Avengers #73: Review

Dec 2003

Geoff Johns, Scott Kolins

::: click cover to ENLARGE it :::

Story Name:

The search for She-Hulk part 2: Savage attack

Review & Comments

Rating:

Avengers #73 Review by Rob Johnson (March 12, 2021)

Hawkeye has been at a loose end since the Thunderbolts team lost their title (in their #75) to a bunch of enhanced wrestlers.

Since then he's been hanging out with Avengers a lot in:-
Thor: Vikings #3 alongside Captain America, Iron Man, Scarlet Witch and Vision.
Marvel Double Shot #2 along with loads of Avengers vs Loki (a humorous tale by Bill Morrison of the Simpsons).
Those 2 occurred before the Red Zone story arc. But his last app was after that and just before the current story began.
Marvel Holiday Special 2004 seemingly with the Avengers in J Jonah Jameson's Christmas Carol story.

From Our Blog:

Gwen Stacy, beauty queen of Standard High School, was Peter Parker's (alias Spider-Man) first great love.

Gwen Stacy: Classic Beauty

Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Avengers #73 Synopsis by Rob Johnson

She-Hulk was adversely affected by stuff during the Red Zone arc and went berserk and ran off (#68). Since then Jennifer Walters has been trying to keep from changing to her big green alter-ego while searching for her cousin Bruce Banner/Hulk for help. But last issue Captain America, Iron Man and Scarlet Witch tracked her to Bone Idaho, and fear of endangering them made her Hulk out (and endanger them).

But we start this issue in quieter mode in Avengers Embassy. Ant-Man is amusing his daughter Cassie Lang by explaining how a scientist friend (Henry Pym) gave him his shrinking power and a helmet that allows him to communicate with insects. Edwin Jarvis interrupts them to say that Cassie's new step-father (Blake Burdick) is here to take her home after her weekly visitation time. Cassie doesn't want to go but she has to. Jarvis reminds Scott Lang that, with resident scientists Iron Man and Yellowjacket away (in Bone and Las Vegas respectively), he's in charge of taking care of Jack Of Hearts.

Meanwhile in Bone She-Hulk is attacking Scarlet Witch in a deserted diner (the other 2 Avengers waited outside). Wanda Maximoff magically makes the gamma radioactivity that fuels Shulkie decay with age. But she only reverts to Jen for an instant and then bounces back to Greenie again. Iron Man powers in but She-Hulk throws him back out. Cap protects Wanda from falling debris until Shellhead zooms back in and airlifts his team-mates out. As a broken gas line explodes behind them.

Back at Avengers Embassy Scott finds Jack Hart watching the minutes tick down. Lang takes him down to the sub-basement where JOH has to spend 14 hours a day in the Zero Room to stop his body exploding like an atomic bomb. The 2 men don't like each other and before locking Jack in Scott accuses him of deliberately letting his half-alien physiology absorb a lot of gamma radiation from She-Hulk (#67), helping to put her in her current state.

In Bone She-Hulk is on a rampage and the Avengers are just saving civilians. They try to lead her out of town but when she grabs an electricity pylon the Witch casts a hex to bring it down on her. But that just makes her angrier. And then Hawkeye shows up.

::: click cover to ENLARGE it :::