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Avengers #29

Aug 2012
Brian Michael Bendis, Walt Simonson

Story Name:

(no title given)


Synopsis

Avengers #29 synopsis by Rob Johnson
Rating: 4 stars
The Avengers are based in Wakanda, now that the Phoenix 5 have declared them outlaws and taken over Avengers Tower, Avengers Mansion and Avengers Academy.

Spider-Woman proposes to Black Panther, Captain America, Hawkeye and Iron Man that they need to take out the X-Men's telepaths before they can tackle the rest of them. Wolverine butts in and says the main targets should be Emma Frost and Rachel Summers. Iron Man thinks Emma Frost is out of their league now she has the Phoenix Force, but Wolvie says he can get Rachel to meet him.

Panther points out that they'll need a telepath of their own in order to get near her. He claims their only candidate is Moondragon, but Hawkeye vetoes her (apparently on the basis that he slept with her (amongst others)). Iron Man says all the best other telepaths are X-Men or their mutant enemies. Cap says he knows who to call, but Wolverine doesn't look happy about it.

Later Logan goes to meet Rachel in the spaceship graveyard at Chaparanga Beach in Indonesia, pretending to be on the run solo. He is in continuous mental contact with Cap's ally, who is also in touch with a hidden team of Avengers (Beast, Cap, Giant-Man, Quicksilver, Spider-Woman, Thor and War Machine). The mystery mentalist is providing psi-shielding, which Rachel assumes is artificial shielding for Wolverine provided by Beast.

Rachel wants to know where the Avengers are hiding Hope Summers. Logan attacks her, but it turns out she was psionicly hiding her own team (Sub-Mariner of the Phoenix 5 leading Angel, Iceman and Kid Gladiator). Mayhem ensues.

Hope and Black Widow appear to have come along for the ride with the Avengers, but they have kept out of the fight. Widow is leading Hope away, but Rachel has sensed her 'sister' and disposes of Natasha. But when the 2 Summers confront each other, Hope turns out to really be Cap's mystery ally who is Prof X.

Rachel telepathically screams to the rest of her team to escape, as Charles Xavier tries to contain her power. But Namor rushes to her aid.

But then Xavier puts all the combatants to sleep, even the Phoenix-powered Sub-Mariner, except Spider-Woman who claims that SHIELD implanted her with psychic shields when she worked for them. She tries to persuade him to use the same power against the rest of the Phoenix 5. But Prof X says he can't do that to his ex-students.

Charles wakes Cap and tells him not to call on him again. He says that when they awake again, none of them will remember he was here.


 

Review / Commentaries


Avengers #29 Review by (August 18, 2012)
Chaparanga Beach was introduced in Astonishing X-Men #25 as the place where the world dumps all the spaceships that have been wrecked on this planet in various Marvel stories. Kid Gladiator is the son of Gladiator of the Shi'ar Imperial Guard, sent to the X-Men's school to be tamed. Hope and Rachel Summers aren't really related. Rachel is the daughter of Scott Summers (Cyclops) and Jean Grey (Marvel Girl/Phoenix/just Jean Grey) from an alternate future. Hope only has the Summmers surname because she was adopted by Cable, the son of Cyclops and Jean Grey-clone Madelyne Pryor. I think this is the 1st time Spider-Woman has been shown to have a psychic shield. Presumably *she* will still remember what happened today. Despite his protestations Prof X does return to help the Avengers in AvX#9.

This AvsX tie-in is set between Avengers vs X-Men #6 and #7, before Hawkeye and Spider-Woman are captured by the X-Men. It isn't obvious whether it happens before or after the Illuminati meeting in New Avengers #29. The battle in this issue was first seen in Wolverine & X-Men #12 from the X-Men's viewpoint (with surrounding scenes). That version had the appearance of Prof X deleted by his mental command. The plan seems illogical. If they need to get rid of the X-Men's telepaths before they can attack the X-Men, then capturing Rachel Summers won't be any use if they know they have no hope of taking out Emma Frost. And then there's all the other mutant telepaths. I think Moondragon is mentioned purely to enhance the idea of Hawkeye as a womaniser. (But I don't recall Hawkeye actually ever having an affair with her.) If they really wanted to rule her out as a telepath they could just have said she's off in space with the Guardians of the Galaxy. On the other hand maybe it's a sleight-of-hand misdirection. By dismissing Moondragon the writer deflects you from thinking about other telepathic (ex-)Avengers they *could* call on like Sersi. And what about Dr Strange? Did Captain America know he could involve Prof X because they're both Illuminati? But that doesn't explain how Wolverine guessed who he meant.


> Avengers comic book info and issue index

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Holy smokes, Batman!
(The Boy Wonder)

Walt Simonson
Scott Hanna
Jason Keith
Mike Deodato Jr. (Cover Penciler)
Mike Deodato Jr. (Cover Inker)
Rainier Beredo (Cover Colorist)
Additional Credits
Letterer: Cory Petit.
Editor: Tom Brevoort.

Characters

Listed in Alphabetical Order.

Angel
Angel

(Warren Worthington III)
Beast
Beast

(Henry Phillip McCoy)
Black Panther
Black Panther

(T'Challa)
Black Widow
Black Widow

(Natasha Romanoff)
Captain America
Captain America

(Steven Rogers)
Hawkeye
Hawkeye

(Clinton Barton)
Iron Man
Iron Man

(Anthony Stark)
Professor X
Professor X

(Charles Xavier)
Quicksilver
Quicksilver

(Pietro Maximoff)
Spider-Woman
Spider-Woman

(Jessica Drew)
Sub-Mariner
Sub-Mariner

(Namor McKenzie)
Thor
Thor

(Odinson)
War Machine
War Machine

(James Rhodes)
Wolverine
Wolverine

(James Howlett)

Plus: Kid Gladiator.