The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 950: Avengers v.1 #266, April 1986

The aftermath of the second Secret War sees the Rocky Mountains torn away, a huge wound in the Earth's crust that threatens to throw the entire world, literally, out of balance.

And the Molecule Man is the only one who can help.

It's fitting that the Molecule Man is there at the end of this second of the Beyonder's adventures with the Earth's superheroes (he does show up again...we'll get there..), as he was there at the end of the last one as well, realizing the extent of his power, and choosing to live a simple life with the woman he loves.

The Molecule Man, as we begin to see him in these series defies easy categorization - his early appearances notwithstanding, in a lot of ways we can see him as a parallel for the Beyonder, a god-like being seeking to know what it is to be human. The Molecule Man, or Owen Reece, rather, chooses to experience life as what he conceives to be normal - perhaps all the Beyonder needed was to have some idea of what "normal" would mean for him.

Reece returns as well, inevitably, in the last Secret War. We'll get there eventually too.

We'll be taking a break from The Avengers for a few days, to catch up with Old Man Prophet and see what his new arc is going to do about the Earth Empire. To be continued!

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 949: Avengers v.1 #265, March 1986

I can't say for a fact that this is the first time (more likely that was in Crisis), but it's got to be one of the earliest examples of needing to have read an issue of a crossover in order to get what was happening in this issue. Today's story assumes that you're also following Secret Wars II.

Now, don't get me wrong.

We all were.

But that should never be an assumption in the cases of "event" series. So, to fill you in, The Beyonder has decided that humankind sucks. He has no idea how to forget us and return to his own dimension, and restore himself to peace. And he's pissed about it. I'm not reading through the series myself at the moment, and I don't remember it super-well, but let's assume the Avengers decide it's do or die time, and they launch themselves at him. This is where today's comic picks up.

There's a great moment, when Sub-Mariner and Hercules are about to come to blows over who will lead the team in Wasp's absence, and Captain Marvel steps between them, knocks them both on their asses, and then tells them to go and make themselves useful while she figures out what to do next. It has been one of the true joys of this run of comics watching Monica Rambeau become Captain Marvel, and really begin to be a superhero. It was a wonderful narrative tool, as well, to bring her in as a rookie, to give the comic reasons to give us the kind of expositions that are inevitable in the comics of the 80s. With Stern's run, we feel like we too are being inducted into a very select group, and the history we're a part of grows up around the story quite naturally.

That said, I think after tomorrow's epilogue to the second Secret War, we'll take a brief break from Avengers, and I'll finally finish the glorious science fiction epic that is Prophet. Very. Excited.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 945: Avengers v.1 #261, November 1985

Another Secret Wars II tie-in issue. And, like the previous one, the Beyonder doesn't do much except cause problems for the Avengers that ultimately serve no end. It's interesting seeing this character in the issues that he crosses over into, as the writers sometimes don't seem to know what to do with him. Given that he's a god-like being of infinite power, he seems to turn up and simply act like a nuisance much of the time. Is that what a god trying to learn to be human would be like? A nuisance that was constantly asking us why we were doing particular things?

If that's the case, all toddlers are gods.

The major plot moment of today's comic is the departure of Starfox from the ranks of Earth's mightiest. I've been on the fence about the character, what with his fairly problematic power set. I wonder if one of the reasons for his departure is that Stern and co. just weren't sure what to do with him. If he goes bad, as superheroes occasionally do, then his pleasure power really puts him on a rapey par with the Purple Man or Mandrill. And aside from the pleasure power, he's got a fairly standard roster of other powers: flight, strength, endurance. The only novel thing he brings to the table is something that could very, very easily be abused, even if it were only being used against enemies. I imagine we'll see him again, though not during this run of Avengers, I don't think. The impetus for his departure is a desire to track down Nebula (teleported away last issue by the Beyonder) and verify her lineage. It's not everyday you discover that you have a psychotic niece cavorting about the galaxy.

We're now coming into the era of Avengers that I actually collected back in the day. We have a new/old face appearing next issue, and the line-up has become the one I remember from the first time I read any of Roger Stern's run. And the stories coming up are amazing, some to this day considered to be amongst the best stories of the team. That said, I have just got a line on issue six of Prophet: Earth War, so we may have to take a six day break in the next little bit just so we can see how that series ends.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 943: Avengers v.1 #260, October 1985

Oh no! It's Secret Wars II.

Perhaps one of the worst crossover events I've read, though in a strangely masochistic maneuver I am only 5 crossover issues away from having the whole crossover.

Where the first Secret Wars, or Marvel Super-Heroes Secret Wars, if you prefer, gave us what basically amounted to a war comic using superheroes (a very gentle war comic, but a war comic nonetheless), the second mini-series is a jumbled mess about a god trying to understand what it means to be human. And he does a lousy job of it. I think the reason may be that he's trying to do so on a world that is populated by gods.

In today's issue he's not particularly intrusive, in that he's not around for a long time, but he does manage to blow the big battle that the Avengers had been engaged in, and foil their capture of Nebula. I only know of this character from the Guardians of the Galaxy film, and her backstory seems to be a bit different in the MCU, but she's definitely the madwoman the movie makes her out to be.

Actually, her lineage does raise a couple of interesting questions about the MCU. For obvious reasons, any claim to Thanos's lineage will be of interest to Starfox, given that they're brothers. So are we going to see any of the Titanian Eternals in the next few MCU films? Thanos has to have come from somewhere, right? And the MCU powers that be aren't afraid of throwing alien races at us - witness GotGv.2.

To be continued.