New Avengers #3: Review

Mar 2005

Brian Michael Bendis, David Finch

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Story Name:

Breakout—Part Three

Review & Comments

Rating:

New Avengers #3 Review by Peter Silvestro (February 27, 2010)

The New Avengers are officially formed in this issue. The identity of Jessica’s mysterious paymaster is not revealed for quite some time. The variant cover for this issue features Wolverine, even though he is not in the story.

New Avengers #3 Review by Rob Johnson (June 10, 2013)

We'll later discover that the organisation Jessica Drew is reporting to about SHIELD and the Avengers is Hydra. But she's actually a double agent and her true loyalty is to Nick Fury. But then we'll learn this isn't really Spider-Woman at all, but a Skrull imposter. And all this was planned from the start of this series! The Official Index says that the Jarvis who becomes their butler here is another Skrull replacement. Iron Man is open with his identity to the team, but Spider-Man still keeps his mask on (despite Cap knowing who he is). IM reinstated his secret id in IM(1998)#89, and is maintaining it in the IM(2005) series. The team now has 5 of the 7 members from the cover of #1 (Cap, IM, Luke Cage, Spider-Man and Spider-Woman). But Wolverine won't turn up until the end of next issue. And Sentry hasn't been asked yet. Cap says the New Avengers' 1st priority is to recapture the 42 successful escapees from the Raft. Spider-Man will chase down some of them in the SM:Breakout mini-series, with a little help from Cap and IM.

Dept of misleading covers:- Sentry is the cover star here, but he's not yet a member of the team, and he's only in this issue for 1 (full-page) panel. Luke Cage and Jessica Jones had a relationship in the Alias series. In Alias #25 Jessica told Luke how Purple Man used his power to abduct her for 8 months when she was teen superheroine Jewel. At the end of the series Luke and Jessica were a permanent couple, and she was pregnant, as she is here. I don't know why Tony Stark can't afford to rebuild Avengers Mansion or pay the team. There's no indication in his own series that he's cash-poor. And anyway the Maria Stark Foundation is supposed to handle all that, independent of Stark's financial status. Eventually the Mansion will get rebuilt, and given to the next New Avengers in vol 2. It's ambiguous whether SHIELD have long known Peter Parker is Spider-Man, or whether Captain America knows who he is because he lost his mask last issue. Luke Cage says he's never been a team player. What about his duo with Iron Fist, and in a later expanded Heroes For Hire? And before that he was a Defender, and even briefly one of the Fantastic Four. Daredevil declines to join the team here, but he'll join a different set of New Avengers in NAv(2010)#16.

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

New Avengers #3 Synopsis by Peter Silvestro

The next day on the SHIELD Helicarrier, Tony Stark and Steve Rogers are reviewing the events of the previous evening, when they managed to stop 45 villains from escaping, though 42 succeeded…. In the chaos Luke Cage was approached by the Purple Man who gave him the hypnotic command to kills the other heroes, then kill himself, while he threatened to murder Luke’s beloved Jessica Jones and their unborn child. Luke in turn revealed that, due to the drugs administered at the prison, Killgrave’s mind control powers do not work; Luke then proceeded to beat his enemy savagely, until halted by Captain America. Steve tells Tony the incident reminded him of the original formation of the Avengers: a group of unlikely allies, drawn together by fate to face a menace none of them could handle separately, spontaneously form a team. Steve reveals his plan to make the heroes in a new team of Avengers, filling the void left by the disbanding of the old group. Steve approaches Peter Parker at school and offers him a place on the team. Pete agrees tentatively. Steve then drops by Luke Cage’s apartment and Luke accepts, thinking of his daughter. Daredevil declines the invitation, not wanting his personal crises to jeopardize the team. He persuades Jessica to reassume her Spider-Woman identity and serve as the Avengers’ liaison with SHIELD. Their headquarters will be the top floors of the new Stark Tower, and Jarvis will again be their butler. Tony has donated the space to the team, trusting in Cap’s instinct for the team’s success. Meanwhile, outside, Jessica Drew is agreeing to report back to a mysterious figure on what goes on among the Avengers as well as SHIELD….

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