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popculturebuffet · 1 year ago

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Mutant Month: House of Claremont: Avengers Annual #10: Rogue Rises, Carol Falls (Patreon Review for Brotoman.exe)

Hello all you happy mutants and welcome back to Mutant Month, my celebration of the X-Men and all things marvel mutant. Today we're taking a step back from the strangest heroes of all themselves: while they do cameo in this story and Charles plays a very imporant roll, the main focus is on the X-Men's sometimes friends, sometimes rivals, and sometimes guys who sit there and do nothing while genocide happened because of editorial not stopping to think how bad this would make them look, the Avengers.. specifically Carol Danvers, at the time Ms Marvel. While Carol is absent most of the story it's her being found half alive and mostly brain dead that kicks off the story, her scathing reason you suck speech to the avengers for the events of Avengers #200, and the writer of this book being so pissed off by the events of said issue he wrote THIS ONE in the first place.

For those who haven't heard of avengers #200... i'm truly sorry i'm about to tell you it exists. But since this story is a direct sequel/fuck you to the story, I have to. Apologizes in advance.

So Avengers #200 was the story of how Carol Danvers got mystically impregnated by Marcus, extradimensional son of avengers foe Immortus... WITH Marcus. Marcus then revealed he'd previously kidnapped Carol, made her fall in love with him with the subtle manipulations of his machines, his EXACT words, and then when he had to go back to his home dimension due to his presence destroying the world, took Carol back with him. The avengers all GLADLY sent her off with her rapist and hoped she'd be okay.

If your curious to view this nightmare for yourself, my review of it's right here`, and it's easily one of the worst things i've reviewed. And that's not in a general group.. i'm still not sure if this monstrosity or the transphobic episode of faimly guy where Brian vomits for 2 minutes straight because he slept with a trans woman is worse. It's a toss up. It's a straight up deadlock of things that PHYSICALY HURT to write about.

So as a sort of apology Brotoman, who comissioned the review of Avengers #200 not having any idea how bad it was, as did I as while I knew what happened reviews only prepare you so much, agreed to eventually have me review the direct response to that, this issue. As for why it's in X-Men Month.. well if you know Carol's history or x-men history.. then you know where Rogue got her powers.. and this is where not only that happens.. but Rogue debuts. So not only does this change avengers history.. but it's also VITALLy important to x-men history, to the point the issue is both int he x-men and marvel masteworks and their respective epic collections. It's simply too vital to both stories to ignore, especially the x-men's as Carol also basically joins the group for a while after this.

As I said this is a direct response from Chris Claremont about Avengers #200. Now any resonable person would hate this story, something i'd rarely say as tastes differ but this is

So I feel confident saying no one likes this and if they do their just being a trollish jackass.

But no one liked this story less than X-Men Maestro Chris Claremont. Chris was deeply attached to Carol and for good reasons: While Carol existed before him, debuting in Captain Marvel and then getting her own solo, the character wasn't exactly defined, first being a kinda sorta but not really love intrest to Captain Mar-Vell, then having this weird split identity gimmick and working at a women's magazine printed by J Jonah Jameson. It was clear while Marvel had the idea of "neat new womens superhero" that was about all they had.

Luckily Chris took on the book and quickly ended the split identity schtick and defined carol as we know her: Tough as nails, badass, miltary referree. He defined her backstory, the son of a sexist jackass who joined the Air Force to get an education after he refused because she was a woman. He defined most of her supporting cast, her skill and genuinely who she was. He even took her archenenemy mystique with him when he started writing x-men and to my shock Rogue was actually intended for an arc in Carol's book.. but the book got cancelled before it happened.

So finding out a character he poured his heart into was raped and her friends were just fine with it while also pouring a thick gravy of sexisim on top of the procedings.. didn't go so well

Shooter.. let Chris right the ship. Which says a lot as normally when editorial is asked to correct a creative mistake they either wait a bit so they can make money off correcting their own bullshit or actively refuse

Granted in this case, Chris Claremont was marvel's #1 writer at the time, with X-Men rising to be their best seller, with Chris having just finished the back to back classics Dark Phoenix Saga and Days of Future Past. It was clear the X-Men needed chris, wouldn't be the same without him and Chris had all the power in this negotation, while all Shooter could do is nod and say sure. While Shooter would ocasoinally flex his power on x-men for both good (shutting down the Colossus and Kitty Pryde thing) and bad (not letting Mystique and Destiny be publicly gay.. or letting Destiny be nightcrawlers mom and Mystique having shapeshifted into a man to make that possible. ), but it was stuff Shooter was willing to fight for where as here the writer of his biggest hit was asking to fix a huge mistake for him. And given jim was busy making mistakes of his own

Someday.... i'll deal with this mess someday.. but for now Chris had the greenlight to fix Shooter's mistake, and thus we got Avengers Annual #10. And as said, since he couldn't do the Rogue story in carol's book, he did it here a way to both set up Rogue as the next big threat for the x-men, and of course swerve it by them being forced to take her in, and Carol joining the team in a supporting role while not having her powers... then giving her a new more powerful set. The latter part was also likely always intended, it simply played out diffrently. It's hard to tell. What won't be is does this issue hold up on it's own and does it help wash the taste of avengers 200 out of our mouths? Let's find out.

Avengers Annual #10 gets right to it as we open with a woman getting pushed off a bridge.. thankfully she's quickly saved by one of the guest stars.. no not storm...We're in san francsico and Chris Claremont is still writing non- mutant books so...

Yup. As a nice bonus to this issue in addition to Carol and the X-Men guest starring, we also get the Startling Spider-Woman. As I mentioned in my review of God Loves, Man Kills, claremont really likes using everything he's worked on or has worked on. I see echoes of that attitude in Al Ewing's work today, finding ways to weave in your other books or tie off loose ends you never got to.

For those less familiar with her, Jessica Drew was experimented on by her dad and the high evolutionary, raised around Animal People, and then became a super heroine, with Claremont turning her into a detective after some hit and miss directions. I'm a fan thanks to Dennis Hopeless breakout run, so it was nice seeing Jess here. When we next see Jess she's waiting at the hospital, where she finds out her Jane Doe is carol.. and whlie not suprising to us given this issues place and history, it was meant to be a suprise at the time with the cover lady easily being any super being the avengers had met.

And before we move on, let's talk about that cover for a second because it's this weird mix of being both really eyecatching and an absolute hot mess. On the one hand the striking red, various panels of all the stuff and nice bit of building intrigue as they don't spell out what out of the brotherhood knocked out cap and iron man. On first look it's not too weird.

But when you really step back and look at it it's saying a lot of nothing. instead of going just with cap being thrown through a window or showing the various things happening to the avengers and then having jess and the x-men on the botttom it tries to showcase EVERYTHING in this issue and cram it all on to one cover, which is never a smart idea. Not helping is the large advertisment for a ten speed giveaway taking up a lot of real estate in an already busy cover. I don't mind covers homaging this, as it's a neat IDEA for a cover, the excecution is just sloppier than I remember and has diminishing returns: it does the job of catching your attention.. but then gets it for all the wrong reasons.

Anyways there's a problem: Carol's mental state is so withdrawn the staff psychologist assumed she'd been insutlationalized since child hood, and they can't really reach her. Thankfully Jess happens to be friends with the x-men.

That's something.. weird that happened with the passage of time. See due to Chris writing her early on Jess was friends with the x-men and her reason for knowing them is not remotely small: on a case she found former member Banshee's lost daughter Siryn, who'd go on to be a major part of X-Force and X-Factor and a faviorite of mine thanks to the latter. It's not the biggest foot note but it's something that almost never gets brought up. She's friendly enough with the x-crowd it's weird it dosen't get brought up apart from her skrull counterpart and wolverine being on good terms due to Jess also having been a close friend of logan's in his series during her powerless days. For instance in the solo I mentioned, none of the uncanny x-men visit her party. They just kinda fell out of touch. I mean Logan was dead at the time but I can't imagine Kurt Wagner would pass up free shrimp and pretty ladies. It's just not who he is.

At any rate Jess calls the professor for help, and we get a little bit of slice of life stuff with the x-men. It's something chris REALLY loved doing and that I honestly miss in modern comics: with how tightly packed the pacing is there isn't time for the x-men to say, be busy rebuilding the danger room after Kitty had to use it to murder an alien, which is the case here. It's fun seeing Kurt and Kitty slowly bond and also fuck up some machinery together trying to fix things. Charles heads down to San Fran, and the avengers have been notififed: Carol's identity isn't public YET , so it's just said their linked "somehow". Charles tells Jess in his mind that not only is her concious mind just.. gone but he was able to find out who did it: Rogue. Who at the time would've gotten a solid reaction out of fans as

As this is her intro. It's a good way to set up a villian though: have her take out a hero at Carol's level.. and a few more. YOu do have to thread this needle carefully: if you go too far, the villian comes off overpowered. Here , Rogue has just enough to be a threat, but not so much she's entirely overpowered, as we find out some drawbacks later.. and much later will find out permenanlty stealing Carol's powers and memories comes with the whopper downside of a whole other person being grafted to her brain.

And we first meet Rogue properly.. as she suprise attacks captain america. Which COULD be seen as cheap.. but Rogue makes a valid point after: she has Carol's memories.. and thus unlike most foes fighting cap , knows how he fights. And Carol being military herself meant she probably thought about how to take him down just in case someone possesed him, turned him into a werewolf or created a nazi clone. You know the usual.

Rogue then does what would become her trademark of taking the power with a kiss. This is also where we find out she stole Carol's powers for keeps, and as long as she dosen't touch someone TOO long can usually not take too much. This part.. is a bit out of sorts with her later deep fear of being touched, but I feel fits: At this point Rogue is a villian and is being encouraged by her moms to be evil. As such the ethics are likely being actively downplayed. Most memroies she's taken fade away and so does the guilt with only her first use of her powers with her childhood friend cody really bothering her. It's a case of her simply not having the downside of her powers HIT HER yet. Without any consequences, she has no reason to fear her power.

While the rest of the avengers minus thor and iron main wait for cap, Rogue leonardos him through a window. This gets them to contact Tony as Iron Man who plans to help.. but turns out the attack on Cap wasn't something random.. it was well planned, with Mystique waiting in hiding as the wasp to trick tony.. and slam some sort of doo dad that depowers the armor and leaves tony stuck inside it.

Finally for the big three, just as Thor turns out of being Donald Blake, Rogue hits him. Granted she docent know he's thor's mortal alter ego... but it still makes sense as he's their doctor. Before she can finish him though Jess shows up, having apparently travled to NYC to follow up on Carol's attempted murder.

We get a neat fight as Rogue really beats the shit out of the avengers, but like I said it's done in a way that dosen't leave her coming off OVERPOWERED. Yes she snatch's thor's powers.. but that's why: She has the combined powers of thor, cap and ms marvel with Steve, Carol and Thor's combined knowledge of their teammates. It makes perfect sense she easily floors them and only dosen't kill them because Mystique has other plans for her daughter. It's also a ncie way to show off her inexperience and deference to mystique: she stole three powers but dosen't know if she can do more, and balks out of a guaranteed win simply becaase it's not in the plan.. which sets up the brotherhood's defeat LATER by not finishing the avengers NOW.

With the avengers on the backfoot for now, Jess reveals that Carol disappeared from new york 6 months ago with avengers 200.. but resurfaced three months later in San Fran, living just fine. It's our first hint that Carol isn't exactly happy to see her friends again. She moved to a city with one other superhero, hasn't picked the mask back up, and didn't call them. And as we'll see later she has every reason not to.

The avengers reacap avengers 200, and after giving me some flashbacks, we get to the main point: This attack was cordinated, the avengers are now down their three strongest and most experienced members. The only good news is Beast, who was an avenger for a while, it's why he wasn't in the Claremont run outside of a few choice guest spots as by the time he wasn't, he got swept into x-factor, meaning beating Rogue won't be easy.

The reason behind hobbling the avengers like this? A prison break. See the brotherhood first appeared a few months before this in the landmark x-men story Days of Future Past, trying to assassinate bigoted senator kelly, our heroes winning.. but Kelly being an ungreatful bastard about it and turning around to be mutantkind's greatest pain in the ass for a while, trying to publish the mutant registration act.

The brotherhood at the time consisted of Mystique, master shapeshifter and Carol's arch enemy at the time turned x-men villian, Destiny, Mystiques wife who can see the futttttttooorrrrrr, the blob, the imovable object, Pyro, Australian arsonist and fire bender, and Avalanche, earthquake machine of the cool costume without a personality to match, with Rogue joining here. They'd keep the lineup minus Rogue for most of the 80's, transitioning from terrorists to being the goverment's go too hired goons

At any rate Misty was the only one to escape last time, so it's her job to break them out, with help from her wife predicting when, and Iron man being used as a blunt instrument. Though really he's more of an object. All that matters is he's blunt, hard and blunt.

So the brotherhood is broken out and costumed up... just in time for the avengers to arrive. Spider-Woman heads to fight iron man while a decent fight ensues: the main gimmick is destiny is tipping off the brotherhood before the avengers each move, allowing them to counter. It's a reminder of just HOW powerful Destiny is: her knowledge of the future isn't 100% , it's more propablities than full info or other wise she'd be invincible and our heroes could never win and it'd be really, really boring. But it's still potent enough and showed off well by chris claremont here: while the rest of the brotherhood get a great showing, their mostly hired goons. Destiny is Mystiques #2 for more reasons than that mouth thing she likes, and this shows it. The avengers are entirely on the backfoot because of her and it's telling the tide turns after Wanda gets a chance to attack her.. and more telling that it was only concidence she got a shot in on her and pure luck, as none of them KNEW destiny was doing this. The X-Men at least later have the advantage of knowing Destiny's the most dangerous piece on the board.

Mystique tries to kill Jessica, mostly because she's pissed Carol lived. Destiny warns her this will be their downfall.. and she's right. Mystique was a terrible choice to send for this as Jessica sees right through her nick fury disguise and Misty barely escapes , with Jessica bringing iron man back

With that the tide has fully turned: Iron Man goes with the genius strategy of hitting Rogue real hard.. and her feeling it tells her she's down to just Carol's power and Mystique tells her to retreat, the two of them feeling. Now.. tha'ts a solid marriage right there. Where you can leave your wife to get captured by the avengers.

We get more of the fight including highlights such as pyro makin ga giant firebird, his trademark and Vision and Jocasta using double laser vision to collapse the ground beneath blob. It's a decent enough fight, I just don't care about it a lot and it's one of the issue's main weaknesses: A lot of it's a fight scene and while there was good setup for it with Misty taking out a lot of their members, the people who did said setup.. have left at this point. IT's down to blob, pyro and avalanche. And while I like all three for their designs and they've had great development in later years... in this case their just three interchangable mooks. Destiny's the one really making them dangerous and with the people who actually personally hurt the avengers gone, it looses any emotional weight. It's just the avengers against some b-list super villians. I've seen this before, i'll see it again and while it's fun enough it just feels like padding. What Chris HAD to do to justify the issue. It would've been more intresting had they actually escaped. The avengers won, the brotherhood just had to retreat. But i'm guessing Chris wanted the actual escape in his own book, and knew it'd also be weird if these guys beat the avengers and the earth's mightest heroes weren't after them.

It's nice ot see the brotherhood in this sort of situation.. but I can see why we only saw them pop up more elsewhere after they became freedom force: it's a lot easier to have the heroes eat the loss or the villians loose when the villians are working for the goverment and thus wont' be going back to jail.

The ending of this annual.. is what we came for though, the big centerpiece. The only thing I can say bad about it is the art. See the avengers come to see Carol, whose staying with the x-men, and will be for the next 20 or so issues of their title. More on that in a moment. For whatever reason artist micheal golden.. decided to have her pool side so this scene of a woman talking about her sexual assault.. is done in a swimsuit.

The art in general is the book's weakpoint: As a critic while i'll point out stuff I dont' like I generally try to be positive. Something bad like Avengers 200 isn't my usual wheelhouse. i'll gladly REVIEW terrible media for money, but even then I try to be fair.

But while the writing is good as any Claremont story of the era... the art from Micheal Golden is just bad. It's bad. At best i'ts inoffensive and at worst we have Rogue's looking like she's a 4 year old who found mommy's make up

Wonder Man looking like he pulled everything , everywhere all at once and cannot move from this pose as a result

Or the blob breifly replaced with a wax statue by the ghost of vincient price

Now credit where it's do there are good shots like this one of wanda

Or beast easily out manuvering pyro and blob

But as you can see their still not the BEST shots, just decent ones. It puts a damper on an otherwise solidly written book.

Speaking of which, it's time for the moment you've been waiting for, the reason we're here. Carol has the x-men and Jessica go inside, she needs to speak with her guests alone. Before she does though there's one small moment.. but an important one

It's a small subtle thing.. but the fact Jess is still here despite this scene taking place weeks later... shows she was there for Carol's recovery. While she found out what happened.. she cared enough to stay by her side and help her.. and it was through that one of the strongest friendships in the marvel universe war born. While it takes Jess becoming relevant again to really take hold, the two have been best friends for most of modern marvel, only briefly having a falling out over civil war II.. and even that didn't last long. Jessica and Carol are each othe'rs ride or die, and that call goes both ways. While we never see these weeks their what built a bond stronger than any on earth.

But this is something Carol has to do alone.

It's an utterly heartbreaking scene, one of the best in Chris Claremont's long career on this reread. The pure PAIN in carol's voice comes through in print, a hard feet but one Chris makes seem easy. And while Golden's artwork still isn't the best... he does a damn fine job of capturing her pain without making it melodramatic: instead we see a person who was horribly violated, has her friends casually assume she was in love with her rapist and even has one loudly tell her "no we saw you you didn't see what you think we saw".. only for Carol to calmly and tearfully explain that no, she did. Marcus violated her, and they LET HIM take her with him. It's only through sheer grace of his instant death far worse didn't happen and by then he'd still done more than enough.

What i love is that while Claremont is very thinly calling out how horrible the writing was.. he dosen't let his understandable outrage hurt his ablility to make a good narrative out of it: many a comic writer can succumb to clumisly fixing what they deem a mistake or even when fixing an actual mistake, fumble the ball. Chris here however turns it into character: Carol calls them out, tearfully, but calmly and lets them know how bad they hurt her, how bad they betrayed her.. but right after also makes it clear theyc an learn from this. They HAVE to learn from this. And if they do maybe all of this will have had SOMETHING good come out of it. But that's their choice.

It gives Carol agency back after an issue that was determined to strip it away, mocking her for not wanting a baby that was forced on her, that left her to a "happy ending" with her rapist." She could wallow in anger, but chooses to move on. She's cutting the avengers out of her life for now.. but after all they've done she can't bare to have them in it, and that panel above, that one right there shows how badly they get that: they came expecting to get some closure.. and instead got the wakeup call that they lost that one. Their friend was in pain, needed help, and they ignored what she wanted, ignored her concerns.. and like marcus ignored her consent. LIke him they didn't care what she wanted or who she was, just waht this whole thing meant to them. And it's clear fromt heir expressions.. that won't happen again.

I also like how it ends: Wanda, the one of them who was the most supportive during this debacle (and was missing during the sendoff with captain rapist, rest in dust you miserable bastard), is the most broken up by it and tells her sorry.. and Carol wipes her tears and accepts it, knowing at least one person tried not to betray her. It's a fitting sendoff for Carol's time in the avengers, a time that wouldn't come again till the 90's, one that dosen't let the avengers off the hook at all and has them utterly raked over the coaals for their henious actions, but allows her to move on

The final scene is in the Quinjet, as most of the avnegers sit in stone silence as the weight of everything hits them.. but it's once again wanda whose the most affected

It's a hell of an ending, one that offers no easy comfort.. simply the promise that maybe there will be a better tommorow. It's not easy making a mistake.. but it's the harder step learning from it. And evne harder to live with what others have inflicted on you.

So yeah while the art is hit and miss.. this issue is still solid. THe last act really steals the show, and is one long callout by chris.. but again it's done perfectly in character, a way to bridge carol leaving the avengers and joining the x-men and to make the Avengers deal with what they did. To make sure #200 isn't just fixed, with Carol back and Marcus a pile of dust, but to make sure it isn't forgotten. It's easier in comics to just.. wipe away a bad decision, and sometims necessary. But it's ofen the better route to take a huge writing mistake and refit it for character.

As for Carol her story would continue: she'd basically join the x-men, helping them on occasion, then get shot up into space with them, with her powers reawakend and reformatted as the even STRONGER binary. But with her emotions attached to most of her memories gonCarol's place on earth was gone and she took to the stars. She'd regain those emotions and rejoin earth of course, rejoining the avnegers, leading them and eventually becoming Captain Marvel.

As for Rogue.. having Carol's Memories would nearly drive her insane, revealing her not as the callous monster seen here.. but as a scared 20 or so year old... and forced to turn to the people who hated her most for help. But that.. my friend sis a story for next year. For now .. we can take comfort that even with lows like Civil War II under her belt.. Carol has never been through something like avengers #200 again.. and god willing never will. Thanks for reading

#captain marvel #carol danvers #x-men #mutant month #avengers #ms marvel #iron man #captain america #thor #the scarlet witch #vision #hawkeye #jocasta #destiny #mystique #the blob #pyro #avalanche

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thebibliomancer · 6 years ago

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Essential Avengers: Avengers #200: The Child is Father To...?

October, 1980

I kept dreading getting to this moment.

As the numbers ticked higher, I thought ‘well 200 is still a ways off’ but I knew it was coming.

Its not just that issue #200 is bad. Everybody knows its bad. Its the fact that everyone knows its bad.

As far as this series is about anything its about exposing how bonkers the Avengers comic could be for people less familiar with it.

But issue #200 is so infamous that I think a lot of people know about it, by reputation at least.

But I’ve been pitching pennies into the void so long, whats another 2 cents? This is just a speed bump on the way to more interesting things anyway.

She-Hulk will be joining the team soon. Tigra’s first stint on the team before that. There’s the fall of Yellowjacket and the albatross that Hank Pym will be wearing around his neck forever upcoming too. Moondragon returns to finally pay off the point of the Korvac Saga.

There’s a lot upcoming to get excited about.

So lets get through this... dear lord, its a double sized issue.

Right in the cover we can see the cracks underlying the story. Not just on the big 200, looking all weathered and damaged. Odd choice for a celebratory anniversary issue.

Also odd choice to have Iron Man and Hawkeye in a combat ready pose when the rest of the Avengers (except Vision. Always except Vision) are smiling and posing around the big cracked, damaged, rotten 200 like a publicity still.

Beast is even hanging out of it. Seductively.

Not right now, Beast. Read the room.

The point I’m trying to make is that there is a dissonance with this cover mood. Why are Iron Man and Hawkeye ready for action when everyone else is in a party mood?

The mood is just as confused in the book itself because it is a confused mess, designed out of committee, compromise, and with a stunning disregard for character. But I’ll get to that.

Also, perfect symmetry wasn’t really attainable here what with Thor and Captain America having significantly different profiles, but I’m annoyed that Yellowjacket wasn’t placed next to Vision so he’d mirror Wasp. You ruin everything, Yellowjacket.

Bit of a trivia: this cover was used as one of the covers for the Essential Avengers volumes. They cut out the big 200 to make it more general which honestly makes the cover look bland. Avengers posing around a big void for no reason.

Now lets get on with it.

“For generations the symbolic root values of the American people have been embodied in the phrase: ‘Mom, apple pie and the girl next door.’ Wars have been fought for these ideals; presidents have been elected over them. Obviously motherhood means a great deal to most Americans. So why, then, do these five heroes, these Avengers, seem upset that one of their own -- is about to give birth? Why is there excitement tinged with a subtle, subconscious shadow -- of fear?”

I think they would seem upset because Carol seems afraid and upset by the situation, became nine months pregnant in a matter of days, and has insisted that there is no possible father.

The real question is why there’s excitement at all? Finally showing some upset and fear is reading the mood but nothing explains this weird mood dissonance where the Avengers react to a mysterious accelerated pregnancy with ‘omg baby!!’

And the last issue ended with Dr. Donald Notthor Blake shouting in panic that Carol had gone into labor and its like nothing he’s ever seen. A good reason for the Avengers to be anxious and yet not really followed up on.

Unless. Oh god. Dr. Donald Notthor Blake really doesn’t have any obstetric experience and has no idea how to deliver a baby.

Thankfully, Jocasta is assisting him. She has cold hands and the precision of a computer so obviously she has excellent bedside manner.

Also, that first part of the narration sounds fake. I’m pretty sure the symbolic root values of the American people are ‘fuck you I don’t like taxes’ and ‘fuck you I want to own people.’

You think other countries don’t like motherhood and pie and geographically adjacent girls? Newsflash, a lot of people like those things. America is not special.

And why is this narration even playing over a scene where a woman is giving birth after being impregnated against her will or knowledge? Shooter, Perez, Layton and Micheline, what part of that sounds like the ideal of motherhood??

We are still on page one.

ALSO. Why does the medical examination laboratory have a big window the Avengers can look through to see their teammate giving birth?

And why are the Avengers pacing outside the door like anxious fathers-to-be?

Hawkeye even snarks about it when Captain America expresses worry.

This comic does not know what its mood should be. Will be a recurring complaint.

Captain America: “Sorry, Hawkeye, but I can’t help being a little nervous. I never thought I’d see the day a child would be born in Avengers Mansion.”

Iron Man: “I hate to put a damper on things, Cap, but it hasn’t been born yet -- and we’ve no assurance that it will even be a ‘child.’”

Mood dissonance. Cap: ‘omg baby!’ Iron Man: ‘More likely an alien’

Inside the medical room, Jocasta detects weirdness with her cybernetic senses. Maybe Ultron gave her an ultrasound when he built her.

Either way, despite my fully deserved mocking before, the real weird thing that made Dr. Donald Notthor Blake panic is that the birth is seemingly occurring without any trauma at all. No trauma and no pain? That ain’t right, per Dr. Donald Blake.

Second round of mocking aside, here’s a weird thing. Carol isn’t pushing at all. The whateveritis baby is just coming out all on its own.

But the baby boy is born and the peanut gallering Avengers all rush into the room to coo over him.

And while they gush about how tiny and cute the baby is and how he’ll be a quarterback when he grows up (???), Captain America asks Dr. Donald Blake to examine him thoroughly. Him the baby. Because Cap is finally realizing that something here isn’t natural. Like the fact that he was born after a three day gestation. For example.

Meanwhile, Jocasta has a weird epiphany about why Humans Are Special TM. A weird, almost Rose Quartzian epiphany.

Jocasta: “Look at them, Vision. Even under these bizarre circumstances, birth seems so... so natural to them. How incredible it must be to be born, to be small, to grow. Even with all their frailties, their weaknesses, I can’t help feeling that in this universe, humans are something very, very special.”

Vision: “It is life that is special, Jocasta -- in whatever form it takes.”

Do... do you think only humans give birth and grow up, Jocasta? Where do you think baby Inhumans, Skrulls, and Atlanteans come from? The Kree are supposedly test tube grown for maximum perfectness but they can still get pregnant. Bug on Star-Lord’s proto-Guardians of the Galaxy team was actually in jail for impregnating a Kree. Consensually. But the Kree have this weird thing about genetic purity. But also this weird thing about not evolving anymore. So maybe they should try crossbreeding with other alien races and see if that does anything for them.

I am getting off track.

Jocasta, you’re dumb. Humans Are Special posts tend to annoy me but this is the stupidest one yet, Jocasta. I still like you but stop.

Wasp realizes that Carol Danvers isn’t around also talking about how great the baby is and goes looking for her after being told that Wonder Man is taking her up to her room to rest.

And no surprise from Wasp who has been on the ‘baby yay!’ train the whole time but she is incredibly insensitive to Carol.

Wasp: “I just wanted to congratulate the proud parent. It’s really a beautiful baby, Carol. You’re so lucky to --”

Carol: “‘Lucky?!’ Wasp, think about what you just said! I’ve been used! That isn’t my baby! I don’t even know who the father is! So if you want to help me, please... just leave me alone.”

Sometimes this comic shows flashes of what may be self-awareness and I wonder if it knows how awful it is. But since Carol later apologizes for snapping at Wasp, no. No it does not.

Its red herring self-awareness. The worst kind.

Also, flashes of modern day Carol. That is the face of a woman who wishes there was something at hand to throw. Like a building.

Meanwhile, in the garden or courtyard of the mansion, Vision and Scarlet Witch do some relationship discussion.

Vision: “You seem calm, my wife, at ease with yourself.”

Scarlet Witch: “That’s because I am, darling. Ever since I reconciled my conflicting emotions concerning parenthood, I’ve not only felt more peaceful, but stronger as well.”

Vision: “Then you feel no regrets that we have produced no offspring?”

Scarlet Witch: “None that matter. A child’s a thing of fragile beauty, something that must be nurtured and protected. Like this rose... and the love we feel for each other. Which is, I’ve realized, the most important thing in my world.”

Vision: “And, my love, in mine.”

Aw. That’s nice.

Also nice is that the rose Scarlet Witch picks during this garden speech is a yellow matching Vision’s cape.

Even in the midst of this thisness, I like that we get a good character moment between Vision and Scarlet Witch. The good ol’ best ol’ Seeing Red ship.

Looking forward five years to the Vision and Scarlet Witch miniseries, these two actually do get to have kids. Granted, it happens after the two ragequit the Avengers because the government is suspicious of Vision after he tried to take over the world under the influence of an alien supercomputer. And magic is involved. And it gets undone by having the children be secretly parts of Mephisto but then it turns out that the kids are retroactively real kinda and are the Young Avengers Billy Kaplan and Speed.

Comics are complicated.

My point being. I like that when they didn’t have Avengers work to worry about, these two somehow immediately found a way to have the children they wanted. And I like that they had an mature, adult conversation about their expectations of their relationship before then.

Scarlet Witch and Vision are so good and a large part of me really hopes they get their own movie in the MCU that’s just. Weird stuff they deal with while trying to sort out their relationship.

Moving on.

During this conversation, Jocasta has been creepin’ like a creep from a second floor window.

Wasp spots her and asks if anything is wrong and Jocasta tells her that there’s just so much about human emotions that she doesn’t understand despite being based on Jan’s personality.

And Jan “Can’t Read The Mood” Van Dyne says something insightful.

Wasp: “Don’t worry, lady, you’re not alone. There’s still a lot about human emotions that we humans don’t understand.”

Also, I think this is the first interaction that Wasp and Jocasta have had.

I know things are probably awkward between them. But Vision and Wonder Man hashed their shit out to function socially around each other. I want more Jocasta and Wasp interaction.

I want more interaction between Jocasta and Scarlet Witch.

So far, Jocasta has mainly been about the dudes, minus an abortive attempt to make friends with Ms Marvel. She’s been trying to make friends or more with Vision a lot. And I get the logic behind that. If anyone gets where she’s at its him but also he’s too wrapped up in him to get where she’s at. But here’s the thing. It just comes across as another Vision-Wanda-Other Woman love triangle.

Give Jocasta girl friends. Or a girlfriend. But definitely girl friends.

Also, Wasp got another new outfit and this one isn’t terrible. I think she got it a couple issues ago but I was preoccupied. Good job, Wasp. You remembered that pants should have both legs.

Meanwhile, Beast and Hawkeye play pool in the rec room.

This is another very good character moment.

Hawkeye has won two games, making two malteds that Beast owes him. Hawkeye is very good at pool because you just pick up on these tricks when you’re a carny. Obviously.

He suggests a third game, double or nothing. And loser gets to shoot first.

But first, Beast pulls out a calculator. A TI-59, in fact. And does a little trigonometry.

And while Hawkeye is protesting that pool isn’t something you learn in math class, its a game of skill and instincts, Beast takes a single shot and sinks every ball.

Because, yup, this whole time Beast was hustling the hustler.

In fairness, you have to be pretty good at pool in the x-mansion. Cyclops is just super good at it and is probably a real sore winner.

Beast tries to get Hawkeye to play again, this time for a year’s salary but Hawkeye says “I only need to get burnt once to know a fire is hot!”

Anyway, I’m glad that some of this issue’s bloated page count went towards this nice little moment.

But with no forthcoming pool game, Beast decides to check in on the main plot with the vidcom intercom.

Apparently in the last hour, the baby has grown to the size and maturity of a two year old child.

So the accelerated growth is accelerating. He was aging three months a day and now he aged two years in an hour. Maybe he’ll age to skeleton bones like he drank out of the wrong grail and this story will end.

Anyway, the creepy Satan child stares right into the camera and thus our souls and demands someone change his diaper.

Uncanny.

Of course, its kind of a thing that most comic artists just don’t know how to draw babies without making them seem like cursed gremlins. So maybe this isn’t supposed to be exactly as creepy as it is.

Its just hard to tell because of the tone thing. This is a weird, unnatural baby. But also 'ZOMGBABY!!!’ So who knows.

And then an interlude. To build up the subplot which is needed to add some action scenes.

Completely normal civilian Raoul Kramer gets off the subway train, monologue complaining about how day in and day out everything is the same ol’ same ol’ same.

But when he leaves the station he finds everything has gone all old timey horse and buggy. Oh god, everything is so same ol’ it went back in time to be different same ol’!

What a perplexment.

But back in the mansion, Wonder Man goes to Ms Marvel’s room to see how she’s holding up.

And apparently she’s feeling well enough to get back in her bathing suit costume.

I guess it makes sense. Its the clothes she uses to punch people and maybe throw buildings at friends. So now that the ordeal is over she can get back to where she left off and love feeling strong and not have to think about cursed child at all.

Of course, people just keep trying to harsh her mood. By insisting that she interact with the baby she wants nothing to do with.

Wonder Man: “So how about coming down to take a look at your son? He’s really an extraordinary little --”

Ms Marvel: “No! He’s not my son! I don’t want to have anything to do with that... that thing!”

Wonder Man: “Come on, Carol, my eyes may look strange, but they see perfectly well. And right now they can see that you’re frightened -- just plain old run-of-the-mill scared. And you’ve every right to be. We don’t know what’s happened to you any more than you do, but ignoring it won’t help anything. Though maybe facing up to it will. What do you say?”

Amazing how a story where a woman is impregnated against her will also has the men in her life insisting they know what’s best for her more than she does. Its really the full package.

Meanwhile, more tone whiplash. After a scene where Ms Marvel calls the baby a thing and insists she wants nothing to do with him, we get a scene of Beast carrying an armful of sports equipment to the impromptu nursery.

I don’t know why Beast is going all sports dad on this mystery baby. I know he played football in school but he’s just behaving very oddly.

Unfortunately for Beast’s dream of having a superbowl winning son-by-proxy, as a now five-year-old with a smart mouth Marcus (because he names himself here) is not really interested in the sportsball. Rather, he’d like a laser torch and some electronic components.

As fast as his physical development, his intellectual capacity has developed far more. And he promises to answer the questions the Avengers have about that once he gets the materials he asked for.

But Cap insists on some answers now and Marcus agrees. He won’t have the manual dexterity necessary for another twenty minutes anyway.

Marcus: “What would you like to know?”

Captain America: “For starters, where did you come from?”

Marcus: “My mother.”

Captain America: “Yes, we know that, but... that is, how were you conceived?”

Marcus: “Uhhhm... by my father?”

Captain America: “Well, of course, blast it! But who is your father?”

Marcus: “I am.”

I wanted to joke that, like Vision, Cap doesn’t know where babies come from. But look at this completely unhelpful brat. He’s definitely being willfully contrarian. And I don’t want any good things to happen to him but from his point of view, things would have gone a lot better had he been a lot more forthcoming.

Iron Man, whose child interaction credentials are suspect, suggests that they just give Marcus whatever he wants and then maybe he’ll behave better.

Cap doesn’t like it but he agrees.

Sending Marcus to his room probably wouldn’t work. He doesn’t have a room. And sending him to bed without dessert? Also probably wouldn’t work. We haven’t seen him eat and he’s growing so fast as to seemingly preclude any nutritional needs. On the other hand, if he’s never tasted anything, the taste of chocolate might kill him. I read that in a book.

Time for another interlude! West of Queens where Ms. Marjorie Hansley checks the mail in hopes that she won a big publishing company sweepstakes grand prize all-expense-paid trip around the world.

We don’t learn whether or not she won the sweepstakes (which I consider rude) but the universe provides in another way and gives her a no-expense-paid no-refusal trip to Jurassic Park.

Or some prehistoric dinosaur time.

Where she is likely to get eaten by an alligator.

Ms. Marjorie Hansley is dead, basically.

But also it seems that time is warped and space is bendable.

I bet this is Marcus’ fault. You don’t backsass Living Legend Captain America and not break time.

But also: he’s aging at an accelerated rate. And time is screwing up elsewhere? He’s borrowed so much time from the time bank that the bank has gone bust and there’s no bailout package for the fourth dimension!

Probably not actually. But imagine if that was the plot.

Back at the mansion, again. Wonder Man and Yellowjacket have a talk.

Wonder Man: “I guess Ms. Marvel isn’t going to show. Tell me, Hank, you’re an old married man -- how did you ever come to understand women?”

Yellowjacket: “I didn’t.”

Wonder Man: “What? But, you and Jan -- !”

Yellowjacket: “Simon, I love Jan, and I accept her for what she is, but to be honest, the day someone comes out with a book on what really makes women tick -- I’ll be the first in line with my checkbook!”

There’s just so much I could say to this exchange. Much of it very harsh towards Hank and about upcoming events. I guess this is in-character for him though. He has never put much effort into understanding his girlfriend and then wife Jan and he passes that ignorance off as women just being fundamentally inexplicable.

You’re not a good scientist, Hank. Let’s leave it at that.

And Wonder Man. Ffs, Simon. Is it really, really, so difficult to understand why a woman might not want to come meet her rape baby?

Again. Not out of character from a man stuck in the past like Simon Williams can be. But this isn’t as fun a character moment as the pool sharking.

At least they’re saying women instead of females.

Meanwhile again, there are a lot of meanwhiles in this comic. A lot of jumping around. But Dr. Donald Notthor Blake observes a now twelve-year-old Marcus sciencing up some gadget or doohickey and marvels that this 12 year old has the intellectual capacity of Einstein now.

And he also wonders that maybe this situation does not require the talents of Dr. Donald Notthor Blake but instead those of the Mighty Verymuchthor Thor.

To put it another way, I think the good doctor Blake is imagining hitting a child with a hammer.

Another meanwhile, where Cap, Beast and Hawkeye are having a tea party.

And where Hawkeye has just suggested putting Marcus in a cage.

Now that everybody isn’t going ‘squee babyyy!1!’ because he is no longer a cute infant, the backlash the other way towards violence and imprisonment is something to behold.

Iron Man comes into the... parlor? Tea room? to let Cap know they’ve been getting some prank calls on the public line. Just some nonsense about a delicatessen being robbed by Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Probably some snotty teenagers having a fun.

Meanwhile again and elsewhere, Jocasta comes to talk to Vision. Who is currently engrossed in studying a subtle energy aura around Marcus that grows as the child does. And it seems that the energy is emanating from within the weirdo and might account for his unnatural growth rate.

Jocasta offers to help with his investigation but just then Scarlet Witch returns with Yellowjacket’s latest readings on Marcus’ physiology. Just what Vision needed.

And now that Scarlet Witch is here, Vision turns to her and starts telling her about his fascinating theory about Marcus.

Feeling like quite the third wheel, Jocasta just leaves, unnoticed.

“Sensing in her husband’s well-modulated tones an excitement that would escape most others, the Scarlet Witch listens intently... so much that neither she nor the Vision even notice when Jocasta turns and, softly, leaves the room. And that, thinks the metalloid would-be Avenger, is the harshest hurt of all...”

Dammit. If she leaves the team because of this bullshit, I’m going to be nettled.

BUT ALSO: lets mock Yellowjacket.

Do you see how Scarlet Witch takes the time to understand Vision, able to sense in him moods that most others don’t? Because she loves him and took the effort to connect with him?

Maybe if you had done the emotional labor, Yellowjacket, women wouldn’t be a big impenetrable mystery to you.

But of course not. That emotional labor flows one way. Get dunked on Yellowjacket specifically and the culture that shaped him more generally.

Elsewherewhen AGAIN, but specifically half the mansion away, Ms Marvel decides that she will, after all, go see the baby she didn’t want.

And also she apologizes for snapping at Jan.

Boooooo! BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Not My Carol!

But she also waited too long. Without proper parental role models, Marcus has grown into a teenage dirtbag, baby.

Now that he’s not a baby I can say: What a punchable face. Someone should punch that face and never stop punching that face forever.

Also the narration specifically states that seeing Marcus fills Ms Marvel with “an odd sense of calm... along with an unexplainable, and undeniable, attraction.”

HEY. That’s gross, comic. I don’t care about the eventual bullshit handwavey explanation for this nonsense. That. Is. Gross.

And I mean, look at that face. Its a face that only a mother could punch. Because she’s closest.

... And Marcus is wearing his child clothes as a loincloth. Did... did nobody get him grownup clothes? Several Avengers live in this mansion. Raid someone’s closet!

Marcus also continues to be an inscrutable ass and refuses to explain anything until his science project is completed. Like how he already knew Carol’s name.

The weirdness of the situation is sufficient that even Wasp is noticing that the situation is freaky.

But before he can refuse to explain anything any further, there’s a huge explosion and Marcus complains “Not so soon! Not so soon!”

Because outside there’s a dinosaur and several UFOs attacking Avengers Mansion.

... Y’know, usually I’d be excited to see dinosaurs and UFOs living together mass hysteria but in this comic its just time wasting to fill out a page count and throw some action scenes into the mess.

I can’t even enjoy Dinosaurs and Mars Attacking the Avengers.

Of course, the Avengers rush out to go fight the dinosaur. Iron Man even punches a T. Rex in the face. But as said, I can’t enjoy this.

Okay. So there’s one bit of the pointless action that I like. While Vision phases through the ceiling to join the dinosaur punching action, Scarlet Witch runs into a medieval knight who decides that she’s obviously a sorceress and so he’s honor-bound to run her through. As ya do.

Not even stopping to think 'this is bonkers' she uses her probability-altering powers to make the knight’s own lance wrap around his face and throw him off his horse.

Which you may recognize as having a probability of ‘exactly zero that would never happen in any circumstance just admit that her power is magic, comic’ but I don’t even care because I love it when Scarlet Witch gets to Do A Thing.

It takes six pages but the knight manages to get up from that asswhupping and accosts Scarlet Witch with a sword.

He doesn’t even get a chance to get his ass kicked by Wanda again because Jocasta comes out of nowhere and uses her ever-useful eyebeams circumcise his sword.

He tries to stab her with the remaining stump while yelling he won’t be bested by women but the blade just shatters on her invincible metal bust.

Sir Cecil of Clampett then immediately surrenders and sinks to the floor muttering about how he’ll never throw porridge at the queen again if they let him live but they’re not even paying attention to him anymore.

If this is to become another bullshit love triangle, I love that Jocasta is still being a civil, great person coming to Wanda’s aid like that while conceding that Wanda can take care of herself.

I just want there to be super-heroine Avengers who are best friends. MEET MY EXTREMELY LOW BAR DEMANDS, COMIC.

But I skipped over a lot of action scene to get to the part I liked. Lets summarize. Iron Man punches a dinosaur again.

... And then some Native Americans attack Beast, Hawkeye, and Captain America.

I’m uncomfortable with this. And Cap beating them up. And with the usually delightful Beast making jokes while beating them up.

Pro-tip: you should probably never have a man dressed as an American flag punching Native Americans.

Hawkeye is smart enough not to get involved in this. Or paranoid enough. Because he’s sure that Marcus is behind this and runs off to deal with him.

In the... science room? Marcus refuses to leave before he finishes his machine, even as the roof is crumbling around them.

Wonder Man, Yellowjacket, and the Wasp fly off to investigate, Wonder Man cheerfully disobeying orders that he stay and protect Marcus.

Ms Marvel also decides to shove Dr. Donald Blake into a reinforced broom closet for his safety. Which gives Dr. Donald Blake the privacy to turn into Thor so he can fly off and join the pointless action scenes.

It becomes clear that in addition to padding out the story and adding some, any action at all, the point of these time distortion fight scenes was to split the party so that events can unfold without too many people around.

I also take some comfort in knowing that even in this comic, Wonder Man’s intrinsic Wonder Manliness shines through as he Leeroy Jenkinses into the fight and immediately gets blasted by future cannons that he didn’t notice because he was recklessly charging into things.

And then as he considers the benefits of cowardice, he gets attacked by a giant snake. Because Wonder Man.

He gets to throw the snake at a pterodactyl that was bothering Iron Man because the fundamental truth about Wonder Man is one of contrast. Bone-headed failures making more apparent when he manages to do a good job.

Thor shows up and does what Thor does best, invalidate the presence of most of the rest of the Avengers by just being so much stronger than they are.

He creates a giant tornado that sucks up the dinosaurs and UFOs and such.

Thor is the Avengers’ win button.

He also notes that there’s something weirdly familiar about Marcus.

Meanwhile, inside the mansion, Jarvis finds himself accosted by the actual fucking D’Artagnan of the Musketeers. Hahaha what.

Who threatens to stab Jarvis in the tongue if he doesn’t tell him where Rochefort is.

Yellowjacket summons a cloud of ants to distract the musketeer and then Jarvis punches him in his face.

Take that, beloved literary figure.

Meanwhile there are so, so many meanwhiles. But in the nursery lab random location, Marcus tries to convince Ms Marvel to leave while he activates the machine.

But she is struck by a strange compulsion to stay at this side no matter what.

So he makes her smell his fingers or maybe uses pink energy to zap her face and that knocks her unconscious and cover Scarlet O’Haraing in his arms.

Which is the part Hawkeye managed to come in just in time to see.

Assuming that Marcus was attacking Ms. Marvel, Hawkeye fires an exploding arrow at the machine built. Exploding it.

Marcus cries a single tear and then puts Ms. Marvel down safe and comfortable in a pile of assorted rubble and pointy shrapnel.

Hawkeye: “Okay, curly-top, put the lady down, gently!”

Marcus: “Yes. I shall... since that had been my intention all along. FOr I knew that the energies from my machine might prove dangerous to humans, and so had planned to take Ms. Marvel to a place of safety. you see, it had been my wish that no harm should befall anyone. But now, bowman, you’d be well advised to try and kill me! For if you don’t, then by the seven levels of limbo, I shall kill you!”

A smirking Hawkeye replies that sounds fair.

But then the a lightning bolt hits between them and Thor and Iron Man enter the scene.

Thor reiterates that Marcus looks familiar and demands he know the source of this deja vu. But Marcus says he’ll tell them nothing unless they kill him.

Ms. Marvel wakes up off-screen and tells Marcus to cut his shit out.

Ms. Marvel: “I don’t understand you -- but I do know you, somehow. And I sense that you’d no more take a life gratuitously than an Avenger would.”

Marcus: “Well, y-you’re wrong! So you’d best tell your comrades to defend themselves, b-because I’ll destroy anyone who gets in my way! I will!”

Ms. Marvel: “In that case, Marcus -- you can start with me.”

And then she stands between him and Iron Man, Thor, and Hawkeye.

Marcus confesses that he wasn’t going to hurt anyone. He just wanted to goad them into killing him, honest!

Because he couldn’t bear to go back to living like he has been since his father abandoned him. His father... IMMORTUS!

DUN DUN DUN!

Ms. Marvel has some concerns. Like how she’s never met Immortus and definitely never did the nasty with him.

And now the rest of this comic is going to be backstory and exposition. Just pages of Marcus explaining things, while crying a single tear.

So once upon a no-time, Immortus ruled Limbo. Not the Illyana one. Or the fun party game. But the place of no-time that we visited during the Celestial Madonna story. You’d think you’d remember that. I certainly typed enough words words words about it.

Anyway, Immortus grew lonely living in Limbo all by himself (later retconned so that he lived with a bunch of Space Phantoms but they’re all boring) so he decided he’d go cruising for some booty.

So he cruised through Earth’s time-stream and eventually found a woman, the sole survivor of a sinking ship, pulled her from the cold waters, and took her back to Limbo with him.

Marcus: “Once back in Limbo, through a combination of gratitude and the subtle manipulations of my father’s ingenious machines, the woman fell in love with him. My father then created within Limbo a pocket of change -- a bubble where time flowed naturally. It was there that I was created.”

... So to reiterate, Immortus caused a woman to fall in love with him with the aid of “subtle manipulations of... ingenious machines.”

Mind control, basically.

So if Marcus had a dad and a mom and neither of them were Carol then how did Marcus come out of her?

There’s a very... explanation for that though.

Immortus raised Marcus in a yes-time bubble so that he could grow and develop.

But there was a limit to how long a mortal could spend in Limbo before being just rubber-banded back to Earth. Which is what happened to Nameless Mrs Immortus.

And then Immortus went to help on the Wild West Adventure which led to Kang dying trying to kill Thor which led to Immortus dying because Kang is his younger self so he never existed.

Which raises unanswered questions now that we know about Marcus.

If Kang died before becoming Immortus which caused Immortus to fade away, why is Marcus even still around?

Is it because he was in a no-time zone like Limbo, unaffected by changes to the time-stream? If that’s the case, couldn’t Immortus have avoided disappearing in a puff of logic by staying home?

Its possible that after all that time alone and all the regret for his past self’s actions, he wanted to die. But that’s a rude as hell thing to pull on a son.

So Marcus was left alone and even more alone than his father had ever been. As a child of Limbo, if Marcus tried to visit Earth, it would create an irreparable disruption of the local time-stream.

But then he had an idea. Marcus got a wonderful awful idea.

If time disruption was a result of being born into Limbo, what if he were born onto Earth?

And by accelerating his birth and aging processes he could negate the time flux distortion before it became irreversible. Because it would be slowed down or confused by him being a baby.

Time would be like ‘whaaaaaat a baby?’ and get really distracted and out of character.

But it would take an exceptionally strong woman to survive gestating a nine month pregnancy in only a couple days so he searched through time and eventually decided on Ms. Marvel for her powerful combination of Kree and Human strengths.

Also, I think he just has a thing for strong blondes that should kick his ass.

A different version of Marcus, Kang’s son instead of Immortus’ but still named Marcus and still looking the same genetics are weird, later developed a crush on Carol. Her reaction to which was split between ‘wut?’ and ‘get rekt!’

But this Marcus decides to time-kidnap Carol while she was traveling to visit Scarlet Witch in New Jersey. Just takes her right out of the Quinjet and brought her to Limbo.

And thus began the wooing process. Because Marcus wanted to win her hand on his own merits and not through some skeezy mind control technology.

Marcus: “To aid my purpose, I brought others in from Earth’s time continuum. I had Shakespeare write you a sonnet, and Beethoven performed an original prelude in your honor, while Marie Antoinette herself clothed you in the finest of satins and silks. Finally, after relative weeks of such efforts -- and admittedly, with a subtle boost from Immortus’ machines -- you became mine.”

You started off with such noble? intentions of kidnapping a woman and convincing her to love you and then you ended up using mind control anyway. You can’t say he didn’t come by it honestly. Its even the same word choice of ‘subtle.’ Subtle manipulations... subtle boost. He learned it from you, dad. He learned it from watching you.

Anyway, after using a machine to convince Carol that she loved him, he used technology and magical limbo powers to implant his ‘essence’ in her “causing a condition that resembled pregnancy.”

Y’know. In the sense of having a baby growing inside her womb. That’s the resemblance.

Also, also. The process of implanting essence looks a lot like rated-g sex. And now we know what Carol’s orgasm face looks like. Thanks a lot, comics. Thanks a lot.

Anyway, having implanted his ‘essence’ inside of her he wiped her memory and sent her back to Earth a second after she had been taken.

I... don’t know why it was necessary that she have her memory wiped. You’d think that to prevent a lot of anxiety and fear, you’d want her to know that her boyfriend would be popping out of her in a couple days.

The memory wipe and the mention that he totally used machines to make her love him make this one sketchy story. Which, do note, he’s saying right in front of Thor, Iron Man, and Hawkeye.

Who are all nodding and going ‘yeah that sounds like your classic love story right there. Like Beauty and the Beast.’ Because they are fools.

Marcus: “Once ‘reborn,’ I knew that as my artificially accelerated growth progressed, the Limbo effect would become stronger. But I had hoped to build a machine to negate the effect before I reached full maturity -- and the effect became permanent. Then, I could have lived among you, using my knowledge of time and history to better the human race. but when my machine was destroyed, I knew there was no time to build another before the Limbo effect became fixed. Therefore, since I cannot and will not cause the destruction of a world just to realize a dream, my options became either to return to Limbo, living in solemn, solitary hell unto infinity... or else goad you Avengers into killing me, and thus sparing me. Now, I have no options...”

This again raises the specter of why didn’t he just let Carol keep her memories. She could have gone up to Iron Man, Yellowjacket, or Beast and said ‘hey time is going to start breaking, I need you to build a machine. No time to explain, I met a guy and I’m going to give birth to him soon. I SAID NO TIME TO EXPLAIN BUILD FOR ME, WRENCH FOOLS.’

Getting a head start on the machine would have erased some of the race against time aspect.

When Hawkeye asks why he didn’t just tell them any of this, Marcus claims that they never would have trusted the son of one of the Avengers’ oldest enemies.

But Immortus has been more a weird, helpful weirdo than an enemy when you factor in that his first appearance was retconned out of existence by Enchantress. They’ve only ever known him as the guy that helps them fight Kang. Who, in fairness, is one of their oldest enemies.

But Carol decided or perhaps ‘decided’ that Marcus won’t be alone.

Ms Marvel: “I mean that while I still don’t know what I felt for you in Limbo, some of that feeling still lingers. And that, combined with the fact that by some bizarre logic, you are my ‘child’ -- makes me feel closer to you than I’ve felt to anyone in a long, long time. And I think that just might be a relationship worth giving a chance. So I’m returning to Limbo with you.”

Which might be a sweet sentiment minus the fact that the lingering sentiment she feels was mind control and the pseudo-incestual vibe to this whole relationship and MINUS THE FACT THAT EARTH PEOPLE CAN ONLY BE ON LIMBO FOR A LIMITED TIME BEFORE BEING YANKED BACK TO EARTH AS PREVIOUSLY ESTABLISHED.

So, no. Nothing about this is a sweet sentiment. Its just layers of horrible.

Iron Man questions if Carol is really sure about what she’s doing and she tells him “not entirely” but she gonna do it anyway. Which at the very least is very Carol Danvers. She tells him to say goodbye to the others.

And then Thor hammerwhirls Marcus and Carol to Limbo. Because he can do that. Remember? He can open space-time rifts by spinning Mjolnir fast enough?

Once Marcus is hammerwhirled off of Earth all of the various time weirderies throughout the mansion vanish, leaving the Avengers who were fighting them perplexed.

And back in the nursery/lab/whatever Hawkeye laments that maybe if he hadn’t destroyed Marcus’ machine none of this would have happened.

Hawkeye: “I can’t help it, Shell-head. I just feel rotten. If I hadn’t destroyed Marcus’ machine --”

Iron Man: “-- Maybe things would have happened the same way, Hawkeye. There’s no way of knowing. We’ve just got to believe that everything worked out for the best.”

Hawkeye: “Yeah, I guess you’re right. That’s all we can do. Believe... and hope that Ms. Marvel lives happily ever after.”

Spoiler: She does not.

So, uh. Yeah. That was Avengers #200.

What does one even say about something like that?

How does something with so many otherwise decent writers turn out like this?

Jim Shooter, George Perez, Bob Layton, and David Michelinie are all credited with writing the plot.

But it seems nobody remembers whose idea this was.

The usual Avengers writer at that time was David Michelinie and he attributes the poor quality of the issue to last minute rewrites and being written by a committee.

David Michelinie: “It’s true that that story originally had a different ending, one suggested by Bob Layton. I believe it involved an alien race (the Kree?) which had reached the limits of its evolutionary possibilities. By generating an alien/human hybrid (impregnating Carol with an alien seed), a new evolutionary path could be created and the dead end could have been circumvented. However, after that storyline had been set up and Avengers #200 plotted, a story came out in another title which almost exactly duplicated the story we had scheduled for Avengers #200. So a last minute alternative was hammered together (hence the plot credit for four different people on that issue) and was hastily drawn and scripted to meet extremely tight deadlines. I don’t remember why we sent Carol Danvers off with Marcus, and out of the Avengers, but I assume it was something that was put together in that marathon plot session.”

The comic that duplicated the original proposed #200 probably would have been What If? #20: What If the Avengers had Fought the Kree-Skrull War Without Rick Jones? Wherein the Supreme Intelligence fuses with Rick Jones’ corpse to become a new being.

In the sense of creating a Kree/Human hybrid, I guess it was stepping on #200′s toes. Although Carol is already a Kree/Human hybrid anyway so. Whatever.

Artist George Perez says in his book:

George Perez: “I don’t remember if it was Dave or Jim who did the Carol Danvers pregnancy story. I believe by the time it was printed it was by four different writers or something. That was probably not the most shining hour for the character, but I liked the idea that they had the story that I really love, which was kind of a precursor to what I would end up doing in Crisis [on Infinite Earths], stuff where you could draw anything happening from various time zones. Like issue 200 of the Avengers, I got to draw a dinosaur attacking Avengers Mansion, with a biplane flying [by]. All this great stuff I eventually got to do with Crisis on Infinite Earths, I got to do with the Avengers.”

As for Jim Shooter, he weirdly both disavows any knowledge of how this happened and also takes full credit.

Jim Shooter: “I found my copy of Avengers #200. I read it. I agree with the consensus, it’s heinous. But, I don’t remember much about how it got that way.

I am credited not only as Editor in Chief but as one of the co-plotters. However, I didn’t see anything in the book that jogged my memory. No bits that I remember suggesting. No corrections of the sort I might have made to a plot passed before me.

But I did see many things I would have changed if I’d seen the plot. For instance, leaving aside the Ms. Marvel mess for the nonce: Iron Man thinks it’s okay for the weird, mysterious child to be given a “laser torch” and electronic equipment so he can build a machine. What?! As the massive machine is being assembled, no one bothers to question what it is or does. What?! Trouble ensues. No kidding, really? Good grief.

At that time, I didn’t approve plots. Editors did. I can think of no reason that plot would have been passed before me. I don’t remember participating in a plotting session. David Michelinie lived far away and seldom came to the office. He and Bob Layton plotted books together mostly over the phone, then Dave wrote them up and presented them to the editor. I don’t know to what extent George Perez was involved. George often added bits and scenes, or made small changes to stories he was drawing, so possibly that is why he was given a plot credit. Usually writers didn’t mind George’s modifications because they were generally pretty good.

Generally, the first time I saw a book was when the finished pages were given to me to sign off on before they were sent to Chemical Color, the separators. There were exceptions, of course, books with which I was more involved. I don’t think this was one of them. But, possibly I made some suggestions that garnered me a ‘co-plotter’ credit, and if so, what was I thinking?

And, I guess I signed off on this book.

I regret it.

But, in those days, in any case, the buck stopped at my desk. I take full responsibility. I screwed up. My judgement failed, or maybe I wasn’t paying enough attention. Sorry. Avengers #200 is a travesty.”

I’m not here to unravel this mystery or cast blame. Although I blame everyone, really.

Shooter is right that the buck stopped at him and he said yeah sure buck go on ahead. Good on him for taking that blame.

Was Avengers #200 the worst story in Avengers history?

I don’t know. I can’t rightly say. I’ve only covered 200 out of... somewhere over 500.

Its not the worst written Avengers story. That would probably be the Crossing crossover. So convoluted and impenetrable, nobody is quite sure what order the issues should be read in.

It might not even be the most offensive. Avengers #33 tried to say that racism is made up by communists.

Its definitely a contender.

Made worse that nobody involved seemed to realize what message they were putting out, which judging by some comments I’ve seen was just unblinkingly accepted by children who read this back in the day.

But here’s the thing. Four different people had enough input to get a co-plotter credit and not one of them went ‘maybe we shouldn’t.’

You can blame the writing by committee for the uneven quality and weird tonal whiplash but you can’t blame it for the central problem where Ms Marvel is raped and impregnated against her will and against her very clearly stated desire not to have children.

That was the foundation of this entire thing.

Even before the story was changed, it was going to be about Carol being impregnated mysteriously. The only thing that was changed was the set dressing. Instead of the Supreme Intelligence and the Kree, it was changed to Immortus’ son.

Because this was a milestone celebration and the important thing here was that a long-time Avengers enemy be behind it.

(Its not even a good milestone celebration. Whose story is this really? Its not really Carol’s. Things happen to her and then she gets a sendoff that would make Doctor Who say ‘whoa, too far.’ It doesn’t celebrate her as a hero. It doesn’t celebrate any of the other Avengers and their history. This is a story about Marcus? And who the fuck is Marcus? The previously unmentioned story of a barely recurring Avengers frenemy. Avengers 100 had EVERY AVENGER. They were badly utilized but thats how you do a milestone.)

There’s no reason to believe that the setup pre-rewrites was going to be any different. Ms Marvel suddenly coming down with a bad case of three-day pregnancy while being alarmed and terrified by what was happening.

There are stories that are bad because of rewrites. And then there are stories that would have been bad from the very conception.

And this would have been one of them.

Pun unintended.

No matter how well-written Avengers #200 was. It would always have been the story where Carol Danvers was written out.

Maybe she wouldn’t have headed off into Limbo at the end because of lingering mind-control affection for her rapist/son but I feel it likely she still would have left the team. Probably gone into space to raise her Kreeman baby.

Heinous and travesty are right.

Could this story have been salvaged?

Like I said, the core concept was Ms Marvel getting mysteriously pregnant. They moved the tombstones but didn’t move the bodies. You’d have to get entirely away from that to find something worth telling.

You could do something with the time weirdery that lets the Avengers punch dinosaurs and maybe relive some old enemies. That could be a way to do a milestone issue. Harkening back without literally just reprinting old panels. Right, AVENGERS 150??

You could have done the pregnancy thing is Carol was an active and willing participant and didn’t have her mind wiped but it still would have felt gross. Because you had her loudly announce her opinion that punching people was more important than motherhood to her.

Do you see, various people who worked on this book, that by having her say that and then immediately become pregnant that it kind of feels vindictive? Punishing her for the words you put in her mouth? And that anything that comes after that will be tainted by that?

Also, mysterious pregnancy plots are usually bad. The only one I can think of that wasn’t was the Spider-Woman plot and the only mystery was that she wouldn’t tell people that she just got a sperm donor so she could make them think that Carol was the father somehow. And its still not great that someone’s thought was ‘what surprising twist can I do with this female character after a time skip? PREGNANCY!’

So was Avengers #200 salvageable? God no. Some of the interpersonal interaction bits were okay. But the actual plot itself was bad, bad, bad. I couldn’t even enjoy the time weirdery because it was disembodied from the plot and was time wasting action scenes and to split the party.

Iron Man punched a T. Rex. TWICE.

I should be gushing about that. I should never stop gushing about it. But it does nothing for me.

Carol Danvers will return... In Avengers Annual #10, angry as hell.

Follow @essential-avengers. Because I will cover Avengers Annual #10 wherein Carol Danvers is angry as hell.

#Avengers #Ms Marvel #Marcus Immortus #the Vision #Scarlet Witch #essential avengers #Wonder Man #Captain America #Iron Man #Thor #Beast #Hawkeye #the Wasp #Yellowjacket #Jocasta #Jarvis #Essential marvel liveblogging #And now its finally behind me

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