After taking a little break from reviewing it, I have returned to Avengers. The end of the arc is coming pretty soon (not this issue, mind you) and possibly the final phase of Hickman’s Avengers run will happen. What will Captain America have learned once everything is said and done? What about this issue? Is it good?
Avengers #33 (Marvel Comics)
So Captain American finds himself all alone in the year 51,028 AD except for an odd tower. Once he arrives at it, it allows him inside to access the Core of the place. However, it may be a trap and whatever AI is running the place has some plans for him.
But first, decompression!
This entire arc so far has covered ideas and concepts about the future, technology, how life is, and outside views on the Avengers that they get to hear about from people they meet during their time traveling adventures. To be fair, those ideas and people that they meet connect back to the main storyline about Cap remembering that he was mind-wiped and wondering how to deal with the incursions. This issue, however, doesn’t even have that, really having nothing to do with the main story. In fact, this issue is pretty pointless when you think about it.
We learn in a very rushed and very dry fashion about how the future currently is and how it got to this point. However, by the end of the issue this entire world is destroyed and nothing is really accomplished or learned from this experience. We don’t learn anything about the Incursions, about what the Avengers did to stop everything, or any of that. Nothing is gained and nothing is lost (except for one thing that ultimately didn’t really amount to anything when you get right down to it). All that we got was the writer throwing a bunch of sci-fi concepts at us and that is not remotely enough.
I’m perfectly able to handle gigantic floating heads!
So, if the story amounts to really nothing in the grand scheme of things (except for the ending), what else can this issue offer instead? Very little, turns out: the pacing is still very slow going, decompressed and featuring endless amounts of tired sci-fi jargon. The dialogue is dull and empty. There’s not much in the way of characterization since the only person there is Captain America, who does get to have one good moment but is sort of an idiot and of course, does not save himself. Like before, an Avenger as to rely on an outside force to save himself or herself. The ending is admittedly kind of interesting and has promise, but do you really want to pay four dollars for one interesting page out of 18 or so?
Leinil Francis Yu is still handling the artwork and he’s fine for the most part here. If he wasn’t doing the artwork, the book would probably be worse off since he really does draw some interesting and fantastic looking science fiction visuals. His layouts are bit average and the action remains very static, but the angles used are decent and the coloring is nice as well. Yu’s weakness still remains his oversexualization of characters and in this issue it’s honestly quite ridiculous. These are AI computer/robot things, so why do some of them have huge boobs and show cleavage? What’s with this AI?! Also, there’s some inconsistency where that bomb jumps out of Captain America’s eye in a big bloody blast, but the rest of the book shows no blood around his eye or any damage.
Seriously? Seriously?!
Is It Good?
Avengers #33 offers very little in the way of story, progression, or character. All it has are ideas that amount to nothing and are not even that original and some artwork that has its own problems. This is easily the most skippable issue of Hickman’s Avengers run yet and I do recommend that you do that, saving yourself some extra money so you could put it towards better comics that are coming out this week.
Join the AIPT Patreon
Want to take our relationship to the next level? Become a patron today to gain access to exclusive perks, such as:
- ❌ Remove all ads on the website
- 💬 Join our Discord community, where we chat about the latest news and releases from everything we cover on AIPT
- 📗 Access to our monthly book club
- 📦 Get a physical trade paperback shipped to you every month
- 💥 And more!
