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thebibliomancer · 21 days ago

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Essential Avengers: West Coast Avengers #64: SHOW AND TELL

November, 1990

Cap, no! That's your World War II buddy, Jim Hammond! Don't hurt him, not while he's serving cake!

This is a fill-in issue. For whatever reason, Terry Kavanagh came in to write this issue, instead of the usual team of Thomases.

And it's not really a West Coast Avengers story. It's a Captain America story. Despite the cover saying he's guest starring, it's more like a couple West Coast Avengers characters are guest starring in his life.

Last times in West Coast Avengers: it is a superhero team that exists and the robot Human Torch, Jim Hammond, is a member.

But enough about him, this is a Captain America story, which is why we start with

Rick Jones getting kidnapped.

Dammit, Rick!

But specifically, this is a transmission that Captain America received, which he manages to trace to the West Coast Avengers Compound!

DUN DUN DUN!

The robot Human Torch, Jim Hammond, answers the big video screen when Cap calls to investigate.

Also, Cap commits a micro-aggression against his good robot pal bud, Jim Hammond.

"Hey, Cap, you're made of meat, why don't you try to interface with a donkey?"

You've been spoiled by Vision, who will plug his brain into any computer, Cap.

But Jim investigates and finds that the West Coast Avengers' computers were hacked and used to reroute a message from an abandoned carnival in the Midwest.

As soon as Cap gets the address, he's gone. He doesn't even bother hanging up the call.

Dammit, Cap, Tony is going to get stuck with that long-distance bill!

But it seems that some little dweeb is the one who sent the message.

I can tell it's some little dweeb because his mom comes in and yells at him that it's bedtime.

The dweeb, Stevie Wojciehowicz, sneaks out after lights out, thinking how great it is that he found a lucky, magical red rock.

Captain America arrives at some abandoned amusement park, while back at the West Coast Avengers Compound, robot Human Torch discovers that the amusement park was not the source of the signal but another relay station!

IT'S A TRAP!

Jim tells Wonder Man to cover monitor duty for him and then flies off to warn Cap, since he can't reach him on communications.

This situation is potentially very dangerous because Jim Torch also detected an energy residue similar to the crimson gem of Cyttorak. Y'know, the thing that made the Juggernaut jugger his nauts? A pretty big deal of a mystic artifact?

So, apparently some backstory. At some point, Juggernaut decided to turn his life partner Black Tom Cassidy into another Juggernaut with the gem so they could jugger together. Except, he realized that this split his own power in half so he threw the gem into space to get his full strength back.

Meanwhile, at the amusement part, copyright infringement.

Earlier there was a funhouse entrance shaped like the Joker's head.

Anyway, the amusement park has been converted into a death trap. Mannequins dressed as popular characters try to kill Cap. The normal lights and sounds have been cranked to painful. And the walls are trying to crush Cap.

Cap escapes the room just before the walls close in but winds up on a white river rapid tunnel of love. He survives going over a waterfall by riding his shield down.

Captain America: "How does anyone get by without an indestructible shield?"

And then the big, lumpy guy from the kidnapping video punches him in the head and steals said shield.

Rude.

Meanwhile, while flying to help Cap, Jim Hammond Human Torch has been struck by lightning, attacked by mirror duplicates of himself, uno reverse carded by the mirrors, and finally attacked by illusions of monsters and his Invaders friends who mess with his circuits thanks to Stevie Wojciehowicz and the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak. This just isn't his day!

But in the madness, he spots Rick Jones and chases after him. Only for both him and Cap (chasing and retrieving his shield from that big guy) to end up in the wax museum.

And suddenly the wax figures come to life and start attacking Cap and Human Torch with wax copies of the real heroes' powers.

Also, Cap and Human Torch assume each other are also wax figures because what else would they think at this point?

They both go to save Rick Jones, menaced by the big lumpy guy, so wind up fighting each other.

Just another classic Marvel Misunderstanding Fight tm.

Anyway, while the two of them are realizing that they're each other, the big, lumpy yellow guy catches Rick and pokes his eyes out.

Gruesome.

And then the Great Lakes Avengers show up, see Cap and Torch standing over a dead Rick Jones and Avengers Assemble on the two heroes.

So, the Great Lakes Avengers getting involved was foreshadowed. By having shadowy figures receive a call, allegedly from Captain America, calling them into action.

Dammit, Stevie!

Seriously, though, it's good to see that someone remembers them and still wants to use them for something. Their appearance in the Terminus Factor wasn't really much to write home about.

Jim Hammond Human Torch grabs Cap and rockets him away from the Great Lakes Avengers but Dinah Soar knocks the two to the ground. Flatman grabs Captain America and Dinah Soar keeps on the Torch.

Mr Immortal tries to flank Cap but the Torch sees it and fires a little fire blast and kinda sorta fries him into a corpse.

Human Torch: "No... It can't be... I didn't mean to kill him! I guess I just assumed... with a name like Mr Immortal... that he couldn't be..."

Cap has to explain to him that he's the kind of immortal where he gets better from fatal injuries. He is people that does not die when he is killed.

Mr Immortal pops back up during this explanation, KRAKs Cap in the head, and tries to run off with his shield.

So the Torch goes 'ok so if he can't die, then I can really brutalize him' and flame broils Mr Immortal into ashes.

There's something about people that can't die that just makes superheroes go 'oh sweet, I can get nasty!'

But there's other Great Lakes Avengers members that haven't shown up so Big Bertha suddenly appears, trying to cannonball the Human Torch.

Cap throws his mighty shield to get her off Jim but Doorman jumps out and lets the shield fly into his portal body.

Doorman's body is a portal to the next room. That's his thing. I don't know how that applies here because the shield doesn't go into the next room. It just disappears into Doorman.

Cap helps Torch heft Big Bertha off himself and throw her on Doorman. And then while the Great Lakes Avengers are incapacitated, Cap goes to inspect the dead, deceased Rick Jones and discovers, yup, that's a wax figure.

Rick was never here. It was all a ruse.

Sheepishly, the Great Lakes Avengers explain that they got a call on the Avengers computers from who they thought was Captain America, telling them that an imposter Captain America had stolen his shield and that only the Great Lakes Avengers could be trusted to retrieve it.

And to his dismay, Doorman discovers that the shield isn't where he teleported it to. Which was apparently supposed to be just to the side.

Geez, the Great Lakes Avengers finally get some screen time and it's being fooled into helping steal Cap's mighty shield.

Except Cap was one step ahead.

He noticed that the robots and wax figures at this amusement park trap kept trying to steal his shield. So he pulled an ol' switcheroo in the wax museum.

Captain America: "The Avengers will find whoever is responsible for this -- and we might want to look for the real Rick Jones while we're at it -- but, in the meantime, the perpetrator is in for a surprise when he tries to use the shield for whatever his dark purpose."

Which is show and tell.

Just like the title of the issue warned us about!

Stevie caused the Avengers all this grief because he wanted to steal Cap's shield for show and tell. And lie and say Cap gave it to him for being such a cool dude.

Unfortunately, for Stevie, he didn't notice the ol' switcheroo until now, when he pulls out the shield and sees its all melty. And alllll of his classmates laugh at him.

I'd feel bad for him if he hadn't been idly musing about killing his whole class even before they laughed at him.

So Stevie swears revenge and probably terrorizes his school with a magical red rock. Probably.

Stevie only appears in this one issue of West Coast Avengers.

That untold tale where he and the Hulk fought the Juggernaut? Never gets told. How the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak goes from Stevie back to the Juggernaut? Unknown. Whether Stevie made good on his vow to make the Avengers pay? I know about as much as you do.

I guess nobody was interested in following up on this plot thread that Terry Kavanagh established, not even Terry Kavanagh.

Next on West Coast Avengers, Grim Reaper again, oy. But first, next on Avengers, more of Rage and the hero of Chernobyl guy.

Follow @essential-avengers. Too tired to give reasons. Just imagine I said some. Like and reblog and maybe comment.

#avengers #essential avengers #west coast avengers #Stevie Wojciehowicz #Captain America #robot Human Torch #Great Lakes Avengers #Mr Immortal #Dinah Soar #Big Bertha #Flatman #Doorman #just a bunch of silliness

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thebibliomancer · 2 months ago

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Essential Avengers: The Terminus Factor - Second Half

1990

WAR of the GARGANTUAS

Is that the proper plural? Huh.

Halfway into the Terminus Factor I still don't know what factor that is. I guess the real circumstance, fact, or influence that contributes to a result or outcome was the friends we made along the way.

Shrug.

In the first half of this annual event, we covered the annuals for Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor. The Captain America annual had Terminus spore launch out of a volcano and infect some fish. When a town and an Iron Man ate the fish, they became rabid. Captain America lured them up a mountain where the cold cured the infection.

BUT: in the Iron Man annual, Iron Man and Machine Man fought a bear that was also infected by the Terminus-tainted fish. No longer weak to cold, the two heroes have to defeat the Termini Bear with some molten metal. After much struggle to defeat just that one bear, they discover that dozens of other animals have been affected.

In the Thor annual, Iron Man asks Thor to protect San Francisco from a big group of Termini. Thor brings Hercules and then ditches him in San Fran to go out into space and beat up on the original Terminus for a while. Thor gets exposition dumped on and Mjolnir stolen, which OG Terminus uses to return to Earth. Meanwhile, Hercules tries to stop a bunch of Termini that have invaded a nuclear power station to eat tasty radiation. He's not able to stop them before they all combine into one new Terminus. Just in time for OG to arrive.

And that's where we are. The Terminus spores infected animals which ate titanium and radiation and merged into a new Terminus but also the original is back.

Let's get these gargantuas warring.

So where have the West Coast Avengers been while all of this has been happening? Back at home.

Specifically, Hank Pym has been using lasers to bring the robot Human Torch back to life after Evil 'n Crazy Wanda turned him off.

After flaring up like that, Jim Hammond Human Torch turns down the temp and asks if somebody could tell him the date. Only, he has a tendency to wake up decades later.

Jim is told that he hasn't been offline that long and brought up to speed on the Wanda situation. Wanda is fine, Magneto and Immortus were dealt with, and she's taking some time to rest with Quicksilver watching her.

Speak of the devil, Quicksilver shows up and tells everyone there's an emergency summon from Hercules in San Francisco.

Quicksilver: "He claims to have been battling hordes of metallic beasts he calls Termini -- and to need our help. He said Iron Man was familiar with the creatures."

Quicksilver offers to go along and help, despite not being active with the Avengers. And Machine Man offers to help too - he's still upset that they killed his good friend, Imposter Peter Spaulding.

Everyone runs off to a Quinjet, leaving robot Human Torch to muse "Out of cold storage for two minutes -- and we're off and running! My new life as an Avenger promises to be anything but dull!"

In the Quinjet, Quicksilver remembers more of Hercules' message. That the Termini have merged into a single 150 foot tall one. And that it has started fighting another giant guy called Terminus.

That kind of feels important, Quicksilver!

Hercules: "By the Medusa's serpentine locks!"

You can say that again, Hercules!

Although... impressive and terrible sight as it may be to have two giant men fighting through the city... I can't help but notice that compared to the more bestial new Terminus, OG Terminus kind of has a pouting baby face.

Also, the Terminuseses have words.

OG Terminus: "So, wormling -- you are the SPAWN of Terminus -- the MANY who are become the ONE. I have returned from far space, having slain a THUNDER GOD and incorporated his HAMMER into my own body! -- To learn WHICH of us shall inherit the vengeful mantle of our long-dead creator race!" New Terminus: "Then you should have stayed hidden behind some darking star, Terminus -- 'FATHER'! For you have journeyed all this vast distance -- only to face OBLITERATION at the hand of your 'SON'." OG Terminus: "HAVE I? We shall see!"

And New Terminus rips off his tail to use as a lance. Alas and for shame. I kinda liked that New Terminus had a tail. Set him apart from the OG while giving him an equivalent of the lance to use.

Also, is this just the Terminus lifecycle? Based on stuff that happens in this issue and based on how Terminus spreading his spore inside Earth was described last time, I'm pretty sure we can conclude he's never gotten around to trying to reproduce.

And if reproduction means that you have to fight whatever new Terminus wins the race to eat lots and grow big, then I can see why Terminus hasn't spored all over other planets.

Honestly, it'd be more interesting if Terminus wasn't the original Terminus. That this process has happened many times over long eons but since every Terminus seems to have implanted memories, each one just continues on the Terminus mission.

Also, if Terminus is an anti-Celestial weapon that goes to planets that the Celestials have tinkered with and ransacks the place, you'd think that making more Terminuses by sporing the planet before he leaves would be standard procedure. It'd make him like a virus. More and more Terminuses, spreading throughout space and trying to undermine the grand Celestial plan.

But I don't get the indication that's what's up. I think there's only ever been one Terminus, minus the faker the Avengers fought in the Savage Land, and that this is the first time Terminus has bothered to spore.

Anyway, the West Coast Avengers Quinjet lands nearby, to Hercules' elation.

Hercules: "Mayhap they can take me to some vantage point whence I can enter the fray."

I love Hercules and his priorities.

Iron Man asks where Thor is, since he was supposed to be here. And Hercules has to relay that Thor fucked off into space and that OG Terminus has boasted that he killed Thor and ate Mjolnir.

Hank Pym points out that the enchantments on Mjolnir should have prevented that. Like some kind of pedantic nerd, speaking for the readers.

Hercules hand-waves the complaint by saying Terminus is "no ordinary foeman."

Everyone got that? No writing letters complaining about it!

Iron Man laments that he couldn't stop the Termini when they were spores or robot animals. US Agent tells him to stop crying, they're Avengers and they'll bring down those giant space men! He doesn't know how! He just knows that the problem will get solved and the Avengers will be involved!

As it happens, Hank Pym has an idea. He takes out a pair of tiny lenses from his pockets of mystery and then enlarges them to be each bigger than a man.

Then instead of explaining what his plan is, he tells the Avengers they'll see when both are in position.

Hank has Iron Man and Machine Man take one lens southwest of the new Terminus. And Wonder Man and robot Human Torch fly the other to the south southeast of original Terminus.

Meanwhile, the rest of the Avengers get in the Quinjet.

Hercules is hype to be fighting alongside the Avengers again. Not sure how he came back from blowing up along with the High Evolutionary but I'm glad he's here.

Wasp is more negative about the situation but US Agent tells her "The G-Man who appointed me to watchdog this combo want those two Kong-types wasted, so that's what we're gonna do -- period. Somehow."

I wonder when Walker had the chance to get orders from Washington in the middle of all this mess. Maybe he's just speculating.

Also in the Quinjet, Quicksilver comments how fortunate it was that the Avengers were able to find such a capable leader as Hank Pym.

Which just makes Hawkeye bitterly think that he's the one that founded the team and nobody has asked him to become the leader again.

My guy, you ragequit the team. And went to go manage another team. Who I assume you're currently neglecting.

The two lens teams arrive in position. Then there's a bright flash of light and the two Terminuses start moving past each other.

Hank Explains It All. Those lenses create reflection images of the opposing Terminus so both are pursuing mirages.

Which isn't going to fool them for long but it should buy time.

And by won't last long I mean. Like. A page. The more bestial new Terminus switches to more cosmic senses and realizes the ruse.

He immediately turns on Wonder Man and robot Human Torch in a rage and blasts the lenses to smithereens.

Wonder Man zooms up and punches new Terminus in the teeth. He manages to knock out a tooth. Robot Human Torch throws some fireballs. To no effect.

Human Torch figures new Terminus must still have a weakness but it's not fire and ice anymore. He creates a bunch of Human Torch fire duplicates to buy time while he tries to figure it out.

Meanwhile, standing on the wing of the Quinjet, Hercules remembers taking down the fake Terminus in the Savage Land and figures he can handle new Terminus the same way.

He jumps from the Quinjet to strike new Terminus in the chest and hopefully rip open his armor but womp womp he just bounces off.

And since he bounced right in new Terminus' path, US Agent says someone will need to do a distraction so Hercules has time to get his senses and get out of the way.

Wonder Man decides to do the distraction because US Agent is kinda out of his depth here.

If you wanted to get US Agent to try something stupid, apparently the best way is by telling him not to.

The Agent jumps from the Quinjet and lands on new Terminus' back. Where he can't do anything at all except try to hang on. Idiot.

Wonder Man: "I learned some time ago, Torch -- the US Agent may be something of a blowhard -- but he's a brave blowhard."

Sure. But it doesn't matter if he's brave if he's putting himself into bad situations just to prove he can and then is an active hindrance to the group effort.

And he is.

He falls off Terminus and has to be saved by Wonder Man.

Meanwhile, Wasp has been left behind to fly the Quinjet. But she decides, eh auto-pilot, and abandons ship. She uses her shrinking to fly underneath New Terminus' armor but just finds him hollow and full of seething energy.

Wasp quickly nopes out of there.

Meanwhile, more Terminus yelling.

New Terminus: "I have wasted time enough -- being led astray by these insignificant human mites. He led me inland -- while my parent was lured seaward -- but I shall swiftly reach him -- and then -- AND THEN -- !"

Now the two Terminuses are heading back at each other.

OG Terminus takes a shot at the Quinjet that Hank Pym and Hawkeye are in. The jet goes into a crash and Hawkeye and Hank Pym have to bail on Hawkeye's sky-cycle.

Hank Pym: "We lose more Quinjets this way!"

I feel like it has become more common recently.

Hawkeye quips that having to replace all these Quinjets is probably responsible for a couple of Tony Stark's bankruptcies.

Terminus is about to walk on a mountainside road heading to Big Sur so Hawkeye shoots a rocket arrow at the big lug. It doesn't do any damage but it does get his attention.

Another lance blast grounds the sky-cycle and then Quicksilver has to NYOOM by to save Hank and Hawk from being Terminally stomped.

Quicksilver is very proud of what a useful boy he is but Hawkeye is just wondering if he can get Tony Stark to pay for him to get a new sky-cycle. And Hank is like good job us, we stopped him from stepping on traffic by making him try to step on us!

Iron Man and Machine Man swoop in for a last ditch effort to keep the OG Terminus from advancing. But Iron Man's "repulsor rays are doing him as much harm as a water pistol" and Machine Man doesn't have anything more potent in his arsenal so he's not even trying. And New Terminus is similarly unfazed by the robot Human Torch's fireballs.

Nothing the Avengers can do can keep the Terminuses from a big, explosive clash.

US Agent says who cares, Let Them Fight. But Hank Pym argues that if Terminus came back to Earth just to fight his grown up son, there's a reason behind it.

AND ALSO, two giant space men punching each other is causing the ground to shake. And California already has enough problems with that!

OG Terminus: "The energy expendirue of us both is now at its PEAK, Terminus-spawn. You have inherited my programming -- and thus you know what that MEANS!" New Terminus: "YES -- !"

OG Terminus knocks New Terminus' lance from his hands and then throws his own lance away. OG knocks new to the ground and then blasts him with some kind of energy.

... Then New Terminus shrinks and OG Terminus eats him.

Yes. Yes, I just said that and yes, it did happen.

Then Terminus glows, explodes, and evolves.

Yeah, remember how all those mini-Terminuses fought each other and then globbed into bigger Terminuses? Well. That. Is. Apparently. How. Terminus. Evolves. Into. Bigger. Terminus? Ultimate Terminus?

Although, if you got two stage-5 Terminuses to fight, you could probably get a Super Ultimate Terminus, or something.

Again, I wonder why Earth is the first time Terminus spread his spores. It seems a natural part of his development is to make more Terminuses and have them merge to get bigger Terminuseses.

Lot of questions being raised. For example: how will the Avengers fight Ultimate Terminus when they couldn't even handle a pair of stage-4s?

Hopefully, by calling in more Avengers. Because Iron Man called the East Coast team and let them know what happened and that Ultimate Terminus is heading East for some reason.

So the two teams are going to meet in the middle and try to kick his ass.

To be concluded... RIGHT NOW.

DESTROY ALL MONSTERS!

You're behind the times, cover. There's only one of them now. One ate the other and then they merged. Like Buu.

Also, way to spoil that Thor isn't dead! Geez!

So, after Terminus ate Terminus and became what several people insistently term Ulterminus or Ultra Terminus, he ditches California and heads East towards St. Louis.

The East and West Coast Avengers teams rush to try to intercept him but know that the big guy just flies faster than a Quinjet. Cap even grouses that they need to update the staple jet for the 90s.

Hank Pym, based on very little evidence, correctly guesses that Ultra Terminus is headed to St. Louis because he wants to eat America from its rough midpoint.

Since Terminus is We Have Galactus at Home.

The West Coast team has Hank Pym, Wasp, Hawkeye, Hercules, US Agent, Machine Man, Iron Man, robot Human Torch, and Wonder Man.

The East Coast team has Captain America, Sersi, Starfox, Vision, Quasar, She-Hulk, and Captain Monica Marvel with her powers restored.

Sersi thanks her for 'tagging along' which Monica objects to, since she's an Avenger too.

Quasar: "The Captain's got a point, Sersi. After all, she was not only an Avenger, but team leader, long before you and I were signed on." Sersi: "And I was an Eternal, Quasar, while both of your ancestors were apes. So what else is new?" Captain Marvel: "I'm not here to play dueling credentials with either of you."

Inside the East Coast's team jet, Captain America is also perturbed that the closest team to St. Louis is... the Great Lakes Avengers.

Captain America: "Lord help us --"

Hey, now, that's not fair. They've been in action a grand total of one times and they really did a good job with it. Sure, they're a goofy bunch but they're not really worth an eye roll at this point!

Honestly, I'm just happy to see them being used. Byrne introduced them with great fanfare and then never really used them for much. And then he left the book but before he did, he had Hawkeye ditch them to come hang out with the West Coast Avengers again.

The poor Great Lakes Avengers are just so excited that they got called into action by Hawkeye and assume that means the real Avengers finally accept them.

The team finds Ultra Terminus floating above St. Louis. Unfortunately, while the GLA is using Big Bertha's private jet and not a Quinjet, legally it counts as a Quinjet and so gets destroyed.

Terminus just. Grabs it while it's jetting past. Leaving the fuselage skrunched in his hand and the jet engines continuing on their journey unburdened.

The Great Lakes Avengers bail out a Doorman portal in the side of the plane and poor Dinah Soar has to lower herself, Big Bertha, and Mockingbird down to the Gateway Arch.

Somehow, after bailing out of the plane, Mr Immortal, Flatman, and Doorman wound up hanging from Ultra Terminus.

Mr Immortal even managed to be hanging from Terminus' helmet and blows him a raspberry.

Which gets him clapped between two giant hands.

Mr Immortal's whole thing is that he's immortal so he laughs it off. Sure, he was basically salsa for about ten seconds but eh, he's got lives to spare.

Ultra Terminus decides he's done with "this superfluity of idiocy!" and decides to focus on the task at hand. He puts a force field around himself and prepares to EAT AMERICA.

(Mr Immortal got dropped but his girlfriend Dinah Soar catches him and flies him down to the arch.)

Mockingbird is just starting to despair that the Great Lakes Avengers failed to save the world when Hawkeye (and the West Coast Avengers) show up. And ever the guy who knows just what to say, Hawkeye tells her she did a good job as a delaying action, which was all he was expecting, honestly.

Mockingbird: "What do you mean -- 'delaying action'? Is that what our new group is to you -- so much cannon fodder?" Hawkeye: "Now look, Bobbi, I --" Mockingbird: "You probably took all the credit for training them, too -- after you dumped us for the West Coast crowd!"

She's right to be pissed.

The only reason why she was leading these goobers is because Hawkeye was depressed after he rage quit the West Coast team. And then he decided, without consulting her, that they were take over the Great Lakes Avengers. And then the instant it looked like he could slide back into his leadership role on the West Coast Avengers, he ditched the Great Lakes Avengers.

But time and place. As Wasp is quick to remind Mockingbird.

Hank Pym repeats his theory that Ultra Terminus is going to use his lance to drain the entire continent of North America of energy and elements. And when the East Coast team suddenly shows up, Vision seconds his theory.

A dude as big as a double-sized Ultra Terminus would require a good plan to deal with, even with threeish Avengers teams. Unfortunately, Vision estimates Terminus will finish preliminary yum yum eat 'em up probing in a few seconds. There's no time for planning, only for rushing in and punching.

Aw, Dinah got into the big group shot! Proud of her!

Also, I only just noticed that the two coastal Avengers teams initialed their Quinjets.

Meanwhile, out in space, Thor isn't dead. It takes a little more than being stranded in space to kill this tough Asgardian son of an Odin. However, he is stranded in space, which isn't an ideal circumstance.

Luckily, Thor somehow managed to angle his body to slightly influence his trajectory when Terminus yeeted (yote?) him into space. So instead of drifting forever, like some dumb Terminus, Thor collides full force with a small planetoid and gets knocked the fuck out.

Look, this is actually an improvement on his situation.

Back on Earth, the strong, flying fighty guys try to get to Terminus but are held at bay by his force field. The slim comfort is that by forcing him to send more energy out of his lance, they've delayed him starting his meal.

But the energy is shaking St Louis so the non-flying or less-punchy guys are saving people from the effects. Captain America and US Agent blocking falling rubble and directing people where to flee. Wasp blasting falling rubble into smaller rubble. Robot Human Torch doing the same thing. She-Hulk holding up an entire building so people can evacuate.

You know, hero stuff.

Meanwhile, the other heroes have been making not a lot of impact. The punchy guys can't get close enough to punch. And Sersi's powers don't work on Terminus because if they worked we wouldn't have a plot.

Quasar finally suggests that they just try doing what he did last time. Which was that he used the Quantum Bands to create a platform under Terminus and then Quasar and Captain Universe Spider-Man yeeted (yote?) Terminus into space.

I have no idea why that wasn't the first thing he suggested trying. Sure, they don't have Captain Universe Spider-Man but they've got a lot of muscle available between Starfox, Quasar, Sersi, Iron Man, Wonder Man, uh maybe Machine Man can help too. Point being, it's worth a try.

So they try.

And, no. Nothing. Dang it. This Terminus is twice as big as the one Quasar fought and thanks to the square-cube law many times more massive. And growing more massive as Ultra Terminus has basically ignored the heroes trying to push him off the planet. Instead, Ultra Terminus has started eating North America and has grown one hundred feet taller already.

Meanwhile, space.

Thor recovers from landing headfirst on a planetoid, finds that there is a slight atmosphere, and so climbs up on a cliff and starts saying... something.

Back on Earth, the Avengers are back to trying to find a way past Terminus' force field so they can punch him. Honestly, they'd be happy even drawing attention since that might mean he stopped eating America so fast.

Quasar: "Ants! He's treating us like ants -- not even worthy of his notice -- !"

Captain Marvel tries... uh... well, apparently she has new powers. She can surround herself with a "dimensional interface" which lets her fly really fast, hit really hard, and not splatter from the impact. So she flies really fast at Ultra Terminus and hits him really hard... and bounces off.

Wonder Man wrestles Terminus' thumb, trying to get him to drop his lance... but gets flicked away.

Quasar suggests that all of the Avengers hit Terminus at the same time in the hopes that they'll overwhelm his force field.

Sersi: "You sure that will work?" Quasar: "No -- but the situation's getting desperate!" Sersi: "Sounds good to me!"

Oh, wow, they really are just trying anything. What's there to lose?

Everyone hits him as hard as they can and, hey, something happens!

Terminus gets yanked up into the sky and everyone that was part of that last desperate attack gets yanked up too.

Weird.

Hercules mentions that he heard Thor's voice as Terminus et al were getting carried away, although nobody else did. The greek god says that it sounded similar to a prayer Thor made (off-panel) as the two gods were heading to California.

Hank Pym theorizes that Thor was reciting a rune-spell to influence Mjolnir, which Terminus had absorbed. Which seems plausible and everyone just accepts this as the answer.

Terminus and co (Quasar, Wonder Man, Machine Man, Captain Marvel, Iron Man, Sersi, Starfox) get pulled through space towards where Terminus had been stranded at the beginning of all of this.

Thor worries about his friends that got pulled along by his rune-spell and worries that they'll die when they collide with the planetoid. Because Thor's entire plan was to summon Mjolnir back to him and Terminus with it and just slam Terminus into a space rock as hard as possible.

It may have even worked before Terminus merged with Terminus.

Unfortunately, it just knocks Ultra Terminus for a loop. But at least the Avengers that got pulled along on this adventure didn't slam into a space rock as fast as possible.

And with them around, there's extra hands to help Thor with his new plan.

While Ultra Terminus tries to absorb the shattered remnants of that planetoid that he just broke with his face, Thor and the Avengers work together to pry the lance out of Ultra Terminus' hand. Then, Quasar quantum-jump boosted throws the lance further than Terminus can summon back.

Then something weird happens.

Ultra Terminus apparently is very energy inefficient. Since he didn't get to finish his meal on Earth, his body starts cannibalizing itself for energy.

Which, for some reason, causes Ultra Terminus to collapse into a black hole. Which Thor summons Mjolnir out of.

Mjolnir apparently can just survive and escape black holes. Thanks to the enchantments on it. Neat.

With his hammer back in hand, Thor is able to gather the dispersed atmosphere from the destroyed planetoid and create an air pocket for the Avengers.

Iron Man compliments Thor's plan coming together. Getting Mjolnir eaten so he could use it to pull Terminus into space? Probably definitely the plan all along. Don't look at the previous issues and think wow he doesn't look like things are going according to schedule.

Then, the Avengers head back to Earth.

That's one Terminus factored.

So in terms of a big Avengers crossover annual event... Hm... I'd say it was stronger in the first half. When the characters were having to figure out the rules to Terminus' weird life cycle. Termini spores possessing animals and making them aggressive was an interesting turn for a giant metal space dude to take.

But I don't think it gelled well with the Terminus lore exposition dump in the Thor issue. If the guy could always spore, why is this the first time he tried? His evil progenitor race is both central to his motivations and also incredibly thinly sketched.

The first two issues played up the idea that every Terminus life cycle stage would have its own weakness but apparently being thrown into space is a shared weakness between a fully grown Terminus and an Ultra Terminus. And even though it was set up in advance, Thor yanking Terminus into space through the Mjolnir he ate really is just repeating how Quasar and Spider-Man beat him.

Also, if Ultra Terminus doesn't eat for five seconds, he turns into a black hole. Weird survival tactic there.

Also also, this is a minor complaint but I wish that the teams had more of a chance to interact and hang-out. This is the first time we have the West, East, and also Great Lakes Avengers together. And the Great Lakes Avengers basically fade out of the plot as soon as the real Avengers arrive. Not a good use of your Great Lakes Avengers!

I do think it was better than Evolutionary War and Atlantis Attacks. It cleared the low bar. But it didn't reach the level of great. Ah, well, there's always next year to try again.

Next time, more West Coast Avengers.

Follow @essential-avengers because if you don't, Terminus may shoot his spores inside another volcano. We can't prove he won't. Like, reblog, and comment. All that stuff prevents Terminuseseses.

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