Synopsis
All-New All-Different Avengers #0 synopsis by
Rob Johnson
Rating:
The framework story for this anthology is called Supremacy
Writer James Robinson. Pencils Leonard Kirk. Inks Paul Neary. Colours Frank Martin. Letters Travis Lanham, Editors Mark Paniccia & Chris Robinson.
Nighthawk (Kyle Richmond) is in the Squadron Supreme's HQ in the Oracle Inc tower, which they have recently taken over from Sub-Mariner, overseeing the rest of the team who are routing out a base of Super-Skrulls. Power Princess (Zarda) doesn't see why they need money when they have raw power. NH says it's because that's the way this universe works, unlike some of their original universes. Hyperion (Marcus Milton), who's been in this universe longer than the rest of them and even became an Avenger, agrees with him. The female Dr Spectrum asks if the Avengers will oppose them. Kyle thinks 1 or more of their various teams may think their methods extreme so they must be ready for anything, which Blur approves of.
NH adds that they're from different Earths and haven't worked together before, even though some of them have worked with equivalent chars. They all lost their worlds and are dedicated to protecting this 1 no matter what it takes.
Story 1: Eidetic
Writer Mark Waid. Artist Mahmud Asrar. Colours Sonia Oback. Letters Cory Petit, Editors Tom Brevoort & Wil Moss & Alanna Smith.
Wanda Maximoff is at Agatha Harkness' house in Whisper Hill, Massachusetts when she gets a visit from her ex-husband the synthezoid Vision seeking help. Flanking Wanda he sees hallucinations of Scarlet Witch in 4 different costumes (the original when they were married with her 2 'sons', in Force Works, in Avengers vol 3 and 1 I can't place) and he tells her he's being haunted.
It started 12 days ago when he was in Avengers Tower retrieving personal effects before its sale to Qeng Enterprises and he 'saw' the Avengers when they invited him to join them (in Av#58). Other times things triggered other flashbacks, flames to when he learned he was created from the WWII android Human Torch, metal would invoke Ultron. Trying to escape familiar stimuli he went to Ecuador and saw a tour bus hit by a landslide. All the occupants were flung out already dead but there was 1 survivor inside. But inside he hallucinated all the people who had ever begged him for help. He grabbed what he thought was the real victim but it wasn't and the bus exploded. He's being uncontrollably haunted by his eidetic memory.
Wanda sympathises with him. For humans traumatic emotionally-charged memories fade but they can't with him. He says she can't help him, but he came here as a test because his memories of her carried the most emotions. He tells her that an hour ago he started a program to solve the problem. While he's been speaking we've seen some images of her vanish, including 1 from their wedding day. She thinks he's erasing his memories but he says he's just deleting the associated feelings. This shocks her even more because it kills the 'man' she loved. At the beginning of the story he called her Wanda but now he refers to her as Wanda Maximoff.
More framework
Zarda celebrates that the Avengers are in disarray (suggesting that the team are aware of the previous story?). Marcus says that the Avengers are formidable even at their weakest. The Super-Skrulls are all dead and Kyle (observing via flying eyes that accompany the team) tells them to secure any alien biotech and then totally obliterate the base and bodies, leaving no trace of the conflict. He also comments to Zarda that 1 of the various Avengers she is so dismissive of is a woman who leads her own group to guard space around Earth.
Story 2: In the beginning
Writer G Willow Wilson. Artist Victor Ibanez. Colours Laura Martin. Letters Cory Petit, Editors Daniel Ketchum & Alanna Smith.
Something happens in space near the Alpha Flight low-orbit space station. We glimpse Sister Grimm, Dazzler and She-Hulk becoming aware of it. We also see astrobiologist Dr Tempest Bell arriving for her 1st day on the station seemingly staffed entirely by women. Then Captain Marvel zooms past to investigate the event which has formed a humanoid body of conscious light which is surprised to find itself somewhere. And also surprised to find something else existing. It extends an exploratory arm through Carol Danvers' body. CM treats it as a painful attack and hits back with a photon blast from her hand. The being is unfazed, commenting that light can't destroy light, and grabs Carol's wrists which shocks her unconscious.
Dr Bell is pressed to come up with a way of combating the thing. The desperate genius thinks they might be able to temporarily disperse it by creating a vacuum close to it. And is shocked to be given a space suit and a device to do that and told to get on with it. She jets over to the being who complains at how many things there are in this place. Bell triggers the vacuum which sucks the being in bit by bit. Captain Marvel awakens and carries Dr Bell back to the station. But at the end something else appears where the 1st being had been.
More framework
Zarda comments that she joined the wrong group (confirming that they're somehow aware of the intervening stories). Hyperion has 'primed' the Skrull base's atomic reactor and Dr Spectrum uses her Power Prism to send it critical. Nighthawk mentions another Avengers team led by Roberto Da Costa, or Sunspot as he was known when he was an Avenger with Marcus, and points out to Zarda that he uses his fortune to fund it.
Story 3: Everything is new
Writer Al Ewing. Artist Gerardo Sandoval. Colours Dono Sanchez Almara. Letters Joe Caramagna, Editors Tom Brevoort & Wil Moss & Alanna Smith.
Insectoid members of WHISPER have captured a telepathic/precognitive SHIELD Agent and they enhance his powers to see the future activities of Sunspot's AIM (Avengers Idea Mechanics) with members Squirrel Girl, Hawkeye (Clint Barton), Hulkling, Songbird, Wiccan, Pod, White Tiger (Ava Ayala) and Power Man (Victor Alvarez) based on Avengers Island (that used to be Hydrobase) in the new New Avengers series. We see the US Army sending American Kaiju against them, White Tiger facing the Tiger God, Hulkling becoming King Of Space, Hawkeye being openly a spy for SHIELD, an invasion by crystal-headed zombies and a team-up with the AVENGERS Initiative from the future.
The SHIELD Agent doesn't survive the process. WHISPER suggest to their Supreme One that they should take AIM from Sunspot, but the boss points out that they've already recruited the useful (evil) members that Da Costa didn't want. He says he wants the Neohedron ready to be deployed within a month. And he doesn't want to be called Supreme but the Maker. And we get a glimpse of an AI called OMNITRONICUS.
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As the Squadron fly away from the mushroom cloud that was a Skrull base Blur opines that they have the advantage of not having to abide by the rules. NH remotely replies that Da Costa can *buy* his way round the rules. Zarda suggests they kill him but Hyperion says they're not going to kill good people just in case they become a problem. Kyle reminds them of another Avengers team that does its own thing - the Avengers Unity Squad (in the Uncanny Avengers set of series) that deliberately include a mixture of humans, mutants and Inhumans. But he doesn't understand why Steve Rogers chose their latest member.
Story 4: The night that hell froze over
Writer Gerry Duggan. Artist Ryan Stegman. Colours Richard Isanove. Letters Clayton Cowles, Editors Tom Brevoort & Daniel Ketchum & Alanna Smith.
Deadpool has 1 of a sequence of recent missions sent to him on a card which he burns after reading. He suspects the card isn't spycraft rather that the old man who sends them hates e-mail, and he's too old now to do the jobs himself. As he breaks into a guarded facility Wade Wilson reflects that he used to pride himself on being his own boss but he's now willingly taking mysterious orders. As he sneaks into a lab behind oblivious scientists and steals a can of macguffin he muses that he used to be a mercenary/assassin but now he feels he's got a purpose, even if he doesn't know what it is. As his plan hits a glitch on the way out and he has to fight some guards he continues to ponder the fact that he's agreed not to kill anyone, and he's not even being paid which would ruin his rep if it got out. But as he grabs a rope ladder to a waiting helicopter he concludes that he feels good about these jobs.
The chopper drops him off outside Avengers Mansion where currently-aged Steve Rogers is waiting for him. The can contains Terrigen Mist which was going to be used for bad purposes but now it may do some good helping to cure Rogue who's hooked up to life-support inside. The Inhumans' T-Mist has a bad effect on mutants and she's especially sensitive, but she flew into a cloud to save some other mutants. Steve is going to give this sample to Hank McCoy and Tony Stark who are researching a cure. Wade asks why he chose him for the mission rather than an Avenger. In reply Steve hands him another card on the way out. It's an Avengers Priority Identicard with his picture and a place for him to sign.
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Dr Spectrum asks Nighthawk if they should return to their ocean floor base but he tells them to come to the Oracle building (if only to annoy Zarda). But he adds that he's heard rumours of another team, of hardhitters ready to face cosmic menaces.
Story 5: The opposite of kicking
Writer Al Ewing. Artist Kenneth Rocafort. Colours Daniel Brown. Letters Joe Sabino, Editors Wil Moss & Jon Moisan.
In space a Wakandan Chanda-Class interstellar craft called the Mikaya has been called in by Captain Marvel to deal with the space-time breach left over by the arrival of Antimatter and Singularity. Black Panther is driving but he's brought Ms America (America Chavez) to do the job. As she exits into space she bemoans the fact that she had to break a date for this. She flies through the rift to mend it from the other side in Exo-Space between realities. There she has to use punches and kicks to discourage various monsters who have been attracted by the hole.
Now she turns to closing the hole. When she kicks open her own holes for interdimensional travel she closes them by thinking happy thoughts. But this hole is much bigger so she's going to need more happy-power. She pulls out a magic cellphone (a 'sorry' gift from Kid Loki from her Young Avengers days) which enables her to contact her date Lisa Halloran. They both start dancing (presumably to the same music) which empowers Chavez to close the rift. The she kicks 1 of her own star-shaped holes and jumps through it back to Earth-616.
She reaches the Ultimates base rather than BP's spaceship where she's welcomed to the team by Blue Marvel and Spectrum, with BP and CM on screens. But we are privy to her thoughts as she tells us she's only joined in case they turn out to be a menace which needs stopping.
Final bit of framework
The Squadron Supreme is united in Oracle Tower. Blur asks Nighthawk if he's really worried about the Avengers teams. NH says no but they must be prepared to fight them if necessary. And he's confidant they will win.