Avengers (Vol. 4) #12.1

Background

Recently in the Avengers, Tony Stark and the other Avengers saw a future where Ultron had won... Tony believes this future is inevitable, because Ultron is smarter than any of the heroes...

Also, Spider-woman, as well as being an Avenger, is also an agent for SWORD. SWORD is an organisation tasked with handling alien problems. Spider-woman is particularly interested in tracking down skrulls and putting the hurt on 'em.

Story Details

Spider-woman tracks down a recent robot alien arrival for SWORD, but is captured by a bunch of bad guys, who are also after the arrival. The bad guys are led by the Wizard and include other science based baddies like Klaw and MODOK. Agent Brand, head of SWORD, then hits up the Avengers to help track down Spider-woman.

The Wizard is interrogating Spider-woman, while his buddies are poking and proding the inert robitic Space Knight they picked up. The Avengers arrive, smash the bad guys and rescue Spider-woman. But, the Space Kinght was activated in the process. In a flash of energy, Ultron appears. Thor engages Ultron in battle, but Ultron creates a huge explosion and escapes.

In the rubble, Agent Brand reveals she had heard Ultron had been off planet creating havok and now it seems he's returned. Iron Man is distraught, revealing he has seen the future and that they have no hope against Ultron.

General Comments

After the first story arc of the newest Avengers reboot, this has been the storyline I have been looking forward to. It looks like it is going to play out in the Avengers book though and not be another event, such as the current Fear Itself. I think this is kind of a shame actually, I'm not that keen on all the extra spin-off books an events entail, but most of them since House of M have been really good. One of the best things about them has been the build up in regular titles leading up to each event. This Ultron storyline has had some excellent build up so far and it would be great to see it "break out" into an event. It definitely makes more sense than the current Fear Itself event.

This is issue itself is great! It's great seeing Hitch on art and the story is nice tight with some great highlights. I wish the regular series was written as tight as this. Personally, I think this single best issue that Bendis has done on the Avengers in quite awhile.

Spidey Watch: he appears on about four interior panels and is attributed on Warcraft quip and doesn't take part in the main action at all!

Overall Rating

Great of combo of Bendis writing a tight "done in one" issue and Hitch's awesome art.