Secret Invasion: Mighty Avengers #17 Review

Secret Invasion tie-ins have been the most inconsistant books we get in the bunker. We, at the Revolution, have seen some great tie-ins. Others have been poorly done. Let us spin the wheel and see where this one fits in.

Creative Team
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Pencils: Khoi Pham
Inks: Danny Miki and Andy Lanning

Art Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10
Story Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10

Synopsis: Our story starts several months ago at a place called Bruno’s Nighttime Cafe. We see a blond haired man walking into the cafe. He asks if they still make the coffee with something else in it. Bruno says he adds hot chocolate. The man orders a cup.

Bruno says it is quiet here. He likes it better than living in New York. The man agrees. As he takes a sip, he says that is what he was looking for. He added it to his list of the top ten best things on the planet. Bruno is impressed that he thinks it is that good. He asks the man if he has been here before. The man says that it was years ago but he never forgot the place.

Out of respect for Bruno, he wants to give him something. After all, it will all be over soon. Bruno looks at him suspiciously. Then he realizes that he recognizes the man. The bell rings. Someone has entered the cafe.

Dum Dum Dugan walks in and calls the man Dr. Pym. Bruno can’t believe that he has been talking to an Avenger. Pym asks Bruno to excuse them for a minute. Pym says he can’t get a hold of her so he called Dugan. Dugan wants to know who she is. Pym starts to say “the Qu…Jessica”. Dugan says that she is busy being an Avenger. Pym says he needs to talk to her. “It” is not going to work.

Dugan wants to know what isn’t going to work. Pym says all of it. They need to retreat. Pym says they are smarter than we give them credit for. They are also more survivalist. And forgiving.

Dugan says the problem is that Pym is sharing a brain with a man who is smarter and more heroic than him. He also thinks he is smarter and more heroic than he actually is. He is really a wife slapping, Ultron creating… This is the kind of talk that always gets Pym where he ends up.

Pym asks if Dugan is threatening him. Dugan says he is not. They need him to continue gathering intel. Pym says that he did gather the intel and they have a failed plan. At best they can hope for a stalemate. They glare at each other. Dugan asks if he is done with his coffee. It is time to go.

The sound of helicopters is heard in the cafe. Bright lights shine through the windows. Suddenly, the cafe explodes. Bruno is looking out from the burning wreckage.

Pym changes into Yellowjacket and grows to giant size. As the helicopters open fire, he picks up a tank. Dugan picks up his hi-tech gun and stands up. Yellowjacket disappears. Dugan orders the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents to switch to infrared and bioscan. Yellowjacket has shrunk down. Dugan sees Bruno crawling from the wreckage. He asks Dugan what is going on. Dugan points the gun at him and says “he loves you”.

Gun shots sound as we see Yellowjacket running through the forest. Bullets are zipping past him. He is the same size as the bullets.

An agent reports to Dugan that they still have a locked target. Dugan tells him to use whatever means necessary to end this. Yellowjacket is flying around in the dark and picking the agents off one at a time. Dugan spots Yellowjacket by using his infrared goggles.

As Yellowjacket flies towards Dugan, he fires. Right before Yellowjacket hits Dugan, one of the agents turns into his Super-Skrull form and nails Yellowjacket. Dugan wants to know what he is doing. The agent says Dugan told him to use whatever means necessary. He did not want them revealing their true identities in public. All of the agents are Skrulls. Dugan says to just end it.

Yellowjacket is in bad shape. He grows back into his giant form. He picks up Dugan and says “all you had to do was listen to me”. He throws Dugan through a tree. As Yellowjacket makes his last stand against the Skrulls, he keeps telling them that it won’t work. A bullet through the head kills Yellowjacket.

Pym returns to his true form, that of a Skrull. One of the agents wants to know how many Hank Pyms they will have to replace. Dugan says as many as it takes. He orders a scorched Earth cleanup. The Skrulls return to their guise of being S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.

As the local police show up, they are stopped by the agents. When asked about what happened, they say it was a mutant. There might be radiation. Someone snaps a picture. A group of onlookers gather around the agent. They want to know what really happened.

Elsewhere…another Skrull is being prepared to be the new Hank Pym. The Queen says they will need to improvise this time.

Camp Hammond…Tigra is in bed. A man is holding 2 glasses and a bottle. Tigra asks him if he is worried about his ex-wife. The man is Hank Pym. He says he is done with his ex-wife. The door is smashed in. Armed S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are looking for Pym. His ex-wife needs to see him. It ends with Pym staring wide-eyed and Tigra takes a drink.

Comments
The Good: I thought this was a well done human(or in this case Skrull) interest story. Maybe it is just me but I always liked Hank Pym. It was interesting to see Hank triumph over the Skrull’s mind. Bendis did mention Hank’s 2 greatest failures. The time he hit his wife(back when Jim Shooter was writing the Avengers) and the creation of Ultron(I believe the first Ultron was created when Roy Thomas was the writer). Both Shooter and Thomas were legendary writers on the Avengers.

This has to be one of Hank’s greatest achievements. Reaching from beyond the grave, so to speak, to help humanity against the Skrull invasion.

Khoi Pham turned in one of his best art jobs. I liked the scenes with Dugan looking through the infrared goggles and the whole flight/fight in the forest. Some of the shots of Yellowjacket dodging bullets, etc were great.

The Bad: Although the story was interesting, there are some confusing parts. Are all of the Skrulls brainwashed into thinking they are Criti Noll? Why would this matter to the Skrulls? Just from reading this story, I was confused how Hank ended up with Tigra in the final scene.

Overall: Not bad. I still am not a big fan of the Avengers as written by Bendis. He does a decent job on the small individual stories but I have not been impressed with his epics. To me a big part of the Avengers is the epic stories. Roy Thomas had his Kree-Skrull War, Steve Englehart his Celestial Madonna series, and Jim Shooter the Korvac Saga. In my opinion, Bendis is better on Spider-Man and other series featuring an individual hero. He seems to be trying for epic with this storyline. The ending of Secret Invasion will tell if it is fondly remembered years from now.

Pham is growing as an artist. Some of the pages were really impressive this time. His style seems to be influenced by Howard Chaykin.