Avengers & X-Men: AXIS #2 Review – Strange Alliances

Red Onslaught represents a danger so grave that defeating him means setting aside all of your grudges and partnering up with anyone who will have you.

More from Comics

• X-Men: 6 reasons why Marvel’s mutants are the best superhero team
• Harley Quinn renewed for a fifth season on Max (and it’s well-deserved)
• Marvel Comics announces seven important X-Men comic books
• The X-Men were betrayed by Captain America in Uncanny Avengers
• Spider-Man: Miles and Peter team-up for their first ongoing series

That’s the big takeaway from Avengers & X-Men: AXIS #2, an issue that is essentially one big fight pitting members from both the titular teams against the Red Skull and his two Tony Stark-designed Sentinels. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, as this feels like a throwdown worthy of an event comic, and Adam Kubert’s art grew on me a bit since the first chapter.

A number of alliances are formed in the heat of battle, and the heroes try Plans A, B and C against Onslaught. The other heroes give Iron Man a bit more of a free pass on “helping” Red Skull build the Sentinels, but I suppose since he did it against his will, it’s not completely his fault. And keeping secret files on his supposed friends is explained away as Tony’s competitive nature, so if you’re okay with that, he’s actually a bit less of a jerk than he’s been acting in general for most of the 21st Century history of Marvel Comics.

There’s also the kernel of an idea regarding how to deal with Onslaught that makes some sense given what we know about how he was formed, and while it doesn’t play out in this issue, one wonders if it has something to do with the Inversion that is supposed to kick in at the end of Act I of AXIS.  I’ve got more thoughts on that front, but only if you want to proceed past the following warning:

SPOILERS PAST THIS POINT!

Iron Man is feeling pretty guilty about the whole Sentinel thing, as well he should. With the help of Captain America, he discovers that the Sentinels are shrinking heroes down using Pym particles and capturing them to harness their energy, or something to that effect.

Eventually, a strategy is hatched: Iron Man and Magneto will run interference with the Sentinels (possible because Iron Man’s files didn’t include plans to stop Magneto since, well, he’s not normally a good guy), Rogue, Nova and some other heroes will keep Onslaught busy, and Scarlet Witch and Doctor Strange (whose arrival is convenient, to say the least) will try an order/chaos magic peanut butter cup to flip the axis (get it?) of Onslaught from Red Skull to Professor X.

Sadly, we never see if it works, because some over-exuberance from Nova, who’s looking to impress Rogue, blows the whole thing up. Iron Man assumes the worst when he sees Magneto run out on the heroes as well.

Tony comes to the next morning and is semi-surprised to find out the battle has been raging all night without him. Only Cyclops, Nightcrawler, Colossus, Wasp, Medusa, Havok, Invisible Woman and Quentin Quire remain free. The X-Men mend their differences for the time being, with the Summers brothers fighting side-by-side once again. Their new gambit also fails, and only Iron Man remains, talking tough despite being hopelessly outgunned and having armor that is out of power. Onslaught taunts Stark by saying he’s looked into Tony’s soul and found him to be a sociopath with a god complex. Well, yeah, but he’s our sociopath!

It looks like curtains for Iron Man, but Magneto has been out gathering the cavalry, such as it is: Hobgoblin, Jack O’ Lantern, Loki, Absorbing Man, Mystique, Carnage, Enchantress, Deadpool, Doctor Doom and Sabretooth. I guess the Super Villain Mutual Admiration Society doesn’t extend to giant, amped-up Red Skulls, eh?

Favorite moment: Magneto might not have much of a sense of humor in the conventional sense, but under Rick Remender, he does know sarcasm.

Iron Man: “All right, big mouth. You and I’ll go to take care of the Sentinels and buy them time. But that means you do what I tell you, even though I’m just a mean ol’ human. Capisce?”

Magneto: “Nothing would make me happier.”

Final thought: It’s not on quite the same scale, but this issue reminded me of one of the story beats from Infinity Gauntlet, where the heroes have taken their shot and failed, and the cosmic beings line up to take a crack at Thanos. Just substitute the villains for the cosmic squad and Red Onslaught for Thanos and there ye be. Alas, I think there’s going to be another big twist in this one in issue #3. Inversion time!