The Avenging Hour: Recent Episodes
Jason & John
Jason and John look at the Avengers, tracing the evolution of the team from its origins in 1963 up to the present! There will be synopses of issues, details, nit picking, unbridled joy, excessive curmudgeonly complaining and general tomfoolery. Plus, Jason makes fun of the Collector! Find us on Instagram at The Avenging Hour!
We're looking at two one shots this week...a Marvel Handbook of villains who escaped during the first storyline of New Avengers and a Young Avengers special that gives us more background on our heroes.
Ugh. Bad news: Its more of the Sentry storyline. Good news: The storyline ends this issue. Woo hoo!
We're back with the New Avengers with the first two parts of a story that focuses on The Sentry! Woooo! Imagine our excitement!
We're back to the Young Avengers, where we find out an important secret about Patriot and the team faces off against Mr. Hyde!
The team is in the Savage Land, where they induct the oddest member to ever join....Wolverine! It makes no sense, but we don't need logic when we have momentum! Also, evil SHIELD agents and more mysterious figures lurking in shadow!
SPOILER WARNING: About 8 minutes in, Jason spoils a plot point from the first trade of Matt Fraction's Batman run. Just FYI! I know we spoil comics all the time (its kind of what we do) but they're usually MUCH older than that.
We continue with New Avengers, continuing to agree that Bendis is doing a better job than we thought, but not as good as we'd hoped after reading the first two issues. What arouses our ire and our appreciation? Listen in to find out!
We're finally here! We begin Bendis' run on New Avengers and we have Mike from the Nerdcave with us again to help us through them! There's two good issues here as the heroes try to stop the villains from breaking out of the Raft!
And be sure to check out Mike's amazing work at TheNerdCaveVideos (@thenerdcavevideos) | TikTok. It's well worth your time!!
Its an episode where we spend more time not talking about the Avengers then we do talking about the issues! The issues aren't bad, they're just mostly fighting, so we spend time talking about Gerry Conway and Atlas Seaborn and all kinds of comics related topics!
We continue with Young Avengers, as we are reintroduced to the Vision, find out that Cassie Lang is now a superhero, and Kang drops by to clean up the mess he created.
We're getting so close to New Avengers, but first we have one more series before the team reformed, and that's the first storyline in Young Avengers, which introduces some amazing new characters. Here we meet characters like Asgardian (who?), Hulkling, Patriot and Kate Bishop and we see more of perennial Avengers villain Kang!
We finish up the GLA miniseries this week with more death, a surprise villain appearance and the heroes manage to defeat a villain that's given the main team a lot of trouble in the past!
We're back in current continuity with the first two issues of the GLA miniseries from 2005! We learn more about the team, which loses some members and gains some members, as they try to step in to fill the void left by the absence of the Avengers after Disassembled!
We finish up the second series of Earth's Mightiest Heroes, where the Avengers face their most fearsome villains...the Circus of Crime!
We continue through Earth's Mightiest Heroes II, coming to perhaps the most nonsensical plotline in Avengers history, the introduction of Yellowjacket! Joe Casey does his best to force some logic on this fever dream, but at least he keeps the best part of it...the Circus of Crime!
Its issues 3-4 of Earth's Mightiest Heroes II, as we see the team fight AIM and some Adaptoids and we begin to see the first cracks in Hank Pym's facade.
We're back with Joe Casey's follow up to Earth's Mightiest Heroes, this time looking at the issues where Hank Pym had his first mental breakdown and became Yellowjacket! Joe Casey does his level best to make that plotline make sense, but in the meantime, he adds in some other plots, including one involving the Super-Adaptoid!
We finish off the miniseries this week as Cap's Kooky Quartet is formed! And we ask, who was this miniseries for? Plus, we talk about the Dark Phoenix Saga, which is definitely Avengers related!
We continue talking about the Earth's Mightiest Heroes series, as we move toward the big fight between Cap and Zemo and the changing of the guard.
We continue our look at Joe Casey's Avengers: Year One project, and we also talk about Wonder Man and John shows he's a pretentious prat. Listen along!
We begin to discuss a limited series this week! Fresh off the success of X-Men: Children of the Atom, Joe Casey comes to the Avengers and gives us a story during the first year and change of the original 1963 title. These two issues cover issues 1-5 of the original Stan Lee/Jack Kirby run!
We skip a few years into the future to discuss the What If that reimagined Avengers Disassembled if the Scarlet Witch hadn't acted alone. We then discuss why we won't be discussing Avengers AAFES in detail on the podcast.
This week we're talking about the Avengers: Finale, which tries to put a bow on Avengers Disassembled and then we take a quick stroll through everything we read during Volume of the Avengers!
We finish Avengers Disassembled this week, as the team is destroyed. Yeah, yeah, I know they've done that trick before, but this time they mean it!
Well, we couldn't put it off any longer: this week we start the Bendis run on Avengers! But we needed some help, so we called in special guest Mike from The Nerdcave (TheNerdCaveVideos (@thenerdcavevideos) | TikTok) to help us begin Avengers Disassembled, where everything you know about the Avengers is going to change!
Its the end of the Avengers/Thunderbolts crossover but will either team, or the Earth itself, survive it? (Spoiler alert: Yes, the Earth survives.)
The Avengers/Thunderbolts storyline continues as the Thunderbolts roust the Wizard and Cobalt man joins their ranks! Or does he?
It's time for a crossover, before the team is destroyed! The Avengers and the Thunderbolts get together to tell a tale about trust and betrayal! We start off with the Avengers inserting one of their own members into the Thunderbolts to figure out what that team has planned.
This episode we're doing an interview with Kurt Busiek! He wasn't able to come on the show in person, but he was so kind to answer a ridiculous number of questions and in some detail via email, and so Jason is going to play him, as we discuss his time on the Avengers!
The Once an Invader story ends, and Jason Lady, author of numerous books for the young (and young at heart) joins us to discuss them.
Find out all about Jason Lady's work at Jason R. Lady- Author of fantasy and sci-fi for young readers!
The Lionheart of Avalon story ends with a new Captain Britain on the team, and then we begin Austen's second (and last) storyline, which introduces a new Invaders team!
The Lionheart of Avalon story continues, as Kelsey Leigh is given the powers of Captain Britain to avenge her death. But there are some unintended consequences for her and what is going on with Thunderball from the Wrecking Crew.
He's here! Chuck Austen comes on as the new writer for a short stint, and he's bringing a whole new Captain Britain with him! The Avengers fight the Wrecking Crew in London and a civilian dies!
It's another Avengers novel, this one written not only be someone who had read Avengers comics but even wrote them! David Michelinie, who wrote some great Avengers comics, gives us a longer and much more interesting novel, that doesn't quite gel, but has some great scenes and some ideas I wish had been explored more.
We're doing the first Avengers novel, written by comic veteran Otto Binder...who may be a comics veteran but perhaps had never read an Avengers comic in his life. It is a very weird thing.
We're taking a break from our normally scheduled program to do a special episode focusing on an Avengers focused issue of the 1970's Marvel fab club magazine FOOM! It includes interviews with Avengers characters both fictional and real (Jarvis and Steve Englehart) and lots of tidbits that give a feeling of what Marvel was like in the early 1970's.
The end of the Search for She-Hulk and the last Johns issue, where an Avenger dies, in one of the most confusing and confounding deaths in all Avengers lore.
We continue The Search for She-Hulk, including the return of Hawkeye to the team, and discuss the decompressed storytelling of this era.
We start with a Hank and Jan one off issue, which contained what was, at the time, an incredibly controversial sex scene, and then we begin The Search for She-Hulk, the last of Johns' multi issue storylines!
It's the end of the Red Zone, as the team fights the villain behind the entire affair and stop the cloud of death from continuing to spread across the country!
Red Zone continues as the Avengers deal with what this deadly virus is, why it was created and who it targeted. We also learn the true identity of Dell Rusk and the She-Hulk goes savage!
It's the beginning of Geoff Johns' biggest storyline, The Red Zone! A mysterious cloud of red mist, which kills those it touches, appears in South Dakota, and it is spreading! The Avengers arrive to figure out what the cloud is, where it came from, and how to stop it!
This week we get the final part of a three-part storyline that features Captain America, Thor and Iron Man that sees Thor leaving the team for a long time, and then we get a Falcon spotlight and that also gives us a lot of time with Henry Peter Gyrich.
We finally get the official lineup for the team and a new (old) security liaison, and then an issue that focuses on Ant-Man and the Jack of Hearts! Geoff Johns is offering up some great character moments so come along and enjoy!
We finish the World Trust storyline, as the team takes on Scorpio, and rescues the In-Betweener! And Thor is back!
Now we welcome Geoff Johns to the regular title, as he begins his run with a story featuring a brand new Scorpio! Cities disappear, long gone Avengers return to the team and Johns writes a great Namor!
We welcome Geoff Johns to the Marvel Universe with this tangentially related (but Avengers branded) four issue series about the Vision! He gets his mind wiped by a new villain from World War II and has to seek our Phineas Horton's descendant for help. Meet new characters that will never appear again in the Marvel Universe.
Its the end of the first Ultimates miniseries...but is it also the end of the Ultimates (the use of the word 'first' is probably a clue)? The team goes up against Nazi aliens, who are Skrulls but with the serial numbers filed off, and it gets nasty!
The Ultimates are now dealing with the aftermath of the Hulk attack and the aftermath of Hank's attack on Jan! So new characters are introduced and a new threat arises!
The Ultimates continues, with even more cynicism, but hey, the books are beautiful to look at! And if you like this series, please, write us and tell us why. Defend your fandom!
Its the introduction of the Avengers to the Ultimate Universe, called The Ultimates!! What if The Avengers, but as reimagined by one of the most cynical comic book writers in the business? The issues are problematic, but man, they are gorgeous to look at!
Its the final issue of the crossover of the century, between the JLA and the Avengers and everyone's invited...not just the heroes of both teams but all of the villains as well!
Its issue 3 of the epic JLA/Avengers crossover and there's a problem with time, as the Avengers and JLA are remembering crossovers that never happened and moving through the histories of both teams.
The JLA/Avengers crossover continues as both teams race to get the cosmic items of power first in order to win the Grandmaster's game. But if one team wins, everybody loses! And can Krona be counted on to uphold his end of the bargain if he loses?
We're hitting it about a year before it should come up in our timeline, but it made sense to do it after we finished the Kurt Busiek run on the main title...that's right, it's the four issue Avengers and JLA crossover from 2003 by Busiek and George Perez! And it's an excuse to have Jason and John talk about some DC characters! This issue is a lot of table setting, but we discuss the Justice League and a ton of DC characters and get that table setting out of the way so we can get into the exciting stuff next issue!
Daryl Lawrence of the X-Factor Files has written a book about Alpha Flight (True North, available from Barnes & Noble) and we thought we'd use that as an opportunity to talk about the crossover from the 1980's when the Avengers and Alpha Flight teamed up to save Marrina from Attuma! We saw one issue of it in Avengers #272, but there were a ton of Alpha Flight issues leading up to that one Avengers issue, and we're here to discuss them all!
You can (and should) preorder Daryl's book here: True North: A Complete Reference Guide and Analysis of Alpha Flight's First Volume by Daryl Richard Lawrence, Paperback | Barnes & Noble®
The Kang War ends at last! The heroes win (no surprise) but is Kang punished for what he has done? And what is the final fate of the Scarlet Centurion?
This episode we start with a pseudo-Astro City issue, with Kurt Busiek and Brent Anderson teaming up to tell a story together about Wonder Man and the Scarlet Witch! And then the heroes gather to fight Kang for the final time!
It's the silent issue from Nuff Said month, and then we finally get to move into the pay off for the Triune Understanding storyline!
We start with a Carol Danvers focused issue before jumping back into the Kang War with both feet!
It's a giant issue with four of the most important Avengers writers to this point and bunches of artists, most of them never having touched the team before!! Oh, and it features Ultron, but not for some time.
The Kang War kicks into high gear as we see battles being fought on multiple fronts and a surprising ally (or is he?) shows his face.
Its the 2001 annual and this year we're solving the mystery of just what is going on with Hank Pym! And we've got three Hanks to do it with! Which Hank will control all at the end?
Its the end of the Alan Davis run (sniff, sniff) as the Kang plot continues with a threat in Russia and another master villain enters the fray!
The Avengers have beaten Diablo, but now they have to face the menace of Kang and the Scarlet Centurion! Kang wants to take over the world, but only for the best of reasons!
The Avengers have a big green problem...actually a lot of big green problems when the population of an entire town are turned into Hulks! Who's behind it? Whoever it is, Silverclaw fights them alone!
Steve Epting sticks around for one more issue as Kurt Busiek surprises us all in bringing back one of the 90'siest characters to ever 90s, Bloodwraith! And then the next art team of Alan Davis and Mark Farmer arrive to help usher in a new era for the team!
After what seems like forever, we're back to the main title, with not nearly as many side trips, since the limited series are going to be pretty...limited for the remainder of this Avengers volume. We start out by checking in on the crew from Avengers: Infinity as they collide with the current Marvel crossover, Maximum Security! And then former Avengers artist Steve Epting returns to help us move some subplots forward!
Woo hoo! This week we are interviewing one of my favorite writers....Fabian Nicieza! We discuss a lot of his early work, which happens to include quite a few Avengers issues, as well as some Thunderbolts and his thoughts on the Avengers in general. He's a super nice man who was so gracious with his time and we hope you all enjoy the conversation
The end of the miniseries and the end of at least one character in the miniseries! Characters we thought were dead turn out to be alive and other characters who don't die, just fade into oblivion. Was the ending worth everything that led up to it?
It's random Eternals! It's the plant Swordsman! It's the living (?) embodiment of Death! Face it True Believer: this miniseries has it all!
We're back for more of the Celestial Quest, as things get even weirder and we wonder....is that the real Thanos?
It begins here! The eight issue Celestial Quest miniseries from epic Avengers scribe Steve Englehart, which surprisingly, features Mantis (who'd thunk it?)! If you listened to our interview with Tom Brevoort, you already know how we feel about it, but why not find out in detail?
We finish off our discussion with Tim Brevoort, getting more into Volume 3 of the Avengers and all of the miniseries that from early in that run that we've discussed on the show! As I said last week, Tom Brevoort is a prince of a man, generous with his time and his intimate knowledge of Marvel Comics. We can't thank him enough and we encourage everyone to check out any title he might be editing, as his instincts are spot on! And check out his writing at The Tom Brevoort Experience – Stuff From the Self-Indulgent World of Tom Brevoort!
If you're a fan of a Marvel comic published in the last few decades that isn't about a mutant, chances are that Tom Brevoort had a hand in it. He's Marvel's Executive Editor and Senior VP of Publishing and he stewarded the Avengers from Heroes Return to very recently. We spoke to him for so long that we had to split it into two episodes, and this week we talk about his early time in comics and some of the thinking behind Heroes Return.
Tom Brevoort is also an incredibly knowledgeable person about comics in general and very generous with his time. We can't thank him enough for his time! You can read his writing at The Tom Brevoort Experience – Stuff From the Self-Indulgent World of Tom Brevoort and even though he's now working on books with mutants in them, I'd highly recommend trying them out! His instincts for what makes good comics are exemplary!
We're finishing up the Avengers: Infinity miniseries this week, where we finally get to meet the Infinites and set this cosmic team of characters on a path to come back to Earth in time for a line wide crossover! Lucky them!
We start off an Avengers miniseries that features a great cast of Avengers, with fan favorite Roger Stern in the writer's chair! The cosmic storyline isn't great but the characterization is top notch!
Hokey smokes! We have a real live professional on the podcast this week, and an incredibly talented one at that! Alex Segura has written an Avengers story exclusively for Marvel Unlimited and we discuss it, but he has written so much more! He's written many Marvel and DC characters, plus creator owned and Archie comics! And then there's all of his novels, including Secret Identity and its newly released sequel, Alter Ego! He's got Marvel character novels, Star Wars novels and noir detective novels!
You can find out about everything he's doing at Alex Segura | Author,
We talk about the end of the Nefaria Protocols, the big Avengers/Thunderbolts crossover! And we are joined by author Jason Lady who helps us talk about these last Avengers issues by George Perez.
You can find more information about Jason Lady's books at Jason R. Lady- Author of fantasy and sci-fi for young readers!
It's the beginning of the Nefaria Protocols storyline, which begins the last storyline of George Perez's run on the title (sniff, sniff) and features so many fun characters! Besides the Avengers we have the Thunderbolts, Count Nefaria, Madame Masque, the Grim Reaper and some various other fun B villains!
We start off discussing a Patsy Walker centric annual that has some fun art and a surprise group of villains for a magic centered story. And the Avengers are kind of in it as well! And then we look at a special 1.5 issue by Roger Stern and Bruce Timm that tells an untold tale of the original team!
Its three issues by Roger Stern and Mark Bagley that team up two of the most fun Avengers (when they're together), Wonder Man and the Beast! So this must be a slam dunk, right? Well, maybe not, unless you read and loved Wonder Man's solo series.
We finish up the good tie in comic to the bad Avengers cartoon, where we see Dr. Doom and Jason's favorite villainous punching bag, the Collector!
Back in the 1990's, Fox Kids decided to follow up their successful (and good) X-Men and Spider-Man cartoons with an Avengers one. It was...not as successful. However, the comic tie in is actually good and we discuss the first half of that series in this episode!
It's the conclusion of the Death Song of Kulan Gath, as Triathlon becomes more fully a part of the team and Silverclaw joins! Is it in time to stop the end of the world?
We get a new team roster! Lots of members quit, old members return and a new member is inducted! And then we start a plotline revolving around a Conan the Barbarian villain and visit Silverclaw's home country (and her origin).
We finish up the Domination Factor crossover with the Fantastic Four, where mysteries are revealed and time travel is the name of the game!
It's a crossover with the Fantastic Four! Domination Factor is an eight-issue miniseries involving both teams and we're covering the first four parts of it this week! And we've got writer/artist Jerry Ordway back for the Avengers issues!
We finish off the big return of the Exemplars, and then we have an issue without the regular team in it, which brings the Triune Understanding back to the forefront of the plot!
This week we see the matters between Wonder Man and the Vision come to the head and then the first part of a follow up to the crossover called The Eighth Day, which introduced the Exemplars! Don't worry if you don't remember it...it wasn't an Avengers crossover and no one really remembers it.
Ultron Unlimited wraps up this episode with one of the best panels in comics, and we discuss just how amazing this storyline is!
This week we start what John considers the best storyline of the Busiek/Perez issues, a run filled with a lot of great stuff! It's Ultron Unlimited, one of the best uses of Ultron ever! Watch the Avengers fight an Ultron at his most evil and vicious!
We finish off the Jerry Ordway fill in and then we do a special Wizard issue that serves as a prelude to the next big plotline....Ultron Unlimited!!!
Loving the Kurt Busiek and George Perez issues? Well, we've got a three issue fill in that we're starting today by writer/artist Jerry Ordway! These issues guest star the Wrecking Crew, Monica Rambeau and the Black Knight! It also stars an obscure villain from the 1970's!
We take a look back at what happened while the heroes were "dead' during Heroes Reborn and we learn a lot of secrets. Characters who have been missing for years turn up and the biggest mystery surrounding Jarvis is finally solved!
We finish our tour of the MC2 universe with the alternate Avengers going to ANOTHER alternate reality to help defeat some familiar alternate foes. Then we see the team go up against some enemies from around the MC2 universe!
We're moving through the rest of the A Next title, and we're introduced to a new mysterious villain who will be plaguing the team a little later. We also find out the secret of Mainframe! And we get an updated Sons of the Serpent, because we can never get away from racists, sadly. Come join us!
The MC2 Universe continues to throw old characters we know at the Avengers as well as some new ones with connections to ones we know. A fan of Doctor Doom or Hercules? Then you're going to want to check out this episode! (Non fans should check it out too.)
We continue looking at the Avengers of the MC2 Universe, where we get the return of the original Defenders and some new members for our team!
It's time for another side trip outside the regular Avengers series, and this time we're going to a completely different universe! It's the MC2 Marvel Universe, or the Spider-Girl universe, since the entire thing is centered on her (although we won't be seeing her in this series). This universe has their own team of Avengers, and even though they call themselves the Avengers, the comic is called A Next! Come meet the new team and see some old familiar faces as well!
The Beast is back!!! And the first issue also guest stars famous comic book characters Kurt Busiek and George Perez! Then we learn more about the Triune Understanding with the return of Triathlon!
We start off this week with a giant size issue featuring the return of Hawkeye and his new pals, the Thunderbolts! We follow that up with an issue guest starring the New Warriors and one that features a new role for the Scarlet Witch!
Avengers Forever is over and we're back to more Busiek and Perez goodness! The mystery of Wonder Man is finally settled, and if you're dealing with Wonder Man, you're likely also dealing with his brother....the Grim Reaper! Plus count how many of the dead Avengers in this issue are still dead in 2024! Its not that many.
This is it....Avengers Forever ends here, with more alternate universe Avengers than you can shake a Quinjet at! See the death of Immortus! See the rebirth of Immortus! See the Supreme Intelligence get a pretty jewel! Everything gets wrapped up with huge fight scenes that Carlos Pacheco poured his heart and soul into!
We're back with more from the 1999 Avengers Forever series! We have an issue that focuses on (and does some retconning to) Kang's history and then the plot kicks back in as we prepare for the grand finale in the next episode!
The Avengers get captured, escape and are captured again when one of their own turns against them! In between all that we get a LOT of retconning of plotlines going back decades, but especially plots from the 90s. Strap in, because this is a big one!
We continue to follow our Avengers away teams through the far future and not quite as distant past as they deal with pregnant robots, hostile aliens, wild west heroes and an alien Richard Nixon! Listen along to see how these forays into the time stream resolve themselves!
We continue our look at Avengers Forever as our team of time tossed Avengers start going through time and find more teams of Avengers throughout different eras in history (and in the future)! We ask how a robot that had hair can now be bald, and also pregnant? Listen along and maybe you can answer this for us!
We're breaking into the main Avengers title to discuss a 12 issue mini-series from 1999 where Kurt Busiek rewrites Avengers history and also throws in a huge time travel plot to boot! We meet our....slightly different Avengers team in these issues, plucked from multiple points in Avengers history, as well as our villain and a former villain who becomes an ally (I'm sorry, three former villains that becomes allies)!
This week we talk about two new characters that Kurt Busiek is introducing into the book. The first is a young woman from Central America named Silverclaw and the second is a man of color who calls himself Triathlon! They're helping the Avengers take on another obscure villain, Moses Magnum!
It's the Avengers teamed with their thinly veiled DC counterparts, the Squadron Supreme! We're finally finishing up the plotline from the main title, as we see the two teams join together to fight the main villain behind this storyline, Imus Champion! Who? Go back and listen to one of our early 70's episodes and you'll hear all about him. But can he take our two teams of two Earth's Mightiest Heroes?
This week we're looking at the Avengers chapter of the Live Kree or Die crossover, which also appeared in Iron Man, Captain America and Quicksilver! What can the Avengers do when the Lunatic Legion returns, the Supreme Intelligence plots and Carol Danvers drinks all the time? Find out this episode!
It's the Avengers vs the Squadron Supreme and one of the teams is mind controlled....guess which one?! We also meet a new member of the Squadron who is NOT a thinly veiled version of a DC hero. Come join us!
This week we're finishing up the first plotline for the new series and then we have to figure out who's going to be on the team! It's time to choose a roster and the members of the team might surprise you (they almost certainly won't)!
Boom! It's now time for Volume 3, and we're thrilled to see Kurt Busiek and George Perez as our new creative team! We'll talk about how Heroes Reborn ended and then dive into a plot with every single Avenger ever, even the stupid ones! Meet the mystery villain and thrill to another alternate reality!
We've already reached the end of Volume 2 and we bid adieu to this weird collection of heroes and villains. We have one issue to clean up all the plotlines and then two parts of two different four part crossovers, including one that will never be reprinted. Join us as we close the curtain on this short divergence and next week we'll get started on Volume 3!
Walt Simonson is here and he's doing his best to try and clean up the mess he's been left! The Avengers fight the Masters of Evil, Loki plots, and its civil war amongst our heroes!
It's the end of the Liefeld era on the Avengers, as Walt Simonson gets invited back to try and clean up a mess....again. He'll do his best, but with only five issues to work with, can he put this book on a good path to bring it in for a satisfying finish?
The Avengers are ready now to deal with the Hulk! Imagine the excitement of Thor fighting the Hulk for an entire issue with no subplots! It's the issue that takes 3 minutes to read!
Heroes Reborn continues as our new team fights a new Kang and Mantis combination! It's like The Crossing, but much shorter and with no crossovers! And if you thought the Crossing was drenched in 90s, wait until you see these issues!
Volume 1 is now officially in the rearview mirror and we're talking about Heroes Reborn from 1996! We'll discuss the end of the Onslaught saga and then how we got here, where Rob Liefeld has the power to change the Avengers into the 90iest comic that ever 90ed!
Its our last special episode before we move on to Volume 2 of the Avengers, and we have not just Daryl from the X-Factor Files podcast, but his cohost Phillip as well! We always love having Daryl join us and it was such a treat to get Phillip as well! You'll want to be checking the Instagram this week, where pictures of all of the costumes will be posted.
We're almost through our retrospective of the first 33 years of the Avengers! This episode we'll discuss the annuals, giant size issues, the West Coast Avengers and all of the limited series! We also have a special guest star who introduces some of our Top 5 and Bottom 5 lists!
Welcome back to the retrospective that will never end, as we discuss the rest of the first volume of the Avengers (at least the main title) and all of the creators from the 70s to the 90s!
We're back and this week we're going to talk about the years of Roy Thomas and Steve Englehart! These two wrote a lot of Avengers comics and made a lot of changes, so come along and listen as we discuss them and their work!
Well, we've done! We've read all the Avengers issues published from 1963 through 1996, all of Volume 1! But before we move on, we're going to spend some time talking about what Volume 1 was all about....who created these issues, who was in them, what happened in them. Its going to take a few weeks, but this week we start with some trivia, and then we move on to talking about the 34 (and 1/2) issues that Stan Lee wrote!
Happy New Year! We finished all of the Avengers issues in Volume 1, so we're skipping back one year to check out this two issue limited series from Peter David and Ariel Olivetti! They're going to spin us a tale of the Avengers in a possible future...let us help you usher in the New Year!
Merry Christmas! Jason and John got up early Christmas morning to record this episode just for our fans! We're finishing up the end of Volume 1 at our 300th episode and at the end of the year! It's a miracle that would be less impressive if we actually had planned it. Come spend your holiday listening to us talk about Onslaught!
Its the wrap up to the Benedict plotline (at least until Kurt Busiek comes along to actually finish it) and the big 400th anniversary issue by new writer Mark Waid! Enjoy your tenure on the book Mr. Waid! I'm sure there's not going to be anything to come along to end it prematurely!
We're barreling toward the end of the original run and this week we discuss a crossover with the Incredible Hulk and then the beginning of the last two parter at the Mansion. Come join us!
We go from one crossover to another, as we explore First Sign, a crossover between Iron Man, Captain America, Thor and the Avengers! The team goes up against the new Zodiac who have taken over New York City!
It's the end of The Crossing! Everything comes to a head here, as the Avengers get a younger Tony Stark from an alternate reality so they can kill the current evil older Tony Stark! This will change the Marvel Universe forever...at least until Heroes Reborn.
Happy Thanksgiving! Jason and John know that we are most thankful for our amazing listeners! As a thank you, here's some extra listening for your holiday weekend....a long podcast we recorded over the summer where we talk all about the sometime-Avenger Moon Knight! We talk about every single solo series he's ever had and share which ones we think are worth reading and which you might want to avoid. Enjoy!
We're at Part V of the Crossing, and things are getting serious! We debut the new Wasp and also discuss Iron Man 324, Force Works 20 and War Machine 23.
Now we're in the thick of it! Our villains have been revealed and its a full run to the finish! This episode is a biggie, with a deep dive into Avengers 393 and recaps of War Machine 21-22, Iron Man 323 and Force Works 19.
We start out this week with a deep dive into Avengers 392, and then we recap War Machine 20, Iron Man 322 and Force Works 18. The plot of this crossover begins to come together and the action ratchets up!
We continue our delve into The Crossing! We spend most of our time on Avengers 391, while also touching on Iron Man 321 and Force Works 17. Is there an actual plot here, or just more and more issues of foreshadowing and clue dropping? Listen along to find out!
It starts here! We've teased it for the last few episodes, but now we actually start reading the giant Avengers crossover, the Crossing! This episode we touch on Iron Man 319-320 and Force Works 16, but spend most of our time going in-depth on Avengers: The Crossing, the special issue that truly kicks everything off!
We're getting closer and closer to the next big crossover, The Crossing! First we have a spotlight on Deathcry, but then it's a Crossing prelude, full of portents and foreshadowing (and hot bods in swimwear!)!
It's the Taking A.I.M. crossover with Captain America, as the team goes to an island of Adaptoids so that they can try to stop the Red Skull from getting the powers of a Cosmic Cube!
We're doing two issues that set the stage for an upcoming crossover. But who cares about that? These issues spotlight the Black Widow! Its about time! It also features the first time the Avengers go face to face with the Red Skull!
We're talking about the six-issue series, Avengers Unplugged. We'll do an overview of the series and then do a deep dive into issue #5!
The Taylor Madison plot finally comes to its conclusion! It's not been quite as long as the Gatherers, but it's been almost fourty issues (so maybe it has been as long as the Gatherers!), Then we're goings to discuss (rather quickly) the Avengers: Strikefile and then the Avengers/Ultraforce crossover!
This episode we finish up the High Evolutionary storyline and then get an entire issue that's an advertisement for the very 90's comic series Fantastic Force!
It's our new penciler, Mike Deodato! He joins just in time for Bob Harras to take two of our Avengers to see Bova at Wundagore Mountain. But how will they fare when caught between the power of Exodus and the High Evolutionary? And a Hank Pym back-up story as a bonus!
It's time to finally follow up with a subplot from 6 months ago, where Vision, Deathcry, Swordsman and Magdalene headed to the Hebrides to find out why one of the Avengers' tracking stations went done. What could have done this? And how does it relate to Deathcry? Find out in this episode!
We've got two fill in issues, focusing on Bob Harras' two favorite characters (although he doesn't write either issue), Quicksilver and Crystal! Everyone was obviously exhausted so we suffer through two spotlight issues. Enjoy!
It's the last Avengers Annual before we get to Volume 3, and it reunites Roy Thomas and John Buscema to tell a story of the Olympian Gods.
This is it! It's the end of the Gathering plotline, for honest and realsies this time! What is the final fate of Proctor? What is the final fate of Sersi? And what is the final fate of Avengers Mansion?
The absolutely for realsies final part of the Gatherers saga begins here! Who is Proctor? What are his final plans for Sersi? And can the Avengers stop him? The answers to these questions are here!
It's a two issue fill in for the title (more of these?) as a break before we finish up the Gatherers plotline! Glenn Herdling writes us two issues of Eternals and Deviants, and if that sounds exciting to you, then these issues are right up your alley! If it doesn't sound exciting to you, then you may be able to co-host this podcast with us.
This is it....the last issue of the Avengers West Coast! And we have a new writing team for this last issue! That seems odd. We'll discuss how the book goes out, then talk a little about the series as a whole and even chat about the book that is replacing this comic, Force Works! It's a milestone for the Avengers!
This issue we finish off Bloodties, doing a quick recap of X-Men 307 and then moving onto the main event and final part, Avengers 369! One Avenger will be injured and another will make a decision that will change his life forever! (Does that sound sufficiently soap opera-y?) Come join us as we finish off the crossover!
The end of the 30th anniversary celebration of the Avengers starts here, and it dovetails with the 30th celebration of the X-Men! The two teams are drawn to the island of Genosha, where the Acolytes of Magneto have brought the kidnapped Luna! But the Acolytes are having an internal power struggle of their own, and not everyone thinks the Avengers should be involved!
Its another huge anniversary issue to finish the Avengers vs Kree story, and then we have a quiet issue where the Vision plays voyeur! Even an android can punch a wall in sexual frustration!
The Avengers may have defeated the Gatherers but they're still stuck in the mountains, and now they have some fanatical Kree after them, and they want to make them pay for the destruction of their empire and the death of their leader! But the Avengers now have Deathcry on their side! Victory must be insured!
Daryl's back! Yay! He returns to give us support as we make our way through one of the worst annuals we've covered, even though it introduces the brand new character Raptor! The most popular comics creation of the 1990s! [citation needed] Join us as we discuss the last annual for the West Coast Avengers!
DARY FROM THE X-FACTOR FILES IS BACK!!! Sorry, but Jason and John are so excited to bring Daryl back as we look at the first of the 1993 annuals. In 1993, Marvel's annuals each introduced a new character, and Daryl (and his podcast) will be discussing all of them! But he was kind enough to join us to start with the Avengers Annual, where we meet Bloodwraith!
This is it! The last big milestone this title will see, and the end of their last major plotline! What will be the fate of the Lethal Legion? And an honest to goodness Avengers dies this issue, a death that will actually stick for over a decade. Who is it? Tune in and find out!
We're counting down to the end of this title, and in their last big storyline we have the return of Satannish and the Hangman! We also introduce a new Lethal Legion, full of historical figures that John doesn't agree are all necessarily on the same level of evil. Come learn who they are with us!
We are finishing this limited series this week, and we'll discuss how the fight between Terminatrix and Alioth ends, the final fate of Kang, and what about the Avengers themselves? Oh, that's right, the book doesn't care about them.
We're starting a miniseries! What if the three Avengers all-stars (Captain America, Iron Man and Thor) teamed up with the three men who temporarily replaced them (U.S. Agent, War Machine and Thunderstrike)? Of more relevance, what if that happened and the book was more interested in what was happening with Terminatrix, aka Nebula, aka Ravonna? These questions may be answered this week!
This episode we have a very special guest, Daryl, who's half of the X-Files Factor podcast! He's here to join us as we continue discussing the issues released during the 30th Anniversary celebration of the Avengers! We get an issue with a guest artist who's a fellow Minnesotan of Daryl's and then we get the end (?) of the Gatherers' storyline! Come join us!
And listen to the X-Factor Files podcast wherever you download podcasts! You can also follow them on Instagram at X-Factor Files Podcast (@xfactorfilespodcast) • Instagram photos and videos!
The mystery of Sersi deepens but we get some possible answers, and a long-standing Avengers returns to the fold in these issues, kicking off the 30th Anniversary of the title!
It's time for the Infinity Crusade, and it's invaded our Avengers title. Kind of. It serves as an excuse for us to focus on Hawkeye, Mockingbird and War Machine as they face off against one of the foes from this title's first year....kind of.
It's a three-part series that brings back the Pacific Overlords, only to destroy them and any potential they had! But hey, you also get Darkhawk and War Machine, and if that doesn't clue you in, these are books from the 1990s!
We finish up our Ultron storyline, and then we have an extra issue where Goliath fights Goliath and Mockingbird gets to show off that she knows science!
We're on the west coast for the first two parts of an Ultron story, as the killer robot comes back to destroy humanity and find a friend!
Its three big issues, as the team gets a warning from the Watcher, a visit from an Acolyte and a chance to save Arkon's homeworld!
The Gatherers plotline really picks up steam, as they try to recruit a Black Panther doppleganger, we meet new members of the team, and the Avengers recruit Lockjaw to help them in battle!
It's a trio of summer bi-weeklies with an all-new creative team, as the Avengers get pulled into a hell dimension by the all-new supernatural powers of the Grim Reaper! How well does supernatural horror work with synthezoids, deities and ages old immortals as the prey being stalked? Come find out!
It's a very special issue of the Avengers, as they celebrate a milestone issue, and a very special episode for The Avenging Hour as we welcome our first guest, the fabulous Chad Anderson of the Graymalkin Lane podcast. We talk about the Starjammers as they appear for the first time in the Avengers, and the Kree come for revenge for the death of the Supreme Intelligence! Join us and be sure to follow Graymalkin Lane wherever you get your podcasts and check him out on social media as well!
Graymalkin Lane's webpage: Graymalkin Lane the podcast | RedCircle
Graymalkin Lane on Instagram: Graymalkin Lane podcast (@graymalkin_lane) • Instagram photos and videos
Graymalkin Lane on Twitter: (1) Graymalkin Lane podcast (@GraymalkinP) / Twitter
And if you like Graymalkin Lane (and why wouldn't you?), show Chad how much you appreciate the insane amount of work he does each week and join his Patreon! It's a ridiculously low $3 a month and worth every single penny! Check it out here: Graymalkin Lane | creating a podcast where queer friends analyze 60s X-Men comics! | Patreon
We're back on the east coast with two rather low key issues. The first one brings us a focus on the Vision as he starts to regain his humanity. In the second issue, Hercules' family shows up to create havoc and set up plots that we won't see the end of for some time!
If you thought the issues that guest starred Spider-Man might be a sales gimmick, here are two issues guest starring Wolverine that are even more egregious! He's working with a small subsection of the west coast team to fight a Soviet Fantastic Four and wackiness ensues!
Here's the second annual crossover to involve an Avengers title in 1992, and we're doing the second part. The first part was in Darkhawk's annual and it ends in Iron Man's annual, but it's truly an Iron Man story from start to finish. But hear us talk about Darkhawk for the first (but not the last) time!
The Deathweb saga concludes, and someone will die! Also, did we mention that Spider-Man is guest-starring? Gotta get those sales figures up!
Galactic Storm is over, but not all of the West Coast Avengers have returned home yet. When the original Human Torch needs help to fight one of his Golden Age villains, looks like he's going to have to call on the Reserves! And when the active team returns, they're going to have to face the menace of Deathweb! But are they worse than Spider-Woman's ex-husband? They certainly don't yell as much!
After three weeks of Galactic Storm we move into another crossover! This year the Avengers annuals don't crossover with each other, but with different titles for different storylines! We tackle the east coast team this week, as they crossover with Captain America, Thor and the Fantastic Four to deal with Kang and the mysterious Nebula...er, Terminatrix!
Here's the end of Operation: Galactic Storm, as we wrap up this extended crossover with a look at the following issues:
Part 15: Captain America 400
Part 16: Avengers West Coast 82
Part 17: Quasar 34
Part 18: Wonder Man 9
Part 19: Avengers 347
Its the second month of Operation: Galactic Storm, and we again have seven issues, although we only talk about the Avengers issues in depth. Here are the parts we discuss:
Part 8: Captain America 399
Part 9: Avengers West Coast 81
Part 10: Quasar 33
Part 11: Wonder Man 8
Part 12: Avengers 346
Part 13: Iron Man 279
Part 14: Thor 446
It starts here! Operation Galactic Storm is a 19 part Avengers story that crosses over with both Avengers comics and all of the members' solo books. We're going to cover the Avengers issues in depth and give short summaries of the others so we know what's going on! This issue we talk about the first seven parts, which came out in March 1992:
Part 1: Captain America 398
Part 2: Avengers West Coast 80
Part 3: Quasar 32
Part 4: Wonder Man 7
Part 5: Avengers 345
Part 6: Iron Man 278
Part 7: Thor 445
These issues begin Bob Harras' big plot for the book, one which will go through the next 30 issues (on and off)! The Gathering starts here, as new characters are introduced and one long dead character appears to return. This sets the stage for so much of Harras' run on the book.
This week we look at a very bad fill-in issue and then it's a two parter guest starring the New Warriors and guest written by their regular writer (and former Avengers scribe) Fabian Nicieza! We'll see a new villain introduced and finally deal with the fact that Rage is a teenager!
It's the end of the Infamous Monster of Hollywood, as the Night Shift make a movie, our face-bellied demon fights the team, and Dr. Strange guest stars!
It's the first two part of Infamous Monsters of Hollywood as we see the reintroduction of the Night Shift! They have a new leader, some enhanced powers and a new demonic ally!
It's the wrap-up for the Collection Obsession, as the secret of the Brethren is revealed and we learn if the Collector is really the doddering old man that he appears to be!
New ongoing writer Bob Harras joins the title, along with new penciler Steve Epting, to bring us another six issue biweekly storyline, The Collection Obsession! Join us as we start our exploration of this story featuring Jason's favorite character, the Collector!
We finish up the Pacific Overlords plot, say goodbye to three long time team members (including one of the founders) and welcome three new team members! Then it's a fill-in issue with Arkon and Thundra!
Roy and Dann Thomas grab the reins of this title with both hands as they introduce a new villain team and begin to settle the membership. Welcome the Pacific Overlords, as well as Spider-Woman!
Its more annuals already, and this year the Avengers are going underground to help Marvel's underground villains fight the menace of the Deviants and their leader Brutus!
Larry Hama wraps up his quick tenure on the book with a two-part story featuring the opening of the new Avengers HQ and a confrontation with Dr. Doom. And Rage hits Doom in the face with a cupcake!
Larry Hama's run on the title continues, as Ngh the Unspeakable comes to Earth and tries to corrupt humans and destroy the Avengers! Meanwhile, the Tetrarchs of Entropy come to Earth and fight the Avengers because they're giant cosmic jerks! Don't know who any of these characters are? Find out in this episode! (Also, find out who's on the new team and what the new charter looks like!)
Larry Hama's run on the title continues, as Ngh the Unspeakable comes to Earth and tries to corrupt humans and destroy the Avengers! Meanwhile, the Tetrarchs of Entropy come to Earth and fight the Avengers because they're giant cosmic jerks! Don't know who any of these characters are? Find out in this episode! (Also, find out who's on the new team and what the new charter looks like!)
Larry Hama, GI Joe scribe extraordinaire, comes to the Avengers title, to introduce the Hero of Chernobyl, and to take away the Avengers US charter! What's our merry band of assembled heroes to do?
The Reaper and the Robot continues, as the team deals with the dual menaces of Ultron and the Grim Reaper! And we get a final showdown between Hawkeye and the U.S. Agent (Spoiler alert: It is not the final showdown.)!
The next West Coast Avengers epic starts here, as the team has to deal with both a zombie-fied Grim Reaper who has to kill humans to extend his undead existence, and the spine-chilling Ultron, who's got a plan to turn all humans into robots!
We return to the West Coast to see the Human Torch have a crisis of faith and to see the introduction of the Living Lightning! And then we see the Torch and Captain America in one of the odder fill-in issues in the title's history!
We finish off the Avengers Spotlight title, knocking out the end of the Hawkeye vs gang violence storyline, and then getting four issues that each focus on one of the underused Avengers: Dr. Druid, Tigra, Black Knight and Vision.
This week we take a look at the 1990 Avengers Annuals (Avengers West Coast Annual 5 and Avengers Annual 19) as they take part in a five part crossover called The Terminus Factor! We'll talk about the other three parts, as well as the non Terminus Factor stories in these annuals, of which there are many!
The Crossing Line continues, as the final fate of the terrorists is decided. Then we have the end of the story that had been winding its way through the back up stories, when the Avengers are menaced by some of the Red Skull's D-List villain flunkies! Will Machinesmith succeed in having sex with the Vision? Listen and find out!
The Crossing Line continues, and now we add in more guest-stars, the Canadianest guest stars possible, Alpha Flight! That's a lot of characters in the book now, although the ending of issue 322 provides a novel solution to how to deal with that many characters...kill them all!
It's our first bi-weekly summer Avengers epic, The Crossing Line! The Avengers have to stop a group of terrorists who have hijacked a nuclear submarine and have bad deeds planned! Guest-starring the Russian version of the Avengers, The People's Protectorate and all of the not-very-important Atlanteans you can name!
We're almost through this title, but these four issues are rough, as Hawkeye fights a street gang, U.S. Agent fights someone gunning down immigrants, and Gilgamesh fights dragons for some reason. Bear with us...the final Avengers Spotlight groups actually contains some fun issues.
The Avengers get their own graphic novel...or do they? The Vault has a breakout led by Venom, and this mostly seems to be a story about the rivalry between Venom and the Vault's warden. As the Avengers head to the Vault to stop the villains from escaping, they're joined by Freedom Force, meaning there are characters galore in these pages!
We finish off the last John Byrne storyline in the Avengers, but without John Byrne, as the Avengers face off against Nebula and the Stranger (at different times)! Spider-Man guest stars as the Avengers cosmic adventure concludes!
It's the last John Byrne story we'll be discussing in the Avengers and he's finally following up on the Nebula plot he's been teasing out for months. The Avengers go up against Nebula and her crew of intergalactic nasties and hey....is that a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man in the book? I do believe it is! We get halfway through the Avengers vs Nebula in this episode!
John Byrne is gone, but the Scarlet Witch is still evil and Immortus is still plotting. We finish up this plotline in this episode, as Roy and Dann Thomas come onboard as the new writers to try and untangle things and bring the title back to a new status quo. And we've got Magneto! Hawkeye returns! And there's a new Legion of the Unliving featuring fan-favorite character Oort the Living Comet!
With John Byrne gone, Marvel is scrambling to figure out what to do with this title, and that means two (count 'em, two) fill in issues! Woo-hoo!
It's our last John Byrne issue on the west coast, as the Avengers West Coast face off against Magneto and the Scarlet Witch!
The Scarlet Witch plotline in West Coast Avengers comes to a head...literally, as we discuss John Byrne's penultimate Avengers West Coast issue, with a very controversial page and some possible writer/artist shenanigans.
The cadre get involved directly in Acts of Vengeance, as the Mandarin and the Wizard fight the Avengers! Can our Assemblers defeat two of the premier villains in the Marvel Universe?
We're back to Avengers Spotlight already as we deal with some Acts of Vengeance crossovers, an amazing adventure with the always mirthful Madcap and the beginning of a very serious storyline where Hawkeye deals with gang violence.
Acts of Vengeance continues, and this time the Avengers West Coast have the dual task of fighting the Mole Man and homaging Fantastic Four #1! Can they do it? Tune in to find out!
Acts of Vengeance continues as the Avengers fight a few of the members of Freedom Force in Avengers Park! Is the Scarlet Witch still crazy? Are Dr. Pym and the Wasp still the stars of the show? And will any Avengers die (of course not!)?
Acts of Vengeance finally starts! And this issue we witness the death of the most important Avengers character....their mansion!
This episode we take a look at the next stack of Solo Avengers issues, where we get to discuss the death of the Orb, the confusing adventures of Starfox, everybody wanting to kill Hawkeye, the Vision going Hollywood and Rick Jones in a bathrobe.
It's the 12th part of Atlantis Attacks, and John Byrne is both writing and drawing this part of the crossover, making it a better issue than last week's! Watch the Brides of Set steal lenses, fight kraken's and take on the Avengers!
It's the first Avengers installment in Marvel's 1989 Annual crossover storyline, Atlantis Attacks! And in this installment, Atlantis....well, it attacks. Can't say the title didn't warn you!
It's the wrap up to the saga of the Scarlet Witch's kids, as Master Pandemonium destroys the Avengers while wearing her children as mittens! It may sound gross, but it looks ridiculous.
What's going on with the Scarlet Witch's children? This issue begins a two part story where we finally find out the truth about the little devils, as John Byrne continues to dismantle Wanda's life!
It's an anniversary issue and we get....no foil cover? No hologram? I guess we're not quite in the 80s yet. And is our story anniversary-issue caliber? Not really....it's a lot of talking that culminates in returning the Human Torch to the Marvel Universe...which already has a Human Torch. Well, I'm confused.
We finish up the plotline where the Scarlet Witch is taken over by....well, hopefully you can tell us by the end of the issue. Guest starring Captain America! She-Hulk! And the GREAT LAKES AVENGERS!!! WOOOOOO! This issue has everything in it...except the West Coast Avengers.
We're still in Texas, as the Scarlet Witch continues to fall under the sway of a manipulating...colony of...paramecia? I'm not entirely sure, but I'm sure it's the last time she'll ever use her powers against her former friends.
We're back on the west coast, and Wanda is still trying to get someone to fix her broken robot husband! This issue she heads to Texas to get the help of some sinister academicians. But there's something odd going on deep in the heart of Texas!
The Avengers bs Blastaar and the final fate of the Eternals! (Note: Final fate does not denote the last time the fate of the Eternals will hang in the balance, nor does it guarantee that their status within continuity will never change.)
The Avengers travel to the Negative Zone to find the Eternals and help Gilgamesh recover! (It really seems like a lot of bother just for Gilgamesh.)
If you enjoyed Marvel's Eternals movie, you may be mildly interested in this issue, which guest stars numerous members of that rather large cast. Also, is Gilgamesh really dead? That question will not be answered in this issue!
The Lava Men saga continues, and then kind of ends, as John Byrne removes the one member of the team that neither he, nor anyone else, cares about!
So, there's some extended talk about the Book of Fett to begin the episode, but by 12 minutes in we're talking comics, as we look at the invasion of the Lava Men!
We're back on the east coast, where John Byrne arrives to take over this team of heroes as well! We talk about the restructuring he does and whether it works or not, as we also start a plotline featuring one of the first group the Avengers ever fought!
Vision Quest ends (?) with an offbeat issue that introduces perhaps the greatest team of superheroes ever created at Marvel Comics....the Great Lakes Avengers! Woooooo!
VisionQuest wraps up with a brand-new Vision, a brand-new member (leader?) for the team and a huge shake up to the status quo.
Well, the Avengers have found the Vision....or what's left of him. Can they restore him? And can the Scarlet Witch's sanity survive the ordeal?
Visionquest continues, and SPOILER ALERT: The Vision is found! But will the Avengers like what they find?
Its the beginning of what is probably the most important story to ever grace the pages of the West Coast Avengers, Vision Quest! Big changes start here, changes for both the Vision and the Scarlet Witch, changes which reverberate all the way to modern comics. And John Byrne returns to the Avengers as both artist and writer! A new era starts here!
Its a fill in issue, and we've lost half our team as Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman don't have time to appear. Instead our other three team members get to meet Spider-Man villain Puma and fight the U-Foes!
It's another big group of Solo Avenger issues as we discuss Hawkeye, Moondragon, The Orb, why this title doesn't quite work and what would make it better.
Its the last issue for the new team of Avengers, only three issues after their first appearance! As this incredibly short era in Avengers history comes to a close we have to ask ourselves....are the Avengers even in this issue? Who's title is this? What's with all the guest stars?
We continue our look at the new Avengers team, as they take on the menace of Super Nova! Or do they? Wait....is this a Quasar book now?
We're finally getting a chance to see our new Avengers team in action and they're menaced by....floating brains? Will these five Avengers manage to survive?
We're back in Solo Avengers territory with the next five issues, featuring stories with Hawkeye, Hercules, Wonder Man, She-Hulk and more!
Its an anniversary issue and we get a team of Avengers again! It may be the weirdest and most temporary team that this title has ever seen, but hey, you take what you get! Join us as we explore the five new members of the team, discuss why they might not make much sense, and finish off our issues that cross over with Inferno!
Inferno continues in the Avengers title, and we're starting to reform the team! Or are we? Because now we have the Captain teaming up with half of the Fantastic Four to fight a kid in a suit of armor and an egg! That seems odd. Join us as we try to figure all of this out!
Hey hey, its the East Coast Avengers, a team we haven't seen for quite some time. But wait, didn't this team disband? I guess that's why this issue is focused on the last member of the team....Jarvis! But can Jarvis handle the X-Men crossover Inferno on his own? Listen to this episode and find out!
We've finally made our way back to both the east coast team (what's left of it) and to the Evolutionary War! Watch the war end, as well as the lives of two Avengers! Thrill to the Beast's hay fever! Gasp at the casual disregard for life the Avengers display! Swoon at the sight of Hercules' belly button!
Its another clump of Solo Avengers issues! There's more Hawkeye shenanigans, as well as solo turns for such fan favorites as Henry Pym and Dr. Druid! Plus, guest stars like Silver Sable and Le Peregrine (soon to get his own movie in the MCU)! (Ok, not really, but you have to imagine it's only a matter of time.)
Its the last issue of West Coast Avengers we're covering for awhile, and here comes a fill in creative team! But it's not a fill in issue, as we're finally going to conclude the Phantom Rider plotline that has been going on for almost two years! Plus, a Thor crossover (kind of) and Jason's favorite son of a devil guest stars!
This episode sees a new writer, but more importantly, it sees an actually enjoyable story starring The Night Shift! Woooooo! Come join your hosts as they unironically appreciate an issue.
Its two issues this week, but one is a fill in, so it doesn't count. In the other episode, we see a long dead Avengers return (kind of) and the end of the Mantis plot, which has barely even begun.
Its Annual time, and this Annual is part of a giant crossover, The Evolutionary War! What is that? What does it mean? And how do the West Coast Avengers fit in? (Awkwardly, as it turns out.) Join us as we discuss this issue, with two special guest stars, one we haven't seen for a while, and one we haven't seen for decades!
Jason and John tackle a new series, a series that doesn't mean a lot to the Avengers as a whole, so we're going to be bunching oodles of issues together! We have lots of Hawkeye to discuss, some very odd backup stories and lots of Mark's Remarks!
Uh-oh! Marriages and teams begin to fall apart as the West Coast Avengers find themselves at odds with each other. And whose the mysterious woman who can hold the entire team at bay all by herself? Well, since it's a Steve Englehart comic, you can probably guess.
In this episode we answer the question....is Hank Pym's first wife really dead? And can Pym hold his own against the rest of the team? And what the &$@# is going on with Moon Knight and Khonshu?
The Whackos invade Hungary to find Hank Pym's first dead wife! Or is she dead? And who's that wearing Doctor Doom's clothes? And why is Quicksilver now a villain? So many questions and a few answers in this episode!
Dr. Pym was married before the Wasp, but that first wife died.....or did she? The West Coast Avengers go to Hungary to find out in this episode!
What if the West Coast Avengers fought a yeti while Mockingbird tried to beat a civilian to death? Jason and John explore that question in this episode!
We're back on the west coast! We just saw the east cast team have so many problems that the entire team disintegrated and now there is no east coast team! But surely the same thing can't happen to the wacky west coast team! Well, not quite, but this team is in for some rough times, and those times start here as the Phantom Rider shows up in the present!
It might have seemed like we would never get here, but we finally have....the Avengers are no more! How does the team fall apart? Will Nebula succeed? Will Druid get all of his dreams fulfilled? We're wrapping up this storyline!
Yeah yeah yeah, its more of Druid being a jerk and the Kangs being all timey-wimey and who cares because we have an actual listener email and a question! Woo-hoo! Someone listens! Say hello to our new favorite person, Paddy Salzer! (Psst, we'll love you too if you write to us!)
Learn the fate of Monica Rambeau! See the team get a new leader! But who's really leading the team?
We come to the halfway point of the fall of the Avengers, as the Marrina plot gets wrapped up. But that's just part of the team's worries, as Dr. Druid continues to be sinister and another team member disappears! More importantly, WE'VE FIXED OUR AUDIO ISSUE! Translated, John is an idiot and realized he forgot to flip a switch. Oy. Anyone want to produce a podcast?
The Fall of the Avengers continues as the team has to figure out what to do about Marrina...can they save her or must they resort to a more permanent solution? Dr. Druid continues to be a creep as the team continues to fracture.
This is it! The countdown to Avengers 300 starts here, and what better way to celebrate a milestone than to destroy the entire team! The dissolution of Earth's Mightiest Heroes begins here, starting with the monstering (?) of Marrina!
This week Jason and John finish up the Zodiac storyline in the West Coast Avengers and then find out what happens when you let Al Milgrom draw AND write a fill in issue for the book! The results are not pretty.
Hey hey! We're back with another slightly echoing episode where we continue the West Coast Avengers fighting the Zodiac! Will this conflict ever end? Yes, yes it will. But not this week.
Its the next part of the Whacko's vs Zodiac and we have naked Nick Fury, Hawkeye alone and betrayal at the Compound! Join us, won't you?
And we have fixed the audio issue....but not in time for this episode! Give us a few more weeks of slightly echoing podcasts and we'll be back to a much crispier sound!
We're back on the West Coast this week, as the Whackos tangle with an all new robot Zodiac! We're having some minor audio issues, but it should be quite listenable.
Jason and John finish off their discussion of the Heavy Metal storyline, which officially ends the Roger Stern era of the title and sets the stage for the disintegration of the team over the next seven months of stories. It also gives us our first glimpse of the non-Captain America, features the further eroding of Captain Marvel's character and an incredibly anti-climactic ending. Woo-hoo! We should sold this issue of comics!
Jason and John tackle two issues of the Heavy Metal storyline this week, discussing roadside tourist attraction, Barney Google and Snuffy Smith cosplay and all kinds of robot shenanigans!
This issue features the last credit for Roger Stern on the Avengers (at least in this era) and continues the fight between the Avengers and a bunch of robots. Woo-hoo!
Its the end of an era, as we talk about the last Roger Stern plotline....although he didn't script it. Is there a difference? There certainly is! We'll be talking about robots, ineffectual leaders and sinister goatees!
Its Annual Time, and for the second year in a row the East and West Coast teams meet up and this time they're trying to rescue Death! Both teams die, they see dead people and many of them die again!
We're finally back on the West Coast to check in on the Whackos and we spend most of our time with Wonder Man. Joy!
This week Jason and John examine the last two issues of this limited series, and foreshadow some of the problems between Roger Stern and Marvel that will foreshadow changes coming up in the main title.
Its time for a limited series! As it says in the title, this limited series sees the Avengers fighting the X-Men, and all because Magneto is a big fat jerk. Or is he? We'll find out by the time these four issues are over....or will we?
John and Jason finish up the saga of the Avengers vs the Gods of Olympus with the last two issues of that storyline! Join us as we discuss all of the punching, zapping and wrestling ensue!
This episode we continue the story of the Avengers against the Gods of Olympus, as the team escapes Hades, makes some allies and finally comes face to face with Zeus himself!
Join John and Jason as the battle between the Avengers and the Gods of Olympus continues! This issue Namor gets involved, Cereberus turns out to just be a big dumb brute in armor and the Avengers have to escape Pluto and all the hordes of Hades!
We're back in the main title, starting a new storyline that John likes and Jason dislikes. (Of course, John is right, and the story rocks, and since he writes these descriptions and Jason doesn't, he gets the last word!) The Avengers deal with the repercussions of Hercules' injuries at the hands of the Masters of Evil starting here!
This issue is mostly a clip show of Jarvis' tenure with the team, so after breezing through it, Jason and John have a thought experiment where they create new Avengers teams for specific needs.
Woo-hoo! Its the last issue (we promise this time) of the Space-Time Caper in the West Coast Avengers as the team finally confronts Dominus. Join Jason and John as they phallic spacecraft, bad fashion and mental illness as a superpower.
Its the final chapter of the Space-Time saga, only it kind of isn't because we'll still be talking about it next week! But this week we get to see Mockingbird face the Phantom Rider and the team is reunited! Come join us as we finally stop skipping throughout the time stream and get ready to return to the present day....1987!
Here we go with another installment in the West Coast Avengers epic, Lost in Space-Time! We're nearing the finish, as Mockingbird strikes back at the Phantom Rider, the team in ancient Egypt tries desperately to get home, and Dr. Pym starts to cosplay! Come along and join the fun!
Jason and John return to the main title to discuss new leadership for the team, and to wonder why it takes an entire issue to come to a conclusion that seemed pretty obvious from the start!
The West Coast Avengers may be the ones lost in Space Time, but its Jason and John who feel like they're trapped in an anomaly and can't get home! Will this storyline ever end? At least this issue we get a cool cover, a new Dr. Pym and the introduction of Moon Knight!
We're in it now! Jason and John continue to chronicle the West Coast Avengers adventure through space-time, as Wonder Man continues to be a jerk, Hawkeye almost dies and the Phantom Rider plot gets really icky. Come join us!
Jason and John are diving straight into the multi-part West Coast Avengers Epic where the team is split across time and space! Come with us to the Old West, where we'll meet 1870's style supervillains, a living totem pole and a crazy rannie who might hurt the team more than they've ever been hurt before!
Jason and John return to the main Avengers title to discuss the aftermath of Under Siege. Who is Dr. Druid and is his main power cape-fighting? How tall is Tyrak? And if Hercules is brain dead, how can you tell? Come join us, and follow us on FB and Instagram at Avenging Hour!
Jason and John are back! After a short two year break they return to pick up where they left off talking about Avengers comics, all the way from the first one in 1963 to the current day! We're in 1987 and back on the left coast to begin the most epic plotline from the early days of the West Coast team! We'll also discuss Marvel's criminally underrated best pulp villain, whether Hawkeye can read and just how many suicide notes are too many. Come join us!
Here it is....the last episode of the first season of Year One! Much to Jason's dismay, its our last Fantastic Four episode, and our first one to star another Marvel character, as the foursome encounter....the Hulk! We end our look at this first year with some thrills and big fight scenes!
It's two, two stories in one issue, as the Fantastic Four meet The Impossible Man, and if that's not enough excitement for you, they also.....read some mail? Well, they can't all be nail biters true believers!
It's the Fantastic Four vs Doctor Doom....again! But this time we get Stan Lee and Jack Kirby as part of the story! So it's....better?
Is it a superhero comic or a horror comic? It may be difficult to tell when the FF face their most grotesque villain ever....the Puppet Master! Arguably Kirby's creepiest design in the first year of the comic, we meet this arch villain, and his stepdaughter Alicia, a pivotal figure in the comic for decades to come!
Its the FF against their greatest archfoe, the one enemy who has bedeviled them numerous times throughout the decades, the name that leaps to everyone's lips when they think of the FF's greatest battles.....Kurrgo, the master of Planet X!
Wait, who now?
See....the FF again run afoul of the government!
See...the FF go off planet for no real reason!
See...Mr. Fantastic's biggest jerk move yet!
Its the first Marvel Team-Up, as Dr. Doom and the Sub-Mariner join forces to take down our faithful foursome! Can our heroes survive?
The FF face their mightiest foe, and the Darth Vader/Darkseid/Dick Cheney of the Marvel Universe, Doctor Doom! See: Doom kidnap the Invisible Girl! See: The Thing become a pirate! See: Doom live in upper New York state!
"Hey Jack, do remember a character we published a couple of decades ago, an underwater type named Sub-Mariner? Why don't we use him for this issue of Fantastic Four?"
"C'mon Stan, no one is going to remember this guy. Why do you want to drag him out of mothballs?"
"Listen Jack, I edit every comic we publish and write three quarters of them! I don't have time for original ideas! Now face forward true believer! Excelsior!"
SEE: The Fantastic Four get costumes!
SEE: The Fantastic Four get a headquarters!
SEE: The Fantastic Four get a mode of transportation!
SEE: The Fantastic Four get their butts handed to them by a cocky loser with all the powers of Doug Henning!
All this and more in episode 3 of the Fantastic Four from 1962!
What happens when the Earth is invaded by shape shifting aliens known as....Skrulls? Can the Fantastic Four defeat them even after the aliens have turned the whole world against them? Issue #1 would suggest the answer is likely no, but they keep publishing the title for another 50 years, so I'm guessing the answer is yes! Listen to how it happens and find out how cows are involved!
Jason and John are finally back! It's only been 11 months, and the podcast is different! Now we're Year One Comics, where we explore the first year of various comics book series. And what better series to kick us off than the first Marvel superhero comic of the Silver Age, the Fantastic Four! In their first issue, we meet the team, the Mole Man, and see Reed Richards' brilliance in the form of flare gun technology! Join us, won't you?
It's the end of the Under Siege storyline AND the end of the Avenging Hour (as we know it)!...
It's the beginning of the Under Siege storyline where the Masters of Evil take over the mansion and we couldn't be happier!
The team battles joins forces with Hellstorm and Hellcat to battle demon horde. Master Pandemonium tags along for their ride through Hell until they venture into Cat People land where Tigra almost murders him. The cat lady and the demon man resolve some of their soul issues and everything is hunky-dory, except that Hank Pym might want to kill himself.
It's a crossover annual extravaganza as BOTH teams (plus, a bunch of former members) join forces to defeat a group of fake Zodiac members and take down the traitor who tried to have them imprisoned for treason!
Graviton, and some useless villains we'll probably never see again, harass the team until Tigra turns back into a female, which confuses everyone iand sends Graviton rocketing off into space on a chunk of planet.
The Avengers have to calm a riot outside the mansion over Namor's inclusion on the team. Moonstone, Absorbing Man, and Titania add to the trouble. Then Wasp, Black Knight, and Paladin face off against Grey Gargoyle, Screaming Mimi, and Yellowjacket. And finally, Alpha Flight assists the team when Namor goes to Atlantis to free his ex-girlfriend form the clutches of Attuma.
OHMYGOSH. THESE TWO ISSUES ARE HORRIBLE. PLEASE DON'T LISTEN. WE WARNED YOU.
Sigh...okay. If you insist. The team goes looking for the Thing and finds two horrible villains instead. Then, most of the team goes to a SHIELD base and runs into even worse villains. The end.
It's a three-part cavalcade of Kangs, featuring a whole council of crazy Kangs and even a Kang with a cape, as Kang tries to murder himself over and over to become the one true Kang! Also: Space Phantom, Ravonna, Dire Wraiths, and...Immortus! A whole mess of time traveling trouble full of flashbacks and fun!
Firebird's old team, the Rangers, arrive at the West Coast compound under demonic possession. After easily defeating them, the Avengers send Mockingbird in disguise to flush out Master Pandemonium, but just as she's about to defeat him, Tigra swoops in and defeats her. Then Thing finally decides to join the team.
The Enclave is back, but that's not important, because they're useless. Instead, the team finds the still living body of Jean Grey at the bottom of the ocean. And then Wasp fights a new female Yellowjacket, which is one step up from being defeated by a door.
Tigra is almost killed by Kraven the Hunter. Wonder Man goes on the Tonight Show and confesses to being a crook. Hank Pym becomes the team's manservant. Thing and Firebird show up. And we meet the greatest (or stupidest) supervillain ever made out of demons: Master Pandemonium!
Let's see...Starfox leaves the team so he and Firelord can go search for Nebula, The Beyonder shows up to annoy EVERYONE , the FAA forces the Avengers to move their Quinjets out of Manhattan, we meet Stingray and his wife who conveniently have a large hydrobase called Hydrobase that could conceivably hold many aircraft, and Hercules punches Namor until he joins the team.
It's the end of the line for Nebula as the Avengers conspire with the ragtag Skrulls to defeat her mercenary army and capture...oh, never mind, The Beyonder showed up and ruined everything. Then we get to meet a bunch of Skrulls who think they're 1930's Earth gangsters, but that doesn't matter because yet another group of Skrulls sets off a bomb that erases the shape-changing abilities from ALL Skrulls and now I'm really tired of saying the word "Skrull."
SORRY SO TARDY...I WAS ON VACATION. (-Jason)
I guess we finally get to the bottom of this whole "which brother is actually my brother" thing, but the only fighting we witness is fighting the urge to scream at the creators for all of these flashbacks. Oh, and most of the bad guys escape anyway.
We're taking a detour for a convoluted story about brothers and zombies and lots and lots of flashbacks. The West Coast Avengers battle Ultron and oceans. Vision and Scarlet Witch go house hunting and learn to drive. Did I mention zombies? Oh yes. That too.
When they borrow Starfox's dad's car, our other Avengers are finally able to reunite with Captain Marvel in a galaxy far, far away where Nebula has already started making moves to destroy what's left of the Skrull empire!
The Avengers are off to the Savage Land to watch a giant robot slug annihilate some Marvel afterthoughts before Hercules shreds him like tin foil. Meanwhile, Captain Marvel gets her powers back and meets Nebula.
Another mid-week episode bringing you up to speed with the Avengers title from the beginning. These issues are notable for the fact that they are not very good and, aside from the Sons of the Serpent story, feature totally lackluster villains. Plus, by the end of it, our team is down to three lousy members. But hey, enjoy the recap!
So that Vision storyline is over and he and Wanda leave the team. Out in space, Captain Marvel is kidnapped by space pirates. And we tackle a Marvel Graphic Novel where Doctor Doom takes over the world, then gets bored and gives it back.
We FINALLY reach the first ending of this whole "Vision takes over the world's computer systems" storyline. I say the first ending, because this thing will drag out in the background for years to come. At least we finally get him and his wife to leave the team though.
Just a few more chapters in the neverending saga of Vision and his world domination indecision. As a distraction, Wasp joins up with Paladin to battle Baron Brimstone. And Hercules knocks out the Blood Brothers but loses his pants. Oh, and the Black Knight returns...that's kinda cool.
Thor asks for the team's help to defeat the demon hordes of Surtur in a story that has nothing to do with the Avengers. Then, both the original and West Coast teams combine to tackle Maelstrom once again as he siphons energy from the Earth's rotation in an effort to become relevant.
It's the end of the first West Coast Avengers Limited Series. Everyone gets to wear a disguise! We find out that Iron Man isn't Iron Man! And the team wins by getting Graviton drunk! Sounds about right.
Here it is! The first part of the four-issue miniseries that launches more chaos into our lives, as we now have to cover two titles! See the obvious people that Vision forces Hawkeye to pick for the team! Laugh at the ridiculous villain they have to face! Wonder why they wasted so much time!
So there's this other bunch of Eternals that aren't the same as Starfox's Eternals, but they all come from the same place which has something to do with a bunch of needlessly confusing flashbacks. None of that matters now because Maelstrom is here to suck all the energy away (or to just plain suck). It's very tiring.
The Avengers first have to fight Hulk's pants...or is it Arnim Zola?...before heading back to Manhattan so Wasp and Starfox can be accidentally kidnapped by aliens...or are they Greeks?...no, they're aliens.
The Avengers head to Florida to battle a group of mushy aliens known as the Dire Wraiths. Starfox takes his shirt off. Wasp accidentally kidnaps herself. Vision breaks a desk. And Scarlet Witch remembers she's on the team. It's all very exciting.
The Marvel Secret Wars crossover event swoops in and steals most of our team away for a week or so. In their absence, Vision assumes control of the Avengers and announces the formation of a West Coast branch to be led by Hawkeye.
Dr. Strange, the Shroud, and Tigra take to the Astral Plane to battle against Morgan LeFay for the soul of Spider-Woman. Oh, and the Avengers are there too, I guess.
Not a lot going on here. Vision wakes up and gets connected to an intergalactic computer. She-Hulk goes apartment hunting. They tie up loose ends with Moonstone and Blackout. Then Hawkeye returns, we find out he's married (and partially deaf), and he gets roped into appearing on Late Night with David Letterman with some other reserve members for Assistant Editors Month.
Two issues guest-starring Spider-Man, who helps the team save Project Pegasus from first the Lava Men and then the combined ineptitude of Moonstone, Electro, Blackout, and Rhino. Wasp tries to reward Spider-Man for his help with membership to the team, but is quickly shot down by the government.
This is the first in a series of mid-week episodes that will bring everyone up to speed with the Avengers title from the beginning. In these first 25 issues, you'll learn how the team came together, who was involved, what villains they faced, and what ridiculous things they did. All the information with less of the listening!
Vision is still down for the count, so let's spend an issue getting to know Scarlet Witch through some exhausting flashbacks. Not good enough for you? Then how about She-Hulk sleeping with Starfox? Or Captain America being aggro about all his perceived failures? You say you want some action, huh...does a dumb fight with The Wizard count? Should we just apologize in advance?
The Avengers guest star in an Inhumans story and then we get the resolution to that invisible bubble thing. Spoiler alert: It's Annihilus. And Vision goes down for a hard reboot.
Iron Man gets drunk and quits the team. The rest of the Avengers rescue SHIELD and the President from the boring clutches of Plantman and his hordes of stick men, while Hawkeye breaks his leg just in time for Starfox to take his place in the lineup.
We finally, FINALLY, get to the end of the Hank Pym and Egghead saga. Hawkeye is cleared of murdering Egghead. Hank puts on the cerebral scanner and proves he was crazy without any outside influence. Then he gives up the Yellowjacket costume, says his goodbyes, and wanders off into the sunset.
We meet the new Captain Marvel, who immediately joins the team. Wasp has brunch. And we get lost in endless flashbacks. Then the Masters of Evil attack in a clever plan to rescue Hank Pym from his trial...
Tony Stark thinks it would be a good idea to date the Wasp without telling her he's Iron Man, but Cap begs to differ. Then, Dr. Druid and the Black Knight drag the team into some sort of Lord of the Rings nightmare that results in Dane Whitman being brought back to present day. Hooray!
A new Masters of Evil lineup stumbles across Avengers mansion and then Hawkeye, Ant-Man, and Taskmaster all run into each other at a carnival. It's a week full of coincidences...
First a domestic violence dispute bores the Avengers into fighting the Defenders, and then our heroes realize that they need more than four members to be entertaining, so they throw a membership draft AGAIN...
Drax the Destroyer and Moondragon force the team to travel to some faraway planet just so Moondragon can sleep with Thor. I mean, sure, Drax makes it seem like it's more important than that, but then he dies. So who really knows?
As if hitting his wife, trying to murder his friends, and getting divorced wasn't enough, Egghead pounds the final nail into the coffin of Yellowjacket's career by framing him in a uselessly elaborate scheme. Then a kid stops by the mansion to kill himself, turn into a sun monster, and come back to Earth again as a child. It is dumb.
Hank Pym wanders off after trying to kill everyone, but the team decides to go fight Ghost Rider instead of caring. Then Silver Surfer accidentally brings Molecule Man back to life and we have to spend two issues trying to make him go away. Oh, and Tigra quits, dropping the membership down to only the Big Three.
It's all falling apart for Hank Pym. First he shoots an Elfqueen in the back, then the team initiates a court-martial against him, then he smacks Wasp around, and then he programs a giant robot to attack the team so he can save them and look like a hero...except he doesn't.
The useless Weathermen threaten our team with moistness! Moondragon mind controls us into a new lineup! Everybody interesting leaves and Tigra joins! Jim Shooter returns as writer and we're almost into the good issues!
Hey everybody, say hello to Rogue! She makes her first appearance here fighting alongside the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants against our heroes. Carol Danvers also returns and is none too happy. Then Beast travels through time to collect the Resurrection Stone and save his girlfriend's life. I've made it all sound much more interesting than it is.
Fill-in issue alert! First the team battles some burning man named Pyron who threatens to blow up New Jersey. Then they kill the Shadow Lord by punching a city and must fend off the Berserker who has all the charm of a manhole cover. It isn't pretty.
The Yellow Claw tries to take over the world by having a bunch of kids, but the Avengers murder him before this dazzling plan can take effect.
Iron Man is apparently hypnotized into helping Ultron kidnap Scarlet Witch, but leaves behind way too many clues. Then Beast and Wonder Man play around with some things they find in the sewer. It all seems like a bad dream.
In a special double-sized issue, Ms. Marvel has a baby, the baby grows to adulthood, and Ms. Marvel goes off to Limbo to be his lover. Yeah, it's as creepy as it sounds. Jarvis gets his own showcase in a back-up story. And the team collectively scratches its head as robots start stealing special resins needed to shape Adamantium. I wonder why they would do that?
Oh no! A giant robot is rampaging through New York! Oh no! Ms. Marvel is pregnant! Oh no! Beast and Wonder Man had a horrible date night and then got drunk and wandered around! If you think that sounds thrilling, have we got an episode for you...
We get to see what the Avengers do on a day off, which somehow involves Vision freaking out and breaking stuff. Then, a mental patient enlists Wasp's help...leading to the team discovering a training facility for bad guys...leading to their first run-in with The Taskmaster!
The team heads to Pittsburgh to help Iron Man and Wonder Man fend off Inferno, a steelworker encased in molten metal kept alive by a chip of Uru metal and a desire for revenge. It's not nearly as thrilling as it sounds.
It's a two-issue fight with the Grey Gargoyle! Action! Conflict! A weird Senate hearing that puts Gyrich in his place! Yes, all the things you've come to love about the Avengers...
The Avengers "save" a Soviet nuclear power plant form the Elements of Doom, fight a World War 2 behemoth named Arsenal which is led by a computerized version of Tony Stark's mom, and then Hawkeye gets a job like the rest of us poor schlubs.
Happy New Year! Settle in and listen to this really long tale of how a crazy sorcerer, an elder demon god, a cow lady, a pink-armored scientist, and a band of gypsies all came together to raise Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch. It'll warm your heart for the freezing hellscape of 2017...
Our Xtra special Xmas episode features a way too long battle with the Absorbing Man that shows us the origin of his costume, features Falcon being a jerk, and allows the Avengers to once again let the bad guy successfully escape. A job well done!
Gyrich returns to upgrade the security system and impose a government-mandated seven-member lineup, leaving Hawkeye, Wonder Man, and a bunch of other useful people out in the cold. Then the team gets a real test as they battle through some dime store mannequins to fight a gypsy pirate and some illusions inside an outer space hotel room and why am I still typing this?...
FILL-IN! FILL-IN! FILL-IN!
There's a guy named Stinger whose weapon is a stinger! There's a guy named Bloodhawk who looks like a bird! The team fights a moving mountain named The Monolith! It's all silly and pointless as we wait for the new creative team to come on board...
Wasp is possessed by the evil Doctor Spectrum's power prism after Hank tries to give it to her as a birthday gift. Many walls are smashed. Then Beast tries to pick up some women, gets caught in a thunderstorm, and falls victim to some idiot calling himself the Manipulator. Can you say fill-in issue? I knew you could...
Hawkeye's back! That's good, because the other Avengers keep disappearing. But it's bad, because he causes them to lose their government privileges. Meanwhile, we learn that Carina is the Collector's daughter. And the team almost learns about Korvac, but he incinerates the Collector instead. OH NO!
Finally, the end of the Korvac Saga...oh, who are we kidding? THIS EPISODE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE KORVAC SAGA! Instead, we're given yet another interlude with Jocasta and Ultron and a convent full of robot nuns and even Ms. Marvel. Someday we can dream of a real storyline...
The Korvac Saga continues...very very slowly. Henry Peter Gyrich tells the team that their security sucks. Starhawk and Korvac battle across multiple planes of existence while standing in his den. And then we get a fill-in issue about a guy who wants the Avengers to kill him, but makes it really complicated.
First, let's talk about an Avengers Annual that the Avengers barely appeared in where Adam Warlock and Captain Marvel fought Thanos until he went away. We'll stick to outer space to have our team meet the original Guardians of the Galaxy while back on Earth, the Wasp hosts a fashion show interrupted by the Porcupine with an appearance by Korvac...
Guess what? Hank Pym is CRAZY! But you know who's crazier? Ultron. Yeah...he thinks he deserves a bride and he's going to steal the Wasp's personality to make one. Or maybe he'll just escape. No harm, no foul. Let's not even mention that weird issue with Typhon, okay?
Meet Graviton, a guy who looks like Dracula with all the personality of an angry sock. He's quite powerful and quite boring. But he does manage to get half the team to leave out of frustration. The few that remain are forced to face the wacky weirdness of the Grim Reaper!
Let's wrap up that Doctor Doom-Namor-Attuma storyline and move on to something more important...fighting a stone statue! Plus, we try out a new format just to see how it feels to have some fun again...
Attuma attacks (for some reason)! The team gets caught up in some shenanigans with Namor, and Dr. Doom...and some other less important people. But worst of all, Vision loses his cape!
We've got a lot of loose ends here: Wanda can fly. Living Laser has the Serpent Crown. Whizzer has returned. Wonder Man is suddenly a good guy. Nuklo is involved as a prisoner of some rogue Army element. None of this is ever fully explained.
This is it! The big anniversary issue to announce the new lineup and its going to...oh wait, never mind, it's mostly reprints. But the next issue has the new lineup and wait, it's written by three people, guest stars Thing and The Champions, and only Beast joins the team? But the next one...ugh...Wonder Man is a zombie and they fight a swamp man in a chicken suit? Oh boy.
The Avengers finally finish business on the Squadron Supreme's world, stealing their president's Serpent Crown and fleeing. Back on their own Earth, they face off against the Brand Corporation and the "might" of Orka. Oooooooh.
Tony Isabella and Don Heck present a two-issue fill-in that makes no sense but also does no harm. Be amazed as The Assassin puts Captain America in the hospital and then takes a roundabout approach to trying to kill everyone else before ultimately being murdered by their own henchmen. Hooray!
It's the final showdown with Kang, mostly because Thor makes him so mad he kills himself. Two Gun Kid decides he wants to go to the future, while Hawkeye plans to quit the team. And Patsy Walker becomes Hellcat right before the rest of the team gets zapped into the Squadron Supreme universe.
Captain America returns and recruits the team to help him break into the Brand Corporation to investigate some shenanigans, but they're immediately defeated by the Squadron Supreme. Immortus helps Thor and Moondragon travel back to the Old West where they find Hawkeye trying to stop Kang from robbing a uranium train with the help of Marvel's Western heroes.
As Wasp lies at Death's door yet again, Whirlwind decides to try to kidnap her. In the ensuing fight, Yellowjacket gets injured and starts growing uncontrollably. Just as we think we may finally get rid of the two Pyms for good, Beast has to go and save them with science. Thanks a lot, new guy.
Time to find some new team members! Looks like Moondragon and Beast are the first two applicants. Of course, they have to get past The Stranger (who seems somewhat stranger than the usual Stranger) first. And Wasp almost dies...again.
Could this possibly be the end to the Celestial Madonna saga? Let's just say it goes out in spectacular fashion. Vision and Scarlet Witch get married. Mantis marries a tree, becomes an official member, then disappears. Plus we get surprise appearances from Dormammu, Kang, and the Space Phantom. It's truly magical.
It's a short one this week, filled with partial origins for Vision and Mantis. We find out what happened to the original Human Torch. We find out why the Kree and the Skrulls hate each other. We meet Moondragon. And we see Scarlet Witch get attacked by a chair.
There are Kangs everywhere! Rama Tut is a Kang! Immortus is a Kang! Even Kang is a Kang! After sitting around Vietnam killing muggers, the team is transported to a castle dungeon in Limbo and forced to face the Legion of the Unliving. Iron Man almost dies. Vision discovers he's the original Human Torch. And some hooded weirdo meets Swordsman's green ghost in an alley.
Great...Kang is back. The team is kidnapped. Hawkeye returns. We get involved in a whole time travel thing and the Celestial Madonna saga begins. The Swordsman dies. The team fights some bad guys in Vietnam. And we all wonder why we wasted our time.
Scarlet Witch learns that The Whizzer is her dad. Ultron interrupts the wedding of Crystal and Quicksilver. The Fantastic Four dump their nanny witch in The Avengers' laps causing some creep named Necrodemus to attack. And now Kang is back. Thanks a lot.
Thanks to some girl who knows Rick Jones, the Avengers get caught up in an intergalactic war with Thanos. We end the issue with the gray-skinned alien hiding out on the mansion's roof. Then Klaw and Solarr try to trick Black Panther into giving up his country. It goes so badly that T'Challa quits the team out of shame.
We get a mini origin for Mantis that will likely change a million times. Swordsman manages to not get killed, but does cry on Scarlet Witch's shoulder. And the team fights a space dragon.
The Zodiac attacks! First they try to zap everyone in Manhattan who's a Gemini, then they blast our heroes into space, and then they fight among themselves long enough for everyone to get bored and leave. Oh, and Libra thinks he's Mantis's father.
It's the end of the Avengers-Defenders War! The teams stopped fighting themselves and had to stop Dormammu from conquering reality. The Defenders went off to the Crusades for no apparent reason. And the Avengers went to Rutland, Vermont to fight The Collector and leave Loki on a farm.
Part One of the Avengers-Defenders War! The storyline where heroes fight heroes for no reason whatsoever...well, okay, they're trying to gather pieces of the Evil Eye to turn the statue Black Knight back to the human Black Knight, but Dormammu and Loki are pulling their strings!
Great, the Lion God is back thanks to our newest member Swordsman and his lady friend Mantis. Luckily there was a spare adamantium tube lying around to stuff him in. Then the team travels to England where they're attacked by the Mole People imitating the cast of a Renaissance Faire. These issues are horrible. We're sorry (again).
Black Widow helps the team defeat The Lion God and then quits, because this is all too much. Then a group calling themselves The Living Bombs (ironic) try to blow up Vision. Just another day in the Avengers' world...
Hawkeye leaves the team in a huff. On the plus side, he goes back to his old costume. On the not so plus side, he has to fight a nine foot tall guy who calls himself Champion and wants to blow the west coast off the country. Then Magneto bull rushes the X-Mansion and the team scrambles to stop him and his weird mind control powers before it's too late (spoiler alert: they beat the clock).
Captain America has enough flashbacks to give everyone PTSD as Space Phantom and Grim Reaper hatch a ridiculous plan to kill the Avengers and transfer Vision's brain into Cap's body. Needless to say, it doesn't work.
It's the issues that Jason didn't really read. The team faces off against the Sentinels, but lets Larry Trask beat them and get killed in the process. Then Quicksilver leaves. Next we visit the Savage Land for no good reason. Thankfully, Steve Englehart is our new writer...
Oh boy. You'd think a story "co-written" by Harlan Ellison would be good. You'd also be VERY wrong. Any time The Watcher shows up you know you're in for something horrible. Then, Grim Reaper offers to put Vision in Wonder Man's dead body. Meanwhile, a Sentinel kidnaps Scarlet Witch.
These three issues all have something to do with Ares, which means they're pretty awful. First Ares disguises himself as Warhawk and tries to incite riots on Earth. Then he gets his hands on the Black Knight's Ebony Blade. Goliath returns as Hawkeye. Hercules returns, but doesn't know who he is. And we celebrate a rather bland centennial issue..
It's the end of the Kree-Skrull War where we find out it was all a Captain Mar-Vell fever dream, the Supreme Intelligence was just a jar of pickled eggs, and Ronan the Accuser was a stray dog that licked Rick Jones's toes in his sleep. Or something like that.
Part Two of the Kree-Skrull War where we learn that the Skrulls are a bunch of shape-changing cows, Goliath is still an idiot, and everything we learned in the last three issues was garbage. Buckle up, True Believers!
It's the beginning of the Kree-Skrull War...well, more of a prelude actually. Captain Marvel is here, and Rick Jones, and Ronan the Accuser and...ugh...Wasp and Yellowjacket return. We also meet Annihilus, and Carol Danvers, and bunches of other new stuff too!
FOUR ISSUES! First, it's a two-part thing with the Squadron Supreme versus the stupid Brain-Child, THEN a one-issue origin of Black Panther, and THEN a one-issue weirdness guest starring Hulk and Falcon and some insect guy named Psyklop that was completely useless and confusing. We are so, so sorry.
The Enchantress gets involved in two silly plots. First she tries to turn the female heroes against the team who are fighting the Masters of Evil at a Halloween Parade. Then she tries to convince Arkon to kill everyone because Black Knight is a spy. Oh boy.
Red Wolf, the first stereotypical Native American superhero, shows up and then promptly disappears like a spirit dissolving into the ancient plains. While we all scratch our heads over that mess, the Zodiac takes over Manhattan a la Dark Knight Rises. Things don't go well and it ends when Thor incinerates their leader.
Hold on to your spandex, superheroes! The Man-Ape is back...and Living Laser...and Power Man...and Swordsman...and Grim Reaper too. It's the Lethal Legion! The villains kidnap the team but end up losing anyway. AGAIN. And then the Vision quits. Whee.
Quicksilver seeks help from the Avengers after an other-dimensional warlord named Arkon kidnaps Scarlet Witch. There's some sort of plot about nuclear weapons and some bad poetry, and then it all kind of goes away. Then a guy named Cornelius Van Lunt hatches a plan to bankrupt Tony Stark that involves the Avengers doing construction work. It's all very silly.
Rick Jones returns to help the team capture Scorpio, who is actually Nick Fury, and who actually doesn't need capturing. Then Black Panther gets wrapped up in some racist shtick from the Sons of the Serpent that includes a white Black Panther and a submarine shaped like a slithering snake. Yikes.
This is our special blizzard-delayed episode where Jason & John recap all the wackiness of the first 71 issues (plus 2 annuals) of The Avengers. The good (a little), the bad (most of it), and the hilarious (that's debatable). John talks a lot about the characters and the creators and the plots, while Jason cracks jokes that mostly fall flat because he forgot to take notes. It's AMAZING!
Kang kidnaps the team in order to ask them for help. See, this dude called the Grandmaster has challenged him to a cosmic game and he needs our heroes to be his pawns. So they help the guy, face off against the Squadron Sinister and the 1940's Invaders, then when all is said and done, Kang tries to kill them. Typical Kang.
SHIELD invents Adamantium and Vision promptly steals it so he can rebuild Ultron. That big, bad robot still has some influence over the synthezoid he created...and we get to hear about it for three whole issues. Lucky us.
The Avengers find out that Egghead has a laser-shooting satellite that can destroy entire cities, and also that Hawkeye...er...Goliath has a brother AND A NAME! Oh, and Swordsman comes back just so he can get beat up again.
Dr. Strange shows up and uses the team as a distraction to save the world, but leaves them stranded in Africa, so Black Panther takes them to his place where he faces off against the Man-Ape, and then they finally make it home only to see Hawkeye ditch his bow and arrows to become the new Goliath. That's a whole bunch of dumb.
Some guy named Yellowjacket shows up, claims to have killed Hank Pym,wants to join the team and, when refused, decides to kidnap Wasp. Things get even weirder when Yellowjacket and Wasp get married and the Circus of Crime shows up!
As Jason and John continue to fight through their colds, The Avengers welcome a new member to their fold. Sure, the Vision tries to kill everyone first, but that's all Ultron's fault. Once that reckless robot is out of the way for good, I'm sure it'll be smooth sailing for our newfound synthezoid.
Cap calls the team to a castle so they can time travel back and watch Bucky die again. Obviously that doesn't go well and now the team is stuck in an alternate timeline thanks to the Scarlet Centurion. They fight themselves, then Goliath unplugs the machine and everything goes back to boring.
The Avengers are under attack from the Masters of Evil! Is Black Knight a good guy or a bad guy? Is the butler Jarvis a good guy or a bad guy? Is that evil robot named Ultron a good guy or a...oh, wait, he's DEFINITELY a bad guy. And don't miss the time Wasp gets knocked out by a door!
Everybody's dead! Or at least that's what the Grim Reaper wants Black Panther to think. But Panther is too good for that nonsense. He saves the team and becomes a member. Then we thankfully get some resolution to that stupid Magneto and Toad plot. Buh-bye, Magneto Island!
We apologize in advance for how awfully boring these two issues are. At least we get the end of that whole Hercules vs. Typhon thing. And Hercules officially quits the team, which leaves just three members. Don't worry though. After our terrific trio defeats the Collector (again), Captain America recommends Black Panther as his replacement...
So...Magneto and Toad kidnap Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch to get them back into the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. Then Captain America quits. Then Hercules wanders off to Mt. Olympus in the most boring scenes ever. Somewhere along the line we get a new Black Knight (a hero version). Wasp buys a plane. And John and I debate the Mount Rushmore of Marvel.
Hercules becomes an official team member at the Avengers Day Celebration in Central Park, Wasp blows some cash on a fancy sports car, and the team faces off with Super-Adaptoid. Then the rest of the team takes the day off while Whirlwind shrinks Hank and Jan down to ant-size and confuses everyone.
Hawkeye and Hercules try to rescue Black Widow from Red Guardian and his handlers, but they end up needing to be rescued by the rest of the team instead. The Avengers do, however, save us all from the stupidity of the Psychotron. And then Mandarin tries to take over the world with a fake diamond, some hate rays, and every villain we've ever seen. (He fails).
Sub-Mariner gets a hold of the Cosmic Cube and causes some trouble until Hercules knocks him back into the sea with a tree. Then we get a few more episodes with Scarlet Witch passing out and Wasp getting captured. Oh, and Dragon Man and Diablo show up too.
Enchantress tricks Hercules into wrestling the Avengers. When he snaps out of it, his daddy gives him a one year timeout on Earth. Since Herc is stuck there anyway, he decides to help the team face off against the Mad Thinker and his Triumvirate of Terror (more like "Terrible"). Black Widow gets conned into helping SHIELD. Cap takes off for a while. And, for as little as they do, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver may as well disappear too.
Someone who looks like Scarlet Witch is back, spinning a yarn of UFOs and androids and a bunch of other nonsense. The team discovers something called Ixar has taken over the Maximoffs' homeland of Transia. Hawkeye and Black Widow team up to take Ixar down. And not much else happens.
Watch out! The Living laser is here to tell us how great he is. And when that doesn't work, he decides to help take over a small country. And when that doesn't work, he just sort of escapes, I guess. PLUS...Goliath can change size again...Bill Foster comes back...Black Widow gets mad...and Wasp tries to go shopping.
The Sons of the Serpent inject a little xenophobia into the Marvel Universe and the Avengers don't like it. After the high-powered hate group kidnaps Captain America, Goliath leads the team to his rescue and Black Widow comes along for the ride. We also take a quick look at Amazing Spider-Man Annual #3 when the Avengers give Spidey a tryout.
Goliath wanders off to South America and falls in with a wacko cult that worships a cobalt bomb. Hawkeye has had enough of the whole Communism thing and drops a building on the bad guys in order to snap Black Widow out of her brainwashing. And Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver realize that no one is paying attention to them so they wander back to Europe.
Giant-Man becomes Goliath and the Avengers finally remember to rescue Wasp from some cosmic hoarder named The Collector. Then Black Widow recruits Power Man and Swordsman to seek some old-fashioned Communist revenge. Wasp loses to a bird and a tree while Goliath gets stuck at ten feet tall. Sounds about right...
The Avengers receive a distress call from Wasp who has been captured by Attuma. They nearly drown fighting him and then promptly forget to rescue her anyway. Meanwhile, Hawkeye leaves the door open while he takes a nap and has to face off with The Beetle.
Kang, Kang, KANG. For some reason, Kang transports the team to the future to taunt them, but when his army turns on him he needs their help to survive. Then, back in present time, the Kooky Quartet faces off against Dr. Doom and a plastic dome that makes no sense!
Enchantress turns a random stranger into Power Man, the Avengers get framed as criminals and disband, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver catch a Broadway show, Captain America wanders off into the rain, and the Circus of Crime calls the cops.
Swordsman wants to join the team or maybe he doesn't, a mysterious letter makes the plot overly confusing, Mandarin shows up with his imaginary Iron Man, and Cap tries to kill himself because nobody likes him anymore. Also, Jason & John recap what we know about the team so far...
The new lineup gets a chance to at least show off some teamwork in two horrible issues where they face off against The Minotaur and The Commissar - threats that aren't really threats and are, thankfully, never seen again!
Rick Jones gets kidnapped by the Masters of Evil, Captain America kills Baron Zemo, Thor disappears, the old team quits, and a new team joins. It''s total chaos!
The team battles Count Nefaria in his New Jersey castle, Wasp gets shot but unfortunately survives, and the Watcher drops by to tell us how lucky we are that the alien version of Santa and his elves fled Earth.
The team follows a Spider-Man robot to Mexico, Giant-Man has a hissy fit, Wasp finally does something right, Red Ghost shows up for no reason, and we read a fan letter from George RR Martin.
The Masters of Evil refuse to give up, Wonder Man comes and goes, Immortus sits around his office waiting for Rick Jones, and the Wasp seems less and less relevant with each passing issue.
The first appearance of Kang, the Avengers act all official, Wasp does nothing, the Teen Brigade saves the day, and Stan Lee answers readers' questions about how awesome he is.
The Avengers fight the Lava Men and the Masters of Evil, Rick Jones tries to be Bucky, Iron Man smokes a cigarette, and Giant-Man sits in a giant chair.
The Avengers won't leave Hulk alone, they fight Namor the Sub-Mariner and a stalk of broccoli, Iron Man is defeated by emery dust, Captain America returns, and Rick Jones refuses to leave.
The origin of the Avengers, their first fights with Loki and Space Phantom, and the Hulk comes and goes. Plus, Rick Jones and his Teen Brigade!