If there was any doubt as to the tone of this series, it's put to rest almost immediately as Hawkeye skewers his way through the first few pages. It's interesting, in so many cases, to see what particular creators think is the line beyond which these altruistic characters will kill. There's always so much controversy about The Punisher (and rightly so), but at some point in each characters existence, we've seen the moments where they are pushed to the same place, the same mindset, as Frank Castle. Perhaps it's that moment of moving from a situation of policing and enforcing to a situation of survival.
As I said yesterday, Age of Ultron is one of the darkest superhero stories I've read. As far as crossovers go, it's a gentle one. There are tie-in issues, none of which I've read, but they're definitely not necessary for one's enjoyment of the main story. Bendis and company tell a solid, coherent tale over the course of these 10 issues, though, spoiler alert, the ending leaves some things slightly open, so it's not quite a complete story.
It's a question I ask fairly regularly - is it possible to have a "complete" story in a serialized format like the superhero narrative? Even something self-enclosed, like All-Star Superman, leaves story threads hanging because that's the nature of the genre, isn't it? Maybe, just maybe, something like Straczynski's Rising Stars manages to tell a self-enclosed superhero narrative, but even that leaves an opening, not for the particular story that's been told, but for the notion that these stories are told over and over again. It's one of the reasons that the Arthur myth translates so nicely into comics, a la Camelot 3000 - it's a story that is not simply destined, but designed, to be told again and again.
Which doesn't really answer the question, but offers a perspective on it. Age of Ultron ties up its major threads, which really distinguishes it from the usual crossovers somewhat. What I think is quite special about this story is that, initially, it sets itself up as an out of continuity tale, but then, later on, we realize that it's set squarely in the mainstream Marvel U, and that makes it all the more terrifying. Part of me wonders if this wouldn't have been an interesting setting to do the same sort of thing that Secret Wars did this last year or so, suspending the main titles and offering in their place Age of Ultron mini-series. Committing to this setting for an extended period would have been a bold move for Marvel, but not, I think, an unprofitable one. And by "unprofitable," I mean that it would have definitely given writers and artists some room to explore different facets of these characters (the ones who've survived, at least) before reassembling the Marvel U and moving on to tell, and retell, the old stories again.
This series is going to offer some interesting perspectives on causality and retconning, so I'm looking forward to getting further and further in. If I can lay hands on the crossover issues for a reasonable price, I'll perhaps insert them where necessary. The Age of Ultron is not a happy age. But it shows us what our heroes are made of, and what they'll sacrifice, communally and personally, to maintain the status quo.
Though, to paraphrase a question Ultron asks in the film of the same name, what's so great about the status quo? Why keep things the same, when things can change?
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