Comic Books

Is It Good? Avengers Assemble #22 Review

Jordan Richards

December 19, 2013

Time more tie-in madness. Let’s return to Avengers Assemble as it continues on with Inhumanity. Is it good?

Avengers Assemble #21 (Marvel Comics)

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Spider-Girl, Spider-Woman and Black Widow continue hunting down the missing Inhuman cocoon that contains Spider-Girl’s teacher. Trouble is though, they ended up getting captured by AIM and are in a bit of a jam. Meanwhile, Dr. June Covington, aka Toxie Doxie (one of the sillier villain names I’ve heard), is doing her own research into the genetics of the Inhumans.

Then who would Link be? Hawkeye maybe?

As with the previous issue (and pretty much the rest of the run since the writer change), Avengers Assemble remains an absolute blast with delightfully enjoyable characters and a great sense of humor. Outside of the scenes with Dr. Covington, every scene has a lot of humor and great bits of character to them (like when our protagonists are being tied up or the car interrogation bit). It is also very accessible to new readers and the previous issue alike, explaining who Dr. Covington is (which is good for me since I haven’t heard of her until now). Like last time, it’s not high art or a challenging book, but for someone who wants good old fashion superheroics, this is right up their alley.

One thing to note about this issue is that two people are writing it: Kelly Sue DeConnick and Warren Ellis. I have honestly never read anything by Ellis, but I believe I can tell what parts of the comic he wrote (basically the scenes with Toxie Doxie) since it is fairly obvious what DeConnick wrote seeing some of the familiar, enjoyable elements that she has brought to the book over a year now. Of course, I could be wrong, but it is at least worth nothing that two people worked on this book.

So many bad jokes, so little time.

Like with the writers, there are two separate artists working on the book: Matteo Buffagni and Paco Diaz. However, if you didn’t know that, you would have never guessed it by reading this comic. The transition between both artists is seamless and almost unnoticeable, except in a few panels. It’s quite impressive and a nice change of pace from comics where the art change is incredibly jarring. The artwork looks great overall. The only downsides is that some of the lips on characters look huge or very weird while some characters bend in some rather unrealistic ways.

avengers-assemble-22-spider-woman-climbing

I’m not sure if spines work like Spider-Woman.

8.0

Great sense of humor.
Characters are distinct and unique.
Artwork looks decent for the most part, even with two different artists.

Simple and low-stakes story.
Some characters look a bit off in the art.

Is It Good?

Avengers Assemble #22 is pure simple fun for people who are craving a superhero book that isn’t super serious or extremely dramatic. It has a great sense of humor, enjoyable characters, and is rather accessible to almost anyone. Give it a shot when you can.