval/Grey Gargoyle, Jessica Drew/Spider-Woman, who did not register and was now considered a criminal, encountered registered superhero Carol Danvers/Ms. Mavel. Ms. Marvel informed Spider-Woman that Captain America was alive and was being kept on the Raft, a maximum-security prison for supervillains, then allowed Spider-Woman to escape. This angered Iron Man as Captain America was, in fact, dead and not being kept on the Raft.

            Maya Lopez/Ronin sent an email to Matt Murdock/Daredevil, informing him she was in Japan fighting the Hand, a group on Ninja assassins led by Matt’s ex-girlfriend Elektra Natchios. During their confrontation, Elektra slew Maya in combat but the Hand resurrected Maya to use for their own purposes. Matt, however, was in jail and did not get the email.

Following the Civil War, a group of former Avengers and currently unregistered superheroes, Luke Cage, Logan/Wolverine, Danny Rand/Iron Fist, Peter Parker/Spider-Man and Spider-Woman were hiding out at the Sanctum Sanctorum, home of Doctor Strange, which the Sorcerer Supreme was using his magic to make look like an abandoned building and future Starbucks. Following her encounter with Ms. Marvel, Spider-Woman informed the group of Captain America’s imprisonment, and the team decided to rescue their friend. The team teleported to the Raft, where they were almost arrested. They returned to the Sanctum Sanctorum, which Iron Man tried to track the team down at, but Doctor Strange’s magic was so powerful that even with the aid of sorcerer Brother Voodoo, Iron Man and his Avengers were unable to locate the resistance team’s secret base. The team received Maya’s email and decided to go to Japan to come to her aid. Clint Barton arrived at the Sanctum Sanctorum. Luke was resistant to letting Clint join the team, but Doctor Strange performed a spell to convince Luke of Clint’s pure intentions and his identity as Clint Barton, but Clint refused to return as Hawkeye. Spider-Man informed Clint the team was costumes only, and Clint joined the team as the new Ronin. The team teleported to Japan, where they fought Elektra and the Hand. During the fight, Maya killed Elektra. Upon her death, the Ninjas left, but Elektra turned out to be a Skrull in disguise. This revelation that a Skrull had infiltrated the Hand and achieved the status as the organization’s leader led to distrust among Luke’s team, leaving them all to believe that anyone could be a Skrull in disguise. Spider-Woman suggested bringing the Elektra Skrull’s body to Tony Stark, who may have been a Skrull himself, to see his reaction, and if Stark were a Skrull, now the Skrulls knew the heroes were on to them. While flying in Iron Fist’s plane home from Japan, the plane lost power and crashed. The team was all knocked out except for Spider-Woman. Spider-Woman then took the Elektra Skrull’s body and left the team.

Parker Robbins/The Hood, a supervillain who shared a body with a demon, began an organized crime ring, employing the greatest supervillains in the underworld with promises of great wealth and protection and setting them against the superheroes. The Hood obtained Luther Manning/Deathlok and planned to unleash him upon Avengers Tower. A Symbiote bomb was dropped on New York City, turning everyone it touched into Symbiote monsters. Luke’s team was infected except for Luke, who aided Iron Man’s Avengers team, who remained unaffected, in stopping the crisis. Following the end of the Symbiote invasion, Stark allowed Luke and his team to leave as a sign of gratitude. During the situation, Luke discovered that Spider-Woman had switched sides and was now allied with Tony’s team. Luke’s team went to Avengers Tower to warn the Avengers of Deathlok’s impending attack but discovered that Deathlok had already been stopped. Luke’s team found the Hood’s organization and came into conflict with them. The heroes were successful, and several of the Hood’s crew were apprehended. The Hood, who promised protection, was true to his word and sprung his crew from custody, and the crime ring then turned their sights on revenge against Luke’s team.

Iron Man called the Illuminati together to show them the Elektra Skrull’s body to inform the group of a possible Skrull invasion, and the group discovered that they had already been infiltrated by the Skrulls and were attacked. The Skrulls had been so well insinuated that they were undetectable, even by telepathy. They uncovered that a Secret Invasion by the Skrulls was already underway and that no one, not even their friends, family, teammates, or each other could be trusted.

Okay, now that the lengthy synopsis has been taken care of, let’s move on to the personal Tim Cubbin part of my review now, shall we? Okay, first things first, I have to complain about the title of the book itself. This book was given the title “New Avengers: The Initiative.” I found this to be a complete misnomer. Following Civil War, there was, in fact, a series titled “Avengers: The Initiative” but not a single issue of that series was collected in this volume. The closest thing this Modern Era Epic Collection had to that was the one-shot “Civil War: The Initiative,” but that was just one issue. The entire rest of this collection had absolutely nothing to do with the Initiative at all. I will say that this had tie-ins to “The Mighty Avengers,” but calling this “The Initiative” to me felt like the wrong title as Tony’s team was not itself the Initiative. I feel like the proper title of this book should have been something like “The Secret Defenders,” which is a quote of what Clint Barton asked Luke if this was what his team was called. That would have, in my opinion, felt like a more appropriate title for this book. As far as the story goes, I was not a fan. When “Civil War” came out, I was a freshman in college. The Superhuman Registration Act had such a negative impact on the Marvel Comics, and I actually fell out of regularly reading comics for several years following this. I just hated what the Superhuman Registration Act did to some of my favorite heroes, turning them into fugitives, despite that fact that during “Civil War” I found myself supporting the Superhuman Registration Act and Iron Man’s team, but it really bothered me that it turned some of the focus away from heroes fighting villains and into heroes running from other heroes while sometimes fighting villains. And this book only collected issues of the team that was against Registration and spent most of the book trying to evade the Registered heroes, so that also detracted from my enjoyment of this book. And don’t even get me started on how “Civil War” eternally ruined “Spider-Man” in the Marvel Universe, you do not want to go there. So, this whole book, with the team being on the run from Iron Man, the Avengers, and S.H.I.E.L.D. really didn’t appeal to me. The “New Avengers: The Illuminati” limited series also held minimal appeal to me. The fact that each issue was from a different point in the timeline and was not continual just felt fractured and the inconsistency just didn’t do it for me. I also disliked how the story was not presented in timeline order and that there were jumps back and forth in the story, so it wasn’t told linearly. The disjointedness just made it hard to follow and was frustrating to put together. I feel like the decision to make reveals of what happened as past events just didn’t work and was very confusing and made it difficult to find a sense of enjoyment while reading this book. Also, Spider-Man was wearing his black costume in this book. I know a little bit about the situation myself from having read some of the issues of the multiple “Spider-Man” ongoing series around that time, but this book offered no explanation as to that, and honestly would be confusing to anyone who hadn’t read any of those stories. And the artwork also was mostly not to my liking. The art in every issue of “New Avengers” in this book was just so unlikeable to me. I found looking at it to be an eyesore. Having artwork that was so visually displeasing and a disjointed story that really didn’t appeal to me, plus a title that didn’t fit the story just made this book so unenjoyable. I was highly disappointed by this book. And I am usually a big fan of the work by writer Brian Michael Bendis, but this book was, to me, not on par with my usual expectations of his standards of writing. Granted, he had to work with what Mark Millar and the other writers did to the Marvel Universe at the time, so this isn’t entirely his fault, but what he put out in these stories was just not his best work.

Next up, we’re going to discuss accessibility. Now, if you’ve never read one of my reviews before, you may not know what I mean when I use this word, and if you have read any of my reviews before, you already know what I mean, but bear with me anyway. So, when I say “accessibility” I mean if you can just pick up and understand the entire book without any outside context. So basically, I’m answering the question: can I know nothing about the previous story and still be able to understand this story? My answer to that is no. This book is highly reliant of outside information. So much of this book spins out of “Civil War” there are parts that tie-in to “The Mighty Avengers” from the time period that not knowing other Marvel stories from the time makes this book extremely difficult to follow. If you never read “Civil War,” I do not recommend trying to read this graphic novel. There are many moments that pick up from points where the previous volume of “New Avengers” in Modern Era Epic Collection format left off, as well, particularly the entire “Ronin” story arc. Not having read previous stories is very detrimental to the consumption of this book, and I really do not recommend this book to new readers.

Okay, I think I’ve gone on long enough at this point and you’re starting to get tired of me, so I’m just going to move on to the main event of my personal part of the review: the numeric score. So, the system I score on is pretty simple: one to ten. One means this book is a flaming pile of trash and should be avoided at all costs. Ten means that this book is perfection. Tens are very rare for me to give. So, there are several factors that I’m deducting points for. First off, the story was disjointed and unappealing to me. Second, the art was just a visual eyesore and looking at it was impossible to enjoy. Third, this book had the wrong title. So, factor all those problems in and we’re taking off a lot of points. So, yes, we’re going to throw everything into my metaphorical blender, the story, the art, and the title, all of which I take fault in, we’re going to turn it on and thoroughly let it all blend together, leaving it on for quite some time, then we’re going to pour it out into my metaphorical cup, and as we look at it, we are looking at the number… three. This book was just not one that I enjoyed, and honestly, that is hard for me because I usually love Bendis’ work, so him writing this dud is just disappointing to me, and I hope that if Marvel continues to release Modern Era Epic Collections of “New Avengers” there is improvement on the dynamics of the storylines and a better balance of superheroes actually being superheroes and not superheroes being turned into fugitives trying to evade other superheroes as was the focus of this book. I also hope for a different assortment of artists, as much of this book was just not enjoyable for me to look at.

Next on the docket is my recommendation. This segment is me telling you two things. The first is if I, myself, Tim Cubbin, recommend this book to readers. The second thing I’m going to tell you is, regardless of the fact if I tell you that you should or shouldn’t read this book, who the best target audience for readers of this book would be. So, let’s start with the first question of do I recommend this book personally. My answer to you is no. This book does not get my recommendation at all. I read this book, and I cannot, in good faith, tell you, my readers, that you should now read this book. Now, if you do actually want to read this book, that is up to you, I cannot stop you, you can read this book and totally disagree with everything I’ve just said in these past four paragraphs, and I leave that up to you, that is the beauty of being a human being, we all have our own opinions, and if you read this book and feel different than I do, I would totally love to hear from you, feel free to leave some form of communication to me to say “Tim Cubbin, I think you’re wrong, I think this was a good book because…” and that would be totally great. Now, as far as who the target audience would be, I would say it is for fans of the Avengers comics who have a particular interest in villains such as the Hand, the Skrulls, and any of the Hell’s Kitchen underworld, as well as fans of Luke Cage, Iron Fist, Doctor Strange and Echo and would like to see them in association with the Avengers. Other than that, I find it hard for me to actually give a recommended audience.

Okay, I’ve rambled on for long enough, it’s time for all of us to move on with our lives. Now, before I go, there are a few final notices I must give. First off, this site has over 150 posts on it, I’ve been doing this for five years now, there’s plenty more to see. If you liked this review, feel free to look for “New Avengers: Assembled” and “New Avengers: Civil War” for more New Avengers content, as well as any of my other over four dozen reviews. I collect every Marvel Modern Era Epic Collection and Ultimate Epic Collection at my earliest convenience and try to get a review out if possible. I currently have two more volumes in my possession, so expect another review coming up in the next week or so. I post very often, so there’s always plenty of content to read as I usually get about three books a month, and I am usually able to get a review of every one of those books up right after I’ve read them. I do have a few I haven’t reviewed because at the time of reading I had no computer and couldn’t compose a post, so there’s a chance those could eventually come up, and there’s one book I didn’t review that I hope will eventually be able to receive a review on this blog. I also have composed other kinds of posts than book reviews, but those are my primary source of content. But if you keep looking at timcubbin.blogspot.com and From the Mind of One Tim Cubbin, there’s also other types of posts, such as short stories, poetry, essays, articles, and editorials, so I’m not limited to being a one-trick pony. Granted I mostly just have book reviews as my focus, I do have a few other ideas I am considering working on, so there’s a chance you could see a short story eventually pop up, or I might write another one of my B’ings, which are just total ways to waste everyone’s time, it’s just me going on for several minutes finding a totally pointless topic and complaining about it, but it’s actually usually pretty amusing, so if you’re interested in that, you can search for those as well. You can also make requests for me on what you would like to see on this blog, and I will try to take that into account as well and attempt to satisfy you. I want to keep you guys coming back, after all. So, I think for the moment I’ve said everything there is to say, really, so I’m just going to sign off now. It’s been a pleasure. Tim Cubbin… out!