As It Stands: Avengers Standoff Recap – Week Seven

Welcome to As It Stands, our weekly recap of everything going on in the Avengers Standoff: Assault on Pleasant Hill spring event. 

The crossover pushes through three titles this week, and Bam Smack Pow will help you figure out which track to follow!

Previously in Avengers Standoff: After Rick Jones (as The Whisperer) leaked that S.H.I.E.L.D. is using sentient cosmic cube Kobik to turn bad guys into good guys in Pleasant Hill, S.H.I.E.L.D. arrested him but AIM (led by the New Avengers) rescued him. The Avengers Unity Squad and the All-New All-Different Avengers made it to Pleasant Hill at the same time, but Kobik grabbed them and wrote them into Pleasant Hill lives. When the Avengers returned to their senses, Kobik threatened to put them back to sleep.

SPOILERS AHEAD! PROCEED WITH CAUTION!

All-New All-Different Avengers #8

The teams from this book and the Uncanny Avengers title find out that the Maria Hill twins that led each of the teams to Pleasant Hill were villains Bloodlust and Mindblast, rewritten to be Maria Hill and keep the Avengers away from Pleasant Hill. Yeah, that obviously failed. The riot of super villains from Assault On Pleasant Hill: Alpha finally happens, and the heroes appear to be killed in battle. Kobik is terrified, and Deadpool uses his tragic origin story to convince her she should stop making puppets out of human beings. As she turns all of the Avengers back into their normal selves (and resurrects the dead ones?), Steve Rogers and Sam Wilson organize on the steps of City Hall to Assemble some Avengers.

Illuminati #6

The Hood and Titania rescue Titania’s husband, Absorbing Man, from Pleasant Hill, but he remembers how happy he felt when he wasn’t a career criminal, even finding love with one of the other inmates, Elektra. Titania is hurt that he only found happiness when he was away from her and that it took S.H.I.E.L.D. forcing a new reality onto him to show him her suggestions that they get clean were good. Angry about the hits to his values and his marriage, Absorbing Man suggests that they recruit all the villains from Pleasant Hill into a bigger Illuminati team.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. #4

The scene of A.I.M. agents (and former New Avengers) Songbird, Pod, Power Man, White Tiger, and Hawkeye rescuing Rick Jones from S.H.I.E.L.D. custody in New Avengers 8 is replayed in pretty much exact detail only with more dialogue from the Agents present (Deathlok, Quake, and Simmons) and a scene where Power Man uses his manipulation of chi to find out that something strange is wrong with Agent Simmons. Nothing else relevant to Avengers Standoff happens. And ignore the cover – Songbird and Mockingbird don’t even meet, much less punch each other out a thousand feet above Avengers Island.

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Well, the Illuminati chapter was beautiful and meaningful but nonessential for the budget-conscious reader. The Agents chapter added precisely nothing to the scenes we saw in New Avengers, but it did ensure that people who read both wasted their money on that other book. The Avengers chapter failed logic and timeline – the Maria Hill clones were designed to keep the Avengers out of Pleasant Hill, but every panel of their existence has been about them leading the Avengers into a trap or making them fight each other. The Unity Squad was answering a distress call from Steve Rogers, but the chapter ends with the riot that led to the distress call, so either Kobik sent everyone needlessly back in time a day or two, or editorial just didn’t explain to Mark Waid what the main story was. This crossover started out as one of the best Avengers stories I’d read in years, but once it left Nick Spencer’s control, it dissolved into muck.

Next week, Avengers Standoff crosses into Captain America: Sam Wilson and New Avengers before hitting the conclusion in Avengers Standoff: Assault On Pleasant Hill Omega. 

To keep track of our recap coverage, watch this link and see you next week!