Avengers vs. X-Men

December 17, 2012
This year’s major Marvel story line is an epic grudge match between the two greatest superhero teams in the Marvel Universe, mostly penned by Bendis but with more than a dozen collaborators. This huge collection comprises the main series and two supplementary spin-offs. When the superheroes disagree about how to handle the planet-killing Phoenix force as it returns to Earth—possibly in search of a new host, a teenage girl named Hope—all hell breaks loose. Once the flawed premise is accepted, it’s impossible to deny the fun of seeing fan favorites throwing punches at one another, but there’s not much beneath that action-based surface. All the artists in this collection are strong, but they vary greatly when it comes to how they portray Hope. Sometimes she looks 12, other times 25, and as the character who much of the book hinges on, the discrepancy is distracting. The short stories featured in the “AVX: VS” portion of the book are essentially more extended battles between certain characters; the high point comes in episode six, where shorter, more humorous, and far more creative stories were tackled by a wider variety of talented creators. While a stereotype of superhero fighting, the Marvel Universe gets a thorough workout in what is a well-executed MMA-version of these well-known characters.

May 15, 2013
In this 23-issue collection produced by a variety of creators (with multimedia material available via app), two of Marvel Comics' premier superhero teams wrestle for control of a young mutant messiah linked to the infernal Phoenix Force. As the Avengers track the fiery approach of a nigh-omnipotent cosmic entity known as the Phoenix, they're surprised to find a matching energy signature already here on Earth, in the X-Men's island base of Utopia. Years ago, the Phoenix had possessed, corrupted and led to the death of founding X-Men Jean Grey. But feeling he's matured since his wife's fatal genocidal turn, Cyclops now plans to harness the Phoenix and restore mutantkind, which had recently been decimated by gone-mad Avenger the Scarlet Witch. The fulcrum of Cyclops' plan is new pupil Hope Summers, a powerful young mutant with the ability to channel the Phoenix Force. When the Avengers arrive en masse at Utopia, insisting on protective custody for Hope, Cyclops refuses, and the fists, shields, lightning bolts, adamantium claws, repulsor rays and optic blasts fly. The book paints the entire story in broad, workmanlike strokes in 12 straight issues of Avengers vs. X-Men, then punches in texture with six straight issues of AvX: Vs, a series of one-on-one-battle vignettes that roughly follow the main arc's chronology, featuring standout "How We Roll," which winningly parodies the whole affair. Ordering the collection by story, not series, would have allowed for a more organic appreciation, as Marvel treads similar ground of morally ambiguous conflict in Civil War (2006). AvX does take an appealing twist, with a handful of X-Men reborn as the Phoenix Five, who rule as benevolent global tyrants. But the Phoenix always goes dark, and the finale marks the apotheosis of Cyclops' recent trajectory from his stiff and bland original incarnation to flawed and fragile in Morrison's 2001 New X-Men and, now, to villain, a la Green Lantern in Emerald Twilight (1996). Artist Olivier Copiel, who illustrates a third of the Avengers vs. X-Men issues, stuns with his sleek redesigns of the Phoenix Five X-Men, particularly the avian Cyclops' Robocop-like visor. The digital material available via Marvel's Augmented Reality app offer some insider looks, with video creator interviews and animated step-by-step recreations of panels, but it seems underutilized in terms of dynamically connecting the story to the decades of Marvel cannon. An uneven must for fanboys.

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