A Page-By-Page Look at AVENGERS #10
by Van Plexico

Okay, here are my mostly complete reactions and thoughts concerning AVENGERS 10.  *If you don't want to read the whole thing, at least skip down to my predictions at the end, regarding the whole Reaper/Simon/Wanda business.*  

Cover:  I'm glad to see SOME mention of the Avengers' anniversary (along with the X-Men related scene inside.)  But I'm really coming to hate Cap's current shield almost as much as the triangular one.  I can just hear Thor:  "Verily, Captain, remove thy bizarre shield from before my groinal region, lest the son of Odin become sterile..."  

And the Jarvis-Heads get their due!  Yaay!  

The letters page titles on the buttons on that hat had me rolling. "Let's Rap with Cap" and "Sock it to Shellhead"-- now THOSE were the good ol' days!  *sigh*... 

Page one:  The Wasp Corps!  Ha!!  And I loved the little kid in the Black Panther costume.  (hmmm... and the guy makes a good point about wishing the Falcon or Panther were there-- though I'll ignore the "Photon" reference, since I just don't like her at all...)  

The big spread:  Jan back in her original (?) costume.  Wow!  Wasn't expecting that.  Hank back in a very close representation of the Goliath suit.  Wow!!  I never liked that costume at all in the old days, but for some reason, here, it works.  I don't know why, but it does. (Maybe it's the eyes).   Is it just me, or is that Jack Kirby holding the "Avengers Forever!" sign?  

Page four:  Spidey watches the proceedings from afar.  This, and the later moment with Daredevil, reminds me so much of all those great moments through the years when the Avengers would be going off to fight some great menace, and Spidey and DD would watch and comment, "We just aren't cut out for that sort of thing."  Great stuff.  

Hank wants to keep Yellowjacket "buried"?  Any direct connection to the exhuming we see later in this story?  Or just coincidental dialogue? And what about the great pains Hank went to back in the "Trial of Pym" storyline to stress that he wanted someone else to take up the Yellowjacket costume?  

I know that many readers are enjoying Firestar's reluctant attitude in regards to being an Avenger, and I certainly can understand the appeal there, for some. But to me, it's to the point now that I just want to yell at her, "If you don't like it, then QUIT, and we'll bring in someone else who WANTS to be here!"  Jeez. But I admit that the "health problems" issue with her has become more interesting to me with the coming involvement of Pym.  

The full page of Avengers past and present:  WOW. My favorite part of that page was the fact that, of all the characters on the page, the ONLY ONE covered up completely by a word balloon was...  RAGE!!  HA!!! (And I loved seeing Wondy in his old, green costume, too.  And seeing George draw Carol again just reminds me once more of what I'm missing every month that she's not in the book...)  

Of course I got a big laugh out of the X-Men scene.  Great stuff.  

Pages 8-10:  Man, Wanda just gets better looking every month.  Suddenly, this book is crawling with babes!  :-) And I agree with those who've said that Agatha Harkness really looks "up to something sinister" here.  

The VILLAINS page:  Oh, my.  This just blew me away.  Many fun, exciting, and interesting things to comment on here. 
From top to bottom:  

1.  The Super Adaptoid, looking like he's SUPPOSED to look!  Big, green, and dorky!  I love it!!!   YAAAAY!!!

2.  Red Ronin.  I wouldn't have even listed him as an "Avengers villain,' much less one for the "all-timers page" (he was a villain in the same way that Porcupine's costume was a villain by itself-- it was that loopy guy doing the steering who was the villain) but it was nice to see him there.

3.  Korvac in his original form!  Odd, since only Thor fought him in that state, but still, a nice representation of ol' computer-pelvis.

4.  Proctor???   (No, not you, Mike.)  Seeing him next to Graviton was very disconcerting to me, for some reason.  1977, meet 1992.  Huh.

5.  Whirlwind, looking like his action figure, with the saw-blades.  Wondy, making this page, as well as the Avengers one.  Zodiac!!  I'm still waiting for the "Second Sign!"  Grim Reaper in his (IMO) coolest costume.  Both Zemos.  Magneto, looking about as good/regal/impressive as I've EVER seen him portrayed.  And the Enchantress, showing once again that, love her or hate her, she's one of the best looking characters in comics.  And as much as I liked Chen's recent version of Mandarin, George shows just how cool the old costume/look can still be. 

And now, the bottom row (Ah, that bottom row!!)  
TASKMASTER!  Reading all the Imus Champion stories and appearances so far, I keep thinking, "How much cooler would this all be if it were Taskmaster instead?"  And George makes him look as spooky, yet human, as I've ever seen him. DOOM! The definitive Doom/Avengers story still hasn't been written.

KANG!!  Now THAT's the Kang I remember-- George positively nails his majesty, his oddly noble yet twisted aura.  This Kang doesn't have to look like the Juggernaut to be impressive-- he radiates power.  I can't wait for his return to the pages of AVENGERS.

ULTRON!!!  Okay, so he's silver here.  He *looks right*, for the first time in a very, very long time.  (more on him in a moment).

THANOS!!!  Holy crow, Thanos down there in the bottom corner!  Some may dispute the degree to which Thanos is an Avengers villain, but I've always argued that he belongs near the head of the pantheon, if only on the strength of Starlin's epic Annual #7/MTIO Annual #2 (not to mention his confrontations with the Assemblers during the various Infinity crises).  And there he is, right down there with the all-time heavy hitters.  Wow.  I dream of the day he shows up again, plotting to wipe out half the universe or something equally Starlinish.   (and oh yeah, the Space Phantom.  Yay.)   Okay, onward. 

Page 12:  ULTRON!  Let me just say, as others have before, that this panel was worth the price of the book, all by itself.   And Grim Reaper, apparently in Hell.  But his comments ("Soon, my most hated enemies.  SOON...") don't seem to fit with his subsequent appearance in this very issue.  More on this in a moment, too...   And the Daredevil scene-- as with Spidey, this brings back the great old memories.  

Pages 13-14:  I'm no huge Wanda scholar-- I've read the issues referred to here, and enjoyed them, but I'm pretty much to the point now that whatever Wanda's "real" story finally ends up being, I'll just say, "So be it."  The art here, as befits Wanda herself, is just gorgeous.  

Page 16:  The Reaper.  Maybe.  Clearly, he's composed of the same ionic (or is it ionic?) energies as the current Wonder Man.  But I now question whether or not either of these Williamses is what he purports to be.  I continue to stand by my theory, first advanced a couple of months back, that Wanda's power is out of control and is causing these people to "come back from the dead"-- or perhaps, it is simply creating facsimilies of them, whole cloth.  Perhaps that isn't ionic energy.  Perhaps it's hex magic energy.  

Page 18:  I know he's dead.  I know this is an animated corpse, or a replica thereof.  I don't care.  I got a couple of panels of my two favorite super heroes EVER, battling one another.  Photon blasts vs. repulsors.  Heaven!  I never, ever thought I'd see that.  

Final pages:  The exchange between Vision and Dr. Druid was just priceless. I found the battle, though too brief (one only has to look at the recent annual to see just how brief such a battle would be if we didn't have George drawing this book), very enjoyable.   

And the last page, and the big mystery:   Simon stands triumphant over the defeated Avengers.  "At last-- at last-- the Avengers have fallen!" Okay, folks, clearly that is NOT Simon talking.  That means one of a few possible situations. 
1.  This isn't Simon, and it never was.  Wanda's been generating him with her out-of-control power, and subconsciously making him behave the way she wanted him to.  And now, SOMEONE ELSE is in control of "him."
2.  This is Simon, but the Reaper is in control of him.
3.  This isn't Simon OR the Reaper, and someone else is using Wanda's power to create and control both of them (as well as the other dead Avengers.)  

Or some combination of the above.    The tag line leads me to think maybe it's Mephisto or one of his ilk.
In any case, I can't wait to find out which it is!  And I trust that Wanda will figure it all out just in time to save the day.